Alan Zendell, July 27, 2025

The United States of America is in serious trouble, far more than it was on December 8, 1941, when our Pacific fleet lay at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean; far more than after our ignominious withdrawal from Viet Nam and Watergate, and far more than after our disastrous twenty year war in Iraq and Afghanistan. As Trump continues to implement Russell Vought’s Project 2025 agenda, trampling over decades of laws, treaties, and our Constitution, the Supreme Court has demonstrated that it will not stop him from dismantling our government as Vought, the Director of the Executive Office of Management and Budget, demands. Vought has repeatedly use his position to nullify acts of Congress he disagreed with in violation of the 1974 Impoundment Control Act, which requires the Executive Branch to faithfully carry out all measures passed by Congress and signed by the President.

Neither Congress nor the Democratic Party has shown any sign of having either the will or the courage to fight to save our democracy. Every Republican in Congress has either shown themselves to be craven cowards, interested only in their own next election, or they have decided to throw in the towel. Once you’ve admitted defeat and succumbed as Senator Thom Tillis has, it’s too late to start telling the truth about Trump and expect to be taken seriously. Remember Jeff Flake, Adam Kinzinger, and Liz Cheney?

There is not a single Democrat, anywhere, willing to commit them self to leading their party back from the self-destruction of 2024. JB Pritzker’s attempt to rouse Democrats to action in New Hampshire fell on deaf ears. The best Democrats in Congress could come up with was a long filibuster by New Jersey Senator Cory Booker, and a 25-hour speech by House Minority Leader Hakim Jeffries, both of which were nothing more than admissions of defeat.

As Trump’s popularity drops deeper into the thirties, and his hold on Republicans in the House and Senate weakens, the same greed and cowardice that enbabled Trump to keep them in line, will undermine his administration, because history has proved that when a president’s approval rating sinks, the midterm elections exact a stiff price. It’s beginning to look like the midterms are our last hope to stop Trump, and Vought and his co-conspirators understand that.

Some people I know think we’ve already lost, that when Trump told evangelists in 2024 that he would fix everything so they’d never have to vote again, he was signaling his intention to either rig or void future elections. As determined as the MAGA crew is to cling to power, even I couldn’t imagine how they could pull that off…until now.

In 1974, the Johnson administration solidified our commitment to the Vietnam War by faking an incident in the Gulf of Tonkin, claiming American naval vessels had been attacked by North Vietnamese torpedo boats. In 2003, the Bush administration, including the highly respected Secretary of State and Joint Chiefs Chairman Colin Powell deceived the nation and the world with faked intelligence about caches of nuclear, chemical, and biological “Weapons of Mass Destruction” to satisfy Americans’ demands that we find and punish the perpetrators of nine-eleven. The falsified intelligence justified attacking Iraq, drawing us into that disastrous conflict. In both instances, our intelligence services were completely compromised, and those administrations were benign compared to Trump 2.

The twenty-fifth anniversary of nine-eleven is September 11, 2026, thirty-three days before the election. Over Labor Day weekend, MAGA influencers will begin leaking intelligence that terrorist organizations are planning to attack American installations around the world, and we’ll be reminded constantly of how terrorists love symbolic acts and dates. Trump will be asked about them, and he will bluster incoherently, warning of hidden terror cells and suitcase nukes planted all over the United States and Europe.

He’ll do what he always does, calling anyone who disagrees with him a traitor, and create so much chaos that as usual, truth is the first casualty. He will accuse Iran of being behind it and spread crazy fears that Iran is planning an all-out war to destroy Israel and dominate the Middle East. He will threaten Iran with total destruction, using words specifically tailored to enrage their governing body. The rhetoric will ramp up as September 11 nears, reminiscent of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and with all that noise, and Trump throwing gasoline on the fire, a few carefully choreographed provocations orchestrated by the Hegseth-Gabbard-Miller brain trust will result in incidents that will be branded as terrorist attacks and blown out of proportion.  

Having brought the country to the brink of a major war, Trump will announce that terrorist groups have infiltrated our social media and election infrastructure. He will declare a State of Emergency and implement martial law, then issue an Executive Order suspending the midterm elections for the duration of the emergency.

That sounds insane, but no more so than what Trump has been doing during his six months in office.