Monday, the Department of Justice headed by attorney general William Barr designated New York City, Seattle, and Portland as “anarchist jurisdictions” accusing those cities as “jurisdictions permitting violence and destruction of property”.
Department of Justice website:
The U.S. Department of Justice today identified the following three jurisdictions that have permitted violence and destruction of property to persist and have refused to undertake reasonable measures to counteract criminal activities: New York City; Portland, Oregon; and Seattle, Washington. The Department of Justice is continuing to work to identify jurisdictions that meet the criteria set out in the President’s Memorandum and will periodically update the list of selected jurisdictions as required therein.
The list was published on DOJ’s website today in response to President Trump’s memorandum of September 2, 2020, entitled “Memorandum on Reviewing Funding to State and Local Government Recipients That Are Permitting Anarchy, Violence, and Destruction in American Cities.”
Furthermore, the DOJ set a number of “criteria” for designating a city as an “anarchist jurisdiction”:
- Whether a jurisdiction forbids the police force from intervening to restore order amid widespread or sustained violence or destruction.
- Whether a jurisdiction has withdrawn law enforcement protection from a geographical area or structure that law enforcement officers are lawfully entitled to access but have been officially prevented from accessing or permitted to access only in exceptional circumstances, except when law enforcement officers are briefly withheld as a tactical decision intended to resolve safely and expeditiously a specific and ongoing unlawful incident posing an imminent threat to the safety of individuals or law enforcement officers.
- Whether a jurisdiction disempowers or defunds police departments.
- Whether a jurisdiction unreasonably refuses to accept offers of law enforcement assistance from the Federal Government.
- Any other related factors the Attorney General deems appropriate.
“Any other related factors the Attorney General deems appropriate” is incredibly ambiguous but is one of the many problems with these designations as this opens the door to continued neofascist approaches by the Trump administration.
First, this move by Trump and his sycophants at the DOJ is nothing more than a strategy to divide the country along the lines of citizens who support Donald Trump and those who do not. Those who do not will suffer the consequences of losing federal funding in a country whose government is supposed to represent all citizens.
Second, this was nothing more than a political move implemented on cities in states who really have no bearing on the upcoming election. New York City, Seattle, and Portland are all in states who certainly won’t be going red in November. Meanwhile, cities like Kenosha and Minneapolis reside in states (Wisconsin and Minnesota) reside in swing states that can still be won within these next few weeks.
Lastly, not since the era of McCarthyism during the mid 20th century has the United States trended so far in the direction of political suppression of a particular political ideology. Notably, anarchism has always been one of the most misunderstood political terms in American history, however, I fail to believe that government officials like William Barr are completely ignorant to its proper definition. Using it in such a nefarious and false sense only adds to any influence when it comes to public perception and further opening the door for additional suppression of those who identify as anarchists by the state. This continues to become another dangerous precedent set by the U.S. government.