When the President Declares War on His Own People

“Hitler did not steal power. His people voted for him, and then he destroyed them.”

That was Pope Francis’s warning, and tonight it feels less like history and more like prophecy.

Because on September 27, 2025, Donald Trump, the president of the United States, posted a message that every single one of us should read with terror in our hearts.

Here is his post:

Full Force. Against us.

This isn’t just another unhinged Truth Social post. This is a declaration. A test. A trial run. A promise. This is how authoritarianism announces itself, not in secret meetings or whispers in backrooms, but out loud, in broad daylight, with the confidence that no one will stop it.

He is daring us to look away.
He is daring us to normalize it.
He is daring us to believe it’s just rhetoric.

And that’s how he wins. Not because he’s smart or strong, but because enough of us convince ourselves that he isn’t serious.

But he is.

He begins by calling Portland “war ravaged.” That is a lie. Portland is not a war zone. Portland is not rubble. Families live there, children go to school there, people are drinking coffee and walking their dogs and going to work. The city has challenges, like every city, but it is not “war ravaged.”

And if you’ve been to Portland, you know the truth. Violent crime is actually down compared to a decade ago. The city’s economy is recovering, with small businesses reopening and downtown foot traffic rising again after the effects of the pandemic, like all cities.

Families crowd into food truck pods on weekends, college students pack Powell’s bookstore, joggers fill the waterfront trail. It is not a battlefield. It is a living, breathing, functioning city. But he relies on the fact that his followers will never go see it for themselves. They’ll sit at home and swallow the images he feeds them. They’ll watch clips on Fox and think it’s reality. That’s how propaganda works. Show the same burned-out car from years ago, over and over, until it becomes the whole story. Invent an apocalypse, then crown yourself the savior.

And it isn’t random. When he calls Portland “war ravaged,” it isn’t just a lie, it’s a strategy. Notice it’s always Democratic cities. It’s Portland. It’s Chicago. It’s Philadelphia. It’s anywhere people vote blue, anywhere diversity is visible, anywhere protest is loudest.

He doesn’t point to Republican towns as “war zones,” even when crime is much higher. He paints Democratic cities as enemy territory. And his base believes him.

Because they don’t verify what he says. They don’t think for themselves anymore. They don’t look at facts, or crime statistics, or the actual state of these cities. They accept his words as truth because they want to. Because it fits the narrative they’ve been fed for years, that these blue cities are corrupt, dangerous, un-American, filled with enemies who deserve to be controlled.

That’s how propaganda works. Repeat the lie enough times, and people stop questioning it. Repeat it enough times, and when he says “war ravaged,” millions nod their heads and say yes.

And that is what makes it even more dangerous. Because once his supporters believe our cities are war zones, they will accept war being waged on them. They will applaud the troops in the streets. They will cheer the chainsaw cutting down the forest, convinced the noise means safety.

But what they forget is that he will eventually come for their cities too. Nowhere will be safe. His endgame isn’t just Portland or Chicago or Philadelphia. His endgame is power. His endgame might just be the whole country turned into a war zone, one giant battlefield where dissent is crushed and obedience is mandatory. That is what authoritarian leaders do. They do not stop with their enemies. They eventually devour their own.

Then he says ICE facilities are “under siege.” By Antifa. By “domestic terrorists.” This, too is a lie. Antifa is not an organization. It has no headquarters, no leaders, no army. It is a label slapped on anyone he doesn’t like. It is a word that lets him turn protestors into terrorists, citizens into enemies.

And we’ve seen how loosely that label is thrown around. Journalists have been called Antifa. Veterans at protests have been called Antifa. Teenagers with signs. Moms standing in front of federal buildings. Anyone who resists him can suddenly be branded as part of this shadowy, made-up army. That’s the danger. Because once the enemy is undefined, anyone can be declared part of it.

Because here’s the truth: once you invent an enemy, you can put anyone in that category. That’s how authoritarian regimes work. That’s how they silence the people they most fear. By calling them terrorists.

And then there’s the part that chilled me to my core: he called Pete Hegseth the “Secretary of War.” That office hasn’t existed in America since 1947. But Trump, the self-proclaimed “peacekeeping” president who brags about having “saved us from seven wars in just eight months” (another piece of Trump propaganda he repeats constantly), is now casually announcing a Secretary of War instead of a Secretary of Defense.

Titles matter. They shape how people think. They signal intent. Trump didn’t make a mistake with his choice of words. He chose that word on purpose. He has been threatening to use military power against Americans for years, and now he is naming his own “Secretary of War” as if it were normal.

And words matter. There’s a reason we changed it. After World War II, America deliberately replaced “War” with “Defense.” Because the word “war” was too dangerous. Because “war” meant aggression, not protection. Because “war” made it sound normal to treat your own people as enemies and made our posture toward foreign countries feel like a threat without cause. “Defense” implies safety. “War” implies conquest.

When Trump brings that word back, it is not nostalgia. It is not an accident. It is preparation. Because “war” changes everything. War suspends rights. War justifies surveillance, detention, violence. War makes it normal to treat your own citizens like combatants. Say it enough times and people start to accept it. He is training us to hear “war” and think of our own neighbors. That’s not an accident. That’s not a slip of the tongue. That is a signal.

And then the final blow: “I am also authorizing Full Force, if necessary.” Full Force. Think about what that means. Batons. Tear gas. Rubber bullets. Tanks. Live ammunition. Full Force is not measured. It is not restrained. It is not careful. It is everything, all at once, unleashed against the people of Portland. Against Americans.

And we have to ask the hard question: does this mean he is okaying lethal force? Because “full force” and “by all means necessary” are not rhetorical flourishes when they come from a commander. They are an invitation. They are a license. They are a warning that anything up to and including deadly force is on the table. Soldiers hear those words, and history shows us what happens next: in places where leaders ordered security forces to act “by all means necessary,” the result was live fire on unarmed civilians.

