The Republican governors of six states — Louisiana, Mississippi, Ohio, South
Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia — are recklessly and needlessly sending
National Guard troops to Washington, D.C. to join the 800 troops that Donald
Trump had already activated. (Other Republican governors may join in this
farce.)

These reactionary governors are using their own National Guard members and the
residents of D.C. to prostrate themselves before Trump, to score “culture war”
points on Fox News, and to advance Trump’s authoritarian agenda. If these
governors actually cared about crime in our nation’s capital, they would speak
up about the rampant corruption within the Trump regime itself.

Now, before we get further along — and because this military deployment is
impacting real people — we want to say a few things about Washington, D.C., and
the people who live here (including, we’ll note, each of us — along with a great
number of Public Citizen employees and members).

SOME BASIC HISTORY

D.C. was established as our young nation’s capital on July 16, 1790, when
President George Washington signed a bill called the Residence Act , which Congress had passed one week earlier, into law. At that point, there
were only 13 states in the entire country . (By the way, five of the six states whose governors are sending National
Guard troops to D.C. were not even in the United States when D.C. was founded.)

As established by law, D.C. is geographically compact. And many people seem to
be familiar with the area encompassing the White House, the U.S. Capitol, the
Washington Monument, the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, the Smithsonian
museums, the National Mall, and a handful of stately government buildings. But,
like any large city, there is much more to D.C. than just its downtown business
district and its tourist attractions.

D.C. IS A REAL PLACE, NOT JUST A TOURIST DESTINATION

Over 700,000 people live in Washington, D.C. That’s more than Boston. Or
Detroit. Or Las Vegas. Or Atlanta. In fact, the population of D.C. is greater
than the population of the entire state of Vermont or the entire state of Wyoming.

People live and work here (including both of us). People raise families here
(including both of us). People send their kids to school here (including both of
us). People go to the grocery store, the gas station, the movies, the park, and
the dentist here.

We have world-class cultural enterprises, including the Smithsonian Institution
and the Kennedy Center. (Though Trump is actively undermining both, cutting
their funding and forcing them to go along with his pathetic anti-DEI crusade.)

In recent years, our National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL), Women’s National
Basketball Association (WNBA), Major League Baseball (MLB), and National Hockey
League (NHL) teams all won championships. Our Major League Soccer (MLS) team is
a three-time champion. Our National Football League (NFL) team is a three-time
Super Bowl winner. (Trump, of course, is making noise about his desire for our
NFL team, the Commanders, to revert back to its blatantly racist former name.)
Our National Basketball Association (NBA) team has won a championship — but that
was way back in 1978, so let’s get going, Wizards!

And D.C. is home to hundreds of nonprofit organizations that — each in their own
way — are trying to make the world a better place. That includes one you might be particularly
familiar with: Public Citizen was founded here in 1971 — over half a century ago
— and our offices are still in D.C.’s Dupont Circle and Capitol Hill
neighborhoods. Again, the majority of our staff live in the city or close by,
and thousands of our amazing supporters call D.C. home as well.

DIVERSITY IN D.C.

People come here from just about every other country in the world to interact
with our government in one way or another. You might hear half a dozen different
languages being spoken just walking around Public Citizen’s headquarters on a
random Tuesday. We consider this a wonderful thing about living here. You can
imagine what Trump or his ghoul of a henchman, Stephen Miller, think of it.

More pointedly, D.C. — one nickname for which is “Chocolate City” — is over 41%
Black. In fact, there is not a single city in the entire country that has both a
larger total population and a higher percentage of Black residents. When Donald
Trump, those in his regime, and the people pretending to be journalists at
propaganda outlets like Fox News say “crime,” what they want you to hear — and
what so many of their followers are all too eager to hear — is “Black.”

TAXATION — AND NOW OCCUPATION — WITHOUT REPRESENTATION

A lot of people don’t seem to know the following: People who live in D.C. are
stateless. D.C. itself is not a state (yet — it should be made one). We have no senators, and no vote in the House of Representatives
(we have a delegate to Congress who has no vote outside of committees and thus
minimal power).

We learn in school that the American Revolution was about “taxation without
representation” — that we fought for, and won, our independence from Great
Britain over this exact issue of not having a voice in a government that ruled
over us. Yet, for well over 200 years, we have expected the residents of D.C. to
accept living as political exiles in their own country. And, to add insult to
injury, this city of over 700,000 unrepresented people is now occupied by U.S. military forces at the whims of a would-be
authoritarian president and the sycophantic governors who are lining up to lick
his boots.

Again, there are more people in D.C. than there are in all of Vermont or
Wyoming. Imagine if we suddenly stripped the people of Vermont of their senators
(including Sen. Bernie Sanders) or if the people of Wyoming no longer had a vote
in the House of Representatives. There would be outrage and perhaps even revolt.
It is long past time for every American to recognize the undemocratic travesty
that has been and continues to be carried out on the people of Washington, D.C.
(where — unlike, say, Vermont and Wyoming — a majority of residents are people
of color.)

THE AUTHORITARIAN TAKEOVER

Now — with the absurd actions of Trump and these six (so far) Republican
governors — there are something like 2,000 National Guard troops in D.C. on top
of all the law enforcement that was already here. By the way, in case it’s not
clear, the National Guard is part of the United States military. So that’s 2,000
members of the U.S. military deployed in an American city, against American
citizens.

(It’s worth considering that National Guard members probably didn’t sign up to
be used as shock troops in the MAGA culture war and as political pawns in
Trump’s Big Brother power trip. Most of them likely thought their service would
involve responding to genuine national security threats and actual emergencies —
including the climate-related disasters that are becoming more frequent and more
severe in part because of stupid, regressive actions the Trump regime is taking
to undo the modest progress we were making on clean energy.)

So, while D.C. was most definitely not the city-wide crime scene Trump paints it
as, with his military takeover the city has — sadly — become noticeably
dystopian virtually overnight.

We must be absolutely clear about what’s going on here. First in Los Angeles,
now in Washington, D.C., and next maybe in your community, Donald Trump is
weaponizing law enforcement and military force against the American people.
Trump is trying to intimidate us into subservience, and he is laying the
groundwork to commit violence in furtherance of his authoritarian fantasies.

This — and this alone — is the reason for the deployment of National Guard
troops in and the military occupation of our nation’s capital.

A message for Governor Jeff Landry of Louisiana, Governor Tate Reeves of
Mississippi, Governor Mike DeWine of Ohio, Governor Henry McMaster of South
Carolina, Governor Bill Lee of Tennessee, and Governor Patrick Morrisey of West
Virginia: [[link removed]]

You are disrespecting and exploiting your own National Guard troops and the
people of Washington, D.C., to grovel at Donald Trump’s feet and to score cheap
“culture war” points on Fox News. And you are shamelessly throwing in with
Trump’s authoritarian project. The people of Washington, D.C., did not elect
you. They did not ask you to send armed military personnel who belong in their
home states. And, by overwhelming numbers, they do not want your National Guard
troops here. Take your troops back and mind your own damn business.
[[link removed]]

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Thanks for taking action.

For justice,

- Lisa Gilbert & Robert Weissman, Co-Presidents of Public Citizen


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