Yet Another Futile Gesture

Last week at Fort Bragg, N.C., Donald Trump addressed the troops. The President was marking the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army. It was more like a Trump rally, like he was enjoining the enthusiastic young soldiers to be part of Team Trump. And yes, undoubtedly, it is good graphics for a president to have the backing of the military.

“You,” asked President Trump, “think this crowd would have showed up for Biden?” Taking its cue, the audience booed the idea.

“No Kings Day” was the left’s protest to counter President Trump and his policies. In the WSJ, Kimberley Strassel explains how the left’s planned events were to symbolize a rejection of the president’s “inhumane” deportation policies.

The mobs are throwing bricks and frozen water bottles at cops, destroying immigrant-owned businesses, and blocking people trying to use freeways to get to hospitals or jobs. The TV screens drip in images of vandalized buildings, flaming streets, Mexican flags. None of this attracts Americans to the cause, to the extent today’s professional anarchists even have one.

Never mind that the left refuses to condemn the lawlessness. Even on the basic question of public order, the left refuses to fully acknowledge the lawlessness.

In an 8-1/2-minute televised address, California Governor Gavin Newsom chastised the “several dozen” rioters engaged in bad behavior. Newsom’s speech was a barrage against the president’s “reckless,” “traumatizing” decision to call in the federal reinforcement, and his “assault” on “democracy,” reports Ms. Strassel.

Political memories are short, but none more fleeting than that of the Democratic collective. We’ve been doing this for nearly a decade, and always to the left’s detriment.

Kimberley Strassel takes readers on a brief walk down protest lane:

In the opening months of Mr. Trump’s first presidency, the “resistance” staged the Women’s March, airport protests against his travel ban, demonstrations against pipeline projects, a Day Without Latinos, a Day Without Immigrants, Not My President’s Day, Resist Trump Tuesday, protests for transgender rights, a Day Without a Woman, a Tax March (April 15), a March for Science and May Day protests. Aside from a few images of ladies in funny pink hats howling at the sky, do you remember any of it?

Certainly, readers are curious: did they misstate aims? The left’s display didn’t move the Trump White House to abandon a single policy, but it was effective in shoring up Trump loyalty and inspiring Republicans to tune out criticism. Ditto the 2020 demonstrations.

What began as opposition to police brutality quickly morphed into violent mobs railing against “systemic racism” and demanding “social justice.” This didn’t get Joe Biden elected; Mr. Trump’s handling of Covid did. But the forces those protests unleashed—cultural and economic progressivism gone wild—put Mr. Trump back into office four years later.

Americans Sour on the Status Quo

No King’s Day was narrowly focused on the left’s blueprint gone wild, which the rest of the country either ignored or resented. The most successful US protests have been backed with a moral banner: women’s suffrage, civil rights, peace in Vietnam. Today’s protests put forward a similar claim—that Mr. Trump is callously deporting migrants, picking on laborers, and separating families. But it was the left’s own policies – open borders – that led millions of migrants to engulf the country and to sour Americans on the status quo.

A Pew Research Center study from March found that 83% of Americans feel that “all” or “some” illegal aliens should be deported, with the largest levels of support for returning violent criminals, nonviolent criminals and those who arrived in the country the past four years. (The numbers fall when discussing migrants who have jobs, kids or an American spouse.) This is Joe Biden’s legacy. A CBS news/YouGov poll last week showed 54% approval for Mr. Trump’s deportation policies—93% among Republicans.

As Trump’s political career approaches the 10-year mark, what does the left have to show for its messaging and tactics? Without set principles, its moral claim is squandered. Movement has become too radicalized and organized to settle for “peaceful protest.” Protest/riots guarantee that every “action” these days will be about the violence and destruction, not about the grievance.

Failed Tantrums 

KS wonders, how does this help Democrats? Weary America asks, is this all the left has? Only outrage?

The foot-stomping is unaccompanied by serious plans for immigration reform, or an outreach to Republicans on a way forward, or a discussion, or regret for the mistakes that led to their loss last November.

Democrats long ago hit zero output from their protests and continued digging a hole.

Until the party recognizes—and breaks—this cycle, they are leaving Mr. Trump the political field.