By Alex Gonzalez
Trump is threatening to deploy the U.S. military to blue states and cities under the pretext of protecting federal buildings during ICE raids. In reality, this appears to be an attempt to harass and intimidate American citizens.
In this op-ed, Ron Brownstein argues that:
Extending the pattern I wrote about this morning: defining blue cities and states, and their elected leaders, as outside the core American republic to accustom the public to harsh tactics against them, including arrests of public officials & military deployments on city streets.
“Trump portrays Democratic-led states and cities as un-American, aiming to normalize treating them like the enemy.” and “ Trump sees militarized immigration enforcement as a way to crack “the Democrat Power Center” in big blue cities.
He is right in many ways: Donald Trump is using immigration not merely as a policy platform, but as a pretext to weaken the political influence of blue states and cities that rejected him at the ballot box. The threat of deploying federal forces under the guise of “protecting federal property” masks a deeper, more troubling intent—to intimidate American citizens and concentrate power where it aligns with his political interests.
But the irony is stark. This erosion of democratic norms was enabled, in part, by the very voters who once helped keep it in check. Millions of Americans who voted for Joe Biden in 2020 failed to turn out in 2024, mistakenly believing that Trump’s incendiary rhetoric would target only immigrants, not citizens. They viewed themselves as insulated, protected by citizenship status. They were wrong.
Donald Trump’s 2024 victory was not a result of overwhelming public support, but rather of voter apathy — particularly among Democrats and Hispanic voters — and resistance among some Biden supporters to back a woman candidate. Trump received 77 million votes in 2024, a decline from Biden’s 84 million in 2020, despite the fact that the electorate grew by roughly 10 million eligible voters during that period.
In California, Vice President Kamala Harris underperformed Biden’s 2020 tally by 1.8 million votes, even though the state gained 1.5 million more eligible voters and added 600,000 new registered voters. The pattern was similar in Texas: in major Democratic strongholds like Dallas and Houston, Harris received 600,000 fewer votes than Biden, despite 2 million more eligible voters statewide. This trend repeated itself in key battlegrounds across the East Coast, Arizona, and Nevada.
Latino voter turnout in 2020 was at around 53% — or 16.5 million voters, but in 2024 it was also 16.5 million, despite the addition of 4 million more eligible Latino voters, or around 36 million. Many Latinos who supported Trump in 2024 cited economic concerns, particularly the rising cost of groceries. Yet under Trump’s policies — including new tariffs, economic uncertainty, and falling stock markets — these costs have only increased.
Many Democratic voters who helped elect Biden in 2020 stayed home in 2024, convinced that immigration policy wouldn’t impact them. But Trump’s recent actions in California and his rhetoric about federal raids in blue cities reveal the true stakes: this is not simply about immigration. It is about using federal agencies and military force to intimidate, punish, and suppress Americans who disagree with him.
Senator Alex Padilla rightly warned last week that immigration is merely the pretext. The real agenda is to weaken the rights of states, cities, and citizens who stand in opposition. Republican leadership has largely remained silent as Trump uses the machinery of government to target political opponents and disenfranchise urban and minority voters. The 2024 election outcome was not the result of Trump’s popularity, but of Democratic voters’ failure to appreciate the threats — underestimating both the risks Trump posed to American citizens and their Constitutional rights.
Many voters – Hispanic, Black, White -who chose not to vote felt safe living in their blue state, or city, bubbles, believing that citizenship alone would protect their rights. They couldn’t have been more wrong.
This outcome was not inevitable. It was the product of voters who underestimated Trump’s threats, dismissed the significance of this election, and believed the consequences would not touch them. But as we are now seeing, the consequences are real — and they affect us all.
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Alex Gonzalez is a political Analyst, Founder of Latino Public Policy Foundation (LPPF), and Political Director for Latinos Ready To Vote. Comments to vote@latinosreadytovote.org or @AlexGonzTXCA
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