And I want to say this directly to Portland, and to any city he tries to target next: do not give him what he wants. He is baiting you. He is daring you to respond with violence, because that is the excuse he craves. That is what will give him permission to unleash fury like we have never seen before. He wants the images of chaos, he wants the broken glass, he wants the fire, because then he can say, “See? I told you it was a war zone.” Do not hand him the match he is begging for.

Think about Kent State in 1970. Four students killed by National Guardsmen during a protest. They weren’t rioters. They weren’t armed. They were students. And they were gunned down because authority decided protest was too much of a threat. When Trump says “full force,” he is laying the groundwork for another Kent State, but bigger.

And once that line is crossed, there is no going back.

And where does it stop? If Portland today, why not Detroit tomorrow? Why not Philadelphia next week? Why not every city that votes blue, every community that resists him, every person who dares to protest? That’s the danger in those words. They aren’t limited to one place. They are a blueprint for everywhere.

This is why I say it’s a trial run. He wants to see how far he can push before anyone pushes back. He wants to know if Democrats will respond with more than sternly worded letters. He wants to know if the press will treat this as the bombshell it is or just another headline in the endless churn of Trump chaos. He wants to know if the public will shrug and scroll past it.

Because this isn’t only about Portland. This is a test. He is measuring us. He is watching to see how desensitized we’ve already become to the idea of soldiers in the streets. To the idea of military force against our own citizens. To the idea that “full force” is a normal phrase for a president to use against the people he swore to serve. Every time we fail to react, every time we tell ourselves it’s just words, every time we minimize, he learns that he can go further. He learns that we will tolerate more.

And if there is no outcry, if there is no resistance, then he will do it again. And again. And again. Until soldiers in the streets of American cities are not shocking anymore, but expected. Until “Full Force” becomes normal. That’s the danger. That’s the plan. He is testing the limits of our outrage, and if we don’t pass this test, he will keep escalating until there are no limits left.

And here’s where my own anger comes in. Because Democrats are still playing by the rules. They are still acting like this is a normal political fight, like the system is intact, like compromise and procedure will save us. It won’t. We don’t have the luxury of pretending this is politics as usual. He is rewriting the rules in real time. He is bending the law to his will. He is testing every boundary to see which ones hold and which ones break. And if we keep showing up to this fight with old school tactics and procedures while he shows up with soldiers, we will lose.

And let’s be clear: there are supposed to be legal guardrails. The Posse Comitatus Act was written to stop presidents from using the military as a domestic police force. The Insurrection Act was meant to be invoked only in the gravest of emergencies. But Trump is showing us how fragile those laws are. They only work if leaders respect them. They only hold if institutions enforce them. And he has made clear that he does not respect the law. He sees it as an obstacle to bulldoze. So when he says “full force,” we have to assume he means everything, up to and including lethal force.

And I wish his followers could see that this is not an us versus them issue. It is an us versus him issue. Because he’s coming for them too. No one is safe in a country where “full force” becomes the law of the land. And that’s the tragedy. People who believe they are protected will be the first to discover they are targets.

They are cheering for their own destruction. Trees applauding the chainsaw. Logs lobbying for the bonfire. Leaves begging for the rake. A forest celebrating the wildfire. Citizens smiling while the walls of their own homes are knocked down around them. Parents handing their children over to the very machine that will take their futures.

That is what we are watching. And history shows us what comes next: once the chainsaw has done its work, there are no trees left to applaud. Once the fire burns through the forest, there is nothing left but ash.

And tonight I write this as someone who loves her country, but is deeply concerned for its future and survival. This is tyranny from above. And it is dangerous because it wears the cloak of authority. It pretends to be lawful. It pretends to be official. It pretends to be government doing its job. That’s how dictatorships are born. Out in the open, with enough people convinced it’s legitimate.

And the worst part is that he’s not hiding any of it. He doesn’t have to. He can post it on social media and tens of thousands of people will like it, re-share it, cheer it on. That is how far we’ve fallen. That is how normalized his authoritarianism has become. He no longer has to whisper. He can shout it from the rooftops. And too many people will clap.

Which brings me back to Pope Francis. Hitler didn’t steal power. He was given it. He was voted in. And then he destroyed his people. That is what Trump is telling us he will do. He is saying the quiet part out loud. He is promising destruction. And unless we stop him, he will deliver it.

So what do we do? We stop pretending this is politics. We stop pretending this is normal. We stop pretending the rules haven’t already been shattered. We use every legal, creative, democratic tool we have left to resist him. We fight with words, with organizing, with ballots, with lawsuits, with protests, with relentless truth-telling. We don’t get tired. We don’t look away. We don’t convince ourselves it isn’t serious. Because it is. Because it could end everything.

And let’s make it tangible. Call your representatives and demand they condemn this. Support local journalism that still dares to tell the truth. Volunteer for voter registration drives. Donate to legal defense groups fighting for civil liberties. Show up at peaceful protests. Talk to your neighbors who are tuning out. Share the truth relentlessly, because silence is surrender.

If we don’t, here’s what will happen: protest will be criminalized. Free speech will be silenced. The press will be muzzled. Dissent will be treated as terrorism. The military will be turned inward, unleashed on its own people. And once that line is crossed, it will not be uncrossed.

That’s why this one post he wrote matters so much. Because it’s not just words. It’s a declaration. It’s a signal. It’s a promise of violence against us.

And I refuse to be silent. I refuse to accept that this is our future.

I will fight. For democracy. For my children. For the America that still exists in the hearts of millions of us who refuse to surrender to this madness.

And I hope you will too.

I’ll see you tomorrow,
Heather