Americans are starting to fear dissent. This is exactly what Trump wants | Robert Reich

I was recently talking to a friend who is a professor at Columbia University of what is happening there. He had a lot to say.

When he needed to escape an appointment, I asked him if he would send me a message or sent an E -mail for the rest of his thoughts.

His answer worried me. “No,” he said. “I’ll do better to no. They could see him again.”

“Who are” them “?” I asked.

“They! The University. The government. I have to go!” It was out.

My friend has never shown signs of paranoia.

I transfer you this because the Trump regime is starting to have a chilling effect on what and how the Americans communicate with each other. He is starting to discourage open dissent, which is exactly what Trump means.

The cold affects all five main pillars of civil society: university, sciences, media, law and arts.

In the capitulation of Columbia University in Trump, he accepted require demonstrators To identify when asked and put his department of Middle Eastern studies under “controlled administration”, not to lose $ 400 million in government funding.

The agreement is already chilling dissent there, as my conversation revealed with my friend.

The “detained” Trump regime also a Columbia University graduate student and the green card holder who participated in the protests at school. Administration’s agents also included dormitories with research mandates and targeted two other students who participated in these protests.

Tuesday, an international student in a graduation program at Tufts University was taken in custody outside his condominium outside the campus by national security agents, handcuffed and taken away from a Prison in Louisiana. It has a valid one visa. His apparent offense? Putting his name to a piece of opinion in the student newspaper Tufts who was critical on how the Tufts administration managed the protests.

Dozens of other great universities are on the Trump target list.

Trump’s attack on Science has led to three of the largest financiers of American science: the centers for disease control, the National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation.

Tens of thousands of researchers are worried about how to continue their research. Many have decided to sink and do not criticize the Trump Administration For fear of losing financing.

Philippe Baptiste, the French minister for higher education, accused that a French scientist traveling at a conference near Houston at the beginning of this month Denied entry In the United States because his phone contained messages of messages with colleagues and friends in which he gave a negative “personal opinion” on Trump’s scientific and research policies. The United States National Security Department denies that this was the reason why the scientist was not admitted to the country.

In the meantime, the main American media fear more legal actions from Trump and his political allies in the wake of the ABC surrender to Trump in December, accepting to pay him $ 15 million to resolve a cause of defamation that he intended against the network.

Journalists who cover the White House are recovering from Trump’s decision to prevent those who consider hostile from important events in which space is limited.

The cold of the media is palpable. Jeff Bezos, owner of the Washington Post, It has openly limited the types of operating operations that appear on its editorial pages.

The last example of the use by Trump of the executive orders to hit powerful law firms that challenged him arrived on Tuesday, Against Jenner & Block.

The company employed the lawyer Andrew Weissmann after working as a prosecutor at the special consultant Robert Mueller on Trump in Trump during his first term.

The White House accused the company “He participated in the weapon of the legal system Against American principles and values ​​”, and an official called Weissmann in particular.

Last month, Trump removed the safety authorizations of Covington & Burling lawyers who represented the former special councilor Jack Smith following his investigations on the role of Trump in the attack of the Capitol of January 6.

Trump also targeted Perkins CoieA company linked to the opposition research against Trump in 2016. His order prohibited Perkins Coie lawyers from federal buildings and has stopped its federal contracts.

Another executive order has targeted Paul Weiss, who employed the lawyer Mark Pomerantz before helping Trump to pay money on Stormy Daniels.

Last Thursday, Trump withdrawn the executive order against Paul Weiss Because, he said, the company had “recognized the pomerantz impulse and promised $ 40 million in free legal work to support the Trump administration.

Non -profit organizations say to the Washington Post that the law firms that once could have helped to fight Trump’s orders now fear that Trump will pursue them if they do it.

Trump is even intimidating the arts from Taking the Kennedy CenterFireing Board Members, exploding its president and becoming president.

The comedian Nikki Glaser, one of the few celebrities to walk on the red carpet at the Kennedy Center of this year, now thinks twice before making political jokes directed to Trump.

“Type, you are only afraid of obtaining Doxxed and death threats or who knows where this carries, as, detained. Honestly, it is not even like a joke. It’s like a real fear”, she is a real fear “, she is a real fear” said Expiration.

Every tyrant in history has tried to suffocate criticisms of himself and his regime.

But America was based on criticism. American democracy was built on dissent. We conducted a revolution against tyranny.

This moment requires courage and collective actions rather than capitulation: solving from universities, researchers, journalists, legal community and arts to resist Trump.

Anyone who has responsible positions in these five pillars of civil society must reject the attempts of Trump of intimidation and condemn what he is trying to do.

Those who surrender to Trump’s tyranny invite more.

• Robert Reich, former secretary of American work, is a professor of emeritus of public politics at the University of California, Berkeley. He is an editorialist of Guardian USA. His newsletter is a Robertreich.substack.com