Is ICE evolving into a masked domestic military force?

Six months into the second Trump administration, two things are becoming clear: First, the president remains a nearly entirely non-strategic actor, motivated only by an abiding desire to accumulate ever greater power, adulation, and wealth. And second, he’s fundamentally changing the nature of the United States in ways that threaten to bring an end to the nation’s 249 year old status as the world’s leading democracy, reported Public Notice.

Despite Trump’s consistently haphazard “governance” style, it’s becoming easy to foresee how his regime could effectively void our democracy. The now fully MAGA-fied GOP is increasingly likely to lose the next presidential election after incurring bracing losses in the midterms and other intervening state races. And as the nation learned before and following the 2020 election, Trumpists are more than willing to use force and other extra-legal actions to attempt to cling to power.

For Trump and his cronies, the prospect of losing power — or even sharing it with Democrats in the event control of the House shifts in 2026 — could prove to be catastrophic because of their reasonable fear of being held accountable for criminality that dwarfs Trump’s first term. And unlike January 2021 — when the Big Lie scheme failed — Trump and his cohorts will have new tools to carry out a coup, including a massive federal police force with a proven willingness to engage in systemic illegality.

Trump’s brownshirts

From its outset, Trump 2.0 has been grounded on systemic illegality and unilateral executive actions, a course of (mis)conduct the administration has succeeded in pursuing because of pliant GOP majorities in Congress the Supreme Court. It’s all but certain that the administration’s authoritarian conduct will grow in scope and intensity over the succeeding months, in no small part because the GOP reconciliation bill will hand over a staggering $170 billion to the Department of Homeland Security.

The bill includes nearly $30 billion in new “enforcement” funds. DHS boasts that it is already the largest federal law enforcement agency, with over 80,000 officers spread across nine organizations. But DHS says it plans to use the new funding to quickly hire 10,000 more more ICE thugs. And in recent months, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem has systematically dismantled DHS’s oversight offices, thereby paving the way for a lot of corner cutting.

The bill also includes $45 billion for expanding detention facilities comprised of both government and privately contracted facilities, meaning DHS is working with a jail budget that far exceeds that of the federal prison system.

With this infusion of cash, the US for the first time will have a massive federal police force with its own rapidly growing concentration camp system, with a reach that extends directly into the nation’s largest states and municipalities, potentially displacing local governance in critical respects.

We do not have to wait to find out how ICE and other agencies will conduct themselves within the US, and particularly in blue states and municipalities with Democratic (and demographically diverse) populations. Just look at what began as a quasi occupation of LA County and has now expanded to encompass large swathes of the state of California. There, the new ICE is focused on creating a state of fear and uncertainty among entire communities, including with militarized assaults on workplaces, complete with chemical munitions.

Last week, for example, a phalanx of masked ICE thugs marched into LA’s MacArthur Park, smack in the middle of one of the city’s largest Hispanic communities, accompanied by California National Guard troops that Trump had dragooned over the governor’s objection.

After parading around MacArthur with assault rifles and other military paraphernalia that served no apparent purpose, the invading force retreated.

Also in recent days, masked and heavily armed thugs have descended upon such dangerous locations as farms at harvest time and car body shops, where they have used force, and in some cases beaten, immigrants and citizens alike.

With his mélange of ICE, FBI, DEA and — importantly — military agents and troops, Trump has finally succeeded in creating what he longed to establish during his first term: A huge, domestic militarized force answerable only to him and his cronies.

The nation has never had a national police force, let alone a lawless one that’s singularly committed to the political agenda of the president. While the rapidly growing ICE force is not yet operating as an authoritarian arm of a dictatorship, it is more than plausible that it could be transformed into that type of Gestapo-like “law enforcement” entity, as Thor Benson has argued.

In that regard, Trump has recently spoken about taking over one or more major cities, including New York, asserting that they need to be “straightened out.” While such Trumpian musings are dismissed by some, they must be viewed in the context of what amount to ongoing militarized invasions of several such municipalities.

Unpopular populism

Trump is frequently described as a “populist” leader, but few pundits address the definition of the term. Hitler and Mussolini were populists who took power without democratic mandates and quickly destroyed institutions. Likewise, there’s every reason to expect that Trump and his crew will attempt another coup given the increasing likelihood they’ll have a hard time winning again in free and fair elections.

