Trump Whips Up the Deplorables at Another Rally

[Content Note: Nativism; border militarization; stochastic terrorism.]

Last night in Florida, Donald Trump continued his campaign of stochastic terrorism, railing against undocumented immigrants, the migrant caravan, and birthright citizenship before a crowd of hate-swelled seethers.

Philip Rucker at the Washington Post reports:

Trump said illegal immigration was the driving issue of the midterm elections and vowed that with enlarged Republican congressional majorities he would achieve his immigration priorities, including eliminating the constitutional right to citizenship for those born in the United States to undocumented immigrant parents.

The president spoke at length about birthright citizenship, which he called "this crazy policy" that he said allowed "hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrant children" born on U.S. soil to automatically become U.S. citizens and therefore eligible for every privilege and benefit of citizenship.

..."The Constitution does not require it," the president said, because "illegal aliens are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States."

The standing crowd of several thousand roared with approval.

...Trump seemed to preview action at the border. "It's going to be very interesting over the next week," he told the rally crowd, though the commander in chief did not offer any details of what he might have in store.

"We're getting prepared for the caravan, folks," Trump said. "We've got a lot of rough people in those caravans. They are not angels. They are not." He called the migrants "the opposition," but added, "We're tougher than anybody."

Absolutely fucking chilling.

For days now, many people have been expressing shock that Trump would continue to use this incendiary rhetoric even after the mailbombs and the massacre at the Tree of Life Synagogue. But to imagine that such acts of violent hatred would give Trump pause is to fundamentally misunderstand that malice is the agenda.

For Trump, the fact that individuals are taking it upon themselves to harm his political opponents and marginalized people is proof that his words are working precisely as intended.

As I wrote in July:

For Trump, disseminating toxic bile from his Twitter account and legalizing untraceable weapons is the ideal strategy for "taking care of" the portions of the population he finds undesirable. He'll let his base handle it.

Which is not to say, of course, that there will not be state violence. There certainly will be; there already is at the border and in prisons, and this will continue.

But the Trump Regime is doing everything they can to empower their base to commit eliminationist violence, against marginalized people and dissidents — and to do so legally, thus avoiding the pitfalls of genocidal regimes: No state-sanctioned mass killing centers; no mass graves. Just Trump loyalists murdering "undesirables."

"I'm quite certain there are people who will find that totally implausible," I added. But here we are.

And it's going to continue. Trump is doing everything he can to make sure of that, with haste and without hesitation.

* * *

Relatedly: Oliver Laughland at the Guardian: "Donald Trump has tweeted a racially inflammatory video falsely accusing Democrats of allowing a man who murdered two police officers in California into the country. ...The video falsely claims: 'Illegal immigrant, Luis Bracamontes, killed our people! ...Democrats let him into our country ...Democrats let him stay.' It has drawn comparisons to the notorious 'Willie Horton' campaign adverts released in support of George HW Bush's 1988 election campaign. ...But the Horton adverts were not directly endorsed by the Bush campaign, unlike the video published by Trump yesterday."