By Civitas
The coup is not coming. It’s halfway done.
On June 6, 2025, the United States witnessed a defining moment: 700 U.S. Marines and over 4,000 National Guard troops were deployed to Los Angeles. Their mission? Not to defend the nation from foreign threats, but to suppress peaceful protests against ICE raids. This isn’t the beginning of something sinister. This is the middle.
Project 2025 is already 50 percent implemented. And the crackdown in LA is the signal that the second half will fall with terrifying speed.
What Is Project 2025?
Originally crafted by the Heritage Foundation, Project 2025 is outlined in a nearly 900-page document titled Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise (Heritage Foundation PDF). It proposes a complete reorganization of the federal government with the following objectives:
- Centralize power in the executive branch
- Fire tens of thousands of nonpartisan civil servants
- Dismantle regulatory agencies like the EPA, DOJ, and IRS
- Repeal civil rights protections and defund DEI initiatives
- Deploy military and law enforcement against domestic protestors
From day one, the Trump administration began executing this plan. Jan. 20, 2025, brought a flood of executive orders purging civil agencies, reversing equality measures, and expanding law enforcement powers. This is not a future hypothetical. This is a legalistic coup in progress.
LA: From Protest to Occupation
Following the ICE raids in LA’s immigrant neighborhoods, protests erupted. Peaceful demonstrations filled the streets of Boyle Heights, Koreatown and Leimert Park. The federal response? Military deployment, tanks, curfews and rubber bullets.
This is not about law and order. It’s about conditioning us to accept military control of civilian life.
“This is martial law in everything but name,” said Los Angeles attorney Portia M. Wood.
As Gov. Gavin Newsom wins his suit to prevent the federalization of California’s National Guard, the White House is considering invoking the Insurrection Act to justify its actions.
The One Big Beautiful Bill: Authoritarianism in Legislative Form
Passed by a single vote in the House (215-214), and now under Senate review, this deceptively named budget bill includes:
- $151 billion in immigration enforcement funding
- Mandatory detentions and expedited deportation for all undocumented individuals charged (not convicted) of crimes
- Authorization to defund elections in jurisdictions deemed “noncompliant”
- Stripped enforcement mechanisms for the National Voter Registration Act
- A 3.5 percent tax on remittances, with proposals to raise it to 15 percent
- Legal immunity for executive orders, shielding them from court review
“If passed, this bill grants the president the power to cancel elections. That’s not democracy. That’s dictatorship,” the Campaign Legal Center opined in a bill analysis. (CLC Analysis)
The bill transforms Project 2025’s ideological framework into binding law. Together, they legalize the erosion of the republic.
The Attack on Citizenship Itself
Also pending is a Supreme Court decision to overturn United States v. Wong Kim Ark (1898), the case that guarantees birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment. If the Court rules in favor of Trump’s executive order, millions of children born on American soil could become stateless.
This would:
- Create a permanent underclass
- Violate international human rights conventions
- Set a precedent for future exclusionary policies
Why Protest Matters
The First Amendment protects the right to free speech, peaceful assembly, and petitioning the government. These are not privileges. They are rights. And exercising them is how we resist creeping authoritarianism.
Peaceful protest:
- Interrupts the normalization of injustice
- Creates political pressure for change
- Documents abuses of power
- Protects the spirit of the republic
Our ancestors bled for this right. From the Montgomery Bus Boycott to the Selma marches, protest has been the spine of Black American liberation. The present is no different.
The Bill of Rights: Our Democratic Firewall
The Bill of Rights guarantees the core freedoms of every American. They are not optional. They are non-negotiable. Here is what they protect:
- Freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and petition
- Right to bear arms
- No forced quartering of soldiers
- Freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures
- Right to due process and protection from double jeopardy and self-incrimination
- Right to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury
- Right to a jury trial in civil cases
- Freedom from cruel and unusual punishment
- Protection of rights not specifically enumerated
- Powers not delegated to the federal government are reserved for the states and the people
When a government begins to violate these tenets, it forfeits the moral legitimacy of its rule. We must not forget that these rights exist not for convenience, but for resistance.
Power to the People
To those in uniform: You are not obligated to follow unlawful orders. Your allegiance is to the Constitution, not a single man.
To civilians: We must rise. We must speak. We must defend the republic.
If we fail, the history books will not say that democracy was stolen in a single night. They will say it was dismantled, piece by piece, in plain sight, while good people stayed silent.
But not us. Not today.
Power to the people.
Drawing inspiration from the original authors of the Federalist papers’ use of “Publius” (referring to Publius Valerius Publicola, a founder of the Roman Republic), we use “Civitas” as our pseudonym.“Civitas” is Latin for “citizenship” or “community of citizens,” emphasizing both the rights and responsibilities of citizens in maintaining a constitutional republic. This pseudonym reflects our focus on civic engagement and the collective effort required to preserve democratic institutions in the face of current challenges.