While Trump did win the popular vote last year, his victory was narrow, and his popularity began to slide immediately after he took office. A current average of polls indicates he’s disapproved by around 52 percent of voters and approved by 44 percent. This is a near reversal of where Trump stood in January, when he (briefly) had net positive approval rating. Also, Trump’s approval on immigration, his signature issue in the 2024 race, has taken a huge tumble into negative territory, with as many as 51 percent of voters disapproving the gratuitous brutality and performative sadism they’ve witnessed in recent months.

Trump is losing the most ground with the independent voters who often determine the outcome of elections — his current disapproval rate among this critical cohort is nearly 61 percent. Likewise, his approval rating among Hispanic voters, who played a key role in the GOP’s success last year, has descended from negative two in February to as low as negative 26. All of this is predictably leading to a corresponding decline in Trump’s approval rating in several of the swing states that allowed him to prevail last year in the Electoral College.

Given that midterm elections are increasingly referendums on the party in power — and considering that the GOP has devolved into little more than a personality cult — it’s all but certain that the 2026 midterms (assuming they are remotely free and fair) will be determined by the electorate’s souring view of Trump’s governance. There’s also increasing reason to believe that voters’ opinions of Trump’s regime will be even more negative by November 2028, when the GOP presidential nominee will almost certainly run as Trump’s anointed successor. That’s because the policies Trump is pursuing are both increasingly unpopular and wildly destructive.

Trump talked a big game on the campaign trail about lowering costs for consumers. Instead, his economic “policies” have focused nearly exclusively on two areas: an increasingly irrational and likely illegal tariff regime, and the expansion of tax cuts heavily favoring the very rich (paid for in part by slashing healthcare coverage and food support for low-income people). Both of these were centerpieces of the regressive reconciliation bill he signed into law earlier this month.

A major midterm loss is hardly unusual for a president, particularly one in his final term in office. After Trump’s unpopular 2017 tax cuts and his failed effort to repeal the ACA the following year, the Republican Party (especially House Republicans) took a drubbing in the 2018 midterms. If, as seems increasingly likely, the economy is in a downturn a year from now, Republican losses in November 2026 could be even worse. Particularly if the midterms turn out badly for the GOP, Trump and his cronies will inevitably begin to fear the consequences of a loss at the polls in the next presidential election and to consider their options.

Given the already massive scale of criminality in the Trump regime from the White House on down, Trump and all of his cronies have even more reason to be concerned about the prospect of being held to account. Additionally, as Anne Applebaum recently observed, Trump’s massive expansion of executive powers will make the prospect of a Democratic president all the more frightening for the members of the administration. They will have every reason to expect that a Democratic successor to Trump in the White House will use the newly enhanced powers of the office to hold Trump and company accountable in ways they didn’t during the Biden years. Against that backdrop, Trumpers may consider ensuring the victory of Trump’s designated successor in 2028 to be essential as a matter of self-preservation.

As anyone who lived through January 6 remembers, Trump and his cronies have already shown themselves willing to attempt to hold on to power illegally. More recently, by pardoning the J6 insurrectionists en masse, Trump took a major step toward legitimizing right-wing coup schemes, much as Hitler rendered his failed Munich putsch into an event worthy of annual celebration.

 Therefore, it is not only possible, but must be viewed as likely that in the wake of an 2028 electoral loss, Trumpists will take every step available to them to maintain control of the White House — including, if necessary, illegal ones.

But by then, Trump and his crew will have new tools at their disposal, including a beefed up ICE that will include large phalanxes of masked thugs who are experienced in using violence at the president’s behest. Thus, if the time comes for Trumpers to effectuate yet another post-election coup, they will have a ready and willing militarized federal police force to back them up and will not have to rely on a ragtag array of right-wing tourists.

While many are currently rightly concerned about the impact Trump’s brutal “immigration crackdown” will have on undocumented persons, the danger of his creation of a massive, non-law-abiding federal police force could extend far beyond the immigration. Congress has just handed the coup leader in the White House new, dangerous tools that he and his cohorts could use in their next attempt to overturn the nation’s democracy once and for all.

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