Letters from an American - July 7, 2025

Episode Date: July 8, 2025

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Music July 7th, 2025. At about 10.30 this morning local time, heavily armed masked agents in trucks, armored vehicles, a helicopter, on foot and on horseback, accompanied by a gun mounted on a truck, raided the MacArthur Park area of Los Angeles. Journalist Mel Buer reported that agents from Customs and Border Patrol, or CBP, the National Guard, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, brought what she called a massive federal presence. Fox News channel personnel were embedded with the Raiders and broadcast throughout the operation,

suggesting that it was designed for the media as a show of force to intimidate opponents. CBP brought its own press team, and its people were also taking photos of bystanders. After Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass arrived and spoke with Border Patrol Chief Gregory Bovino, the agents left. It is not clear that there was a specific target for the raid or that anyone was arrested. Later, Bovino told Bill Mulugan of the Fox News Channel, I don't work for Karen Bass. Better get used to us now because this is going to be normal very soon. We will go anywhere, anytime we want in Los Angeles.

Immigrants' rights groups sued Bovino last week to block what they call an ongoing pattern and practice of flouting the Constitution and federal law during immigration raids. Steve Bannon of Military.com reports that about 70 National Guard troops have been deployed to the new detention facility in the Florida Everglades as the administration leans harder on the military to enforce its nationwide immigration crackdown. Unlike the National Guard troops, Trump federalized in Los Angeles, these troops are operating as state troops under Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Another 8,500 active duty and

National Guard troops are stationed along the border between the US and Mexico. The Trump administration is also sending 200 Marines to Florida to aid ICE, part of a push to increase deportations by using active duty troops. The US Marine Corps has launched a pilot program to station ICE agents at Camp Pendleton in California, Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia, and Marine Corps Base Hawaii. Sarah Rumpf-Whitten of Fox News writes that the plan is to strengthen security at those bases, although University of Tampa Defense Professor Abbie Hall Blanco pointed out, University of Tampa defense professor Abbie Hall Blanco pointed out, it gives kind of an odd impression that the Marine Corps is not handling its own security

sufficiently. Having known quite a few Marines in my time, I can't imagine that they would find that to be a particularly flattering interpretation. As Harvard sociologist Theda Scotchpole pointed out in Talking Points memo, it appears that officials in the Trump administration are using immigration as a way to establish a police state. Indeed, they are using the concept that presidents have control of foreign affairs as a way to work around the laws in place to prevent a dictatorship. In its 2024 Donald J. Trump v. United States decision, the Supreme

Court majority held that a former president has absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority, as well as presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts. In April 2025, the court specified that it considered foreign affairs to fall within a president's constitutional authority, writing in Nome v. Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia that the executive branch was owed deference in the conduct of foreign affairs. Although the framers of the constitution put the power to make laws in the conduct of foreign affairs. Although the framers of the Constitution

put the power to make laws in the hands of Congress, they divided power in foreign affairs between Congress and the President. Almost immediately, presidents began to assert their authority over foreign affairs, noting that the Constitution gave them power to appoint ambassadors and negotiate treaties and pointing to the president's role as commander-in-chief of the Army.

The branches have tussled over this power ever since, but as James Goldgeiger and Elizabeth N. Saunders wrote in Foreign Affairs, presidential power over foreign affairs has grown dramatically since 2000. After the attacks of September 11th, 2001, members of Congress were unwilling to appear soft on terror and so allowed President George W. Bush great leeway in the nation's war on terror, even after it became clear that Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003 was failing. In Foreign Affairs last month Saunders wrote that a lack of accountability for either the failures

of the Iraq war or the 2008 international financial crisis fed the idea that the president could make sweeping decisions about both foreign intervention and the international economy without check by Congress. On February 12, 2025, the Trump administration made clear that its members intended to expand Trump's power by pushing the boundaries of what foreign affairs entails. In an executive order, Trump claimed the Constitution vests the power to conduct foreign policy in the President of the United States. Trump's actual work in foreign affairs has been different from what he promised during his presidential campaign. His vow that he

could end Russia's war against Ukraine with one phone call has resulted only in Russian President Vladimir Putin's accelerating his attacks on Ukraine. As foreign affairs journalist Anne Applebaum wrote on July 4th in The Atlantic, it is clear that Putin believes he can conquer all of Ukraine because Trump is abandoning the long-standing U.S. bipartisan support for Ukraine and pivoting the U.S. to back Russia. Last week, the administration said it would not send Ukraine a large shipment of weapons already funded under President Joe Biden. It claimed that U.S. stockpiles of weapons are insufficient, a claim former Biden officials

and independent analysts contradict. Applebaum notes that Russia has interpreted the change as a sign that the US is ending its support for Ukraine. The US is also essentially lifting the economic sanctions that have hamstrung Russia's economy. By not adjusting sanctions to combat developing Russian workarounds, the administration is allowing Russia to rebuild its economy. In addition, the Trump administration has stopped countering Russian disinformation around the world, while Trump appointees, including Trump's main negotiator with Russia, Steve Witkoff, regularly parrot Russian propaganda. Trump's launching of strikes against Iran's nuclear weapon production sites, without input from Congress, earned pushback from Congress members who noted that the president's authority to launch emergency operations depends on an actual emergency.

Trump's own director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, told Congress in March that the intelligence community assessed Iran was not, in fact, building a nuclear weapon. Then Trump's claim that he had totally obliterated Iran's nuclear program turned out to be exaggerated, although as journalists questioned his statement, the administration doubled down on it. Today, Barack Ravid of Axios reported that Israeli officials believe Trump will greenlight further Israeli attacks on Iran. Trump has said twice since the U.S. strikes that the U.S. could attack Iran again if Iran

renews its nuclear program. But the claim to domestic power, based in the president's alleged right to control over foreign affairs, has fueled much of the administration's domestic agenda. The administration claimed the power to render undocumented Venezuelans to the notorious terrorist CICOT prison in El Salvador by arguing that the Venezuelan government was sending members of the MS-13 gang to invade the U.S. After wrongfully delivering Maryland man Kilmar Abrego Garcia to El Salvador in violation of a court order, the administration claimed courts could not order him returned to the U.S. because that order would interfere with Trump's ability to conduct foreign affairs.

Documents filed in court today said Salvadoran officials told the United Nations that the U.S. retained jurisdiction over the migrants it sent to El Salvador, undermining the administration's insistence that it has no control over migrants once they are out of U.S. territory. El Salvador simply had an agreement with the U.S. to use the Salvadoran prison system to detain U.S. prisoners, they said. In this context, the jurisdiction and legal responsibility for these persons lie exclusively with the competent foreign authorities, by virtue of international agreements signed and in accordance with the principles of sovereignty and international cooperation in criminal matters. In a lawsuit against the administration, Abrego Garcia says he was tortured in El Salvador,

severely beaten, deprived of sleep, inadequately fed, denied bathroom facilities, and tortured psychologically. He says he lost 31 pounds in two weeks. Today, the administration ended temporary protection from deportation for about 72,000 migrants from Honduras and another 4,000 from Nicaragua. The decision strips them of their legal status and echoes similar decisions made about migrants

from Afghanistan, Cameroon, Haiti, Nepal, and Venezuela. A federal court has blocked the early termination of protected status for Haitians. Letters from an American was written and read by Heather Cox Richardson. It was produced at Soundscape Productions, Dead in Massachusetts. Recorded with music composed by Michael Moss.