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Was this the point all along? Donald Trump is now openly threatening to invoke the Insurrection act and deploy the military against American citizens who are protesting ISIS actions in Minneapolis. We are going to walk through what's happening on the ground, why this is textbook authoritarian playbook and how this could be used as a really a pretext to crack down on dissent and even interfere with the election. We will then hear from some Republicans who are saying we will not allow Trump to take Greenland by force, period. Is it real resistance or some kind of calculated PR thing? And then during a milk event. Milk? What are you talking about? Yes, during a milk event, Trump falls asleep and cannot answer basic questions. We also have new polling about Gen Z with regard to Republicans and maga. I'll preview that. They have completely turned on maga and we have prosecutors getting fired, jaw dropping insider trading allegations, and a Trump adviser spreading one of the most pathetic economic lies I've heard this year. We're only 15 days in, but it's still one of the worst this year. All of it and more. Today. You will remember where you were when you heard that Donald Trump was starting to move towards invoking the Insurrection Act. Was this what it was about all along? I know many of you listen to the show on the treadmill or on your commute to or from work, wherever you are. If this is the direction we are going as we approach November of 2026, I can only assume you will remember where you were when you first heard it. So let me tell you what's going on. Donald Trump has now threatened to invoke the Insurrection act specifically to deploy American troops against protesters in Minneapolis. Let me say it one more time. The President threatening to use military force against American citizens who are protesting legally. The federal immigration enforcement tactics that have already resulted in multiple shootings, including the fatal shooting of of 37 year old Renee Goode. Donald Trump taking to Truth Social and laying it out. Quote, if the corrupt politicians of Minnesota don't obey the law and stop the professional agitators and insurrectionists from attacking the patriots of ICE who are only trying to do their job, I will institute the Insurrection act, which many presidents have done before me, and quickly put an end to the travesty that is taking place in that once great state. Trump previously, when he's been asked about the Insurrection act, he's sort of been like, I might need it someday. But now he is saying specifically it is the next step in Minneapolis. If it doesn't go the way I want it to go. Now, what's actually happening on the ground is that since early December, the Department of Homeland Security has flooded Minneapolis with immigration enforcement officers. Mayor Jacob Fry says it is a force five times larger than. Than the city's entire police force that has descended upon that city. 3,000 federal agents compared to 600 officers of the police in Minneapolis, and they are operating in one city. Fry says it is an invasion, probably accurate. I don't think that that's hyperbolic. Now, as many of you know, Officer Jonathan Ross killed Renee Goode while she was in her car near her home in Minneapolis. We've looked at that video a number of times. Ross firing three shots at close range, killing her. I think it's important to mention, by the way, as everybody has looked at the videos, like the Pruder film, and slowed it down and whatnot, if the justification for shooting her was that she was going to drive over Ross and then drive away dangerously, shooting her three times didn't actually prevent her from driving away, which she did, and. And then struck. I believe it's a telephone pole. Anybody should have realized that shooting her as she was pulling away was not going to stop the vehicle, at least not in a safe way. We then had another shooting yesterday. A federal officer shot a man in the leg during an arrest attempt. And the result here has been nightly protests with federal agents in gas masks firing all sorts of stuff into crowds. How does Trump respond? He says, well, I might have to invoke the Insurrection Act. He's calling the protesters professional agitators and insurrectionists. There's no evidence of that. These are residents of Minneapolis and of Minnesota who are understandably angry about the dissent of these federal agents and the fact that federal agents have killed at least one person there. He's calling the ICE officers the patriots with a capital P. He's saying, the governor there is corrupt. Tim Walls, because he hasn't cracked down harder. And the key threat is that of potentially deploying the military against American citizens on American soil. I hate to say it. I don't like the hyperbole, and I don't think that that is what it is. This is how police states can begin. This is the playbook. You flood a city with federal agents, their presence results in violence and a public outcry. You say that the outcry is. Is from individuals