Riot gear

With the National Guard deployed to DC, and preparing to mobilize across 19 states, the threat of Boston falling to federal capture looms over Massachusetts. The Democrat party has vocally opposed this measure, predictably to accusations of being soft on crime from the right.

Now more than ever, we need to come to terms with due process, oversight, and the necessity of protecting the rights of criminals.

Sidestep lazy pitfalls

The justification behind the National Guard presence on DC relies on distraction discourse to portray it as “tough on crime”, placing dissenters in an implied “soft on crime” position by default. This is a false dichotomy. To follow this logic to the extremes, we could subject ourselves to random police searches at any hour of the day, and we would surely uncover criminal activity. However, that would violate the Fourth and Fifth Amendments. Logically, everyone exchanges a degree of safety for privacy and liberty. Advocating for personal freedom isn’t inherently a defense of the actions of the worst examples of criminals someone can conjure, it’s protection against state-weaponized lawlessness.

Which, of course, is a bipartisan belief.

The farce of “tough on crime”

Here’s an example that resonates with the GOP: Trump, with 34 felonies, was elected to the highest office of the US. The party position is that these convictions were politically motivated. Anecdotally, other justifications are:

  • This crime has never been charged before
  • It was a hoax
  • They should have been misdemeanors

Here’s the key: if someone can rationalize that a criminal with dozens of felony convictions was unfairly targeted, then they are not “tough on crime”. There is an implicit understanding that “criminal” and “guilty” are not synonymous. If it’s true for the most powerful person in the country, it can be true for anyone.

From there, it is imperative to drive home the point that any of us are much closer in status to an illegal immigrant than we are to the president. Protecting due process is paramount for a free society.

Criminal rights are our rights

If the recognition that the justice system is flawed is a bipartisan stance, then advocating for the fairest treatment of the accused isn’t “soft on crime”, it’s “pro-liberty”. Don’t fall for lazy labels that put you in an impossible position, and don’t rely on them to pull yourself out. Call out the contradictions, find the common principles, and keep our cities free from federal militarization.