We’ve seen the video. Trump’s lies about it are fanning the flames |
President Donald Trump is putting on a clinic about how to break the United States.
There are few things in American life more divisive than controversies over police violence. The racial reckoning of 2020 and the protests and riots that followed George Floyd’s murder at the hands of a police officer are still fresh in our minds. We also remember the unrest and violence that followed the police shooting of Michael Brown jnr in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014.
Illustration by Simon Letch
The last time a president invoked the Insurrection Act and deployed active-duty troops to American streets was at the request of the mayor of Los Angeles and governor of California in 1992, during the LA riots that followed the acquittal of four officers on charges, including assault and the use of excessive force, after their severe beating, crucially videotaped, of Rodney King.
The King case was a preview of our modern dilemma. How do political leaders respond when video evidence causes the public to make up its own mind – regardless of what any judge or jury might have to say?
The terrible divisiveness of police violence is why responsible leaders respond to every incident with extreme care. You lament the lives lost, you promise a fair and thorough investigation, and you call for calm. You do not prejudge the case. You do not set up an expectation that justice will be done only if your side’s interests are vindicated. And you definitely don’t send out allies and subordinates to whip up public anger.
Even if you follow that playbook perfectly — you say the right words, you do the right things — violence can still erupt. That’s how fraught the issue is.
But Trump isn’t a responsible leader, and he’s at his absolute worst in a crisis. He lies. He inflames his base. And – most dangerous of all – he pits the federal government against states and cities, treating them not as partners in constitutional governance but as hostile inferiors that must be brought to heel.
That’s exactly what has happened in the hours and days since an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shot and killed Renee Good on the streets of Minneapolis on Wednesday.
Instantly, the administration’s narrative locked in. In a Truth Social post published mere hours after Good’s death, Trump said Good........