By the time you read this, Joe Biden will be the President and the worst president in U.S. history will be history. I truly hope the door hits Trump in the ass on his way out. Hard. And all of his grifting family, too.
As I write this it is Martin Luther King Jr. day. Lots of folks, including Republicans who have continually backed this virulently racist administration, are posting quotes from Dr. King as if posting an “arc of justice” meme makes you not racist.
Make no mistake, the domestic terrorists who stormed the U.S. Capitol were by and large motivated by racism. Capitol police officers reported that they were targets of racist epithets throughout the attack. But most importantly, the terrorists were willing to risk everything to keep the most racist president in my lifetime in office. Because they like the racism. That’s a feature, not a bug. When they say they like Trump because he “tells it like it is,” they are really saying they like Trump because he, unlike so many Republicans before him, isn’t of the “dog whistle” camp when it comes to racism. He’s of the bullhorn variety. And way too many people find him refreshing. It’s what they’ve been waiting for. Praying for, even. It’s not coincidental that evangelical Christians are huge Trump fans. They love the hate.
I don’t know what’s going to happen on Jan. 20. You don’t have to gaze into a crystal ball to suspect that those who think the election was stolen from Trump will be up to no good — it wasn’t. He lost. Also he sucks. And yet, no doubt there will be folks who underestimate them, just like D.C. did on Jan. 6.
I live in Michigan where domestic terrorists planned to kidnap and execute Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. They stormed into the state capitol with guns. Because, and I’m not kidding, guns are allowed inside the building. Because, you know, freedom. Signs, however, are not allowed. The only speech that’s free here is “I could kill you so easily right now,” which is basically what you’re saying when you hold a gun in the gallery as you overlook legislators doing their job. That doesn’t make you a patriot. It makes you a terrorist.
So, yeah, if what happened in D.C. surprised you, then you haven’t been paying attention. Michigan was basically the dress rehearsal for these creeps.
There have been many arrests of people who participated in the attack in D.C. And there are a lot of people who are shocked, just shocked, that they are being threatened with arrest.
Case in point: Texas real estate agent Jenna Ryan who flew to D.C. on a private jet. She posted on social media, “We just stormed the Capital [sic]. It was one of the best days of my life.” She says that her arrest has made her feel “persecuted” and that she didn’t know there was any violence going on, even as she live streamed herself storming the building and saying, “We’re all gonna be up here, and we’re gonna be breaking those windows. We’re gonna fucking go in here. Life or death, it doesn’t matter.”
“I personally feel innocent,” she says. “In my heart of hearts, do I feel like a criminal? No, I am not the villain that a lot of people would make me out to be or maybe think I am because I was a Trump supporter.”
And yet she proudly posted a photo of herself next to a broken window in the Capitol with a threat that the media was next.
“I would like a pardon from the President of the United States. I think that we all deserve a pardon,” she says.
And then with a look of disbelief, “I’m facing a prison sentence. I think that I do not deserve that.”
A very convincing argument. She doesn’t FEEL guilty and she doesn’t DESERVE punishment. Case closed.
She’s also upset that her career has been harmed.
Man, wait until she learns what it’s like when, say, a young Black man gets arrested, tried and imprisoned for marijuana possession.
Ha ha. Kidding. Because she no doubt personally feels like Black people in jail deserve “prison sentence” in her heart of hearts.
We live in a country that considers mistakes made by Black and Brown people to be justification for the ruination of the rest of their lives. People like Jenna, however, are allowed to make mistakes over and over again. They’re so used to that privilege that they do things like “accidentally” commit an act of terrorism in the name of a white supremacist president.
I don’t know if Trump will actually pardon her or anyone else. It would be a lot of work, and he really isn’t into that kind of thing.
D’Anne Witkowski is a poet, writer and comedian living in Michigan with her wife and son. She has been writing about LGBTQ politics for over a decade. Follow her on Twitter @MamaDWitkowski.