MAGA in Europe: Make America Go Away

0:00Support for Here and Now Anytime comes from MathWorks, creator of MATLAB and Simulink software for technical computing and model-based design. MathWorks accelerating the pace of discovery in engineering engineering. Learn more at mathworks.com. WBUR Podcasts, Boston. It's more shocking and more disillusioned than it has ever been. And I think we are really at the worst of the relationship now with the United States since the inauguration of Donald Trump exactly a year ago. American threats of war over Greenland have European allies wondering, with friends like these, who needs enemies?

0:52It's Tuesday, January 20th, and this is Here and Now, Anytime from NPR and WBUR. I'm Chris Bentley. Today on the show, immigration agents are breaking into homes in Minnesota, even hauling one American citizen out into the snow in his underwear. This is yet another instance of an illegal warrantless entry. They banged, bashed down his door. Got to have a warrant from a federal judge to do that. They did not. An update from the Twin Cities coming up in a few minutes. We'll also consider how Trump has expanded the presence of the federal government in American life since he returned to office one year ago today.

1:37But first, MAGA hats are taking off in Denmark. Except this MAGA stands for Make America Go Away. The hats also feature a pretty clever pun in Danish involving the capital of Greenland. Danes want President Trump to drop his campaign to acquire Greenland, which is a Danish territory. It's not a new idea. It's something that Trump wanted badly in his first term, but back then the idea was brushed off. Now he's threatening to tighten the screws on tariffs to get what he wants. So imports from eight European countries could cost 10 % more starting February 1st and 25 % more in June. For more on how European leaders are responding to all this, we called up Liana Fix.

2:26She's a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and she spoke to Indira Lakshmanan. So let's start with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Today at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, she said tariffs are a huge mistake. She said the U.S. and Europe should remember they are allies with common enemies. And plunging us into a downward spiral would only aid the very adversaries we are both so committed to keeping out of the strategic landscape. So our response will be unflinching, united and proportional. Liana, the U.S. has had extensive access to Greenland since 1951.

3:06Denmark has recently tried to appease the president by offering him what you refer to as everything but territory. More U.S. troops posted there, investment deals for resources. Why is that not enough? The concern from the Europeans is that that is not enough because it's not really about economic incentives, about security concerns, but because it might really be about territory, about territorial ambitions from the United States. And if that's the case, then any European engagement will not help. Then Europe has to shift towards deterrence, towards deterring Trump from taking Greenland by force.

3:43Well, you're right that Trump has framed this as an issue of control and ownership, almost as if it's a real estate acquisition. So what can and should Europe do in response? So the hope from the European side is that if they delay the issue long enough and if they try to tone it down from the high stakes that it is where it is right now, there might be some victory that could be sold to Donald Trump. additional access for the United States, a package deal, an agreement with Greenland that will look nice, but not cross the red lines of a breach of international law and probably the end of NATO if the United States moves on Greenland forcefully.

4:27That's a tactic that Europeans have deployed in the last year too. This year, it proves more difficult because apparently the president is really set on controlling Greenland above everything else. So the worst case scenario would be the dissolution of NATO or even U.S. military action against Europe and its allies there. In terms of what Europe could do to tone down the temperature until then, we've heard about this trade bazooka that they could use to respond to tariffs. We've heard they could limit access to U.S. forces in Europe, even kick the U.S. off their military basis. What are you hearing from European leaders?

5:05I know you were just there last week. What is the range of options they're considering now? So the scope of the range of options really has expanded. No one would have thought before about limiting access to U.S. bases in Europe. But right now, this is more a threat scenario that Europeans are building up. This trade bazooka that the Europeans have is basically a legal justification to impose tariffs on the United States, originally designed for China, by the way. So they are trying to give this whole landscape of dramatic responses from the European side to really signal to Donald Trump, well, back off.

5:46It's unclear if that will work. And if it doesn't work, then they will have to pull through with some of those measures. And most likely it's going to be the economic measures, because a military conflict with the US is still unimaginable for Europeans, in the end, they still rely on the United States for protection against Russia. Well, that's right. And Treasury Secretary Scott Besant is also in Davos and spoke today. He warned Europe basically that they shouldn't retaliate, but he said, let's everyone just take a deep breath, he told the Europeans, and let things play out. I'm wondering, does it sound condescending to you to tell Europe to calm down when we have the U.S.

6:25president who's saying he will take European territory of a NATO ally by any means? Yeah, I think, I mean, obviously the tone will not make Europeans happy. But I think what Scott Besson and others might underestimate is that from a European perspective, something has really shifted since the end of the last year, the beginning of this year. And this is the impression that the United States treats Europe increasingly in the national security strategy that has been published over Ukraine, that the United States treats Europe increasingly as an adversary. And sooner or later, that might also lead the Europeans to consider the United States as being just another great power like China and Russia, where Europe has to assert itself against.

