Obama told Marc Maron on the “WTF” podcast that it wasn’t controversial for him to go to other countries and say, “You know what? It’s a good idea for militaries to be under civilian control,” because when a military can use force against its own people, it becomes corrupt.
He added that the Trump administration is trying to go around laws that stop the military from doing police work.
Obama said, “That is a genuine effort to weaken how we have understood democracy.”
Trump’s actions to use the National Guard in ways that go beyond his authority have gotten worse in recent weeks.
Cities like Portland and Chicago have become key examples of his authoritarian tendencies. His ability to do this is still being challenged in court. Recently, a federal appeals court removed a judge’s block on Trump’s attempt to federalize the Illinois National Guard, but kept the block on his ability to send it to Chicago.
Obama called the whole situation a farce.
He said it’s clear that the president, who is a convicted criminal, isn’t really trying to fight “lawlessness.” Instead, he’s trying to take more power for himself, scare his political enemies, and make the American people used to seeing armed troops on the streets.
He said, “If I had sent in the National Guard into Texas and said, ‘There’s a lot of problems in Dallas, a lot of crime there, and I don’t care what Governor Abbott says, I’m going to take over law enforcement because I think things are out of control,’ it’s mind-boggling to me how Fox News would have responded.”
He also said, “We don’t want masked people with rifles and machine guns patrolling our streets.
We want cops who know the neighborhood and the kids around them, and that’s how we keep the peace around here.”
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