Wannabe Dictator, Autocrat, Authoritarian, King...

If you've been paying attention, this isn't new...but if you haven't...

The New York Times recently published an article Are We Losing Our Democracy? where they looked at various signs of dictatorship or autocracy and whether we had crossed that line. (I also provided the text in a Facebook post for those without NY Times access). I am going to look at each segment in turn and provide my own thoughts. (All twelve segments are combined below)

#1 An Authoritarian stifles dissent and speech.

One of the excuses Trump supporters gave before the 2024 election was that Harris, and indeed the Democrats, would put an end to the freedoms enshrined in the First Amendment. 

A clip from a speech that Vice President Harris made in 2019 when she was a Senator running for president was making the rounds on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. Typically the tweet would start with something along the lines of: "Kamala: I will censor content on X that I don't like", followed by a clip where she doesn't say anything like that. In the clip she is actually saying:

"We'll put the Department of Justice of the United States back in the business of justice. We will double the Civil Rights Division and direct law enforcement to counter this extremism. We will hold social media platforms accountable for the hate infiltrating their platforms because they have a responsibility to help fight against this threat to our democracy. And if you profit off of hate, if you act as a megaphone for misinformation or cyber warfare, if you don't police your platforms, we are going to hold you accountable as a community.”

She is addressing the NAACP, a Black advocacy organization, and there had been a number of killings inspired by racial animus that had been abetted by social media posts. She specifically invokes the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department. It's unclear from the context what she intends by "hold them accountable". What is clear is that does not mention censoring social media platforms or shutting them down. I can draw some conclusions based on who she is speaking to and what was going on nationally. 

 One can infer from her remarks that she is targeting online incitement to violence. I have seen arguments that what she is saying amounts to de facto censorship, if not censorship de jure. If Harris' 5-year old speech is indicative of her current policy position and it means censorship, of course I was concerned, but I don't believe that's the most logical, reasonable inference to be made. (More on this subject here)

But what actions has the supposed free speech president taken since his inauguration? What comments has he made that point to future actions?

• He claimed that criticism of him on television was illegal. Recently his FCC Director pressured ABC/Disney to remove Jimmy Kimmel for remarks he made critical of Trump, that the regime characterized as celebrating the death of Charlie Kirk. ABC/Disney reversed their initial decision to remove Kimmel, but Trump has pushed for other comedians and talk show hosts who were critical of him to be removed. 
• Pam Bondi, his Attorney General claimed that "hate speech", which she suggested was speech that the regime didn't like, was not included in free speech. 
• Non-citizens, including those who were in the United States legally, had their visas or green cards revoked for participating in pro-Palestinian demonstrations. 
• Trump says that peaceful protesters should be put in jail
• Universities are being forced to change their curricula if it does not line up with his ideology
• Investigations have been ordered into liberal organizations
• News organization covering the Pentagon were required to sign an agreement stating that they would not report information that hadn't been pre-approved
• Associated Press was removed from the White House press pool for refusing to use the term "Gulf of America"
• News organizations that reported negatively about Trump were threatened with investigations
• Private companies that have Diversity, Equity and Inclusion policies are being threatened with federal investigation on the pretext that they are discriminatory
• Secret Service protection has been withdrawn from former officials who criticized Trump
• Several news organizations have been sued by Trump personally and have settled for hundreds of millions of dollars
• Pro-Palestinian activists are being investigated for their speech, characterizing it as "material support for terrorism"
• Law firms who represented clients opposed to Trump are being pressured
• Department of Justice employees who were involved in prosecutions of Trump were fired
• Of course, the most recent is the pressure from Trump and his top officials to go after anyone who spoke negatively about Charlie Kirk 

Some of these items are overt actions, some are threats, others are just talk. But even the threats and  talk have the effect of stifling dissent and free speech when it comes from the administration and the president himself. Trump supporters have attempted to debunk the opinion that Trump's actions amount to autocratic maneuvers. They say that since I can speak my mind and haven't been locked up (yet), and that millions have been able to protest on No Kings Day, that proves we are not a dictatorship. But elimination of a free press, freedom of speech and freedom to peacefully assemble to let the government know what our grievances are, doesn't necessarily happen all at once. The First Amendment is being chipped away, bit by bit, not blown up with dynamite. But it's heading in that direction. 

#2 Persecution of Political Opponents

Trump reliably got applause throughout the 2016 campaign with by encouraging his followers to "lock her up", referring to his election opponent, Secretary of State Clinton. He never did, but it was a threat that always seemed to be hanging over the heads of his opponents. 

From the Times article:

"In addition to restricting speech and dissent, autocrats use the immense power of law enforcement to investigate and imprison people who have fallen out of favor. Mr. Trump’s Justice Department has become an enforcer of his personal interests, targeting people for legally dubious reasons while creating a culture in which his allies can act with impunity.

Following the president’s demands, his appointees have secured indictments of a few critics (including Attorney General Letitia James of New York and the former F.B.I. director James Comey and ordered investigations of others including Senator Adam Schiff of California. Some of these appointees were once Mr. Trump’s personal lawyers. Mr. Trump has also used executive orders to go after perceived enemies, including law firms representing his critics. And he has systematically fired government employees who played roles in earlier investigations of him or his allies.

Mr. Trump has simultaneously shielded his own supporters from legal consequences for their actions, including through blanket pardon of the January 6 rioters.

True authoritarians go much further than Mr. Trump has, but he has already targeted his opponents with legal persecution in shocking ways."

There's not much I can add to the words of the NY Times editorial, but it's getting worse, not better. Trump recently was quoted as saying, in regards to his political retribution:

"I hope they're looking at all of these people, and I'm allowed to find out. I'm allowed, you know, I’m in theory chief law enforcement officer.”

Well yes, in theory, but predominantly in the Unitary Executive Theory, which imbues the president with almost monarchial powers. The Justice Department, while under the authority of the president, has been viewed by presidents of both parties as functionally independent, with the president uninvolved in prosecutorial decisions. Thus it's the Attorney General, not the President, who is in practice the chief law enforcement officer. Trump's remarks seem at odds with his other remarks stating that the law is what he says it is and his serial lawbreaking since being re-elected. 

In addition to the targets named in the Times article, former Special Counsel Jack Smith and former FBI Director Christopher Wray have been threatened with investigations and former National Security Advisor John Bolton has been charged with retaining government documents. George Soros has been mentioned as a potential target, as well as an ill-defined number of liberal fund raising organizations. Just today, as Trump's name has featured prominently in thousands of emails to and from Jeffrey Epstein, Trump has ordered Attorney General Bondi to open investigations into Epstein links to several prominent Democrats, including former President Bill Clinton. 

Trump's campaign isn't some high-minded crusade against corruption and impunity by public officials. He is motivated by nothing more than a desire to get back at those who treated him "unfairly" or had the temerity to publicly criticize him. 

