Governance in a democracy rests on a covenant requiring daily renewal. An endorsement of a candidate electorally one day does not equal complete freedom of action the next. It is an approval by the franchised to allow an individual into a place of power. Extrapolating an election into a free hand is the position of the reductionists (the simple-minded), the maximalists (the authoritarians), and the avaricious (the wannabe oligarchs). For now, standing between these groups and unimpeded power is the battle to maintain the consent of the governed. When a group in power steps beyond its appointed boundaries, consent gradually drains away and friction builds. In expressing the loss of the consent of the governed, citizens gradually force the issue. A governing party must retreat in a weakened state or double down and risk increasing discontent, stretching itself thin and becoming susceptible to collapse from within and without. That is how democracy is supposed to work, as aggravating, ponderous, and imperfect as it has proven over the course of our history.

So there’s no need to be precious about things: we are witnessing an attempt to entirely circumvent this brake of the governed. By fist, boot, and bullet, the United States is nakedly trying to upend the system by which its power is checked from within. Minnesota appears to be the American government’s chosen battleground to begin mastering and muzzling the society over which it rules. The Feds’ hands have snuffed out the lives of two Americans already. The aftermath of each killing suggests they are only getting started.

There are three fights ongoing: one to cement federal domination over the states of the Union, one for intensified government trampling of personal freedoms, and one for the hearts and minds of the nation outside the Twin Cities. By attempting to win the latter—ergo maintain the consent of the governed—DC believes the other dominoes will fall in their favor. That context explains why the government is committed lock, stock, and barrel to its torrent of lies and posturing; keep enough voters onside with your version of events and you may just win total supremacy. If the Federal government wavers for even a moment, it will invalidate its bid to place a metro of 3.7 million of its people under siege. It will damage its legitimacy to crown its agents as judge, jury, and executioner of its citizens. The house of cards falls apart as the consent of the governed shatters. Suddenly, those dishing out misery become vulnerable to retribution (electoral, legal, and moral). Their stakes couldn’t get much higher. That’s what makes continuing and burgeoning resistance critical. Thwarting the elected is the fail safe of a threatened electorate.

The Feds have made immigration enforcement their battering ram. It is an effective tool, too; today, to be an immigrant, the child of immigrants, or to simply appear different from the national majority is frowned upon across the entire globe. This is a cruel time we have made for ourselves. Nearly all nations have lost the confidence that their ethos can appeal to those who come to their shores. Consequently, they no longer feel it to be their duty to protect those who call their nation home. America has become a leader in this trend. When faith in a positive national project withers away, cudgels come out to keep people in line.

Unsurprisingly, our most vulnerable group of “outsiders” have been selected for sacrifice at the altar of state-sanctioned violence. DHS is the child of terror. It is an organization forged in the fires of a frightened state responding to the world at-large by militarizing first and finding places to apply force later. The militarized elements we sent overseas got used to punching down abroad while becoming a punching bag domestically. Sensitive to their increasingly bleak and divisive image at home, those who left the service and gone on to like lines of work continue to see every problem as a nail and their force the hammer. Rather than take aboard and grapple with critique, our militarized government agencies have sought new fronts to vent their frustration with a society they deem not nearly respectful enough of their sacrifices. Punishing non-citizens and their supporters fits the pattern familiar to our agents of brutality. Used to operating with functionally no limits abroad, they’re at their happiest doing the same here.

And so the war has, in a sense, come home. Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota is where it has landed. The heartening news is that the governed are not taking it quietly and have resisted and will resist with remarkable restraint. Federal power can cause tremendous pain, but the bloodletting weakens its legitimacy by the day. Eventually, a critical mass will revoke the consent of the governed.

If the Twin Cities are to be the fields upon which this government arrogantly gambles its ambitions, they will also become this administration’s grave.