Republished with permission from D. Earl Stephens

As I began typing a piece this morning about my love-hate relationship with The New York Times, and our capacity to stay engaged and fight against authoritarianism and the America-attacking Trump regime, I got this news alert from the newspaper in my email:

Breaking News: F.B.I. Arrests Wisconsin Judge in Immigration Dispute

I blinked hard, broke into a cold sweat, hit the story, and almost threw up because this is not OK in America. Hell, it is not OK ANYWHERE, but here we are.

Today, the United States officially became Russia.

Read that again: Today, the United States officially became Russia.

Because once you storm into a courthouse and start locking up officers of the law you have descended into a fascist state.

There is no taking it back.

This is a developing story, but what we know for sure is that the conspiracy-theorist and Director of the FBI, Kash Patel (pictured), put this post up on the despicable Elon Musk’s rightwing propaganda platform “X” this morning to announce the arrest of Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan:

He then just as quickly deleted it, because whether it’s the drunken Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, or other members of this clown show that the vile Trump has nailed to his broken cabinet, all of them are expected to give their absolute worst for their country.

Essentially, Patel just couldn’t WAIT to spike his deflated football, and was most likely told by a cooler-headed fascist in his disintegrating department that maybe his sickening tweet wasn’t a good look.

“We believe Judge Dugan …” Really? “You believe” this? Got any facts, sonny? Because I believe that you are nothing but a two-bit Nazi given your despicable, anti-American actions today.

Dugan was actually arrested AT HER COURTHOUSE and is being charged with two federal felony counts: obstruction and concealing an individual.

So in America, where our nation’s top judges can be wined and dined and flown all over the world by corrupt billionaires—where they can even loudly signal their support for insurrection and are provided immunity—a county judge who doesn’t want ICE crawling all over courtroom can be arrested.

Until proven otherwise, it looks like Judge Dugan was arrested for upholding the law and how it is supposed to be comported, not breaking it.

Gwen Moore, who serves Wisconsin’s 4th Congressional District where this heinous act occurred, just released this statement on social media channels:

Wisconsin Senator Tammy Baldwin just released this statement:

House Judiciary Committee ranking member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said this:

“It is remarkable that the Administration would dare to start arresting state court judges. It’s a whole new descent into government chaos.

My Congressman, Mark Pocan (D-Wisc.) said this:

“The Trump administration again is breaking norms in how it’s dealing with immigration, the legal system, and normalcy. This is stuff I expect from Third World countries.”

As this very sad story continues to develop, tired as we all are from the daily chaos, every single one of us should be watching and taking action, because as of three hours ago, every single one of us is a potential target for doing something the mad King Trump doesn’t like.

Call your representatives NOW: (202) 224-3121.

This is an emergency.