He has turned the government into a vehicle to exact revenge upon those who he perceived as having wronged him.

#3 Bypassing the Legislature

This is one area where the Republican majority in Congress has enabled Trump's authoritarian tendencies, refusing to rein him in by asserting their authority. The Constitution makes clear, in Article I, that Congress alone has the "power of the purse".

From the NY Times article:

His administration has violated federal law at least six times by withholding funding authorized by Congress for libraries, preschools, scientific research and more, the Government Accountability Office found. He has gutted or dismantled congressionally authorized agencies like the Department of Education and U.S.A.I.D. He has also imposed new taxes — his tariffs — without congressional approval. Since the current government shutdown began, he has used donations from billionaires to pay troops and finance the construction of a ballroom at the White House.

Anyone who paid attention in social studies class, or even watched Schoolhouse Rock, knows that laws, including annual budgets, originate in Congress and are then sent to the president for his signature (or veto). Once the president signs, the bill becomes law and it's the president's responsibility to carry out that law, including implementing the budget. It's true that the president has wide discretion regarding how the laws are executed, but he does not have the discretion to ignore the law. He especially does not have the discretion to ignore the Constitution. 

Contextually, presidents have been chipping away at Congress's authority for quite a while now. The issuance of executive orders in lieu of Congressional action has become almost routine. Most of the time, executive orders are statements of policy, or formalize a president's priorities, but Trump's executive orders, starting with the blizzard of them on Day One, go far beyond that. The most egregious of them is the executive order overturning part of the Constitution! He actually issued an executive order claiming that the part of the Fourteenth Amendment guaranteeing citizenship to children born here would no longer be interpreted that way. He was editing the Constitution by fiat. I wrote an article about his Day One EO's where I looked at each one. 

In addition to attempting to reinterpret the Constitution, the bulk of his executive orders circumvented the law by empowering The "Department of Government Efficiency" (DOGE) to gut whole Congressionally authorized departments, fire thousands of employees, cancel contracts, eliminate inspectors general, and make it clear that previously passed laws and budgets don't apply to him. In the recent government shutdown he decided who would get paid and who wouldn't, even withholding available SNAP benefits. Of course, there's the tariffs, aside from the sheer idiocy of how they're applied, ordinarily tariffs, like all taxes, are set by Congress, not the president. Trump has declared an economic national emergency in order to justify usurping this authority.  

Some of the blame lies with the Republican leaders of Congress, who have failed to fight his power grabs. Their complicity does not change the fact that these power grabs have been illegal.

In full autocracies, legislatures often formally transfer some of their authority to the executive, and some congressional Republicans have proposed such changes.

Trump supporters seem to have no problem, either ignoring the authoritarian nature of his actions, or rationalizing that he "getting things done". 

It's still illegal, and it's still dictatorial.

#4 Using The Military For Domestic Control

Even democracies occasionally use their militaries on home soil. The military can keep order and protect citizens after a devastating storm. In extreme and rare circumstances, troops can enforce the law when local authorities refuse to do so, as happened in the segregated South in the 1950s and 1960s.

Authoritarians use the military much more frequently and performatively — to suppress dissent, instill fear and convey supreme power. Mr. Trump deployed the National Guard in Los Angeles to crack down on protests, despite local officials’ insistence that they had the situation under control. He attempted the same in Portland, Ore., and Chicago, before being restrained by federal courts. He has also begun to treat the military as an extension of himself, firing several high-ranking officials without good reason and summoning hundreds of leaders to Virginia to listen to overtly political speeches by him and his appointees.

In addition to the points that the New York Times made, I would add that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has, under Trump, become a quasi military/national police with branches of the military and National Guard working with ICE, blurring the supposed bright line between the military and law enforcement. Army and National Guard units have been stationed at the southern border since Day One, engaged in border security. 

Trump has stated that he envisions using our cities as training grounds for the military. The repeated use of the military to support ICE, and the more dangerous use in supposed law enforcement or crime fighting roles is not only illegal and unjustified, but is a clear effort to intimidate opposition office holders as well as any citizen protesters. 

Trump, via his Secretary of Defense, has purged the top ranks of generals and admirals deemed insufficiently loyal. He has purged the Judge Advocates General divisions of their most experienced legal officers. He has threatened to use the military against Venezuela and Nigeria. He has ordered the Navy to conduct extralegal executions of alleged drug smugglers—arguably illegal orders. The specter of illegally ordered operations motivated six members of Congress, mostly veterans, to remind service members to refuse to obey illegal orders. In response the Secretary of Defense is considering recalling Senator Mark Kelley, a retired Navy Captain, and court martialing him. The FBI is reportedly "investigating" the other five. 

Trump is turning the military into his personal enforcement militia—ridding it of anyone who would stand up to him. 

#5 - An Authoritarian Defies The Courts

"Would-be authoritarians recognize that courts can keep them from consolidating power, and they often take steps to weaken or confront judges."

Donald Trump has spent his whole life getting away with illegal activities. Before he ran for president he routinely waited out people who took him to court—dragging out proceedings through technically legal means until the plaintiffs simply ran out of money. Even when the occasional civil ruling went against him the fines were a drop in the bucket and didn't materially affect his bank account. He used the same strategy when faced with criminal charges after he lost the 2020 election, although this time he wasn't waiting until the other side ran out of money, but he and his lawyers delayed and delayed, making any charges moot when he was re-elected president in 2024. Even the one set of felony convictions in New York carried no penalty other than the stain on his reputation.  

Trump has always viewed the law and the courts as something that applied to other people. 

Article III of the Constitution states that "The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish." It is sometimes misunderstood that it is only the Supreme Court that has the authority to rule on issues of national significance. The Constitution disagrees. While the Supreme Court does have the last word, federal district and appeals courts have the constitutional authority to rule whether any act, law or statute is legal. And they have been doing so.

Another misunderstood item is the "presidential immunity" that the Supreme Court has bestowed. It does not give the president permission to take extralegal or unconstitutional actions. It immunizes the president from criminal prosecution for actions taken as part of his official duties and carries a strong presumption that any action is official unless clearly outside a president's duties. Courts can still rule on the constitutionality or legality of specific actions and order that such actions be stopped. The problem is that the courts have no mechanism for enforcing their rulings against the president, since the technically the executive branch, headed by the president, is the enforcement mechanism. Trump and his team have stated that their position is that the courts have no authority to interfere in his exercise of executive branch functions. 

"Mr. Trump has baldly defied federal judges on several occasions. In March, for instance, his administration ignored a federal judge’s order to turn around airplanes that were deporting migrants to El Salvador. More often, the Trump administration has engaged in gamesmanship, going around orders rather than directly disobeying them. One example: After a federal judge blocked his deployment of the Oregon National Guard, the administration moved to deploy National Guards from other states instead.

