Democrats defend themselves: military operation like in war? Trump provokes Chicago

With an allusion to a possible military operation in Chicago, US President Donald Trump raised the mayor and the governor of the surrounding state of Illinois. He spread a graphic created with artificial intelligence, which shows the skyline of the democratically ruled city of millions and reminds of the war film “Apocalypse Now” in the design and choice of words. There it says: Chicago can find out why the US Department of Defense was renamed the Ministry of War.

Trump’s martial post on the Truth Social platform was given the words “I love the smell of deportations in the morning” – an allusion to the well -known film quote “I love the smell of Napalm in the morning.” As so often at Trump, it initially remained unclear whether the content of the graphic is really to be understood as a serious threat or as a PR campaign.

The President had previously announced that it would massively intervene against allegedly excessive crime in Chicago. In the capital Washington, referred to by him as a “rat hole”, he had activated the National Guard weeks ago with the same reason and put the local police under federal control. Trump did not say exactly what he is planning in Chicago, how far these plans have been involved, whether he wants to mobilize the national guard again or when such a commitment could begin.

Governor calls Trump “wannabe dictator”

Politicians in Illinois took Trump’s allusion seriously. Illinois’ Democratic Governor JB Pritzker wrote on X: “The President of the United States threatens to explain the war to an American city. It’s no joke. It’s not normal.” And further: “Donald Trump is not a strong man, he is scared. Illinois cannot be intimidated by a wannabe dictator.”

Mayor: must protect us from authoritarianism

Chicago’s mayor Brandon Johnson, also a democrat, called the republican threats unworthy for a president. “The reality is that he wants to occupy our city and break our constitution,” wrote Johnson on X. “We have to defend our democracy from this authoritarianism by protecting each other and protecting Chicago from Donald Trump.”

Raids against migrants – protests against Trump

In the west coast metropolis of Los Angeles, Trump’s government justified her intervention and the mobilization of the National Guard in June, among other things, with alleged chaos and resistance to civil servants from the ICE immigration authority. US Minister of Homeland Protection Kristi Noem recently announced further missions by the authority, which is known for raids with partly hooded civil servants. In Chicago, Illinois and other states, there have already been ICE inserts – now there are additional resources for this. The raids repeatedly lead to protests against Trump’s aggressive migration policy.

After Los Angeles and Washington, Chicago would be the third democratically ruled city in which the president intervenes. In Washington, Trump’s military missions were demonstrated again at the weekend. Meanwhile, the President brought other major cities such as Baltimore into play as a setting for a demonstration of power in his government. He also publicly thought about military missions in New York and New Orleans.