Emergency-Gate: Focus on Challenging the Premise of Trump’s Power

*neighborhood in southeast Baltimore

It keeps happening. Trump does something outrageous, something so unwarranted that in “the before times’ would constitute an abuse of power, and instead of solely focusing on that abuse, we follow him down the rabbit-hole of a trumped-up “emergency.” We are now four “emergencies” in during the eight months that Trump has been in office. Mainstream media sources only half-heartedly question each emergency. Instead they get right to the framing they feel more comfortable with: “Trump has a point.” “Some countries do take advantage of us on trade.” “Crime really is bad in Washington, D.C.” And the evergreen “how did the Democrats fail to get the jump on this issue when they had power?”

What is missing from media, from Democrats and even from the narratives adopted by some activists as they respond to Trump is a sustained and powerful refusal to play Trump’s power game on his terms. Trump pulls the fire alarm when there’s no fire so that he can take over the empty building. We end up talking about fire-preparedness. What are we doing? We had better sort out our ability to see the forest for the trees and to STAY ON MESSAGE about what’s really going on if we’re to challenge Trump’s excesses in the coming months.

Call him to account on the “emergency” designation. Remember when he offered up his homework to explain the trade emergency? It didn’t go well. Trump and his hyped-up sidekick Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick produced a chart that purported to show how we were “being taken advantage of by other countries.” The chart actually showed our trade deficit with several dozen countries. Trump appeared to think that a “trade deficit” means that we are “being cheated.” Every economist and half-sentient finance person watched the presentation in horror.[i] The Wall Street Journal referred to it as “the dumbest trade war in history.” [ii]

And sure enough it’s been a disaster. The real consequences of Trump’s pretend emergency are just beginning to be felt as farmers start feeling the consequences of lost buyers for their crops. Trump will be raiding the treasury for a bailout for those farmers any day now – just as he did in 2020.

Trump insistence on a migrant “emergency” – in which our lives were being endangered by murderers, rapists, and sociopaths (Hannibal Lechters) sent here from Latin Americans countries and the Congo, was used to justify an attempt to defy the express words of the Constitution guaranteeing birthright citizenship, and to launch a mass deportation initiative fueled by amped up ICE enforcement, and supplemented by the FBI and National Guard troops. That fake emergency has been the cover for the most inhumane and grotesque display of state power we have seen on U.S. soil in generations, as masked men (purporting to be federal agents, but who can tell?) have been unleashed to engage in widespread racial profiling, family separation, and kidnapping. Not to arrest violent criminals – but to disappear construction workers, landscapers, meat-packing workers, nannies, and restaurant busboys. The unconstitutionality of denying these kidnapped workers due process, of sending them to facilities that fail the 8^th Amendment’s ban on cruel & unusual punishment, or to foreign gulags to be disappeared, demonstrates how dangerously and consequentially the cover of “emergency” can be manipulated to destroy lives.

Then three weeks ago Trump announced a new emergency: crime in the District of Columbia.[iii] On this pretext President Trump ordered a military occupation of the nation’s capital, which Trump has said is a “crime-ridden mess.”[iv] Trump flagged his intention to do the same to other cities: Baltimore, Chicago, Oakland. All cities with Black mayors and large Black populations. All of the evidence – including the numbers from Trump’s own Department of Justice demonstrate that violent crime has fallen precipitously in the capital – to a thirty-year low in Washington, D.C.[v] Baltimore is seeing the lowest homicide rate in decades, and violent crime rates are in freefall.[vi]

What’s been disturbing is how so many media outlets, political pundits, and even some activists have taken the bait – focusing their narrative on crime in our cities. Of course there’s crime in all of those cities. But the rates of violent crime are higher in cities located in states like Alabama, Colorado, and Louisiana (all with Republican Governors), making it clear that crime-fighting is not Trump’s obsession. Still local news and national news outlets have taken to airing long drawn-out stories asking residents whether they think that their city could do more to stop violent crime. Obviously, the answer will always be yes. That is not really the question of the moment. The focus should be on what Trump is doing – the fact that he has broken a critically important norm by ordering a federal takeover of our nation’s capital, by threatening to do the same in other cities, and that given the absence of an emergency, his actions are likely unconstitutional.

With all that we have seen from President Trump, can we at this point, well into the second half of 2025, start from the premise that whatever Trump does is not for altruistic purposes? He is not interested in the price of groceries, or in the quality of art or museums. He cares not at all for history, or for the imaginary “beautiful Black ladies in Chicago” who he says have begged him to send the military. He has no interest in promoting peace between Russia and Ukraine. He does not want a strong NATO. He cares not a whit about whales, children with autism, veterans, healthcare, antisemitism, or the deficit. Do we get that yet? Can we agree that Trump uses these things – each of which raise issues that people of good faith wrestle with every day – as cover for the pursuit of his sole passionate interest?

