MSNBC host Rachel Maddow offered a half-hour diatribe accusing President Donald Trump of turning the U.S. into an “authoritarian country,” rambling about immigration enforcement and Texas redistricting.
Democrats in the Texas state legislature fled to Illinois and New York to thwart a special session of the body considering a redistricting plan that could net Republicans up to five seats in the House of Representatives. Maddow spent nearly half her show whining to viewers, telling them that a “dictatorship” had been established.
“The thing we were all warning about for the last few years is not coming. It is here. We are in it. This is what it likes, it turns out — this is what it’s like, right? I mean, it’s August, it’s a Monday,” Maddow said after delving into the redistricting. “Every day, the sun rises and the sun sets, and there are, you know, sports and movies and there are new hit songs. There are scandals here and there. There are crimes. There’s everybody’s personal quotient of family drama and health worries and money worries and falling in and out of love and in and out of faith. Life has not stopped and none of our personal lives have stopped.”
“But also, at the same time, life in the United States is profoundly changing. It’s profoundly different than it was even six months ago, because we do now live in a country that has an authoritarian leader in charge. We have a consolidating dictatorship in our country. And it sounds melodramatic to say it, I know, but just go with that for a minute, right? Think — think in melodramatic terms. Think in cinematic terms,” Maddow continued.
WATCH:
Maddow then turned her attention to operations by United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents across the country.
“Imagine the cartoon level caricature of what you think a dictatorship looks like. I mean, it’s secret police, right? A massive, anonymous, unbadged, literally masked, totally unaccountable internal police force that apparently has infinite funding but no identifiable leadership. And they act in ways designed to instill maximum fear and use maximum force,” Maddow claimed.
“I mean, when you imagine an authoritarian country, right, what you imagine is masked secret police breaking people’s car windows and snatching people off the streets and at a church parking lots and courtroom hallways and taking them away with no charges, no notice, no paperwork, no explanation, not letting them see lawyers and then moving them secretly to what are effectively black site prisons where they won’t tell you who’s there and where no one is allowed in to see what’s going on,” Maddow continued.
Maddow went on to praise resistance to ICE operations to arrest illegal immigrants, which included a Milwaukee judge who allegedly helped an illegal immigrant briefly evade ICE agents sent to arrest him in April. Democratic Mayor Freddie O’Connell of Nashville released the names of ICE agents involved in a crackdown on illegal immigrants in the city in May.
In New York City, ICE agents arrested Democratic mayoral candidate Brad Lander on June 18 after he allegedly interfered with an ICE operation in a Manhattan court. Democratic Rep. LaMonica McIver of New Jersey was charged with assaulting an ICE agent after a May incident at an ICE facility in Newark.
One person fired at ICE agents with a pistol when they raided a California marijuana farm in July after obtaining a warrant, with the FBI offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the suspect’s identification, arrest and conviction. ICE rescued at least ten minors working at the marijuana farm, eight of whom were reportedly unaccompanied, during that operation.
All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact [email protected].
