Troops in LA, tanks in DC. But Trump is winning the battle for public opinion
There are thunderstorms forecast for the weekend, and protesters planning to rain on his military parade, but there's one piece of good news for Donald Trump on his 79th birthday.
Polling shared with The Telegraph shows significant support for the president's deployment of troops to clamp down on riots in Los Angeles, with the public backing his move by a margin of 14 per cent.
Initially, Mr Trump's decision to send the National Guard and US Marines to the city of angels had threatened to cast a cloud over his parade on Saturday, with soldiers detaining US citizens during what was meant to be a shared celebration of the country's military history.
James Johnson, co-founder of JL Partners, which conducted the polling, said it showed the president was 'very much winning the battle of public opinion when it comes to the protests'.
He told The Telegraph: 'People are instinctively on the side of order and the police over what they see as concerning levels of unrest… Right now, the message is well-calibrated and his approach is garnering support.'
The legal battle is still making its way through the courts, in a tug of war between Mr Trump and Gavin Newsom, the California governor, but the president can notch up a victory from the public reaction.
However, another fight is just around the corner.
No Kings, a collection of protest groups, is planning a series of protests around the country to coincide with the parade, protesting against what it claims is Mr Trump's monarchical ambitions.
Millions of people will turn out in thousands of towns and cities across the US on Saturday, organisers said, to create a 'split-screen' between the displays of military strength in Washington while ordinary citizens turn out in opposition.
Among the 'No Kings' backers are Christy Walton, the Walmart heiress who is worth even more than Mr Trump, and has become a figurehead in pushing back on the president.
Mr Trump warned that any protesters assembling during the ceremony, which coincides with his birthday, would be met with 'very big force'. Protest organisers, wary of provoking clashes with law enforcement, plan demonstrations in every major city except the capital.
Ostensibly meant to celebrate two and a half centuries of military history, more than 6,000 soldiers dressed in uniforms ranging from the Revolutionary War up to the present day will parade down an eight-block route.
From the accounts trailed in the media, it should be an unadulterated display of US military might from a president who casts himself as the 'peacemaker-in-chief'.
A flyover of F-22s, the most advanced fighter jets in the world, is scheduled, while dozens of Chinook, Apache and Black Hawk helicopters will also take to the skies.
A B-25 bomber, which cemented itself in the nation's consciousness for the daring raids conducted in Japan during the Second World War, is expected to roar above the crowds, more than six decades after it was finally retired.
Armoured vehicles, including 60-ton Abrams tanks, will roll through the streets of Washington DC, in what was expected to be the largest military parade in the city since the end of the first Gulf War in 1991.
Trundling amongst some of the bristling display of firepower will be a 19th-century army escort wagon, pulled by mules and carrying a dog called Doc Holliday, who is part of the 1st Cavalry Division Horse Cavalry Detachment.
Attendees will have to navigate a security perimeter formed out of 18.5 miles of steel, 175 metal detectors and two security checkpoints.
The procession will start near the Lincoln Memorial, honouring Abraham Lincoln, who guided the nation through the US civil war in the mid-19th century.
It then passes memorials honouring Vietnam veterans and the nurses and women who served in the war, the Korean War Veterans Memorial, and the vast World War II memorial, where granite pillars representing the US states and territories surround a central fountain.
It then travels by the DC War Memorial, paying tribute to the city's veterans who served in the First World War, before finishing after the Washington Monument, the towering obelisk which marks George Washington's victory in the War of Independence.
Mr Trump is expected to view the parade from the Ellipse – a park south of the White House – and will be presented with the Stars and Stripes by the US Army's Golden Knights parachute display team.
But the spectacle has provoked fears about the politicisation of the military in service of the commander-in-chief.
Even though it is meant to commemorate the military, Monica Crowley, the White House's chief of protocol, has suggested the crowd should serenade Mr Trump with a rendition of 'Happy Birthday'.
And it coincides not just with the army cracking down on riots in Los Angeles, but soldiers at Fort Bragg this week booing the president's political opponents, including Mr Newsom, and the press.
