By Joe LAURIA
It shouldn't fall to armed Americans to take on the White House militia because the governor can't use the National Guard to force ICE out of Minnesota, writes Joe Lauria.
After the second execution of a U.S. citizen by the White House militia in the streets of Minneapolis, the governor of Minnesota demanded ICE agents leave the state. But the U.S. Constitution leaves him with few options to make it happen.
Though the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a governor, and not the White House, controls National Guard troops operating inside a state, the Constitution's so-called Supremacy Clause means that Gov. Tim Walz cannot deploy Minnesota's 13,000 troops to stop the 3,000 ICE agents from terrorizing the population.
Such a dramatic move by a disciplined force to arrest or disarm the ragtag ICE agents would of course risk civil conflict if ICE did not back down.
After the second ICE murder this month, Walz demanded: "The President must end this operation. Pull the thousands of violent, untrained officers out of Minnesota. Now."
But according to the Constitution, all he can do is plead directly with the White House, which he did in a phone call with Donald Trump on Tuesday; or ask a federal judge to temporarily halt the ICE deployment, which Minnesota has done, arguing that it has become an illegal federal occupation of the state in violation of the 10th amendment.
Otherwise, under the Constitution's Article 6, Clause 2 - the so-called Supremacy Clause - federal agents can operate in any state without the consent of state or local government. All the locals have been able to do so far is refuse to cooperate with ICE.
Since ICE is a paramilitary force controlled by the civilian Department of Homeland Security and not the Pentagon, the Posse Comitatus Act, which bans the military from domestic law enforcement, cannot be invoked to evict ICE from Minnesota.
These legal protections have emboldened White House officials to continue the operation and to investigate the mayor and governor rather than the shooters, as well as condemn the victims of ICE's brutality instead of the ICE agents inflicting it.
After the deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good, Trump officials like Stephen Miller, the deputy chief of staff, and DHS Director Kristi Noem accused the murdered of being "terrorists."
Miller also accused Pretti of being an "assassin" because he brought a legally obtained handgun to the protest against ICE agents. Citizen videos shot of the killing clearly show Pretti being disarmed of his pistol before he is murdered execution style by two agents as other agents pin him defenselessly to the ground. Several bullets were pumped into him after he became motionless.
Vilifying Pretti as an assassin because he was legally carrying a gun has upset a group normally 100 percent behind Republican governments: the gun lobby.
If the Constitution bars the governor from using his troops to repel an invading paramilitary army, it allows the citizenry to be armed and to take action only in self-defense, a not far-fetched development that would be best avoided.
Local police arresting ICE agents would not only invite altercation, but federal prosecutors are withholding evidence in the Good case, making it difficult for the state to charge an agent. A federal judge has ordered DHS to preserve evidence in the Pretti killing.
The egregiousness of these murders, especially of Pretti pinned to the ground - disarmed of his legally-owned gun - is a massive test for the identity of the United States. What kind of a country will it allow itself to become?
How far will it tolerate a federal authority waging war on the population ? Is there a line government can cross to trigger a response from elected leaders ? (Such a line was never crossed in their support for an allied nation committing genocide.)
The way to stop ICE is not to resort to vigilante violence, but for Congress to defund it and for public pressure, especially from his gun-loving base, to get Trump to back down. Already we see some Democratic lawmakers saying they won't vote to fund ICE - and may shut down Congress to achieve that - and Republican Senators like Ted Cruz are asking for an investigation into Pretti's death.
It is a moment of truth for the United States.
Original article: consortiumnews.com