First Came the Chaos; Next Comes the Retribution

The Felon has been back in office just shy of three months, yet it seems more like three years given the chaos being visited to federal government agencies and the ham handed manner in which fund is being cut to anything the Felon, Elon Musk, and/or the DOGE hacks - some of whom are seemingly not too bright since environmental bio-diversity grants were cut seemingly because some cretin thought it involved DEI - dislike.  The result has been chaos in many agencies and some worry that Social Security could collapse inflicting disaster on many older voters, including those who stupidly voted for the Felon.  Just as ominous are the signs that the Felon's regime is out to employ Putin like tactics (no one has "fallen" from windows at least yet)to silence critics through bogus investigations and prosecutions or simple intimidation. Frighteningly, too many Americans (including some individuals I know) seem blind to the reality that as a fascist dictatorship takes control, the circle of targets expands and that ultimately, no one is totally safe. The Felon wants to send "homegrown" criminals to El Salvador, with the Felon, of course, deciding who is a criminal.  American friends living abroad are looking on in horror at what is unfolding in America and some have urged us to devise an escape plan "just in case" things continue to worsen. Indeed, I have begun the inquiry of securing an other passport through my ancestry and we are nixing for now travel plans in 2026 to conserve funds for whatever we may face, especially since LGBT rights and individuals are targets of Project 2025 which the Felon continues to implement.  A piece in The Atlantic looks at what may be coming next:

During the first two months of his presidency, the prevailing theme of Trump’s White House was the Elon Musk–led attempt to drastically cut federal agencies. The purge is incomplete—the U.S. DOGE Service continues to seek cuts at more agencies, and litigation has slowed or blocked some of the cuts—but we seem to have already moved into the next stage: revenge.

Trump took one of his most chilling steps toward retribution last week, when he directed the government to investigate two officials in his first administration: Chris Krebs, who headed the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, and Miles Taylor, who was chief of staff at the Department of Homeland Security. The reasons Trump is out to get these two men are clear enough. Krebs, whose work focused on election security, was fired for refusing to say that fraud tainted the 2020 presidential election; as I wrote back in November of that year, Trump targeted him “not because he did a bad job, but because he did too good a job and said so.” Taylor wrote a notable anonymous New York Times op-ed about administration officials resisting Trump, then published a book unmasking himself and worked to organize Republican opposition to Trump.

One might be tempted to think that Trump’s new orders rely on pretexts to target the duo, but they don’t even really bother: They’re pretty straightforward about the reasons. Trump is starting with a conclusion that the two men did something wrong and demanding the government work backwards to find some evidence to support it.

You don’t have to be a fan of either Krebs or Taylor to be alarmed by these actions, just as you don’t have to agree with Mahmoud Khalil’s views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to see why his detention is a danger to all Americans.

Any legal inquiries into Krebs and Taylor seem unlikely to go anywhere, beyond stripping their security clearance, which Trump has the power to do. But the two will have to hire lawyers, likely at significant cost, and go through the stress and fear of defending themselves. Even if they triumph, they will have been made examples; other would-be dissenters will see their travails and think twice before speaking, as Trump intends.

Trump has been quietly imposing retribution for some time, but the DOGE-led purges mean fewer longtime professionals who might object to or stand in the way of the latest revenge moves.

In January, the acting U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, Ed Martin, fired several attorneys who had prosecuted cases related to the January 6, 2021, riots. Trump also stripped security details for officials who had served in his first administration but later criticized him—even though some face credible death threats from Iran because of actions they took on Trump’s behalf.

Meanwhile, in a sort of inverse retribution, the administration is rewarding its loyal allies. The Justice Department is pushing for the release of a man convicted of lying to FBI agents about the Biden family.

One prominent target for Trump’s retribution has been law firms. Trump has gone after a series of major firms simply because current or former attorneys there were involved in things Trump hated: his felony conviction in Manhattan, Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, Special Counsel Jack Smith’s work. Last week, he also assailed a firm that has represented plaintiffs in defamation cases related to 2020 election fraud. As the Atlantic contributor Paul Rosenzweig writes, the speed with which some of these firms have surrendered is deplorable.

In the settlements, these firms have agreed to provide a combined total of about $1 billion in “pro bono” work supporting causes the president backs. As The Wall Street Journal reports, these deals have been negotiated by Trump’s personal lawyer Boris Epshteyn, who is not a government employee—making clear that these causes relate to Trump’s personal revenge rather than some legitimate governmental purpose.

But then, Trump has never seen much distinction between his own interests and the power of the government. For him, revenge isn’t just a welcome adjunct to controlling the levels of government. It’s the reason to control them.