7:10Hopefully it doesn't come to that situation, but unfortunately, this is the trajectory where we are on right now. Now, Liana, is it true that European leaders are trying to explain to their contacts in Washington that Greenland is much smaller than it appears on a standard Mercator projection map? I can't confirm that from my sources, but certainly maps are something, maps and the size of anything has been something that has kept the White House busy and has always been something that alerted to the White House. Okay. Well, you just came back from Europe last week. What is the mood there among the public about this, you know, ploy for Greenland, this play that Donald Trump wants to make.

7:56It's more shocking and more disillusioned than it has ever been. And I think we are really at the worst of the relationship now with the United States since the inauguration of Donald Trump exactly a year ago. This is a historic depth of the relationship that I personally have never seen before and probably not imagined that we would get there. That's Liana Fix. She's a senior fellow for Europe at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, D.C. Liana, thank you so much. It's my pleasure. Thank you. Well, that's The View from Europe. Coming up next, The View from Minnesota, where the Department of Homeland Security said its agents have made 3 ,000 arrests in the last six weeks.

8:37That number is hard to verify. But there are thousands of immigration agents on the streets, using aggressive tactics to detain people, including American citizens. More after the break.

9:12your unique needs. They shop, you save. In as little as 15 minutes, SelectQuote's licensed agents will compare policies from trusted top-rated insurance companies to find you the best fit for your health, your lifestyle, and your budget. And they work for you for free. Get the right life insurance for you and save more than 50 % at selectquote.com slash anytime. That's 50 % off at selectquote.com slash anytime. Immigration raids continue in Minnesota. And so too do the stories of people wrongfully detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. 57-year-old Chongli Scott Tao told the Associated Press, masked agents with guns forced their way into his home on Sunday without showing a warrant.

10:01They hauled him outside in his underwear in single-digit temperature. His family said he was brought back an hour later with no apology or explanation. Tao is an American citizen. So is Alia Rahman, who was detained by ICE agents while she was on her way to a doctor's visit last week. She says she got stuck in protest traffic and ICE slashed her seatbelt to rip her out of her car. She described the encounter on CNN last night. Back and forth between move, get out, trying to open my door, more threats of breaking a window, which I don't understand the functional purpose of. And it's not a warning.

10:42It's a threat of violence that really shouldn't be packaged with an instruction. For more on these cases, Minnesota Public Radio's Matt Sepik spoke to Robin Young. First, Leah Rahman is an American. Just briefly, her lawyer says she may sue. What is DHS saying? Well, they are calling her an agitator, a commander at large of CBP Customs and Border Protection. Greg Bravino said on X recently that she was impeding federal officers and refused to move and was, quote, her choice entirely. But that's just not true. She was on her way to the doctor. She was not part of any sort of protest that had gathered in the area.

11:24And by the way, this was on Portland Avenue, right on the same block where Renee Good was killed nearly two weeks ago. She was just driving through and got caught up in this, hauled out of her car, arrested, released quickly, and now is being smeared by the federal government as some sort of agitator. Well, I will follow that story. But meantime, DHS gave these names and pictures of what they say are migrants who've committed serious crimes. What more do we know? Well, they've been throwing around a lot of numbers and making really big claims about, quote, criminal illegal aliens and the various offenses they're alleged to have committed.

12:02And occasionally they'll release names and mugshots of some of the people they've been targeting for deportation. But my colleague Peter Cox, in a story just a couple of days ago here at Minnesota Public Radio, he took a deep dive, analyzed some of the court records to look into some of these claims from DHS. He looked at names of 13 people listed in a news release from the agency last week, listed as the worst of the worst. And DHS is correct. Many of the people on this list have convictions for serious crimes, including murder and sexual assault. But it's really critical to point out ICE, DHS, they're taking credit for recent arrests of people who were already in prison.

12:45And Peter took a look at corrections department records. Five of these folks were transferred straight from prison to ICE custody between last year, really at the end of last year, before this so-called Operation Metro surge began on December 1st. And another four of them had been released by Minnesota prison officials to ICE custody even before 2005. So that's what we're looking at here when we see these claims of thousands and thousands of, quote, criminal illegal aliens. And I should add, too, Minnesota is a small state. We have a total population here of five and a half million people. the undocumented population here is really very small compared to what you see in larger states like Texas.

13:35Well, if you reach back to 2005, you know, you're going to add to the numbers. I just want to ask about Chong Li Scott Tao, his family, Fred Laos in the 1970s. He's been living here for decades. Agents drove him around, took a picture of him in his underwear. Is there any explanation for why he was just picked up and thrown back? Well, ICE says they were looking for a sex offender, and he, quote, fit the description at this particular address. And again, this is yet another instance of an illegal warrantless entry. They bashed down his door. Got to have a warrant from a federal judge to do that.

14:10They did not. And of course, there's no sex offender living at this house. It was only Mr. Tao, his son, daughter-in-law, and grandson live at this rental home. Neither they nor the property's owner are even listed in the Minnesota sex offender registry. The nearest one lives two blocks away. So there was absolutely no reason for this arrest. They could have knocked and left when they figured out they got the wrong guy. Okay, just a touchdown there in Minnesota with Matt Sepik, correspondent at Minnesota Public Radio, who we so appreciate. Matt, thank you so much. Glad to be here.