So far, Mr. Trump has defied no Supreme Court orders and has pledged not to. But the justices have too often played into his strategy by failing to stand up for lower courts."

The Supreme Court, while ruling against him on occasion, seems more willing to dig for interpretations that support Trump, or to rely on overly technical viewpoints which results in legal gridlock. 

The mindset that the courts have no authority over the executive branch is what is disturbing. 

#6 - Declares National Emergencies On False Pretenses

Authoritarians often curtail democracy by declaring an emergency and arguing that the threat requires them to exercise unusual degrees of power.

There are legal guidelines that describe a president's emergency powers. The National Emergencies Act of 1986 was passed to create a standardized and formal process for declaring emergencies. This law replaced over 450 statutes that granted emergency powers in a variety of circumstances that were inconsistent regrading their use, or most importantly, the emergency's termination. 

From The Legal Clarity.org website:

A declaration of a national emergency does not grant the President a blank check; instead, it unlocks more than 130 specific statutory powers that Congress has previously passed into law. The specific authorities available depend on the nature of the emergency and the laws cited in the President’s proclamation.

Unlocked powers include the ability to control or shut down communications facilities, including radio stations, telephone services, and internet traffic. The President can also gain the authority to redirect funds that Congress has appropriated for military construction projects, allowing for the rapid building of facilities deemed necessary for the emergency response. Other statutes permit the seizure of private property, though legal processes and compensation requirements typically still apply.

In situations involving international crises, a national emergency declaration can activate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). This act allows the President to impose economic sanctions, freeze the assets of foreign governments or individuals, and regulate or prohibit foreign exchange transactions. These financial powers are among the most frequently used, forming the basis for many of the over 40 national emergencies that currently remain in effect, with the longest-running active emergency dating back to 1979.

The courts can hear challenges to an emergency declaration, and the courts or Congress can end the national emergency, which in any case ends after one year if no other action is taken. They can be renewed indefinitely. 

Previous presidents have used their ability to declare emergencies, sometimes questionably. The reason there is an emergency powers statute is that sometimes the situation calls for quick action. Trump, like so many other things, has abused this authority in order to bypass Congress. 

He has used manufactured emergencies to sidestep Congress and impose tariffs, deregulate the energy industry, intensify immigration enforcement and send the National Guard into Washington. Chillingly, he has claimed that a Venezuelan gang invaded the United States to justify the killing of foreign civilians in international waters, in defiance of U.S. and international law.

The most egregious use of emergency powers has been to declare various groups as terrorists, or even an invading army. He has designated some immigrant groups this way in order to facilitate deportations. He has designated opposition groups as domestic terrorists in order to quell dissent. He has labeled Venezuelan nationals, piloting small boats that may be carrying drugs that might eventually end up in the United States, as a national security threat, justifying murder on the high seas. 

He is sidestepping constitutional order and making everything an emergency to allow him to rule without guardrails.

#7 - Vilifies Marginalized Groups

Authoritarians tend to demean minority groups, trying to turn them into a perceived threat that provides a justification for a leader to amass power. Mr. Trump has repeatedly suggested that marginalized groups are responsible for the nation’s problems.

Trump has had, from the day he announced his candidacy in 2015, a hatred for immigrants. Not just criminal immigrants, not just those here illegally, but all immigrants. This goes beyond the arguably legitimate desire to secure the borders and to properly vet anyone wanting to come here. He has characterized immigrants as "poisoning the blood" of the nation; called them animals; referred to some nations as "shithole countries"; he framed previous surges as "an invasion"; he has recently focussed on Somalis, saying "their country stinks" and called them "garbage". The crackdown by ICE seems to be designed to not only carry out the law, but to humiliate and dehumanize those who are caught in its net.

One of his executive orders issued on Inauguration Day was an attempt to eliminate birthright citizenship, a right enshrined in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution.  If the Supreme Court agrees with him, children born in the United States will effectively be stateless, creating a permanent class of people with no right to be here, and no home to go to. 

He has vilified transgender Americans and barred them from military service. He has fired women and people of color from leadership posts and ended programs that promote workplace diversity. His administration has attempted to erase aspects of Black history, including by removing books on slavery and segregation from military libraries and pressuring Smithsonian museums to minimize those subjects. At the same time, he has suggested that white people and Christians are victims, which echoes the autocratic habit of claiming that majority groups are in fact oppressed.

His focus on eliminating anything related to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives, and erasing anything that he labels as "woke", rolls back decades of civil rights advances. 

By attacking powerless populations and erasing the historical record of depredations against them, by turning them into a bogeyman responsible for all the nations problems, he is creating a scapegoat to distract from his own shortcomings. 

#8 - Attempts to Control Information and News Media

Democratic governments prize accurate information as a guide to decision-making. Authoritarians seek to suppress inconvenient truths.

While this overlaps somewhat with Part I - Stifling Dissent and Free Speech, it goes much farther than that. Trump, going back to his first term, has been working overtime to undermine faith and confidence in a free press. Whatever you think about the major, mainstream, news organizations, however biased you believe they are, however beholden to corporate interests, they have resources and access that we, as ordinary citizens, do not. Trump, with his dismissal of any reporting that he doesn't like as "fake news" has convinced half of the voting public that anything negative about him is a lie. He has painted most of the media as "the enemy of the people"—a choice of words any dictator would love. 

Not satisfied with killing their reputation, Trump has weaponized the courts, filing lawsuits against ABS, Paramount (owner of CBS), Meta (owner of Facebook), YouTube—all which have settled for millions of dollars. Lawsuits against the New York Times and Wall Street Journal are underway. He has pressured Congress to defund NPR and to eliminate the Corporation For Public Broadcasting. News organization that cross him are barred from covering the White House; those who report on the Pentagon, other than a handful of right wing pseudo-journalists, have been banned for refusing to sign a restrictive agreement to only report pre-approved information. 

He has used his so-called Department of Government Efficiency to shut down departments that compile statistics critical for informed governmental decisions. He fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics after the agency reported disappointing job growth this summer. He shut down federal data collection efforts related to climate change, presumably because the information might encourage people to take action.

In place of an independent and free press, Mr. Trump evidently hopes to create a shadow ecosystem willing to promote his interests and talking points.

#9 - Attempts To Take Over Universities

Authoritarians, recognizing that universities are hotbeds of independent thought and political dissent, often single them out for repression. Mr. Putin and Mr. Erdogan have closed universities. Mr. Modi’s government has arrested dissident scholars, while Mr. Orban has appointed loyalist foundations to run universities.

Trump was once famously quoted as saying that he loved the poorly educated. He has more recently commented that smart people don't like him. There is definitely an anti-intellectual streak among those who are his strongest supporters. He's playing to their distrust of "the elites", but he's also attacking a segment of society most likely to see through his authoritarian tendencies. 

