EDITORIAL: Our new Secretary of Offense and the assault on due process

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Of all the policies and actions by the Trump administration, including the deployment of National Guard troops to U.S. cities, none is more disturbing than the U.S. military attack last week on a suspected drug boat. One would presume that the engagement course with suspected narco-terrorists would be arrest and interrogation, not annihilation. But in the Trump world order, suspicion is tantamount to guilt, and the killing of 11 alleged members of Tren de Aragua is consistent with his changing the Department of Defense to the Department of War.

In effect, then the Secretary of Defense is now the Secretary of Offense.

Should we be concerned about this irrational act? Certainly, because the next executive order could potentially allow protesters against the deployment of troops to U.S. cities to be classified as resistors to domestic policies and gunned down by the troops.

There is no evidence that the boat was in fact trafficking drugs from Venezuela, and it apparently had no intentions of conducting warfare, which might have justified being fired upon. Trump’s method has always been to strike first and ask questions later. He faces a multitude of questions about the strike that occurred in international waters without any provocation.

Trump claimed they were members of the gang, and he can make the same claims about immigrants and anti-war protesters, knowing well enough, he can, with impunity, impose his lawlessness.

The lives on the boat must be granted innocence until proven guilty, so their civil and human rights were violated, and they were denied due process. Not only denied legal defenses, but in this instance denied their lives.

Let us hope this is an anomaly, something that won’t happen again, though that’s just another wishful thought when it comes to the lack of justice and human dignity in the Trump world.