Trump’s dystopian vision in real time

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Washington, DC – Below is a column by Maribel Hastings from America’s Voice en Español translated to English from Spanish. It ran in several Spanish-language media outlets earlier this week:

Just as Donald Trump uses immigration as an excuse to justify extremist policies that seek to consolidate his authoritarian vision, he is now using crime in the District of Columbia to declare a state of emergency, federalize the city’s police force, and deploy the National Guard.

In both cases, Trump is declaring “emergencies” where none exist to continue expanding his powers, undermining the Constitution, our rights, and democracy itself.

There was and is no “invasion” at the border with Mexico that justifies the militarization of immigration policy and the abuses and violations of due process and individual liberties through indiscriminate raids and summary deportations.

Similarly, the violent crime rate in the federal capital is at its lowest level in 30 years, according to the Department of Justice itself, based on figures provided by the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD).

According to the Department of Justice press release dated January 3, 2025: “The total number of violent crimes in the District of Columbia in 2024 has fallen by 35% compared to 2023 and is the lowest in more than 30 years…Homicides are down 32%; robberies are down 39%; armed vehicle thefts are down 53%; and assaults with dangerous weapons are down 27% compared to 2023 levels.”

But “Big Brother” Trump twists the truth to suit his agenda and, in true Orwellian fashion, wants to convince us that 2+2=5. The real goal is to exercise control and erode civil liberties and institutions in his flirtation with authoritarianism.

In the case of immigration, it is a declared war against immigrants of color, but also against authorized residents and citizens of color. His eagerness to whitewash a multiracial society even leads him to arrest citizens using racial profiling. Speaking Spanish, no less than in Southern California, is a sign, according to Trump’s ICE, that a person may be undocumented.

For its part, the takeover of DC also has racial and political overtones, as it is a predominantly African American and Democratic city. As he did in Los Angeles, a predominantly Hispanic and Democratic city, Trump declares false emergencies to activate the National Guard without request or necessity, to justify abuses of power and escalate the use of the military in civil society.

Does anyone believe that Trump cares about crime? One of the most violent incidents the District of Columbia has seen in recent years was the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol by Trump’s angry mobs who wanted to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 victory. Those mobs, driven by Trump’s lie that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him, attacked police officers, destroyed property, desecrated the Capitol, were convicted of their crimes, and many were serving time in prison. But when Trump took office in 2025, he pardoned them and even called them “patriots” and “hostages.”

This “champion” of law and order operates in a bizarro world that is the opposite of normal.

His announcement was riddled with falsehoods and misinformation: “The murder rate in Washington today is higher than that of Bogotá, Colombia; Mexico City, or some of the places that you hear about as being the worst places on Earth. It’s much higher,” Trump said.

It’s an attempt to exploit the fears of specific sectors of the population, even though the statistics contradict the president’s claims. Let us remember that he also justified his tariff war based on an economic “emergency” that did not exist until he created it himself.

He declared an energy emergency to get rid of all the environmental protections and regulations adopted by previous Democratic administrations to give fossil fuel producers carte blanche to drill.

Trump’s dystopian vision has already manifested itself in real time in Los Angeles, Washington, DC, and has other Democratic cities in its sights. And he has only been in power for seven months.

The original Spanish version is here.