His attacks on universities came via two main approaches: opposition to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives and purported support for Jewish student who were recipients of antisemitic attacks. DEI was a Day One target, pushed by the Heritage Foundation and their Project 2025 attack on anything progressive. It started out as a "DEI Purge" throughout the federal workforce, spearheaded by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. It quickly expanded to an effort to eliminate DEI initiatives even among private entities, especially universities, reviled by the Right as "woke". 

Other than the obvious mission of universities to educate, they are also where much of our scientific research takes place, often funded by federal government grants. Trump has threatened to withhold university funding for those that have anything to do with DEI, including classes that touch on the issue. Trump is using this fiscal threat to mold what is taught in university classrooms. 

While there is no question that some demonstrators protesting Israel's actions in Gaza have targeted Jewish students with verbal abuse, and sometimes even violence, the majority are focussed on the government of Israel, not individual Jews. Trump has accused universities of antisemitism due to their supposed failure to protect Jewish students and threatened sanctions based on that pretext. Trump's Justice Department has also conflated protests in support of Palestinians in Gaza with support of Hamas and accusing them of materially supporting terrorism. They have used this excuse to revoke the visas of foreign students who were studying here legally. 

A signature policy of Mr. Trump’s second term has been his attack on higher education. He has cut millions of dollars of research funding, tried to dictate hiring and admissions policies and forced the resignation of the University of Virginia’s president. It is a sustained campaign to weaken an influential sector home to many political progressives who do not support him — and to many young people, who typically form the crux of anti-authoritarian protest movements.

Trump is using the threat of withholding government grants to control universities, knowing that much of the opposition to his policies come from university faculty and students. 

#10 - Creates a Cult of Personality

       

Emperors and kings often glorified themselves by displaying their portraits everywhere. The American tradition has rejected that kind of hagiography for living presidents. Our leaders haven’t needed to puff themselves up this way, until now.

That Trump fosters a cult of personality has been obvious since before his first term. The trappings of this go beyond, and are separate, from the cultish way his core followers unquestioningly believe everything he says, even when he contradicts himself. As he campaigned for the presidency the first time he insisted that "he alone" could fix the problems that he claimed that plagued the country.  Here is a list, in no particular order, of the ways that he has put himself on a pedestal and sought to equate the nation with himself.

• He posts a meme wear he wears a crown
• Proposes a prescription referral service called TrumpRx 
• The new permanent resident visa, are being called the "Trump Gold Card" and will have his image on them
• He renamed the Kennedy Center the Trump-Kennedy Center 
• The United States Institute for Peace is now the Donald J. Trump Institute for Peace
• Child investment account that were part of the 2025 tax bill are called Trump Accounts
• Government building have giant banners with his face on them hanging in front
• There is talk about minting a one dollar gold coin with his face on it
• The ballroom that will replace the destroyed East Wing of the White is supposed be named after him
• Lavish military parade on his birthday
• He has ordered a new class of naval vessel class called The Trump Class

I've possibly missed some things, but isn't that enough? 

The Trump cult of personality plays into his claims — common among autocrats — that he possesses a unique ability to solve the country’s problems. As he put it, “I alone can fix it.” He seeks to equate himself with the federal government, as if it does not exist without him.

#11 - Uses Power For Personal Profit

Authoritarians often turn the government into a machine for enriching themselves, their families and their allies. Mr. Trump glories in his administration’s culture of corruption.

A fallacy about the super-rich who run for public office that they have so much money that they can't be bribed. That story was told about Trump as he campaigned for the presidency in 2016. It's a fallacy because rich people don't look at their bank accounts and list of assets and at some point decide that they have enough. It's never enough. In some ways it's a method of keeping score. Or maybe it's simply greed. Trump has always found ways to enrich himself at the expense of those around him. When he was busy bankrupting casinos and his companies were losing money on real estate transactions, he always made sure that he personally got paid, even if the company that he was was running was failing. There's plenty of information available documenting this. 

He openly uses the presidency as an opportunity to pad his bottom line, in ways that range from the comically petty (like charging the Secret Service up to $1,200 per night for rooms at his hotels) to the shamelessly greedy (like the $40 million that Amazon paid for the rights to a Melania Trump documentary or his recent demand that the government pay him $230 million because he was investigated for breaking the law). He solicits favors from foreign governments, including an airplane from Qatar. His children also profit from their father’s position, through real-estate deals, crypto, a private club in Washington and more. And he rewards those who enrich them, recently pardoning the head of a cryptocurrency firm who worked with the Trump family.

In the first six months of this year, the Trump Organization’s income soared to $864 million, up from just $51 million a year earlier, according to a recent Reuters analysis. It’s worth noting that recent Supreme Court decisions have made corruption harder to police.

His second term has seen an expansion of his monetizing of the office. The Supreme Court decision effectively immunizing him from virtually any act, and Congress's unwillingness to remove him from office, even if they do impeach him, has emboldened him to turn the White House into an extension of his businesses. 

And he doesn't even try to hide it any more. 

#12 - Manipulates The Law To Stay In Power

 Authoritarians change election rules to help their party, and they rewrite laws — or violate their spirit — to ignore term limits.

Trump follows two parallel paths in this segment. In the first, he is mostly a passive beneficiary of the Republicans longstanding attempts to place roadblocks in the way of people's ability to easily vote. Gerrymandering, voter I.D., closing polling places, purging voter rolls, shortening early voting and placing restrictions on mail-in voting, all benefitting Republican candidates. Locking in compliant Republican office holders makes it easier for Trump to act unilaterally without oversight by Congress. 

In addition to the traditional Republican chicanery, Trump has also pushed states with Republican legislatures and governors to further gerrymander their Congressional districts. 

Mr. Trump’s biggest attempt to follow this playbook failed, when he was unable to undo his election defeat to Joe Biden in 2020. But that effort showed Mr. Trump’s willingness to break the law to remain in power. He issued an executive order in March that seeks to interfere with how states run their elections. 

The other path Trump has taken is his ongoing "jokes" about running for a third term or cancelling elections. He regularly "jokes" about scenarios where this could happen. Even if he isn't serious, subverting the Constitution isn't something that the president of the United States should be kidding about.  However, if anyone doubts his willingness to ignore the results of an election we have only to look at his actions in 2020 and early 2021 when he literally attempted to ignore the results of an election. 

The NY Times ended their series with this quote:

The clearest sign that a democracy has died is that a leader and his party make it impossible for their opponents to win an election and hold power. Once that stage is reached, however, the change is extremely difficult to reverse. And aspiring authoritarians use other excesses, like a cowed legislature and judiciary, to lock in their power.

The United States is not an autocracy today. It still has a mostly free press and independent judiciary, and millions of Americans recently attended the “No Kings” protests. But it has started down an anti-democratic path, and many Americans — including people in positions of power — remain far too complacent about the threat.