14:50It's been one year since President Trump returned to office, and his immigration agenda is one major way that he's expanded the presence of the federal government in Americans' lives. Mass deportations and aggressive law enforcement were campaign promises, but they're also counter to the longtime conservative branding of limited government. After the break, Robin speaks with historian Julian Zelizer about what he calls Trump's big presidential government conservatism. Stick around.

15:33Well, today marks one year since President Trump took office for the second time. a year he began by creating, with much fanfare, the Department of Government Efficiency, Doge, led by Elon Musk, with big claims of making governments smaller, cutting jobs, clawing back funds, shutting down agencies. But Julian Zelizer, the Princeton historian in our guide through past history and how history is being made today, says that when it comes to presidential power, that form of government, Trump has exploded any myths that Republicans are the party of small government, unleashing federal power to advance his agenda and protect his own authority.

16:10Julian Zelizer is here. And Julian, we're seeing that. You know, let's get right to it. I want Greenland. But make your case, just maybe with a laundry list at the top here, ways in which Trump has expanded this power. Well, we see through ICE federal troops on the streets. We see a massive tariff program based on emergency powers. It's an intervention in the economy. We've seen the erosion of the wall between the Oval Office and the Department of Justice using DOJ for his own purposes, deals with businesses, law firms and universities, shooting boats and seizing the leader of a sovereign country.

16:48This is presidential power at its most grandiose. Well, and he has said it out loud. It's not something I don't think he would deny. You know, he said recently to the New York Times is the only check on his presidential powers is my own morality, my own mind. It's the one thing that can stop me. He was asked, what about international law? You know, they brushed it aside. So it's not as if, I mean, am I seeing that correctly? I mean, maybe in the beginning of the year, there was a sense of, oh, look over here where we're taking about government and don't look over here where we're not. But now there's it's completely transparent.

17:26Yeah, I mean, the only reason you wouldn't notice is if you're not watching or listening. He's very open about it. And that statement, which was about foreign policy, you know, went against many decades where presidents, even when they wanna do whatever they want, do at least consider international alliances and institutions and the role of Congress. He doesn't care about these. And he's very open that presidential decisions will stem entirely from the mind of the president. That's why that quote, I think, caught many people's attention. But this has not been subtle. It has not been hidden. Yeah.

18:02Well, and just give us the historical view, because some people are probably, you know, searching through right now. Well, Nixon, you know, abused power. And, you know, Teddy Roosevelt carried a big stick, but he also wanted to speak softly. Is there any, who has come as close to Trump? Well, I mean, Nixon did use presidential power very aggressively and did so in many of the ways that Trump is doing it, to intimidate the media, to seize budgetary power, to use war-making authority without congressional consent. And so in some ways, you know, President Trump is doing a lot of what Nixon did, but on a scale and scope that many would argue, including federal troops on the streets, that is much grander.

18:49In the economy, he's even more aggressive than Nixon was, I think, even with wage and price controls. The tariffs, the deals, he just has a heavy hand on how the economy should work. And finally, he's just abandoned President Trump, any of the guardrails that even a Richard Nixon still at some level was considering. He's all in on his own authority. Well, and in retribution. And in retribution. And that's where efforts to kind of overcome what happened during Nixon's administration, where DOJ became a weapon, have now been, you know, vanquished, many would argue. and DOJ becomes a tool of retribution rather than a tool of the rule of law.

19:36So his base, his followers, have still stuck with him. But do you think in recent days and in the minute we have, we're seeing something different when it comes to saying, I want Greenland, for instance, and sounds more like the real estate developer. And I don't mean that in a flippant way. He hasn't been in real estate in a long time, and it feels as if that's the business he's getting back into. Look, at the same time the nation has allowed presidential power to expand dramatically, there's still a deep feeling, I think, in the body politic that this isn't always good, and it can be dangerous.

20:19That goes back to the Constitution, to the Declaration. And I think with Greenland, with Minneapolis, as his transparency and his doing things so aggressively does cause disapproval, and we've seen protests, and he could clearly generate a backlash. We will see. But I don't think all of the country is on board with all of this. History is being written as we speak. Julian Zelizer, Princeton historian and our frequent guest. Thank you. Thank you.

20:55That's our show for today. Here and Now Anytime comes from NPR and WBUR Boston. Today's stories were produced by Will Wacke, Lynn Managon, and Hafsa Qureshi. Today's editors were Todd Muntz and Michael Scotto. Technical direction from Caleb Green and Matt Reed. Our theme music is by Mike Moschetto, Max Liebman, and me, Chris Bentley. Our digital producers are Allison Hagen and Grace Griffin. And the executive producer of Here and Now is Alan Price. Thanks for listening. We'll be back with you tomorrow. Thank you.