This We’ll Defend

I, [name], do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same…

I raised my right hand and repeated those words in January, 1994. I was seventeen years old, and I wrote a check to my country payable with my very life. The gravitas of that moment is still burned on my soul. I love my country fiercely and I meant it with every fiber of my being.

That oath didn’t have an expiration date. Didn’t come with a clause saying “except when it’s inconvenient” or “unless your guy is in office.” It was absolute. Defend the Constitution. Against all enemies. Foreign and domestic.

Period. Full stop.

Now I’m watching domestic enemies dismantle my country at speed. And the bastards think they’re patriots.

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The past few days I’ve been in the trenches on social media arguing with people about Trump deploying federal troops to American cities. Not theoretically. Actually doing it. Portland. Chicago. Places where federal judges have ruled there’s no legal justification.

Here’s what I’ve heard from intelligent, educated people who claim to be constitutional conservatives:

“Precedent is a legal argument. Judges shouldn’t just overturn it based on their politics.”—From a Fox News editor who just finished calling multiple federal judges “corrupt” for ruling against Trump. Including judges Trump himself appointed.

“Who is the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces? The President, or some random district court judge?”—Framing constitutional checks and balances as illegitimate obstacles to executive will.

“Corrupt judges notwithstanding, it is long established precedent that the federal government can federalize the national guard.”—Ignoring that courts found zero evidence of the “rebellion” required by law.

These people are arguing the President should be able to deploy military troops wherever he wants, and any judge who disagrees is corrupt.

That’s not constitutional conservatism. That’s advocating for the exact tyranny the Constitution was designed to prevent.

The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.

James Madison, Federalist No. 47

I’ve researched how democracies die for a long time now, and there’s a pattern. Three phases, executed systematically:

Phase One: Delegitimize Congress.

“Do-nothing Congress.” “Bought by special interests.” “Gridlock.” “Can’t get anything done.”

Congress approval sits at 15-25% with a 55-point partisan gap based solely on which party controls it. Americans don’t evaluate Congress on performance or constitutional role anymore. Only whether their team is winning.

Phase Two: Delegitimize the Judiciary.

“Activist judges legislating from the bench.” “Politically motivated rulings.” “Corrupt judges who hate Trump.”

Supreme Court trust collapsed 27 points in six years. From 68% to 41%. Federal judiciary confidence dropped 24 points in four years. Most damning: 56% of Americans now believe Supreme Court decisions are based mainly on politics rather than law.

Phase Three: Elevate the Executive as sole legitimate authority.

“Only the president can get things done.” “He has a mandate from voters.” “Strong executive action is necessary because the other branches failed.”

78% of Americans say expanding presidential power is “too risky” in the abstract. But 59-78% of Republicans support giving Trump specifically more power. The principle isn’t “checks and balances matter.” It’s “my guy should do whatever he wants.”

This isn’t conspiracy theory. This is documented democratic backsliding. The same pattern that played out in Hungary under Viktor Orbán, Poland under the Law and Justice Party, Turkey under Erdoğan.

In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.

James Madison, Federalist No. 51

The founders understood that concentrating power in one branch was the death of republican government. They built the entire system around preventing it.

And Trump supporters are dismantling that system. On purpose. While calling it patriotism.

September 27, 2025. Trump announces deployment of 200 Oregon National Guard troops to Portland. Claims the city is “burning to the ground,” facing “insurrection.”

October 4. U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut—whom Trump appointed in 2019—blocks the deployment.

She reviews the evidence: Protests are “small and sedate” with minimal arrests. Portland Police made 36 arrests at the ICE facility between June and October. Twenty-five of those in a single week. None for months afterward. The night before Trump’s announcement, 8-15 people were present. Mostly sitting in lawn chairs. Local residents testified seeing no fires, no lynchings, no riots, no looting, no assaults.

Judge Immergut writes: “The government has not offered any evidence demonstrating that those violent incidents were part of an organized attempt to overthrow the government as a whole.” She finds the deployments “simply untethered to the facts.”

The legal standard under 10 U.S.C. § 12406 requires evidence of “rebellion against the authority of the Government” that makes it “impracticable to enforce” federal law through ordinary means. No such evidence exists.

Trump’s response? Immediately deploys California National Guard to circumvent her order.

When Immergut blocks that too—broader order prohibiting ANY state National Guard from deploying to Oregon—Trump attacks her personally: “That judge ought to be ashamed of herself because Portland is burning to the ground.”