I disagree with the NY Times that we are not yet at the stage where we are in an autocracy. While there still exists a free press, many outlets are self-censoring or settling with Trump when sued. Lower courts are attempting to block some of his maneuvers, but the results are not uniform, and the Supreme Court has not upheld all the blocks. Trump in many ways is incompetent. He is clearly in the early stages of dementia. He is ignorant of how things work. He is not an efficient autocrat or dictator, but he rules as if only his word matters.

What else do you call it?

 

Changing Gears & Abandoning Principle

One of the most resilient of Trump supporters' beliefs is that those of us who oppose him do so out of an irrational hatred whereby we can't recognize or give him credit for the good that he does. They further believe that he would do even more good if everyone would just get out of his way and let him do his job. You've heard the term tossed around, usually on social media, if not in person: Trump Derangement Syndrome. The Trumpists are incapable of understanding that we may have reasonable, logical reasons for opposing him. Part of this is that they often truly believe that what Trump is doing is good for the country, although that is usually paired with a disregard for the price that is paid. 

One could argue that reducing the size and cost of the federal government is a positive achievement, and Trumpists are aghast that progressives are against what Trump unleashed with DOGE and that federal judges have attempted to roll back some of what was done. However, the DOGE actions was not a thoughtful, considered review of government programs, it was an ideological purge by people who had no understanding of how government worked, or what most of these agencies actually did. It's hard to view something like that as an achievement when it represents a dismantling of programs that you believe are necessary. The regime's border policies are often cited by Trumpists as an achievement and described as "closing the border" as opposed to Biden's "open border". But what has been done is the shutting off of the ability of people fleeing violence and persecution to claim asylum.  The immigration system infrastructure still hasn't been fixed — instead the government is hunting down undocumented immigrants and revoking previously agreed-to temporary legal status for asylum seekers. Recently a Trump voter pointed out how I had benefitted by the new bonus standard deduction for seniors — a Trump initiative. It's true that many taxpayers saw their tax bills reduced due to the senior deduction, as well as partial deductions for tips and overtime, but personally I'd rather pay the higher taxes than live under this increasingly despotic regime. 

And now, in addition to the 14 months of autocratic rule by an ignorant bully, we are involved in a war in the Middle East...and those always go so well. 

I have written often about how Trump support is a cult. The Iran War, along with the attack on Venezuela and the possible attack on Cuba, is another item that supports that assertion. Trump campaigned very clearly and vociferously on staying out of the affairs of other countries and not starting any wars. He lobbied shamelessly for the Nobel Peace Prize and recently inaugurated his "Board of Peace". He and other Republicans characterized Vice President Harris and other Democrats as warmongers and predicted that we would be at war if she were elected. Yet most of his supporters have seamlessly transitioned to supporters of war in Iran. Just like their top stated reason for voting for Trump was his promise to end inflation and bring prices down as inflation continues and prices continue to rise. Few things that a president does have any meaningful effect on inflation...except tariffs. If he had just left well enough alone the trend started in Biden's final two years would have resulted in low inflation and Trump could have taken credit for it. Few things that a president does have any meaningful effect on gas prices...except war. And the reasonable gas prices that he had been taking credit for are now rising. And through it all, the Trumpists change gears, and seamlessly adopt the new Trump position.

Who is it that is deranged?

Waging Peace (Right? That's What We're Doing....Right?)

 

Iran is led by bad guys. No disagreement there. But it's inarguable that the world is full of countries led by bad guys...including the United States. And from a strict viewpoint of who has the ability to bomb the United States, Iran isn't on the list. 

Why are we bombing Iran? Why have we, by way of our ally, Israel, intentionally killed their top leadership? The consensus is that no one wants Iran to have nuclear weapons (or nucular ones either). Smaller nations might reasonably ask why The United States, Russia, India, Pakistan, Israel, The United Kingdom all get to have nuclear weapons in order to defend themselves, but no one else can? I can understand why Israel, Saudi Arabia and the other Sunni-dominated nations might be nervous about a nuclear-armed Iran, but why is it our business? Especially since this regime was so adamant about ditching our allies and withdrawing into our borders. 

Something that often gets overlooked is, despite public revulsion of the doctrine of mutually assured destruction, how nations that voluntarily give up their quest for nuclear weapons end up getting invaded. Ukraine gave up it's bombs left over from Soviet Union days in exchange for pledges from Russia to respect their independence. Libya's government was bombed out of power with no way to respond, with no threat of reprisal available to hold off attacks. North Korea's Kim dynasty is arguably still in power because they have nuclear weapons. 

During President Obama's time in office, a coalition that included the United States, Russia, China and the European Union negotiated a treaty with Iran whereby they would foreswear their nuclear weapon ambitions in exchange for a lifting of economic sanctions. There was no evidence that Iran was violating their end of the agreement, but Trump unilaterally canceled it during his first term. Unsurprisingly Iran resumed work on a nuclear weapon. Trump acted offended that they would do so...but it wasn't Iran that violated the agreement, it was him. He could have kept the agreement in place while seeking diplomatic avenues to improve it, but the resumption of sanctions gave Iran the excuse to do the very thing they had agreed to stop doing. 

Trump's idea of diplomacy has never involved consensus or middle ground. Even with inter-governmental dealings, he has always viewed bipartisanship as the other partisans simply agreeing to his demands. His fumbling attempts to mediate the Russia-Ukraine War have mainly been telling the two sides what he wants them to do. His "diplomacy" in the talks with Iran were more of the same. There is evidence that Iran's negotiators were acting in less than good faith as well, but Trump had evidently decided that he was going to attack Iran unless they in effect dismantled their military and perhaps their theocratic governmental structure. Of course Iran was never going to agree to that — they would be leaving themselves open to attack by Israel at Israel's convenience. 

One of the few things I agreed with Trump about was his promise to end "forever wars" and to concentrate on domestic concerns. I'm no isolationist. I know that sometimes it's in our national interest to get involved internationally — whether by intervening militarily or by supporting financially. But our track record hasn't been good when it comes to regime change. We invaded Iraq because our leaders lied about the presence of "weapons of mass destruction" that allegedly were a threat to us. We quickly defeated the Iraqi Army and overthrew the government, but spent eight years occupying the country and fighting off various insurgencies as we propped up the corrupt successor government. After we were back in Iraq after a few years to fight the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. We quickly dislodged the Taliban government in Afghanistan, but spent 20 years occupying that nation and propping up its corrupt government. The Taliban regained power as soon as we left. Limited involvement was no better. Our bombing campaign led to the execution of the Libyan leader, but the country is governed by competing warlords who each control their own territory. This was no secret to the American people and Trump's pledge to keep us out of this kind of adventurism appealed to many. 

Oops.

