After getting through another heartbreaking day yesterday of watching videos, listening to speeches, learning about a woman who was murdered in the street by a reckless, trigger happy, poorly trained, perhaps mentally unstable ICE agent…and watching the city I call home turned into the epicenter of political violence and unrest once again, just a couple days after the Governor that got us through some real trying times announce he’d had enough. On this day after, this is my takeaway:
These are the optics they’re going for? Really?
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They’re going to double down on victim-blaming no matter how many angles come out. They’ll ignore basic common sense that most have earned from watching a single YouTube reel of a traffic stop, or any episode of On Patrol Live, Live PD, or COPS. You don’t run and stand in front of a car at a traffic stop. Especially one you just saw moving. Ever.
So the murdererr who we’re now learning is named Jonathan Ross (I honestly thought we’d never learn his name) either was reckless enough to put himself there—which means he wasn’t just trigger-happy, he was catastrophically incompetent—or the training was so bad that it might as well not exist. Either way, that’s not “law and order.” That’s negligence with a badge. I had assumed this was one of those MAGAs who took ’em up on the ads I keep seeing for big signing bonuses to be an ICE agent…turns out he’s been doing this a while actually, which doesn’t make it any better.
But let’s zoom out. Forget the slow-motion breakdowns. Forget the training manuals. Forget the guy’s mental fitness for the job.
These are the optics the T***p administration wants?
This is the message? These are the “terrorists” they’re supposedly hunting? Citizens…Moms in their 30s? This is how they want armed agents behaving in public streets—charging up to cars, screaming “get out of the fucking car,” with zero effort at de-escalation? Behavior that even a rookie cop wouldn’t pull after a high-speed chase, let alone as a first move?
I’ve noticed a strategy by the right in the past decade or more to never apologize, never admit mistakes, no matter how many facts are against you…. but I just don’t think that’s smart here. No press discipline. No reassurance to the public. No acknowledgment that de-escalation matters. Just brute force, chaos, and then blaming the victim. Even on the same fucking day it happened. Not “we’ll wait for the investigation to play out…” Conclusions were drawn. Fingers were pointed. Same fucking day. While a family and a neighborhood and major city and half of a country freshly grieves, you’ve already got your fucking finger out.
And then they act shocked when public trust collapses even further. It’s ridiculous. It’s reckless. And it guarantees exactly what comes next: more fear, more escalation, and more violence.
But maybe that’s the point. Chaos is the brand. It’s always been the brand for these monsters. This is Donald T***p’s fault—full stop—and instead of dialing it back, he’s chosen to pour gasoline on it. This horrid leadership approach is so much like what made is so unsettled during Covid. He’s repeating that history on the same week his storm trooper Army made the Governor who got us through that with calm and care decided to step away from politics.
When I think this, I remember something Mister Rogers taught us about crises: look for the helpers — and there were helpers there. Brave people who stayed and filmed what was happening instead of running away. The physician on the side of the road who tried to give aid even when agents blocked him from helping. Those people still live in my city — and knowing they’re here gives me a small measure of comfort.
But that instinct to feel absolute dread for the people directly involved — for the family of the woman who was killed, for the neighbors who saw it happen, for everyone taking to the streets in protest — that feeling is so far removed from some of the responses online. I’ve seen people immediately jump to blame the victim, saying it was “a tragedy of her own making.” What? How can that be the takeaway? How does someone not feel even a moment of pause before immediately assuming she deserved to die because she didn’t immediately comply? That’s not analysis — that’s heartlessness.
And then there’s the bizarre public discourse happening around it: statements by the Fraternity of Police focused on defending the ICE agent’s due process while the woman who died got none. Grown adults — including union spokespeople and public figures — issuing one-sided defenses of federal agents while refusing to acknowledge the humanity of the person who was killed. It’s unbelievable to see such black-and-white, reflexive thinking from people who should be capable of nuance. It’s infuriating.
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