The United States Govt Is Building Concentration Camps

Donald Trump is sending people to concentration camps in El Salvador and in defiance of the U.S. Supreme Court--this is a Constitutional Crisis

The Holocaust Encyclopedia defines a concentration camp as follows:

What distinguishes a concentration camp from a prison (in the modern sense) is that it functions outside of a judicial system. The prisoners are not indicted or convicted of any crime by judicial process.

That’s not a historical footnote—it’s a warning. And today, it’s happening again.

Mahmoud Khalil was here legally.
Rumeysa Ozturk was here legally.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia was here legally.

Yet they are all detained, disappeared, or deported without trial, without conviction, without any due process. Languishing in government ordered confinement, their incarceration can only be described as a Concentration Camp. Let’s Address This.

El Salvador's president has offered to incarcerate criminals deported from the US at The Terrorism Confinement Center, a mega-prison intentionally isolated from urban areas that can accommodate up to 40,000 inmates. via Secretaria de Prensa de la Presidencia

The Trump regime’s horrific treatment of a growing number of Black and brown (and yes, documented) immigrants is proof of one thing: When MAGA Republicans claim they “just want legal immigration,” they are lying. What they actually want—what they’ve always actually wanted—is to end non-white immigration entirely, just as it was before the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act. That’s what the “Again” in “Make America Great Again” has always meant: a return to Jim Crow America. A return to white Christian nationalism by any means necessary.

This isn’t speculation. This is policy.

A non-comprehensive list of Black and brown immigrants not charged with any crime, but arrested, detained, and/or deported without due process of law for the “crime” of criticizing U.S. foreign policy.

Take the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia. This week Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen traveled to El Salvador to fight for his release. He discovered something that should horrify every American: El Salvador admits Kilmar committed no crime, that they have no evidence that he committed any crime—and the U.S. government is paying El Salvador to keep him locked away. This despite the US Supreme Court ruling 9-0 that Garcia should be returned to the United States immediately.

A picture of Kilmar Abrego Garcia and his son. Photo: Alex Wong/Getty

This is a Constitutional Crisis of the highest order. An American president is defying a direct order from the U.S. Supreme Court. He’s sending innocent people—legal immigrants—to foreign black sites and demanding other governments build more camps to detain more people. Caught on a hot mic last week, Trump remarked to El Salvador's president to build at least five more of these facilities because Trump wants to send “home grown” people there soon. That’s not immigration policy. That’s not national security. That is fascism. And yes—those are concentration camps.

Fascism Is Unoriginal

We’ve seen this playbook before. As Princeton Professor James Q. Whitman documents in his landmark book, Hitler’s American Model, Hitler explicitly based the Nazi racial purity laws on the United States’ Jim Crow laws.

Today’s GOP is taking it full circle.

And while Black and brown people are being kidnapped, deported, and tortured for speaking out, consider that KKK terrorists—who murdered over 5,000 Black Americans that we know of—continue to exist freely under the guise of “free speech.” That’s not justice. That’s not law and order. That’s the core of American fascism—where whiteness is protected and every other identity is criminalized by default.

We Must Uphold Justice Over Politics

Moreover, while it might hurt to hear this part, do not make the mistake of thinking this is just a MAGA problem. A shocking 60 Democratic members of Congress—House and Senate combined—helped pass the fascist Laken Riley Act, which allows the federal government to deport immigrants on the mere accusation of a crime, without evidence or conviction. About the Laken Riley Act, the National Immigration Council warned:

The bill eliminates due process for many immigrants, including some who have been living and working legally in the U.S. for years. Under this law, they would be placed in indefinite detention if accused—not convicted—of low-level crimes like shoplifting. That could include children who are mistakenly arrested and accused of crimes they did not commit. “This bill does nothing to improve safety or fix our broken immigration system. Under the guise of preventing violence, the bill forces immigration officers to indefinitely detain and deport non-citizens who pose no public safety risk, without access to basic due process. The bill also gives state attorneys general unprecedented power over immigration policy. The bill strips people of their basic rights and upends how the U.S. government enforces immigration law,” said Nayna Gupta, policy director at the American Immigration Council.

And yet, 60 Democrats voted YES on this fascist bill and helped make it law. Who are they? Well, the 12 Senate Democrats who voted for it are as follows:

• Arizona: Mark Kelly, Ruben Gallego

• Nevada: Jacky Rosen, Catherine Cortez Masto

• New Hampshire: Maggie Hassan, Jeanne Shaheen

• Georgia: Jon Ossoff, Raphael Warnock

• Michigan: Gary Peters, Elissa Slotkin

• Virginia: Mark Warner

• Pennsylvania: John Fetterman

These 12 Democrats helped overcome the filibuster requirement and ensured this unjust piece of legislation became law. And while Republicans could in theory pass this bill through the House without any Democratic support, 48 House Democrats joined Republicans anyway. [See full list linked at bottom of article]¹

So when these same Democrats post statements of concern about Mahmoud Khalil, Rumeysa Ozturk, or Kilmar Abrego Garcia or about the importance of due process of law and Constitutional rights—just know they helped make this fascism possible. We need a true opposition party, and right now too many Democrats are failing at fulfilling that obligation to the American people or to the United States Constitution.

And finally, let’s not forget the enablers who stood by as fascism advanced in America. We are here because of a comprehensive failure of leadership, and it is important we recognize this fact.

Mitch McConnell admitted on January 6 that Trump was responsible for the violent insurrection, and then he voted to acquit him of wrongdoing. Knowing all this, former Attorney General Merrick Garland “stuck to norms” and refused to prosecute Trump, even as the law demanded it. He chose to protect the illusion of institutional decorum over the survival of democracy itself. And of course, as the Supreme Court gave Trump near-total immunity last year, Trump is now using that immunity to ignore the Court entirely. Honestly, who could have seen this coming? (Spoiler alert: everyone with eyes, a conscience, or a basic understanding of history.)

Conclusion

We must say it plainly and clearly. We are in a Constitutional Crisis. The United States Government is building concentration camps in foreign nations to disappear people it doesn’t like—not because they committed any form of crime—but because the President has decided that the US Constitution is not worth upholding. I am unsure what Democratic Party leadership needs to see to recognize that this is a Constitutional Crisis, and we are already under a five-alarm fire. We need more leaders like Senator Chris Van Hollen to demonstrate that it is not enough to merely resist fascism—we need a true opposition party.

Otherwise, we may not make it to Mid-term elections.

1. https://www.newsweek.com/full-list-democrats-voted-pass-laken-riley-act-2019432