Then threatens to invoke the Insurrection Act: “If I had to enact it, I’d do that. If people were being killed, and courts were holding us up, or governors or mayors were holding us up, sure, I’d do that.”

Translation: If courts tell me I can’t do something, I’ll declare an emergency and do it anyway.

The independence of the judges is equally requisite to guard the Constitution and the rights of individuals… And it proves, in the last place, that as liberty can have nothing to fear from the judiciary alone, but would have every thing to fear from its union with either of the other departments.

Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 78

Here’s what I’ve been told in these debates:

“Precedent is a legal argument!”

Sure. You know what else is precedent? Marbury v. Madison (1803). Judicial review. The foundation of courts being able to check executive power. But somehow that precedent doesn’t count when it constrains your guy.

“Judges are corrupt!”

Judge Immergut was appointed by Trump. Judge Timothy Reif, who ruled Trump’s tariff orders illegal, was appointed by Trump. Multiple Trump-appointed judges have ruled against him based on law. They’re all suddenly “corrupt” the moment they don’t rubber-stamp whatever he wants.

“The President is Commander-in-Chief!”

Yes. And that power is constrained by laws Congress passed and subject to judicial review. The entire constitutional framework exists because no branch has unlimited power. Commander-in-Chief doesn’t mean deploy troops anywhere for any reason. That’s what the Posse Comitatus Act and Insurrection Act statutes are about—defining when and how military force can be used domestically.

“But if local officials won’t enforce the law…”

Federal law enforcement handles it. FBI, DEA, ATF, U.S. Marshals. We have plenty of federal law enforcement agencies. What we don’t do is deploy military troops as domestic police, because that’s exactly the tyranny the founders fought a revolution against.

A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty… The means of defence against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home.

James Madison, Constitutional Convention, June 29, 1787

The Constitution doesn’t grant the President unlimited power. It specifically divides power among three co-equal branches to prevent any one person from becoming a tyrant.

Article I: Congress makes laws.

Article II: The President executes laws. Not makes them. Not ignores them. Executes them.

Article III: Courts interpret laws and determine if executive actions are legal.

When Trump deploys troops despite courts finding no legal justification, he’s not being a “strong leader.” He’s violating separation of powers.

When he attacks judges as “corrupt” for ruling against him, he’s not “fighting the deep state.” He’s undermining judicial independence.

When he threatens emergency powers to override court orders, he’s not “protecting America.” He’s concentrating unchecked power in the executive branch.

You know what we call a system where one person has unchecked power and can override courts and ignore laws?

Tyranny.

Exactly what we fought a bloody revolution to escape and the Constitution was explicitly designed to prevent.

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Democracy scholars have documented this exact pattern in multiple countries:

Hungary under Viktor Orbán systematically attacked judicial independence, packed courts with loyalists, seized control of media, created a system where elections still happen but democratic accountability is gone. Freedom House downgraded Hungary from “free” to “partly free”—first EU member to lose that status.

Poland under Law and Justice Party refused to seat constitutionally elected judges, purged Supreme Court justices, created disciplinary panels to punish judges who criticized reforms, directly defied court rulings. Took them months to do what Trump is attempting in weeks.

Turkey under Erdoğan spent years delegitimizing courts before 2010 reforms. After the 2016 coup attempt, purged 30% of all judges, arrested 100,000+ people, consolidated near-total executive power. Turkey now has over 23,000 pending cases at the European Court of Human Rights.

The pattern is always the same: Attack legitimacy of institutions that check executive power. Frame institutional resistance as “obstruction” rather than constitutional duty. Use popular mandate to justify anti-democratic actions. Gradually or rapidly capture institutions until democratic accountability is gone.

The United States is following this playbook. Carnegie Endowment scholars documented in August 2025 that Trump’s executive aggrandizement is happening with “unusual speed and aggression” compared to other democracies that have backslid. We’re compressing into weeks what took months in Poland and Hungary.

V-Dem Institute’s Director stated in March 2025 that the “U.S. was on track to lose its democracy status in six months.”

Six months.

So, right now, basically.

If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.

James Madison, Federalist No. 51

Madison understood what we’re forgetting: The system only works if all branches actually check each other. When one branch attacks the others’ legitimacy, when Americans stop trusting any institution that constrains their preferred leader, the whole structure collapses.