Trump wants a Nobel Peace Prize. Obama got one, so he wants one. He has been lobbying for the award since his first term, styling himself as the "Peace President", and falsely claimed to have ended eight wars. He has (unofficially) renamed the Department of Defense the Department of War; killed over 100 pilots of small boats in the Caribbean, bombed Venezuela and kidnapped its president, bombed Nigeria because supposedly Christians were being killed, dropped a giant bomb on Iran's nuclear research site last summer and now has started a full-fledged war with Iran. His administration has been cagey about the use of the term "war". When he started blowing up boats of alleged drug runners, it was characterized as a military operation to avoid due process, but was also termed not-a-war to avoid getting permission from Congress. 

Constitutionally, Congress has the responsibility and authority to declare war while the president has the responsibility and authority to command the military. The War Powers Act allows the president to send the military into action in the case of an emergency, i.e. an attack or imminent attack on the United States. The Act requires the president to notify Congress within 48 hours and requires an end to the military action within 60 days. In recent decades presidents have acted with impunity or skirted the requirements regularly, Trump is not the first one to do this, however, it's unique in that there was no effort to convince either Congress or the American people of the necessity of action at this time. It's appears to me to me a combination of doing a favor for his buddy Netanyahu and a reaction to not getting his own way. Either way, sober thinking, and even sanity seems to pay no role.  

The MAGA double talk has already begun. Despite the fact that the United States under President Trump started a war, it is being framed, not as starting a new war, but as ending a "forever war", one that Iran started a generation ago with the taking of American hostages in 1979. Supporters of the Iran War point to Iran's support of Shi'a militias in Iraq, Lebanon, and Gaza over the years, as well as Iraqi militias who were funded by Iran being responsible for American military deaths. It is conveniently ignored that these groups were fighting a power that was occupying their country...us. 

Already there are casualties. Many among regular Iranians, in addition to Iranian military. There have been deaths in Israel and in some of the Gulf nations. Several U.S. service members have died. Kuwait "accidently" shot down three of our F-15s. What comes next? Will the opposition take over? Will the Kurds declare independence? Will Iran get lucky and sink one of our ships? Will there be troops on the ground? Will we just bomb the shit out of their infrastructure for a few weeks and then hallucinate a victory? Who knows. But it's never as easy as the politicians think it is. 

Trump's War-Ending Scorecard

Trump's continuing to claim that he ended eight wars, here's an update. 

The Navy is blowing up boats of alleged drug smugglers near Venezuela, and has invaded the country,  kidnapping its president. He has impounded a several Venezuelan oil tankers, one of which was flying a Russian flag and was escorted by a Russian submarine. He is threatening to take over Greenland by force. As of this update, we are at war with Iran. 

Trump has claimed that he has ended eight wars, part of his pathetic grasping for a Nobel Peace Prize. But has he?

1. Israel-Gaza:

I wrote about this recently. In this article I showed how the supposed "New Dawn of Peace in the Middle East" was virtually identical to the cease fire that was in place when he took office in January which was over in March. This one has already been violated multiple times. Hamas has not agreed to several of the terms, in fact they were not consulted and had the "agreement" imposed upon them.

Update: ceasefire violations are continuing on a daily basis. None of the other items in the "20 Point Peace Plan" have been started, other than the weirdly named "Board of Peace", which has done nothing other than collect money. The Israeli government continues to not only allow Jewish settlers to steal Palestinian territory, but to abuse or kill individual Palestinians with impunity. This side of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will surely blow up before long. 

2. Pakistan-India:

It wasn't a war, just another in the many border scuffles that these two countries have engaged in since their existence. India says that Trump has nothing to do with the cessation of hostilities which were negotiated directly between India and Pakistan.

Update: ceasefire has held

3. Rwanda-Democratic Republic of The Congo:

These two countries have had on again-off again periods of border fighting for years. As well as cease fires and "peace agreements" that are regularly violated. Peace talks are ongoing, as are the violations of the cease fire. 

Update: The so-called peace agreement was signed with great fanfare at the "United States Institute Of Peace", recently named "Donald J. Trump Institute Of Peace" on Thursday December 4th, but fighting has not stopped, and has in fact escalated. 

4. Thailand-Cambodia:

After a week of cross-border fighting, Malaysia brokered a ceasefire. The only involvement by Trump was a threat to leave high tariffs in place. 

Update: fighting has broken out again

5. Armenia-Azerbaijan:

These two former Soviet Republics have been fighting over where the border should be since they achieved independence. The biggest disagreement has been over Nagorno-Karabakh, an Armenian enclave within Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan effectively ejected all Armenians from the enclave, making the settlement of the conflict moot. 

Update: No active fighting, but core issues have not been addressed, let alone solved

6. Egypt-Ethiopia:

Not even fighting, let alone a war. They're arguing over water use. 

Update: there never was a war, not even border skirmishes. Still none. 

7. Serbia-Kosovo:

Also no fighting. Trump is claiming that he stopped a war before it started.

Update: there never was a war, not even border skirmishes. Still none. 

8. Israel-Iran:

Israel had been conducting preemptive strikes against Iran and it's regional non-state allies like Hezbollah in tandem with its war against Hamas. Israel and Iran traded missile strikes for 12 days, ending after Trump had our military drop a bomb on Iran's nuclear facility. Iran declined to escalate. There is no peace agreement, but their is a cessation of hostilities. 

Update: There's been no resumption of hostilities, but Trump can hardly be called a peacemaker if he had to drop a bomb to get their attention. Trump is threatening to attack Iran with little or no reasons given for doing so

So here's the score:

• Diplomatic disagreements that involved no fighting whatsoever and therefore there was nothing to end: 2
• Fighting that stopped after we dropped a huge bomb on one side: 1
• Peace plan with a cease fire that is currently being violated: 3
• Conflicts that involved decades-long border fighting that will likely continue, but the ceasefire is currently holding: 2
• Actual lasting peace: 0

Meanwhile, the one war that we were involved in, Afghanistan, which he campaigned on ending in his first term, was not ended in his first term. And of course, the Russia-Ukraine war, which claimed he could end "in 24 hours, even before he was inaugurated" is still going on. 

Chaos: Ignorance, Incompetence, and Illusion

It's not simply a matter of partisan disagreements. It's not a case of what the Trump Cult calls Trump Derangement Syndrome, or mindless "Orange Man Bad", we are in multiple overlapping Constitutional Crises, and it's simultaneously being shouted (literally) in the streets and ignored by those who can do something about it. 

The Epstein Files are at once a glimpse into a horrible underworld of powerful people trafficking and abusing women and girls and an indictment of the justice system in our country. As bad as what is being alleged in what has been released so far, the out in the open lying, cover-ups, and enabling by a woman who is supposedly the top law enforcement officer in the country, is just plain disgusting. Add to that, the head of the FBI, who is heading the agency who should be taking the lead on any investigations, is too busy using government resources to party with the U.S. Olympic Hockey Team and shuttle his girlfriend to gigs around the country. Here's a link to an article outlining why releasing the files publicly may have enabled those involved to forever escape consequences. 

