Just as the dire predictions of what might occur were not been taken seriously enough until the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol, the prospect that President Trump might still attempt to declare a state of emergency or martial law is not being given the attention it requires.
Everything that happened leading up to January 6 – ALL OF IT - was predicted, including the potential for fascism or a civil war – except for that the insurrectionists would make the monumental strategic blunder of making a direct attack on the United States Capitol Building itself.
In an October article entitled The War After the Election [https://medium.com/illumination-curated/the-war-after-the-election-545de96aa4ca?source=friends_link&sk=627c55d616d9296af3e398f1686493a4] I summarized the findings of the Transition Integrity Project, a group that included former Congressmen, United States Senators, previous cabinet members, White House Chiefs of Staffs, Secretaries of Defense and Homeland Security and state governors whose “war games” predicted almost exactly what is happening. I intend to keep updating the article to take into account events since January 6 and regarding what we should do about the situation now – including that we as a citizenry should refrain from giving Donald Trump any excuse for attempting to declare states of emergency or to impose martial law.
The question should be reversed: not what do “you” have to lose, but what would TRUMP have to lose by declaring martial law? Because of the emergency powers that Congress has ceded to the executive branch over centuries, what Trump would be attempting in declaring martial law could actually be justified as LEGAL. Not that everybody would get on board with it or that it would necessarily succeed, but that the President could justify the legality of the initiation of martial law more than he can justify many other things he has done.
If this sounds like hyperbole, remember that ten former Secretaries of Defense recently took the extraordinary step of co-authoring an article warning against the military becoming involved in our election process; and that the leaders of the United States government are actively considering impeaching the President of the United States or removing him from office via the 25th Amendment with less than two weeks remaining in his term.
More long-term, in addition to the action called for in The War After the Election, I urge you to sign The Pledge to Safeguard the Constitution [https://www.thepledge.site/the-pledge-to-safeguard-the-constitution] which petitions Congress to pass specific, targeted legislation to limit presidential power in the most urgently necessary areas and prevent anything like the events of January 6 from ever happening again.
