Jamie Stiehm

By JAMIE STIEHM

Just when you think President Donald Trump can’t get worse, he gets worse.

Now he threatens to send soldiers and federal agents to Baltimore and Chicago next. Woe is U.S.

I live in lovely, green and safe Washington, where crime is down. The Smithsonian museums are free. The river and marble memorials make the city gleam at night. It’s far from the most dangerous city in the world, as Trump claims “without evidence,” as they say.

With no status as a state, we’re under Trump’s thumb. All 700,000 of us. With hundreds of armed young men pouring onto our streets on summer nights, we’re under siege — again.

Trump is paying us back for the Capitol riot he incited.

Army tanks parked by our Beaux-Arts train station are a strategic way to move troops on tracks to Baltimore and Chicago.

That would test the mettle of two Democratic governors who are top contenders in the 2028 presidential race: Wes Moore of Maryland and JB Pritzker of Illinois.

Moore is a charismatic combat veteran. Pritzker has a sharp tongue he does not tame. Each is up to fighting tooth-and-nail against a president waging war on the people.

They shall not surrender, joining California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom on the front lines. Newsom is cleverly mocking Trump’s anti-social media.

Yet with a rogue Pentagon at Trump’s command, dear American cities are in danger of a hostile takeover. The media call it a “crackdown,” which is fast becoming a cliche.

That’s too good a word for what’s going on.

As a Marine fighter pilot spelled out to me, the military is never in charge of civilians at home. Never, except in a coup.

So the National Guard showed up here, all dressed in camo for kids’ first day of school. A memory to cherish.

Trump is using and abusing every lever of power against blue strongholds and five Texas members of Congress, erasing their seats with a new district map.

He particularly wants Rep. Al Green, the first to call for his impeachment, out. Green, a former head of the Houston NAACP, bellowed back at Trump in the House during a 99-minute presidential tirade.

Trump never forgets. The Republican elephant symbol suits him perfectly.

Remember that.

Trump takes special pleasure in humiliating D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Black woman. Violent crime is falling here, and he failed to deliver a promised $1 billion to the peaceful capital. Chicago and Baltimore are also blue cities with Black mayors.

What grudge does he hold against the city of Chicago, where the first skyscraper rose by the waters of Lake Michigan?

That’s where former Vice President Kamala Harris was nominated last August in an exuberant convention. Hillary and Bill Clinton gave stemwinders. Harris hit her peak at the 2024 campaign there, then it seemed she had a fighting chance to win.

As for Baltimore, where I covered the news, it’s a stage set of ethnic enclaves. The Catholic, Black and Jewish communities make the big city seem a small town; Baltimore folks would not live anywhere else.

It does bear racial scars. Frederick Douglass worked on the Fells Point waterfront and escaped from slavery. He took the train north in a sailor suit.

That brings us to history, a subject Trump never studied in school.

His assault on the Smithsonian, on facing our past in the National Museum of African American History and Culture, is as bad as his ugly insults to great American cities.

Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie Bunch assembled the amazing collection from scratch. We peer at progress through the tragic and triumphant prism he created.

Any attempt to alter this treasure, no newspaper should report as “just the facts.”

The Smithsonian, the nation’s attic, is precious in preserving and presenting the greatest art, nature and history. A fortune was given in the 1829 will of James Smithson, a peculiar English scientist, to set up a Washington institution for “the diffusion of knowledge.”

(Look it up, Donald.)

The Southern titan John Calhoun argued that accepting the gift violated “states’ rights.”

What fate awaits our giant pandas, China’s gift to the Smithsonian?

Don’t ask.

Don’t let the lights go out in our cities.

The author may be reached at JamieStiehm.com. To find out more about Jamie Stiehm and other Creators Syndicate columnists and cartoonists, please visit creators.com. Copyright 2025 Creators.com.