Next we have the reign of terror by the Department of Homeland Security. Frankly when this department was created post 9-11 I thought the name had an ominous fascist-like tenor to it, and they're certainly living up to it. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) [The actual Border Patrol is part of CBP] have operated as de facto secret police/storm troopers. The initial, and quite reasonable, campaign promise to detain and deport all the "violent, criminal, illegals" quickly morphed into shock and awe invasions of Democratic run cities with immigrants, many here legally, being snatched off the streets, from their beds, and from mandated appointments with immigration officials, and have many times detained citizens. They have killed around a dozen people so far. I have some doubt whether he has actually even "closed the border".

The chaotic purge of government workers by DOGE in the early days of the regime may appear to be in the past, but the results are still with us and politically motivated firings of employees deemed to be disloyal continue. DOGE was touted as a program that was tasked with rooting out waste and corruption but it didn't even come close. Union protections were illegally trod upon, Congressionally authorized agencies were dismantled, and programs and expenditures were unilaterally killed. Trump continues to flout the law, daring Congress and the Supreme Court to do something about it. Even when he technically obeys a court order, he rails against the courts and finds legally questionable work arounds. 

The imposition of tariffs, which can only loosely be called a "policy" is based on ignorance what tariffs and balance of trade are. I've covered tariffs a number of times; this article was reposted today. His tariffs, in addition bringing chaos to world trade and made planning next to impossible for American businesses, have imposed a de facto sales tax on American consumers. 

Attempts to stifle dissent and free speech continue, including attempts to control the media and sources of information. He has turned the Justice Department into the Department of Trump Retribution. 

By the time you read this, we may be at war with Iran. Trump has named himself  "The President of Peace", and repeatedly claimed that he has ended eight wars, which is easily debunked after 10 minutes of internet searches. Our quickie invasion of Venezuela, our kidnapping of their president, and the Cuban blockade, in addition to the previous unprovoked bombing of Iran, makes you wonder what his definition of peace is. What is even more disturbing is that Congress has made no effort to assert their Constitutional authority to declare war and that Trump is not even pretending to seek their input or the support of the public. Mainstream media, which I usually defend from progressives who believe it should be a partisan cheerleader, is reporting the run-up to a possible war, as if it's just another day at the White House. 

Last but not least — Trump's mental state. He has always been a loose cannon, making decisions based, not on any evidence, or consideration of what's best for the country, but on what the last person he had lunch with told him, or what he heard on Fox News. Economic stability and national security have always taken a back seat to his sense of grievance, his thin skin, and need for adulation. He's always been ignorant and incompetent. But it's gotten worse. His public statements, both in person and on his inaccurately named Truth Social platform, have been increasingly incoherent and divorced from reality. (See the statement about sending the USS Comfort, a hospital ship that is not currently in service, to Greenland to help with a crisis that doesn't exist). What's worse is that no one is going to do anything about it. Half of them agree with his craziness and the other half benefit from his deranged patronage and are terrified of offending him. The two Constitutional ways of removing him will not happen.

I'm sure I've left things out...but we are screwed.

Nebraska Tax Incentives - Fraud?

In my opinion Auditor of Public Accounts Mike Foley does a thorough job. He and his team of auditors are responsible for auditing all state government departments, including the legislature and the governor's office. They audit village councils in small towns. He's currently going after the governor. Today there were news reports that he had uncovered $1.2 billion in lost revenue. The articles suggested that there was fraud. I do not agree, at least not based on what Foley is quoted as saying. 

There are several tax incentives programs in Nebraska. The largest are the Nebraska Advantage Act (NAA) and ImagiNE (a relatively new program). There are a also smaller programs like Microenterprise (for businesses with five or fewer full-time equivalent employees) and Nebraska Historic Tax Credits (for rehabilitating and renovating buildings on the National Register of Historic Places), but the bulk of tax incentives go to companies participating in NAA and ImagiNE. Before I retired from the Department of Revenue in 2025 I worked with tax incentives. From 2016-2022 I was the initial reviewer on NAA tax refund claims as well as doing preliminary audit work for new applicants. From 2023-2025 I also reviewed the work of the initial examiners and approved claims for payment. I had little to with ImagiNE, since claims were just starting to come in a few months before I retired. 

The goal of NAA is to reward companies who do two things: (1) Increase employment and (2) Increase investment. There are multiple tiers within the program — each tier has a different benchmark for how much additional employment (measured by total compensation) and investment is required. For example, Tier 1 projects require $1 million in additional investment and 10 additional Full Time Equivalents (FTE's); Tier 2 requires $3 million in additional investment and 30 additional FTE's. The requirements increase with each tier. There are sub-tiers for large data centers and a tier for investment only. 

The year that a company applies is called "the base year". The applicant must show increases in compensation and investment compared to the base year. In order to determine what is an the increase a "qualification audit" is done to determine what the increase in compensation and investment actually is. A preliminary review of the applicant's calculations is done by an examiner. The applicant provides a list of employees and investment in the base year as well as the years that they believe they have met the requirements of the tier in which they are applying. The examiner is basically checking the math. If it adds up, an auditor takes over and examines the applicant's books to determine whether they have met the requirements for an incentive project. Once the auditor approves the project, the applicant can now begin earning credits.

For most tiers, the entitlement period (the number of years in which the project owner can earn and use tax credits) is seven years. The amount of the tax credits available for use is calculated using a standard formula. The incentives company can then use the tax credits earned to receive a tax refund. The refund is most commonly used for a refund of sales and use taxes, but also can be used to refund payroll taxes or corporate income taxes. For sales and use taxes, the refund can only be for tax paid at the location listed in their incentives application (for example sales tax paid for a corporate retreat at a hotel, or tax paid at an out-of-state location are not eligible). Once the seven-year entitlement period ends the incentives company no longer earns credits, but there is a "carryover period" of varying length when they can continue to use credits. 

The incentives company is required to meet the benchmarks for their tier every year within the entitlement period. If they do not meet the requirements in any of the seven years they will be charged back 1/7 of the refunds previously received; future refund claims will be reduced by 1/7 for each year the benchmarks are not achieved. 

For example: Company XYZ has an incentive project with an entitlement period of 2012-2018. They have a carryover period from 2019-2023. This means that they are earning credits from 2012-2018. They can use the credits if the tax was accrued any time from 2012-2023, even if they submit their claim after December 31, 2023. (There is a three-year statute of limitations for filing sales tax refunds, unless a request for extension is filed — these extensions are routinely granted)

This is where the State Auditor's information strays from reality and the reporting gets it wrong. If our example company, XYZ Corp ceases operations — all employees are terminated, and there are still unused credits, the XYZ Corp can continue to submit refund claims for sales tax accrued for any of the entitlement or carryover years. (There are also aging  of credits issues, which I don't need to get into to explain the system) This may seem counter to the goals of the program, which is to attract and keep businesses in Nebraska, but nothing in the incentives statute requires that an incentives company remain in Nebraska after the term of their agreement has expired. They are penalized, as I stated two paragraphs previously, if they close shop before the term of their agreement is up, but afterwards there is nothing to prevent them from leaving the state, selling to another company, or simply ceasing to operate.