who are terrorists and enemies of the state. You say the local authorities are corrupt and can't handle it. And then you say, well, now it's time for military intervention. We are kind of like at step three, heading towards step four, and Trump is openly telling us about his intention to move to step five, which is actually deploying military forces against citizens. And then the question is, is step six somewhere down the line? State of emergency. And step seven is, well, we can't have elections now. This wouldn't be an appropriate time for a midterm election. Now, Governor Walz has spoken about what he sees going on. He says it defies belief. He says this has become a campaign of organized brutality against the people of Minnesota. And it does seem to be that from that copious videos that we are seeing. And think about the precedent that this sets. If Trump successfully invokes the Insurrection act in Minneapolis and it establishes that the president can flood any city with federal agents. And if there is any reaction to that, even when the agents have killed a civilian, the president can say, well, now we need troops to crush the protests. Protests against environmental policies, Deploy the troops. Protests against abortion restrictions, deploy the troops. Do you see how this could be applied to any situation that the administration wants? And it is not about immigration enforcement anymore. This is about the president being able to use the military force to suppress dissent. And what really concerns me is that Trump's been testing the boundaries of executive power and pushing to see what can I get away with? And he's getting away with a lot. Now, at the end of this rainbow is the pot of gold or the pot of coal or whatever, is it to try to do something about the midterm elections? Has this been the plan all along? Foment chaos in the streets? Implement the Insurrection Act, Maybe you declare martial law and then you suspend the elections? Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is already asking military branches to provide 40 lawyers to support immigration operations in Minneapolis. The Pentagon is bragging. We are proud to support what is going on in Minneapolis. So there's no pushback. They're enabling it. And this is a line we cannot allow to be crossed. Now, I'm not here doing the. It's civil war. You know, the people that have been predicting Civil War for 15 years. There is a counterpoint to this as a path to cancel elections. And the counterpoint is very simple. The federal government doesn't run the elections. States run the elections, and therefore the president can't possibly cancel them. And that is a good argument legally. But we shouldn't underestimate this president's willingness to impose force, even if it is not legal. So what happens in Minneapolis over the next few days quite literally could determine the next several years of civil liberties, free speech, and fair elections in this country. The Stakes are extraordinarily high, and we are going to be following it really closely. Something remarkable is happening, or at least Republicans want you to think something remarkable is happening. Let me explain. The Hill has a new report out that there are some Senate Republicans vowing to block Trump from seizing Greenland by military force. That. That's the year we're talking about the. This is not like some town called Greenland in the Midwest. Greenland, which is there in the North Atlantic, the Naito ally. Trump has been openly threatening to take it if Denmark doesn't sell. He's repeated it to reporters. He's posted about it on Troth Central. His administration is doubling down in these meetings with Danish officials, and suddenly you've got a couple Republicans clutching their pearls. We're told the Republican senators are concerned. Republican senators are Flummox. They're worried about Naito. And there are two Republican senators, the same names we keep hearing, Thom Tillis and Lisa Murkowski, who are flying to Copenhagen, beautiful city, by the way, to reassure Denmark that Congress will stop Trump if he tries something crazy. Now, if you just read the headline, it sounds kind of bold, sounds kind of brave. It sounds like Republican resistance against Donald Trump. But let's slow it down for a second. This is the same party that has spent nearly a decade whispering all of its objections to Donald Trump off the record, while voting him with him on everything that matters. Notice how much of the pushback is anonymous, because Tillis and Murkowski, who are at very low risk if they come out and say this stuff, they are putting their names to this. But then we hear about other Republicans that are privately alarmed, off the record, they're concerned, but publicly they're deferential. That is cowardice. At the end of the day, these are the same Republicans who said they were going to rein in Trump during his first term and then during his second term, and they were going to be a check and a balance. And the same Republicans who said, this time it's going to be different. And every single