Troops were screened before the event for loyalty to the administration and physical attractiveness, according to Military.com. A Pentagon spokesman said in response: 'Believe me, no one needs to be encouraged to boo the media.'
Kori Schake, a former defence official under George W Bush, called the timing of the ceremony ominous and said she worried about the 'normalisation of political involvement by troops'.
The seeds of Saturday's procession lie in Mr Trump's trip to Paris in 2017, when French president Emmanuel Macron treated him to a military parade for Bastille Day.
The president, by all accounts, was rapt.
He later instructed his administration to create their own parade, but his vision of tanks rolling down the streets of Washington never got further than a much-derided memo issued to officials.
Mr Trump often liked to boast about 'my generals' in his first stint in the White House, but top brass and ex-military figures pushed back hard on the suggestion.
James Mattis, the defence secretary at the time, who declined an interview for this article, declared he would 'rather swallow acid' than submit to a 'Soviet Union-like display of authoritarian power', according to an aide.
Paul J Selva, then vice-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, declared the display was 'what dictators do'.
Eight years later, the president has an administration that is firmly under his thumb and will do what he wants – dictator comparisons be damned. Many Republicans on Capitol Hill are giving the event a wide berth, but they're not speaking against it.
Then again, the national mood could sour if Mr Trump appears too triumphalist on Saturday, and if any naked displays of partisanship intrude on the military parade.
And Mr Johnson notes that his polling advantage in Los Angeles could fall away if authorities fall into the trap of 'appearing to define any non-white person as a threat' rather than focusing on their law and order message.
Mr Trump might be winning the battle of public opinion, but he hasn't won the war.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Herald Scotland
34 minutes ago
- The Herald Scotland
Scotland's future is uncertain. But then so is the here and now
At the same time, many in the mischievous media exaggerate the transient. Who is up, who is down? What is new, what is demanding attention? Always eager to hasten to the next caravanserai. This week, by contrast, there was a glance towards the longer term. Where are we going with our NHS, our services, our fiscal structure? What, an Edinburgh conference asked, will Scotland look like in 2050? Now, even adopting such a perspective may be viewed as courageous, given the perils currently confronting our planet. As Israel and Iran trade missiles, as President Trump ponders, it may seem rash to contemplate anything other than our collective survival. However, we cannot live that way. We cannot flee for the sanctuary of a dark corner whenever Donald J. Trump turns into King Lear: confused and uncertain yet insisting that he is the terror of the earth. And so it is entirely right to cast an eye ahead. However it may appear at first glance that there is a faintly futile tinge to the entire endeavour. Consider. In 1920, did the ravaged continent of Europe discern that, by 1945, they would have endured a second, bloody conflict? They did not. More prosaically, in 1980, did we know that the passing of a further quarter century would lead to a transformation in Information Technology and the creation of a Scottish Parliament? We did not. Yet contemplate a little more deeply. Were not the roots of the Second World War seeded in the aftermath of the First World War? The constraints and financial reparations understandably imposed upon Germany – but resented by their emerging, deadly leader? Read more Brian Taylor Do the Scottish Conservatives have any reason to exist? This is a set-back and an opportunity for the SNP - which one will they embrace? Brian Taylor: The fundamental battle which unites Donald Trump and Nigel Farage And the more modern period? Were there not early prequels for the 21st century information revolution? Further, here in Scotland, was not the cause of Scottish self-government measurably advanced in the wake of the election of Margaret Thatcher in 1979? In short, when we purport to look into the future, we are in reality studying present-day conditions. We are examining how reform might generate a steady transformation which would emerge over that longer period. It is a way of urging impatient voters and the mischievous media to cut a little slack for our elected tribunes. It is about the future, yes, but viewed through the prism of the present. In the context of reform, there was much talk this week about reviving thoughts advanced by the commission on public services, ably chaired by the late and decidedly great Campbell Christie. I recall Campbell for his intellect, his humour, his baffling devotion to Falkirk FC, his fierce competitiveness at golf – and his determination to work with all and sundry to make Scotland a better place. In 2011, his commission urged Scotland to embrace 'empowerment, integration, efficiency and prevention' in transforming the public sector. This week, Ivan McKee, Scotland's Public Finance Minister, set out a programme of reforms and savings – with an explicit nod to those earlier endeavours by the Christie team. Mr McKee is a key figure in the Scottish Government, returning to office alongside his close ally, Kate Forbes. Both advocate a focus upon efficiency – and, perhaps above all, economic growth. In doing so, they are most certainly aligned with the instincts and aims of the First Minister. Now John Swinney displayed another intuitive tendency in his forward-looking remarks this week. His solution to the entrenched problems confronting Scotland? It lay, you will be astonished to learn, with independence. So shifting attention back to independence, rather than the day-to-day concerns of the voters? Was this a U-turn? Not really, no. Indeed, I suspect too much can be made of this apparent change. Firstly, Mr Swinney is a believer, a fervent Nationalist. He yearns for independence. Secondly, he leads a party which contains many whose fervour is undimmed by minor matters such as convincing others. Thirdly, there is an SNP National Council this weekend. Enough, Brian. Away with cynicism. I believe John Swinney is simply sustaining his dual strategy. He feels a little more liberated to advance the option of independence – while simultaneously concentrating for the most part on the anxieties of the people, such as the cost of living and the health service. John Swinney (Image: PA) In short, his attention is drawn by the here and now, even as he offers a potential vision of the future. His opponents are similarly grounded. Labour's Anas Sarwar, for example, glanced forward and concluded that the SNP were only offering 'managed decline.' Still, futurology can be a source of innocent merriment. What might we favour? Ivan McKee is surely right to suggest public services which prioritise customers rather than producers, which share information and thus resources. But how about the health service? The current system is simply unsustainable, unaffordable. Do you see that nurse gesturing to you? That health worker is not waving but drowning. We have to cut waste – but also overall demand. Perhaps, as the Health Secretary Neil Gray suggested, that can be done in part by an emphasis on prevention. However, that will undoubtedly take time – which ministers facing elections do not have. Politically, Mr Swinney's focus will be upon ensuring that the stats are going in the right direction. Education? Our economy, our society, both need the acquisition of useful skills. I recall my school textbook entitled 'Physics is Fun!' This proved to be a brazen lie. However, physics is vital, along with tricky stuff like maths, literature and French irregular verbs. Our universities are struggling financially. But, as they reform, they must maintain the objective of excellence. If they are truly to be world-class, as Scotland advertises, then they must aspire to the very highest standards. And the economy itself? We need growth and prosperity. We need an environmental drive, including renewables, which does not shut down our industry and agriculture. The future? Simple really. Brian Taylor is a former political editor for BBC Scotland and a columnist for The Herald. He cherishes his family, the theatre – and Dundee United FC
Telegraph
44 minutes ago
- Telegraph
Trump attack on Left-wing bias on TV sparks ‘constitutional crisis'
Elon Musk may have stepped aside, but Donald Trump still has a Doge problem. The US president's plan to run a scythe through up to $425bn (£316bn) of government spending could be gutted or even vetoed in the Senate, where just a few rebel Republicans could scupper the cuts. But Trump and Russell Vought, his budget tsar, have hatched a scheme, called a 'pocket rescission', that might keep the Doge (department of government efficiency) dream on track. And it could even shift the constitutional balance of power between president and Congress towards a testy Trump. It's a high-risk, high-stakes strategy. The outcome will determine whether the Doge spending reductions can go ahead, helping to pay for Trump's 'big, beautiful' tax cuts without blowing out the budget and rattling the bond markets. But the unprecedented procedure takes the White House and Capitol Hill into uncharted legal waters. So it is likely to end up in the courts – joining a raft of litigation that will either reinforce the institutional checks on the president's power or unleash him. 'It's a challenge to Congress,' says Sarah Binder, a political scientist at the Brookings Institution and George Washington University. 