O say can't you see

Concentrate on what is happening

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming

Back in September, I wrote a piece called Here's exactly what the first year of a second Trump Administration will look like. I’m bringing it out from behind the paywall because I think it might help people understand what is going on in the US at the moment. It foregrounds the underlying post-legal nature of Trump’s plan and gives us a way to see more clearly what the once and future president and his apologists are trying to obscure.

The Human American eagle; 12,500 officers, nurses and men; Camp Gordon, Atlanta, Georgia. ARTIST Arthur Mole, John Thomas DATE ca. 1918

The only Democrat who seems to understand all this and who is willing to call it out is Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. She has previously used the c-word to describe Trump’s camps, and yesterday in Congress she explained how the Laken Riley Act will create what amounts to a system of concentration camps for extra-judicial imprisoning of immigrants.

"In this…