ICE's Secrecy Is a Giant Leap Forward for a Police State in America: An Executive Watch Roundup
Our late-July selection of the president's latest and greatest assaults on the rule of law
The Institute for the Study of Modern Authoritarianism, the publisher of The UnPopulist, launched Executive Watch earlier this year. This one-of-a-kind project, which is designed to track presidential abuses of power as they are happening, has been meticulously documenting each illicit action emanating from the White House.
Below is our biweekly selection of new entries posted in Executive Watch. We’re covering everything from U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi’s attempts to convince the courts to ascribe king-like powers to Trump, effectively allowing him to unilaterally suspend any law he wants, to Trump’s suggestion that he might arrest and deport the Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, who is a U.S. citizen. That’s just for starters. We document more of his abuses below.
You should bookmark this page that contains a chronological scroll of the abuses and this post that sorts and lists them under our 5 P categories:
After reading this roundup, tell us in the comments: Which of these abuses do you take to be the most troubling, and why?
July 15, 2025
Secret Police and Secret Courts: The Trump Administration Withholds Names of Immigration Prosecutors, Taking a Great Leap Forward Toward a Police State
Category: Power Consolidation
In a free society, the law is enforced out in the open, subject to public scrutiny. In a dictatorship, there are secret police and secret courts. With ICE agents wearing masks and refusing to identify themselves, we have already taken the first step in that direction. Here is the next step: Trump administration immigration prosecutors are now refusing to identify themselves in court.
The Intercept describes this extraordinary situation:
Inside a federal immigration courtroom in New York City last month, a judge took an exceedingly unusual step: declining to state the name of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement attorney pressing to deport asylum seekers.
“We’re not really doing names publicly,” said Judge ShaSha Xu—after stating her own name and those of the immigrants and their lawyers. It was the first of two separate instances The Intercept identified in which judges chose to withhold the identities of the attorneys representing the Trump administration’s deportation regime.
As ICE agents across the country wear masks to raid workplaces and detain immigrants, government attorneys need not cover their faces to shield their identities. Legal experts who spoke to The Intercept agreed the practice of concealing the lawyers’ identities was both novel and concerning.
“I’ve never heard of someone in open court not being identified,” said Elissa Steglich, a law professor and co-director of the Immigration Clinic at the University of Texas at Austin. “Part of the court’s ethical obligation is transparency, including clear identification of the parties. Not identifying an attorney for the government means if there are unethical or professional concerns regarding [the Department of Homeland Security], the individual cannot be held accountable. And it makes the judge appear partial to the government.”
This is a good opportunity to remind everyone that immigration judges are not real judges. They are not independent of the immigration enforcement apparatus—they are its creatures and serve as its pliant lackeys.
The next step after this will be secret charges and secret trials. With some detainees, including U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents, already disappearing into the immigration police state and being detained and deported with no record or legal process, we’re almost all the way there.
July 15, 2025
Trump Digs Into Schiff’s Financial Records and Threatens to Prosecute the Senator on Dubious Grounds as Payback for Impeachment
Category: Presidential Retribution
Donald Trump has promised retaliation against his political opponents, and one of his chief targets is Sen. Adam Schiff, a leader of the first impeachment inquiry against Trump and the congressional investigation into his coup attempt in 2021. Now Trump is targeting Schiff for prosecution on a dubious charge of mortgage fraud.
See an overview from Axios:
President Trump accused Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) of mortgage fraud on Tuesday, calling Schiff a “scam artist” who “needs to be brought to justice.”
Trump’s call for Schiff to be prosecuted is part of a larger pattern of the president seeking retribution against Americans who have spoken out against him.
Trump wrote on Truth Social that Schiff reported his primary residence incorrectly from 2009 to 2020, which the president called a “sustained pattern of possible Mortgage Fraud.” …
A spokesperson for Schiff said the senator maintained a home in Maryland for easy access to Washington, calling it “routine for a member of Congress representing a district thousands of miles away.”
“The lenders who provided the mortgages for both homes were well aware of then-Representative Schiff’s Congressional service and of his intended year-round use of both homes, neither of which were vacation homes,” the spokesperson added. “He has always been completely transparent about this.”
It’s pretty rich for Trump to accuse someone else of a “sustained pattern of fraud” when this is precisely what he was found guilty of in New York, making flagrantly false claims to lenders and insurers for decades.
Connect this to Trump’s plan to fire Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. The letter firing Powell was reportedly drawn up by William J. Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency—the same person behind this new accusation against Sen. Schiff. In the report on Powell, The New York Times notes:
Mr. Pulte has also emerged as an aggressive force in the Trump administration targeting some of the president’s perceived enemies, such as New York Attorney General Letitia James and Senator Adam Schiff of California, Democrats who were involved in investigations into Mr. Trump.
That is the pattern for this administration, in which agency heads and top officials function as enforcers of the president’s personal grudges.