Mr. Foley is framing his findings as if there is either fraud on the part of some incentives companies, or malfeasance on the part of the Department of Revenue (DOR). I was employed in DOR from 2016-2025, for the first 7 1/2 years in the Incentives Group, and the rest in a related work group. I can attest that the leadership of the Incentives Group is extremely diligent at following the statutes, and that there are numerous checks and balances to ensure that every dollar is correctly allocated. If anything, I thought auditors and managers were overly picky in their reviews. 

It has been suggested that DOR is understaffed and overworked and that explains the alleged "lost revenue". I can say with confidence that elimination of remote work by Governor Pillen has contributed in large part to the staffing issues. When his edict was finally executed, the Incentives Group lost half of its experienced auditors. Despite this loss of key people, the work was still getting done in a timely manner. At least it was when I retired last June. 

Foley has declined to name companies who are "uninvesting", citing the fact that tax returns are confidential. But you don't need tax returns. All companies receiving tax incentives are public record, listed on the DOR website, including how much they receive each year. 

Does Foley have a point? Yes he does. There are numerous aspects of the state's incentives programs, not just NAA, that allow companies to game the system. Should we still be sending out millions to companies which are no longer operating in Nebraska? I don't think anyone would argue that we should. But Foley's argument is with the legislature, not the agency that executes the statutes. 

Fearing For Their Lives? - Again

In 2024 I served on the Lancaster County Grand Jury as Jury Foreman. Unlike trial juries, grand jurors serve for a term of one year. The same 19 jurors (including three alternates) deliberate on all the grand jury investigations for the year. In Nebraska any death that occurs at the hands of law enforcement, or while in law enforcement or corrections custody, requires a grand jury investigation. During my term we mainly looked at sick or elderly inmates who died while incarcerated. We also investigated and indicted  former Seward County Sheriff's Deputy Anthony Gann who was acquitted on Friday of manslaughter charges. 

Since grand jury deliberations are secret, I'm not able to write about anything that didn't make it into the trial, which is public record. At least I don't think so — better safe than sorry! Anything that I do write is publicly available information. 

On October 23, 2023 Seward County Sheriff's Deputy Anthony Gann spotted Jorge Luis Santana Ramírez driving west on Interstate 80. Santana Ramirez had fled from Deputy Gann a week earlier — and a pursuit ensued. Santana Ramirez, presumably to avoid arrest, changed directions and drove east in the westbound lane until crossing over into the eastbound lane, eventually leaving Seward County and crossing into Lancaster County. At some point Santana Ramírez's  vehicle broke down. He refused to exit his vehicle as Gann shouted for him to "get out of the fucking car" for several minutes. Another Deputy, Chase Palmer, arrived while this was going on. After Palmer arrived, a knife in Santana Ramírez's hand was incorrectly identified as a gun. Gann then began shooting, pausing once to reload, ultimately firing 35 rounds into the back of the vehicle which was facing away from the deputies. Santana Ramírez was seated in the front seat during this time. 

The Seward County Sheriff "investigated" the incident and concluded that Gann had followed department procedures for the use of lethal force. The other deputy on the scene, who had more experience than Gann, testified at trial that Gann was not justified in shooting Santana Ramírez. 

This is what the law says:

Nebraska Revised Statute 28-1412

(b) The use of deadly force is not in any event justifiable under this subsection unless:

(i) The actor believes that there is a substantial risk that the person whom he seeks to prevent from committing a crime will cause death or serious bodily harm to another unless the commission or the consummation of the crime is prevented and that the use of such force presents no substantial risk of injury to innocent persons...

So, according to 28-1415 (b) (i), if the officer believes that there is substantial risk that death or serious bodily harm will come to the officer or any anyone else, then lethal force is justified. 

Nebraska Revised Statute 28-1409, which is the self-defense statute, is similar:

(4) The use of deadly force shall not be justifiable under this section unless the actor believes that such force is necessary to protect himself against death, serious bodily harm, kidnapping or sexual intercourse compelled by force or threat, nor is it justifiable if:

(a) The actor, with the purpose of causing death or serious bodily harm, provoked the use of force against himself in the same encounter; or

(b) The actor knows that he can avoid the necessity of using such force with complete safety by retreating or by surrendering possession of a thing to a person asserting a claim of right thereto or by complying with a demand that he abstain from any action which he has no duty to take, except that:

(i) The actor shall not be obliged to retreat from his dwelling or place of work, unless he was the initial aggressor or is assailed in his place of work by another person whose place of work the actor knows it to be..

Prior to the trial, Gann's attorney attempted to have the charges dismissed based on the allegation that the grand jury was briefed on 28-1409, the self-defense statute, and not 28-1412, the statute dealing with use of force by law enforcement. The judge did not grant their motion to dismiss. Gann's attorney appealed the decision and the appeals court upheld the judge's decision. 

One of the reasons that you rarely see any law enforcement officer charged, let alone convicted of manslaughter or murder, is the word "believes" in both of these statutes. How many times have we heard "I feared for my life" after a cop shot someone reaching for their wallet, or who saw a child playing with a toy gun? It's a subjective decision, determining whether deadly force was necessary, but it's impossible to determine what was going on in someone's mind. How could you prove whether someone didn't genuinely fear for their life, or truly didn't believe that deadly force was necessary to prevent death or serious bodily harm? You can't do it, and in our legal system it's not the job of the defendant to prove their innocence, but the job of the state to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. 

Gann testified at his trial that he was facing an armed threat that necessitated deadly force. Except that he didn't based on objective facts, but he believed that he did. Or at least said that he believed that. The grand jury didn't think he was justified and indicted him, the trial jury apparently did, acquitting him after two and a half hours of deliberation. 

I understand that law enforcement is a stressful job, and they all want to come home alive at the end of their shift, but what we see, time after time, is law enforcement officers prioritizing their own safety over the lives of people who often have been convicted of no crime. There's even a cop saying: "I'd rather by tried by 12 than carried by 6" — in other words, I'd rather take my chances with a trial than risk getting killed. Than risk aversion often results in unarmed people being killed "just in case". 

The legal system needs to change — we have to stop assuming that law enforcement is always legally in the right.  

In the case of Jorge Luis Santana Ramírez, he didn't do himself any favors, but fleeing to avoid arrest isn't a capital crime, and Sheriff's Deputies aren't authorized judges, juries, or executioners.