time when it mattered, they folded. Look at Venezuela. All the work to block Trump's impulses there, the warnings about it would be destabilizing and the stern talk about consequences and all of it. And Trump did what he wanted anyway, and Republicans have mostly lined up right behind him or at least gotten out of the way. So forgive me if I don't take this whole we're very concerned thing super seriously. As we are about to enter year two of Donald Trump's second term, there are a lot of strong words here, even Mitch McConnell gave a very strange slurring speech on the floor of the Senate. But in that speech, he said seizing Greenland would incinerate Naito and it would damage efforts to contain Russia and it would shatter trust with allies permanently. Mitch is completely right about it. But Mitch has also mastered the art of saying the right thing after the damage is either done or already underway. And that's the bigger problem here, which is that Republicans are acting like the issue is this one idea. Greenland's the only problem. The problem is the person generating these ideas. This is not a glitch or a bug. This is Trump as a system working as designed, impulsive and vindictive, treating foreign policy like real estate deals and military forces as personal security blocking one insane plan to take Greenland by force would solve nothing about the underlying problem. If Republicans were actually serious here, the answer wouldn't be, well, we're going to do a delegation trip to Denmark. It wouldn't be another anonymous quote of concern. The answer would be, remove the guy from office, stop letting him terrorize our allies and destabilize global security. And float these trial balloons about invading a friendly country or declaring the insurance, invoking the Insurrection act or whatever. And so forgive me if, as I hear Thom Tillis and Lisa Murkowski tell us what they're going to do and how Republicans are very concerned. Privately, I am not really impressed with it. Don't worry, don't worry. We're not going to let him do this thing. And then Trump applies real pressure. The base starts screaming, the threats begin, the loyalty tests start, and we know how it ends. We just. Trump gets away with it. So spare me the heroic framing about these very disturbed Republicans. They are not standing up to their dear leader in any serious manner. They're trying to manage him while avoiding any political price. Now, Thom Tillis maybe is the exception because he's quitting. Lisa Murkowski maybe is the exception because she's always been more sort of independent minded and Alaska voters. Alaska Republicans are a little different than Arkansas Republicans, but other than them, this entire situation is shaping up to be one bad day away from a serious international crisis that Republicans are impotent to actually rein in and stop. If I'm being too harsh on these Republicans, let me know. If you are impressed that Thom Tillis and Lisa Murkowski won't let Trump take Greenland by force, let me know now. I want to be clear. I don't believe Trump will take Greenland by force, but I don't think it's going to be because Republicans in the Senate are going to stop them. You know, I'll often talk to my friends about what do we really think is private on our computers and on our phones. And many people believe that their emails are genuinely private. 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The link is in the description. Hey, what about signing up for a membership on my website? I don't know. Is that crazy? We are an independent media program. We rely primarily on the support of our audience. We're not part of a big media conglomerate. We're not part of any kind of system where we receive free front funding from above. It's just people who like the show and they sign up and they get a membership. The two newest people who have done so I want to say thanks to right now, Michael Knott and Skilla Williams. Appreciate both of you. You can join them@join packman.com Read about all the all of the great perks and there is no perk greater than knowing deep, deep in your soul that you're supporting independent media. We're also doing a one day membership drive on Tuesday, January 20th. That's this coming Tuesday it will be. It's the one year anniversary of Donald Trump swearing in for his second term and we will be officially three years away from the end of Trump and we're doing a one day membership discount. If you want to be notified about that, just send me an email info at David Pakman Dotcom. I'll put you on my newsletter and you'll get an email on Tuesday. This is beyond belief. Donald Trump fell asleep during an event while it was being discussed that milk is good for the brain. Trump fell asleep, wakes up and goes, I passed all my cognitive tests. If I told you even six months ago that this was going to happen, you would probably say, no, that's too on the nose. It can't be. Watch Trump sleep and then wake up as Ben Carson, who is not exactly a passionate and inspiring speaker, starts talking about the importance of milk for the.