July 9, 2025
Trump’s Retribution Agenda Gets Underway With Criminal Referrals Against Officials Who Investigated Him
Category: Presidential Retribution
Donald Trump has been threatening to open investigations of his critics and political enemies, but Trump says a lot of things that no one ever follows up on. Now, however, his underlings are beginning to implement this vow, moving forward on criminal investigations of former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan.
The New York Times reports:
John Ratcliffe, the CIA director and a harsh critic of his Democratic-appointed predecessors, has made a criminal referral of Mr. Brennan to the FBI, accusing him of lying to Congress, officials said. The bureau is also scrutinizing Mr. Comey for his role in the Russia investigation, other officials said, although the exact basis for any inquiry remains unclear.
Even if it is unclear whether the moves will lead to charges, they are among the most significant indications that President Trump’s appointees intend to follow through on his campaign to exact retribution against his perceived enemies. …
In 2018, the president told the White House counsel that he planned to order the Justice Department to prosecute Mr. Comey and Mrs. Clinton. The counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, rebuffed him, saying that he had no authority to do so. Mr. McGahn said that while he could request an investigation, that too could prompt accusations of abuse of power and drafted a memo warning that he could face a range of consequences, including impeachment. …
It is also not even clear if the Justice Department has legal authority to pursue charges if the FBI finds ample evidence to prosecute. Mr. Brennan’s testimony before the Senate is now seven years old, which appears to lie beyond the statute of limitations in such cases.
This is revenge for the investigation of Trump’s ties with Russia, even though the results of the Russia investigation have never been refuted. And while charges against either are unlikely to succeed, remember the old adage that the process is the punishment. Being investigated and vilified will impose costs intended to deter future critics of Trump.
July 4, 2025
Paramount Shamelessly Signs Up to Toe the Administration’s Line, Capitulating to Trump's Corrupt Shakedown
Category: Power Consolidation
Paramount, the parent company of CBS News, has capitulated in a bogus lawsuit filed by Donald Trump, agreeing to pay a $16 million bribe to his presidential library—essentially, a Trump slush fund—in exchange for approval of a merger that puts the company in Trump-friendly hands. But it’s worse than that.
The Los Angeles Times reports:
The settlement, which the president approved late Tuesday, included a commitment by Trump to drop his claims and not sue over the May “60 Minutes” broadcast, according to sources and a Paramount statement.
Paramount said it agreed to pay Trump’s legal fees. The remainder of the $16-million settlement will go toward his future presidential library.
“Larry Ellison is a friend of mine. He’s a great guy,” Trump told reporters following a Thursday night rally in Iowa. “I think he’s going to run CBS really well, and I think he’s making a good deal to buy it.” …
One person close to the legal effort said the agreement “got over the finish line” due to a sweetener for Trump. His team anticipates that Paramount networks eventually will run millions of dollars worth of free commercials, or public service announcements, in support of Trump causes, including combating antisemitism and increasing border security.
Trump also referenced the alleged side deal.
“We did a deal for about $16 million plus $16 million — or maybe more than that in advertising,” Trump said. “So [the settlement] is like $32- to maybe $35 million.”
Paramount has denied the extra “side deal,” though it has also been reported elsewhere. It wouldn’t be the first time someone makes a “deal” with Trump only to have him alter it later to demand more. Either way, it is clear that CBS will no longer be able to claim a shred of independence from the Trump administration.
July 3, 2025
Trump Is Failing to Enforce Congress’ Ban on TikTok, Claiming King-Like Powers to Suspend Laws He Does Not Like
Category: Policy Illegality
Donald Trump’s refusal to enforce the TikTok ban turns out to be about an issue much bigger than what happens to TikTok. In letters to tech companies, the Trump administration has been claiming that the president has a broad and unilateral power to suspend laws passed by Congress.
The New York Times filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the documents, and it reports on the results:
In letters to companies like Apple and Google, Ms. Bondi wrote that Mr. Trump had decided that shutting down TikTok would interfere with his “constitutional duties,” so the law banning the social media app must give way to his “core presidential national security and foreign affairs powers.” …
The executive branch has the power, as a matter of prosecutorial discretion, to choose not to enforce laws in particular instances or to set priorities about what categories of lawbreaking they will prioritize when resources are limited. …
In her letters, Ms. Bondi went far beyond that. Because of Mr. Trump’s order, she said, tech firms that acted contrary to the statute were breaking no law, even in theory, and the department was “irrevocably relinquishing” any legal claims against them—including under future administrations. …
Essentially, legal experts said, Mr. Trump is claiming a constitutional power to immunize private parties to commit otherwise illegal acts with impunity.
Executive Functions provides a thorough analysis of this claim, describing it as an attempt to resurrect the “dispensing power,” the authority to “grant dispensations that prospectively excuse legal violations” that was once claimed by kings but has long been declared anathema to the American political system.
