The Trump administration has recently deployed federal personnel to the streets of Portland, Oregon, to violently confront peaceful protesters, and the deployment has drawn outrage from figures including Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul, who has only very rarely broken with the president. This time, Paul issued a stern condemnation of the deployments, which have consisted of personnel who are not always clearly identified and who have been operating out of sometimes unmarked vehicles. It’s as if the forces and/or their superiors imagine themselves to be some kind of secret police operating on behalf of the Trump administration — how else are observers supposed to explain unidentified personnel conducting punitive “arrests” out of unmarked vehicles?
On Twitter this week, Sen. Paul commented:
‘We cannot give up liberty for security. Local law enforcement can and should be handling these situations in our cities but there is no place for federal troops or unidentified federal agents rounding people up at will.’
We cannot give up liberty for security. Local law enforcement can and should be handling these situations in our cities but there is no place for federal troops or unidentified federal agents rounding people up at will. https://t.co/vkSHmlOzDW
— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) July 20, 2020
There are numerous options that Paul has for putting these words into practice. At least two different pieces of legislation have recently been making their way through Congress that could curtail the president’s power to deploy federal forces onto U.S. streets. The first piece of legislation, introduced in the Senate by Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Chris Murphy (D-Ct.), would mandate “individual and agency identification on uniforms of officers and prevent unmarked vehicles from being used in arrests” and restrain “federal agents’ crowd control activities to federal property and its immediate vicinity, unless their presence is specifically requested by both the mayor and governor,” among other provisions. The Portland deployments have been against the explicit wishes of local authorities. The House also passed legislation this week that would require the president to consult with Congress, among other steps, before invoking the Insurrection Act and deploying active-duty troops onto U.S. streets.
This week, Paul also spoke out about his Republican colleagues’ willingness to add to the federal debt. He tweeted:
‘I’m old enough to remember when Republicans criticized President Obama for doubling the debt. Now Republicans join hands with Democrats to explode the debt. Hypocrisy anyone?’
I’m old enough to remember when Republicans criticized President Obama for doubling the debt. Now Republicans join hands with Democrats to explode the debt. Hypocrisy anyone? https://t.co/QmSgmmnn9i
— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) July 21, 2020
Check out Twitter’s response to Paul below:
