Hillary Clinton has accused President Donald Trump of “following the authoritarian playbook.”
President Trump has also been described by hysterical Democrats as a dictator, a tyrant, a fascist, a Nazi, and has been compared to Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Joseph Stalin.
When he cracked down on crime in D.C., Democrats on the U.S. House Oversight Committee declared his action as “dictator-level stuff.”
And Gov. Gavin Newsom, D-Calif., preaches that Trump will flood cities with soldiers to lay the groundwork to cancel the 2028 elections.
These accusations are ludicrous.
Granted, Trump is testing the limits of presidential power; and the U.S. Supreme Court may clip his wings. Nevertheless, for Democrats to assert he is an autocrat is not only dishonest but hypocritical.
They appear to have forgotten that numerous 20th century Democratic presidents have abused the powers of their office.
Let’s review:
During World War 1, the nation’s 28th president, Woodrow Wilson (1913-1920), embraced wartime suppression of American’s basic rights.
He pushed through Congress a sedition act in 1918 that put violators in prison for 10 years for daring to disagree with the government’s war policies.
The noted socialist, Eugene Debs was thrown in jail for opposing the draft.
Wilson restrained his attorney general, Thomas Gregory, from prosecuting the vigilante acts of members of the American Protective League (APA).
The nativist organization was permitted to violently break up labor strikes and to spy on citizens perceived to be disloyal.
Defending the behavior of the APA, Wilson declared, “Woe be to the man or group of men that seeks to stand in our way.”
In 1919, the Wilson administration trampled on civil liberties by engaging in warrantless raids to round up alleged red radicals.
President Franklin Roosevelt (1933-1945) used the IRS to investigate the finances of political foes including former treasury secretary Andrew Mellon, Congressman Hamilton Fish and aviator Charles Lindbergh.
Following attack on Pearl Harbor (Dec. 7, 1941), FDR approved the interment of 110,000 people of Japanese ancestry into concentration camps guarded by troops. The American Civil Liberties Union called this policy, “The worst single wholesale violation of civil rights of American citizens in our history.”
Roosevelt ordered the FBI to put taps on the phones of members of his administration, and the national chairman of the Republican Party.
When steel workers threatened to go out on strike during the Korean War, President Harry Truman (1945-1953) issued an executive order instructing the federals to seize control of the nation’s steel mills.
The U.S. Supreme Court subsequently ruled that Truman lacked the constitutional authority to seize private property.
The John F. Kennedy administration attempted to crush dissent by ordering the IRS to investigate tax-exempt right-wing and left-wing groups opposing his policies, particularly in Cuba.
Critics of the administration, including longtime journalists Walter Winchell and Jim Bishop, were hit with IRS audits.
The Kennedy administration also abused the FCC’s fairness doctrine in 1963.
It developed plans to stifle radio attacks to enhance the president’s chances of reelection in the 1964 presidential campaign.
The Rockefeller Commission on CIA activities revealed that in 1962 members of the press had been wiretapped by the CIA “with the knowledge and consent of Attorney General Kennedy.”
President Lyndon B. Johnson (1963-1969) also used the FBI to spy on Democrat and Republican senators who opposed his policies in Vietnam.
He ordered the FBI to create a special squad that would be used by him personally at both the 1964 and 1968 Democratic national conventions.
Johnson continued the surveillance commenced by the Kennedys of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He ordered wire taps to be installed in King’s office and hotel suites and ordered the monitoring of the national director of the Congress of Racial Equality, James Farmer.
He also directed the FBI to employ espionage and wiretapping to spy on the activities of radical dissenters and political adversaries.
Following the election of 1968, J. Edgar Hoover told Nixon that his campaign plane had been bugged by the FBI.
In more recent times, President Barack Obama ordered his Justice Department to ignore the Defense of Marriage Act and not to defend it in court cases.
Obama’s Justice Department spied on journalists.
Obama appointed over two dozen unaccountable “czars” whose far left-wing policies were shielded from congressional oversight.
Obama’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released a ridiculous report arguing that those who are anti-abortion could be a serious threat to national security.
They were considered potential terrorists because they were viewed as anti-government, right-wing extremists dedicated to a single issue.
As for the Biden administration: it’s health department and FBI violated the First Amendment rights of social media companies when they pressured them to suppress or remove COVID-19 postings criticizing Biden policies.
For over a century, Democratic presidents have abused their executive power.
And before the “powers that be” in that party point accusatory fingers at Trump, they should own up to their transgressions and apologize on bended knee to all Americans.
George J. Marlin, a former executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, is the author of “The American Catholic Voter: Two Hundred Years of Political Impact,” and “Christian Persecutions in the Middle East: A 21st Century Tragedy.” Read George J. Marlin’s Reports — More Here.
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