This December the San Diego Board of Supervisors voted to bring County policies into compliance with California State Senate Bill 54. This bill states that law enforcement agencies are not allowed to use money or personnel to "detain, detect, or arrest persons for immigration enforcement purposes." 

In response, the San Diego County Sheriff Kelly Martinez stated she would not honor the policy, which is intended to help shield people from the mass deportations promised by President-elect Donald Trump, and that she instead would cooperate with ICE. 

Then on December 20 Nora Vargas—the Chair of the Board of Supervisors in San Diego, who had just won re-election a month earlier—suddenly stepped down. She released a statement saying, “Due to personal safety and security reasons, I will not take the oath of office for a second term.” While we don’t know all the circumstances, Vargas received a torrent of hateful comments and death threats for spearheading the measure voted on by the Board of Supervisors. 

This should be a wake-up call for every decent person. This is fascism—Trump/MAGA 2.0 moving with a vengeance this time around to implement their program in a much more thorough and punishing way. They do not intend to let officials get in their way. A further dramatic example of this is a six-page letter sent by top Trump advisor Steven Miller to 249 local officials in “sanctuary” jurisdictions threatening criminal prosecution for defying federal immigration law.   

If  this goes unchallenged, it will not stop there. These policies and actions by sheriffs like Martinez need to be opposed. And people—including public officials like Nora Vargas—need to be defended when they come under fascist attack. 

If and when people do stand up, and if their rights and lives are defended in a way that draws many of the decent people into the fray AGAINST this  intimidation, and if this is done as part of a larger movement against this Trump/MAGA fascism as a whole… that can “become contagious.” This can give others the backbone to stand up and to be part of building a truly massive movement aiming to create the kind of political crisis that is so deep and profound that Trump cannot govern and lock down his fascist remaking of the country. 

At the same time, the scientific fact is there is NO section of the rulers of this system that have any real answers to the crisis of immigration. The immigration crisis has been created by the “normal” everyday workings of capitalism-imperialism. Climate destruction, brutal exploitation, plunder and nearly endless wars have uprooted 120 million and rising to 200 million by 2050, who are now on the move for a way to simply survive. This is a system which all politicians work to maintain and enforce—even as right now they are locked in a deadly conflict over how to do so. 

Yes, on one level these are conflicts between different sections of those who rule this capitalist-imperialist system over how to rule. But this is not just “oh, who cares, they’re all bad”—splits like this have real significance to masses of people here and worldwide. If the fascists get away with attacks on people who oppose their draconian measures, no matter what their position in society, it will have very negative consequences very immediately for immigrants, and it will also have consequences for anyone who cares about justice and the rule of law. It will push forward the full-out consolidation of the fascist regime, which will have catastrophic consequences for all of humanity. 

Bob Avakian has said in social media message REVOLUTION #106:

IN THE NAME OF HUMANITY, WE REFUSE TO ACCEPT A FASCIST AMERICA! is  not an empty slogan—or merely some kind of general statement of opposition—it is an active orientation for building mass opposition and resistance to Trump/MAGA fascism. 

In its most important dimension, this means uniting all who can be united—mobilizing people growing into the millions, and ultimately tens of millions—in protest and resistance against this fascism.

At the same time, an important part of this will involve defending people against attacks on their rights and even on their very lives. This defense will need to involve many different dimensions: legal and political defense—and defense against attempts to carry out physical attacks on people who are targets of this fascism.

As I emphasized in “Something Terrible Or Something Truly Emancipating”: 

There is plenty that needs to be done, and urgently, which requires real boldness and heart, to stand up against the fascists, and any other oppressive force, in their moves to threaten and intimidate, brutalize and even murder people. Let me make clear that I am not calling for launching unprovoked and unjustified attacks on anybody; but there is a right, and a need—and there is the responsibility—to defend the people who are oppressed and brutalized under this system, and those who represent and stand for what is right, and are being attacked because of that.

Now, with the re-election of Trump, the MAGA fascists are pumped up, feeling they have powerful backing to intimidate and attack immigrants, women, LGBT people, Black people and others who are targets of this Trump/MAGA fascism. Those who recognize the importance of defeating this fascism, need to have an offensive orientation in challenging this fascism, while defense is built against attacks by these fascists.”

As we revcoms (revolutionary communists) have made clear in the Declaration WE NEED AND WE DEMAND: A WHOLE NEW WAY TO LIVE, A FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT SYSTEM: “So long as we are still living under the rule of this system of capitalism-imperialism, we will defend people against attacks on their lives and on the rights that are supposed to be guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution.”

At the same time, this Declaration goes on to make this crucial point: 

we need a whole different system, with a whole different Constitution—the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America—which will provide much greater rights for the people, including the basic right to have the fundamentally determining role in a new society and government whose purpose and goal is to eliminate all exploitation and oppression, everywhere.

This flows from the understanding that is concentrated in the second slogan I included at the start:

THIS WHOLE SYSTEM IS ROTTEN AND ILLEGITIMATE—WE NEED AND WE DEMAND: A WHOLE NEW WAY TO LIVE, A FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT SYSTEM!