Trump’s only sustained interest is the accumulation of power and money. He is also a narcissist. That means he wants to impose himself on every aspect of our society – as dictators do. He wants to run the world and the Kennedy Center. He wants the Nobel Peace Prize, and the World Cup trophy. He wants to takeover Greenland, and protect the integrity of the “soft, beautiful, stone”[vii] on the new White House patio.

Concerns about crime in cities and suburbs across America are real and serious. They are not new. I lived in New York for the first 30 years of my life and since then in both Baltimore and New York. I work in Washington, D.C. I care about crime. Everyone who lives and works in those cities cares as well. Crime is the subject of local discussion, activism, and demand. So is the state of our schools. And the lack of affordable housing. And public transportation.

The mere fact that a would-be despot claims an interest in crime does not mean we should welcome his effort to grab political and geographic control of our cities with military might. We do not surrender our citizenship or the sovereignty of our cities and states because of crime rates. We should never become comfortable with the National Guard walking our streets in a time of peace. They are not a crime-fighting force – even if crime was as bad as Trump claims. That they are now in the business of “beautification” in D.C. – mulching and weeding - only confirms the absurdity of Trump’s pretext.

What the media, pundits, pollsters, Democrats, and activists should be doing is sounding the alarm, not feeding Trump’s deflections. Asking Maryland Governor Wes Moore, as one reporter did on a Sunday morning program this week “but don’t you want the help fighting crime?” is utterly irresponsible. If Putin offered to help Zelensky fight crime in Ukraine would the media be so naïve as to focus on crime rates in Kyiv?

We know what Trump is. We don’t have to pretend anymore. In fact, we can’t afford to play along with his narrative. Or we will be the ones who end up someday saying, as some said about Hitler “well, he did build the autobahn.” Making the trains run on time is what authoritarians do. Whether he has authority to take over those trains, which citizens he will allow to ride the trains, and who or what those trains will be used to transport are the questions we ask in a democracy.

As the Democrats prepare to return from recess, they must take care not to cede to the narrative of “emergency.” Democrats have no reason to be on their back heels about crime. Violent crime fell precipitously after we emerged fully from COVID and got our bearings. Democratic Mayors like Brandon Scott in Baltimore are showing that a city can make progress on violent crime – not by flooding the streets with cops – but by beefing up social services and programs for young people.[viii] He and others like him should be applauded. And national media outlets should admit that they missed that story. Had the fall of violent crime in D.C. and Baltimore been given as much prominence as stories about its increase are always given in the months prior to Trump’s emergency declaration, Trump’s pretext would have been dead on arrival.

Is the crime problem “solved” in any major city in our country? No. It is serious and must remain a top priority. People want to feel safe. But when Trump cuts out of the budget funding for the kind of services that helps address the root causes of crime, and when Trump frees 600 criminals in one day who stormed the Capitol hunting for the Speaker of the House and the Vice-President, Democrats should feel that they stand on firm ground.

The Republican Party of 2025 is not the party of law and order. They are the Party of lawlessness and impunity. They are in no position to scold Democrats about crime.

So as Congress returns from recess, let me give some advice. Don’t back down.

Repeat after me. There is no trade emergency. There is no migrant emergency. There is no crime emergency. There is only a chilling and determined power grab by the most dangerous man to every occupy the White House. Eyes on 2026.

---

[i] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/03/trumps-idiotic-and-flawed-tariff-calculations-stun-economists

[ii] https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-tariffs-25-percent-mexico-canada-trade-economy-84476fb2?mod=article_inline

[iii] https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/08/declaring-a-crime-emergency-in-the-district-of-columbia/

[iv] https://time.com/7309133/dc-crime-stats-trump-national-guard/

[v] https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/pr/violent-crime-dc-hits-30-year-low#:~:text=WASHINGTON%20%2D%20Total%20violent%20crime%20for,Graves.

[vi] https://www.cbsnews.com/baltimore/news/maryland-baltimore-city-violent-crime-homicides/

[vii] https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/trump-shames-stupid-workers-cracked-154927436.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAF5kCIkq1u0pUCgWgXGMj57TEx5XVmeRI9W2r45szwCndy30l7ZmOcrLugcf85ar-9_DGrxQUdjT0KruC68PtWwK6yc3EI3YSUdc9kiyr3MQ_JudyZlDxTRNHoeIaPphoI2BV80Gv-0My7CxtAnNk4DP8HTBkTb8DhqlpFDcYjcA

[viii] https://www.cbsnews.com/baltimore/news/baltimore-mayor-brandon-scott-maryland-crime-budget-freddie-gray/; https://baltimorefishbowl.com/stories/walter-p-carter-3rd-new-pool-to-baltimore-city/; https://www.wbaltv.com/article/carroll-park-neighborhood-rec-center/61856789 ; https://www.thebanner.com/community/middle-branch-fitness-wellness-center-cherry-hill-Z6EVB4SRD5F2HLK6YPJC2F2OYQ/