🍊"Orange Dawn" Edition

In a bold tribute to American history's greatest hits—like the Boston Massacre and Kent State—President Donald Trump has once again reached for his favorite presidential toy: the military. This time, he's parachuting the National Guard and the Marines into Los Angeles like it's D-Day...but against Home Depot day laborers. Because what better way to cool tensions than armed troops staring down citizens like it's Fallujah?

Apparently, in Trump’s Second Term: Electric Boogaloo, a few protests over ICE raids mean California “has been invaded and occupied by Illegal Aliens and Criminals” and was being inundated with “violent, insurrectionist mobs.” He ordered federal authorities to “liberate Los Angeles from the Migrant invasion.” (Yes, those are real quotes.) It’s the kind of rhetoric you get when a guy thinks Red Dawn was a documentary and Posse Comitatus was a gang of cowboys rounded up to catch outlaws.

Despite the fact that border crossings are down, crime is down, and reality is still functioning, Trump is determined to manufacture a flaming crisis big enough to cram his whole ego through. With ICE now told to arrest 3,000 people a day, even kindergarteners selling lemonade may want to carry ID.

Naturally, the Defense Secretary helping bring this fever dream to life is none other than Pete Hegseth, the Fox News frat bro whose qualifications include being loud on television and maybe oversharing military secrets in a group chat.

Of course, none of this is about public safety. It’s about political theater, a flaming kabuki show where Trump stars as a strongman president and the military plays reluctant extras hoping they don’t end up on CNN.

With the Joint Chiefs reshuffled to ensure maximum loyalty (and minimal moral resistance), this could all end in disaster. But Trump doesn’t care. He’s too busy trying to provoke someone into throwing a Molotov cocktail on live TV, so he can yell “INSURRECTION!” and maybe cancel voting in half the country.

In summary, history warns us not to use troops this way. Trump saw that history and said, “Hold my Diet Coke.”

Clay Bennett - Counterpoint Media

Michael Ramirez - Creators

Pedro Molina - Counterpoint Media

Nick Anderson - Tribune Content Agency (Nick’s Substack newsletter)

Christ Britt - Creators

Jeff Danziger - Counterpoint Media

Drew Sheneman - Tribune Content Agency

John Deering - Creators

Jeff Danziger - Counterpoint Media

Jeff Stahler - Andrews McMeel

Donald Trump’s idea of federalism is simple: States are free to govern themselves—unless they dare disobey Daddy. Then it's time for the military, budget cuts, and threats of arrest. It’s like co-parenting with a dictator who only knows two moods: “absent” and “authoritarian.”

This isn’t a new parenting technique. Trump is just putting a fresh MAGA spin on “Because I said so.” His administration practices a sort of reverse child support: if your state doesn’t obey, he cuts your funds and sends ICE agents instead of FEMA. Got wildfires? Sorry, should’ve voted red. Got immigrants? Congrats, you’re now a “war zone.”

While Gavin Newsom is out here trying to run the world’s fifth-largest economy, Trump is playing petty warlord. He’s cutting university funding, sending in the National Guard and Marines uninvited, and allegedly mulling over whether it’s legal to put Newsom in time-out (i.e., jail).

The last time a president federalized the National Guard over a governor’s objections, it was to stop George Wallace from blocking civil rights marches. Trump, on the other hand, just doesn’t like people waving Mexican flags or questioning his daily deportation quota like it’s a Groupon deal.

Meanwhile, his Homeland Security Secretary is Kristi Noem, who once screamed about federal overreach until she got promoted and decided “federal overreach” actually means “your turn with the flamethrower.” Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, is openly fantasizing about arresting governors like he’s casting for a reality show called Law & Order: Executive Branch Victims Unit.

But don’t worry—this is all part of Trump’s broader plan to Make Big Government Right-Wing Again. That’s right: the same guy whose party once preached states’ rights now wants to run every state like a Trump casino—deep in debt, badly managed, and on fire.

In short, under Trump, states don’t get to pick between freedom and tyranny. They get both—freedom from federal aid, and tyranny if they complain.