We’re not there yet. But we’re headed that direction at speed.

And here’s what really pisses me off:

The people arguing for unlimited executive power genuinely think they’re patriots.

They call themselves “pro-liberty.”

They’ve wrapped themselves in the flag I served under and my son is actively serving under while advocating for destruction of everything that flag represents. They claim to be “constitutional conservatives” while rejecting the Constitution’s entire framework. They say they “support the troops” while cheering a President who weaponizes the military against American cities.

These are intelligent, educated people. Not stupid. Not ignorant. They’ve just been systematically conditioned through years of rhetoric to distrust every institution that checks executive power, until the only thing left they trust is the executive himself.

And when you only trust one branch of government, you don’t have a constitutional republic anymore.

You have an autocracy waiting to happen.

Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm.

James Madison, Federalist No. 10

The founders built the system assuming leaders would be ambitious, self-interested, sometimes corrupt. They didn’t rely on virtue. They built mechanical checks. Institutional constraints. Ways to make ambition counteract ambition.

We’re dismantling those checks. Calling them obstruction. Calling judges who enforce them corrupt. Demanding our guy be able to do whatever he wants because we trust him.

The founders would call us fools.

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I know some of you reading this think I’ve lost my mind. That this is just normal political disagreement. That I’m being hysterical.

It’s not.

I took an oath. Swore to support and defend the Constitution. Not a person. Not a party. Not a political movement. The Constitution.

That Constitution established a system where power is divided and checked specifically to prevent tyranny. When we see someone systematically attacking those checks, defying court orders, threatening emergency powers to override judicial rulings, demanding unlimited authority—we have a duty to call it out.

This isn’t about policy disagreements. This is about defending the constitutional framework itself.

If you think the President should deploy military troops wherever he wants and courts have no authority to stop him, you’re not defending the Constitution. You’re advocating for its destruction.

If you think judges who rule against the President are automatically “corrupt” rather than doing their constitutional job, you’ve abandoned judicial independence.

If you’re a veteran like me and think separation of powers and checks and balances are “obstruction” rather than foundational constitutional design, you’ve forgotten what you swore to defend.

The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.

James Madison, Speech at the Virginia Constitutional Convention, 1829

The oath didn’t expire when I left service.

And right now, the most dangerous enemies to our Constitution are the people who claim to love it most while systematically tearing it apart.

You don’t have to be a veteran to recognize what’s happening. You just have to care about preserving American democracy.

The pattern is documented. The historical parallels are clear. The trajectory is alarming. The window to reverse course is closing.

When intelligent, educated people explicitly argue the President should have unchecked power and courts shouldn’t constrain him, we’re not having a policy debate. We’re watching constitutional government dismantle in real-time.

The rhetoric has been so effective that people don’t recognize authoritarianism when they’re advocating for it. They think they’re defending America while systematically destroying the institutions that make America a democracy.

This isn’t hyperbole. This isn’t “both sides do it.” This is documented, systematic assault on constitutional checks and balances, following the exact playbook used in countries that have lost their democracies.

If we don’t stand up today and say “fuck no, we won’t stand for this jackbooted bullshit,” we’ll wake up tomorrow in a country where elections still happen but democracy is gone.

In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution.

Thomas Jefferson, Kentucky Resolutions, 1798

Jefferson understood that trusting leaders—any leaders, even good ones—was the path to tyranny. The Constitution’s power comes from constraining everyone, regardless of how much we trust them, regardless of whether they’re “our guy.”

People are removing those chains. Calling them obstacles. Demanding their preferred leader be freed from constitutional constraints.

And they’re doing it while wrapping themselves in the flag and calling themselves patriots.

It’s disgusting. It’s un-American.

And it’s treason.

I took an oath to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

My oath didn’t expire.

And right now, watching people argue that the President should be above the law, that courts checking executive power are “corrupt,” that military deployment in American cities without legal justification is patriotic—I know exactly what domestic enemies look like.

They’re wrapped in flags. Wearing red hats. Calling themselves conservatives.

And they’re dismantling the constitutional republic the founders built, one institution at a time, while claiming they’re saving it.

The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted.

James Madison, Debate at the Constitutional Convention, July 11, 1787

Madison was right.

Somehow we forgot.

And we’re about to pay the price.

Unless we remember our oaths and stand up for what we swore to defend with our very lives.

Hoc Defendemus.