'I don't like to throw around the term 'constitutional crisis', but it's not a great position for lawmakers and institutions.' Under the constitution, Congress has the so-called power of the purse, meaning that lawmakers, not the president, are the final arbiter of what the government spends or does not spend. If the president wants to cut funding or programmes that Congress has already authorised, his only option is to launch a rescission procedure – a formal request for the cuts, which both houses of Congress must approve. The rescission process was introduced in a law called the Impoundment Control Act, which had the overall aim of making it hard for Richard Nixon, the then-president, and his successors from delaying or withholding funds once Congress had green-lighted them. Rescission has seldom been used. Ronald Reagan used it to secure $15.2bn of spending cuts as president in the early 1980s, but later in the decade, Congress tended to ignore or refuse his rescission messages. Trump tried it on with a $15bn-plus request in his first term, but was stymied in the Senate. The Democrats then got control of Congress in the midterms and pushed back another $27bn salvo. Now Trump is trying again. The initial proposal – Vought says it will be 'the first of many' – is to scuttle $9.4bn of spending on public broadcasters and international aid programmes. This rescission was flagged back in March but formally put to Congress only this month. In an executive order early last month, Trump said he wanted to terminate all public funding of National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), which accounts for about $1bn of this first rescission package. 'Which viewpoints NPR and PBS promote does not matter. What does matter is that neither entity presents a fair, accurate or unbiased portrayal of current events to tax-paying citizens,' Trump said. 'Today the media landscape is filled with abundant, diverse, and innovative news options. Government funding of news media in this environment is not only outdated and unnecessary but corrosive to the appearance of journalistic independence.' The White House has until July 18 to persuade Congress. The rescission scraped through the House of Representatives by 214 votes to 212, but the Senate is the real test. If just four Republicans in the 100-seat upper house swap sides, the spending stays in place. It's not looking promising for Trump. Several Republicans have already voiced concern about at least some of the cuts. The dissenters include Senator Susan Collins, who chairs an influential Senate finance committee that will consider the cuts at a session on June 25. There could be fireworks. Vought will appear before the committee and, in recent weeks, he has started airing the possibility of bypassing Congress altogether through an untested and almost unknown variant of rescission: the so-called pocket rescission. 'It's a provision that has been rarely used, but it is there,' Vought told CNN. 'And we intend to use all of these tools.' The trick with the pocket rescission is to make the request to Congress right before the end of the fiscal year, which runs to Sept 30. The White House reckons that the Impoundment Control Act's wording creates a loophole: if Congress does not act on the request before Sept 30, then even if the window is well short of 45 days the spending approval will lapse automatically on that date. The case for pocket rescissions was made recently by Wade Miller, of the Center for Renewing America (CRA), a Right-wing think tank. 'A rescission is a viable tool for carrying out the broader political mandate to curb unnecessary spending,' he wrote in a briefing paper. 'If the executive branch decides to use this process, the deployment of a rescission with fewer than 45 days remaining in the fiscal year is a statutorily and constitutionally valid strategy.' The CRA was set up by Vought himself, after he served as director of the Office of Management and Budget in the final six months of Trump's first term. He returned to the White House with the president this January, in the same role. But other Washington think tanks trenchantly oppose the CRA's position. 'Calling it a pocket rescission implies that it's like an actual functional tool under the law, in a way that it's actually not. It is a strategy that the person who is running the Office of Management and Budget has articulated to evade the law,' says Cerin Lindgrensavage, a lawyer at Protect Democracy. She says the whole purpose of the Impoundment Control Act was to stop any presidential ploy to skirt its strictures. 'One of the reasons why they might want to do this is because they're afraid they don't have the votes to actually make the cuts the legal way.' Binder, from Brookings, says that the Act doesn't explicitly deal with what happens if a president makes the request right before the end of the fiscal year. 'There's certainly room here for an aggressive Office of Management and Budget and an aggressive administration to try to stretch – others might say manipulate – the silence in the budget law,' she says. 'But the logic of the matter suggests that pocket rescissions are not legal under the Act and I would imagine there's a strong argument that they are unconstitutional under Congress's power of the purse.' Binder suspects Vought is looking to get a test case into the courts. Given there could be a constitutional principle at stake, it could go all the way to the Supreme Court, where a majority of judges are Republican appointees. In the meantime, litigants could get restraining orders or injunctions to prevent the Doge cuts. But they can't necessarily get the White House to respect these. The stage is set for a constitutional showdown. The question is whether Trump and Vought will really pull the trigger. And then, whether the weapon will actually work.
Spectator
an hour ago
- Spectator
Spain's Pedro Sanchez won't limp on for long
Ahead of next week's Nato summit in The Hague, Spain's socialist prime minister has refused to increase his country's defence spending to 5 per cent of GDP. Pedro Sánchez says that the increase, championed by President Trump and backed by Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte, is 'unreasonable'. His refusal has disrupted preparations for the summit at which all the allies were to be asked to commit to the 5 per cent target. Spain, currently the lowest spender on defence in Nato, recently pledged to increase from 1.3 to 2 per cent of GDP. To increase to 5 per cent would cost a further €80 billion (£68 billion) a year, Sánchez said in a forthright letter sent to Rutte on Thursday. That would require tax increases and cuts to healthcare, education, pensions, green investment and the much-needed housing budget. Instead Sánchez proposed that Spain be exempted from any spending target agreed next week or at least be allowed to adopt a flexible, voluntary approach. The events of recent days have left Sanchez's credibility in shreds Sánchez's anti-Trump stance will be well-received by the radical left-wing and separatist parliamentary allies that prop up his fragile minority coalition government. Engulfed in corruption scandals, Sánchez desperately needs their continued support to remain in office. Allegations of kickbacks on public sector contracts and sleaze in his left-wing party emerge almost daily. Even El País, Spain's centre-left newspaper of record whose support Sánchez can usually count on, has suggested that he should resign. The most damaging allegations centre on long-standing, systemic corruption in Sánchez's inner circle. Sánchez has tried, so far unsuccessfully, to distance himself from what he calls the 'toxic triangle' of two former right-hand men and a close adviser. This week audio recordings in which the men, who all deny wrongdoing, discuss how to divide the kickbacks as well as the different merits and attributes of various prostitutes whose company they are preparing to enjoy have surfaced. Those recordings have caused revulsion across Spain and the damage has been compounded by a series of unforced errors by Sánchez. In a parliamentary debate on Wednesday he provoked outrage by describing the corruption allegations as merely 'an anecdote'. Previously he attempted to dismiss the importance of another recording which appears to show evidence of vote-rigging by two of the toxic trio during his election as party leader in 2014. Unimpressive too are Sánchez's suggestions that others have done worse things and that his main problem is that he is such a trusting person that it never occurs to him that such things might be going on under his nose. It is not only Sánchez, though, who is showing signs of strain. Three of his ministers recently claimed that a member of the Guardia Civil police force was plotting to assassinate the prime minister. Even when the accusation, based on fake news, was shown to be false, the ministers refused to withdraw the accusation. A few weeks previously, one of the three, the Deputy Prime Minister, alarmed the public by declaring that the principle of presumption of innocence is a disgrace. When reminded that it's actually a cornerstone of democratic freedom, she tried to pretend that she'd never suggested otherwise. Meanwhile, Trump's press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, has confirmed that the President wants to see all Nato countries pay their fair share towards defence by meeting the 5 per cent target. She said that she had not yet seen 'Spain's comments' but 'would make sure the President sees them'. But Sánchez's resistance to the increase in defence spending may not pose a long-term obstacle for Trump. Sánchez came to power promising 'democratic regeneration', so the events of recent days have left his credibility in shreds. With revulsion growing and further revelations expected, it seems increasingly unlikely that his government will survive until August 2027 when the next general election is due. Whenever that election is held, it's likely to usher in a right-wing coalition government of the Partido Popular and Vox. Vox in particular is strongly supportive of Trump. So, despite Spain's pacifist tradition – a 2024 Gallup survey showed that only 29 per cent of citizens were willing to take up arms in case of war, compared to a global average of 52 per cent – Spain's next government may well be more willing to align with Trump's defence priorities.