July 1, 2025
Trump Signs Off on Military Troops Acting as the Judge, Jury, and Deportation Squad to Eject Immigrants
Category: Power Consolidation
Donald Trump sent National Guard troops into Los Angeles to suppress “riots.” If such a threat ever existed, it died down weeks ago—but the troops are still there as a permanent military occupation. Now Trump is expanding the National Guard’s role by making them into immigration judges in Florida.
The Miami Herald has the news:
For months now, Gov. Ron DeSantis has sought the approval of the federal government to deputize Florida National Guard Judge Advocate General Corps officers to act as immigration judges. On Tuesday, Trump said he is in favor of the plan. “He didn’t even have to ask me. He has my approval,” Trump said during a roundtable discussion at the immigration detention center in the Everglades.
DeSantis on Monday said having the National Guard work as immigration judges on site at the detention center could fast-track deportation. …
Unlike federal judges, who work for the judicial branch and are independent of the President, immigration judges work under the direction of the U.S. Attorney General.
Because the detention center is built on an old airstrip, DeSantis and others have also said it will speed up the deportation process by allowing the federal government to fly migrants out of the site. Attorney General James Uthmeier, who was instrumental in the detention center’s planning, said on social media Tuesday that it was a “one stop shop for immigration enforcement.” “Come in, get your ‘process,’ and fly out,” Uthmeier said.
Uthmeier himself put quotation marks around the word “process,” openly flaunting that the goal is to deprive immigrants of due process by holding rushed procedures at a remote airfield, conducted by the military. Trump is using immigration to create a preserve of martial law within the American legal system, especially since he’s also firing actual immigration judges.
July 1, 2025
Trump Threatens to Arrest, Denaturalize, and Deport New York’s Democratic Mayoral Candidate Zohran Mamdani
Category: Presidential Retribution
An immigration crackdown is emerging as the main instrument Donald Trump is using to impose a police state on America, complete with the by-now-routine arrest of opposition politicians. Most recently, Trump threatened to arrest and deport the Democratic candidate for mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani.
USA Today provides the details:
Trump threatened to arrest Mamdani if as mayor he follows through on pledges not to assist federal officials enforcing immigration laws.
“Well then, we’ll have to arrest him,” Trump told reporters on July 1 while visiting a detention center in Florida. Trump said that he would “be watching over him very carefully on behalf of the nation.”
Trump also said “a lot of people are saying he’s here illegally,” which is false. Mamdani is a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Uganda, who immigrated to the United States with his parents—film director Mira Nair and Columbia University professor Mahmood Mamdani—at the age of seven.
Mamdani, a state Assembly member who won the nomination for mayor on a progressive platform, responded on social media that Trump is threatening him despite the fact that not cooperating with ICE doesn't violate any law. (The Immigrant Legal Resource Center notes “There is no federal legal obligation for state and local jurisdictions to use their resources to help with immigration enforcement.”) …
Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tennessee, called for Mamdani to be stripped of his citizenship and deported and offensively referred to Mamdani as “little Muhammad” in reference to his Muslim religion.
Do not take this last threat lightly. The Trump Department of Justice just issued a memo “which advises prosecutors in the DOJ’s Civil Division to prioritize the denaturalization of various naturalized citizens over alleged infractions ranging from war crimes to ‘material misrepresentations’ in their citizenship applications.”
In a free society, the citizens decide who is the president. In Trump’s America, the president will decide who is a citizen.
June 18, 2025
Trump Has Seated Uncle Sam on U.S. Steel’s Board and Handed Him Veto Powers Over Private Business Decisions
Category: Power Consolidation
Nippon Steel has long pursued a buyout of U.S. Steel, and the Trump administration recently gave the deal its approval—with the condition of a seat on the board and veto power over the company’s policies by the president.
The Guardian describes the deal:
The golden share gives the US government veto authority over a raft of corporate decisions, from idling plants to cutting production capacity and moving jobs overseas, as previewed in a weekend social media post by the commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick.
The share also gives the government a veto over a potential relocation of US Steel’s headquarters from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a transfer of jobs overseas, a name change, and any potential future acquisition of a rival business, the release shows.
The inclusion of the golden share to win approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US, which scrutinizes foreign investment for national security risks, could drive overseas investors away from US companies, national security lawyers said on Monday. …
After the United Steelworkers union came out against the deal last year, both then president Joe Biden, a Democrat, and Trump, a Republican, expressed their opposition as they sought to woo voters in Pennsylvania, a key swing state, in the presidential election campaign.
In this case, the executive power grab might have happened even without Trump. It is a reminder that the dictatorial power Trump is now claiming has been—in part and perhaps unwittingly—prepared for him by his predecessors of both parties.
© The UnPopulist, 2025
Follow us on Bluesky, Threads, YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and X.
We welcome your reactions and replies. Please adhere to our comments policy.