"The tone of the administration's reaction was originally set by DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, who instantly labeled the shooting victim a "domestic terrorist." But the real champion of ICE's prerogative to kill small-fry protesters like Good has been Vice-President J.D. Vance, who has aggressively argued that anyone who gets in the way of mass-deportation operations is part of an unlawful leftist network that has to be crushed."
"[Vance] could have expressed support for law enforcement more generally. He did not have to malign the victim. He did not have to champion the shooter. He did not have to insert himself as the main character in a story that was still only just coming into view. ... But there is a logic to Vance's combative stance. Vance clearly understood what ICE means to Trump's base. ... For MAGA America, ICE is an instrument for cleansing violence."
"And people like Good, Frum suggests, are guilty of disrespecting ICE and the people who thrill at the masked agents' Dirty Harry exploits. Frum continues: MAGA is many things, but above all it's a movement about redistributing respect away from those who command too much (overeducated coastal elites) to those who don't have enough (white Americans without advanced degrees who feel left behind). ... Nowhere does the demand to redistribute respect come into starker view than when guns start firing."
An ICE agent shot and killed a protester, Renee Good, on a Minneapolis residential street. High-level administration figures, including DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and Vice President J.D. Vance, have defended the agent, labeling the victim a "domestic terrorist" and arguing that those who obstruct mass-deportation operations belong to unlawful leftist networks that must be crushed. Vance's rhetoric goes beyond defending law enforcement, celebrating ICE's excesses and portraying ICE as an instrument that redistributes respect toward marginalized white Americans who feel disempowered. This rhetoric normalizes violence against protesters and frames armed enforcement as a virtue in the immigration fight.
Read at Intelligencer
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