Fear! Suspicion! Distrust!

Have you heard of National Security Presidential Memorandum 7 (“NSPM-7”)? You should... we are labeled a terrorist organizations! The full name is NSPM‑7 is a National Security Presidential Memorandum titled “Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence"

The libertarian think tank, The Cato Institute writes,

 Yesterday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order laying out plans to use law enforcement and regulation to “investigate and disrupt networks, entities, and organizations” that, according to him, are responsible for encouraging acts of political violence. The order envisages the use of government power to crack down on a vaguely specified mix of organizational, associational, and individual speech and action, much of which is properly seen as protected by the First Amendment. 

Among the announced targets of the order, entitled “Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence,” are “campaigns of … radicalization,” that is, speech persuading people to adopt radical ideas, grounded in a range of aims that include wanting to “change or direct policy outcomes.” Another way of describing nonviolent speech that agitates to transform opinion so as to “change… policy outcomes” might be “petitioning for the redress of grievances.”

[...]

The executive order goes on to target the practice of “doxxing,” that is, the accurate reporting of persons’ identities and details about them, without acknowledging that many instances of such reporting by itself constitute speech protected by the First Amendment, most especially as applied to employees of the state acting in the name of the public, such as law enforcers.

The article ends with...

As with Trump’s wave of prosecutions instituted over the objections of professional prosecutors, we now have a signal for all willing to listen that federal law enforcement is being turned into the instrument of one man’s zeal for revenge and appetite to accumulate power.

I received an email about what LGBTQ+ organizations can do to protect themselves. We haven't seen the likes of this since Senator Joseph McCarthy's House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) conducted their witch hunts of anti-communist activities. And then his attackes on the Gay and Lesbian communities known as the  Lavender Scare, the National Archives put it this way,

Beginning in the late 1940s and continuing through the 1960s, thousands of gay employees were fired or forced to resign from the federal workforce because of their sexuality. Dubbed the Lavender Scare, this wave of repression was also bound up with anti-Communism and fueled by the power of congressional investigation.

We are now living in the Lavender Scare II.

Things are so bad that warning are being issued... watch your backs! The email says in part...

Prepare for legal and policy action

•     Identify legal partners and constitutional law allies in case agency actions under NSPM-7 threaten organizational standing, expressive rights, or funding.
•     Follow these partners to track how similar government efforts have been challenged (e.g., on First Amendment grounds) and position your organization to benefit from strategic legal precedent.

Closing Note

NSPM-7 introduces troubling ambiguity in how the federal government may scrutinize nonprofit, advocacy, and civil rights work. Yet our communities are stronger when we do not shrink under ambiguity — when we act with both courage and care. We affirm that LGBTQ+ organizations have a vital role in advancing justice, and we will hold fast to our responsibility to protect and uplift our communities.

The purpose of all of this is create fear, suspicion, and distrust among or community: "That new member? Is he a spy for the FBI" Will this blog show up on the FBI's most wanted list?

Some of the tools and mechanisms NSPM-7 includes:

Empowering Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs) to have a domestic focus and coordinate investigations. 

• Directing the Treasury to identify and disrupt financial networks that fund “domestic terrorism” and political violence, and issuing guidance to financial institutions to file suspicious activity reports (SARs) when financial flows appear tied to illicit (political violence) activity. 
• Mandating the IRS to ensure that tax-exempt entities are not directly or indirectly financing political violence or domestic terrorism, and to refer such organizations (and their officers/employees) to DOJ for possible investigation. 
• Allowing the Attorney General to recommend designating groups or entities whose activities meet the definition of domestic terrorism. 
• The memorandum also describes certain “motivations” or “indicia” that might be considered when assessing risk, such as anti‑capitalism, anti‑Christianity, anti‑Americanism, hostility toward traditional morality, extremism on gender or race, support for overthrowing the government, etc

Do you remember Trump speech to the generals? “We should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military," is this what he was talking about?