Trump Is Building His Own Paramilitary Force

I'm John Caramonica, a critic at The New York Times. And I'm Joe Cascarelli, a culture reporter at The Times. Together we host Popcast, a weekly pop culture chat show where we speak to the biggest musicians, actors, internet celebrities, and more. We've had Bad Bunny, Olivia Rodrigo, and Anne Hathaway. We've also hosted live performances with Andre 3000 and Erica Badu.

Plus we end every conversation with a snack. Catch new episodes of Popcast every week on YouTube and anywhere you get your podcasts. You know those optical illusions where you look at a picture and depending on where and how your eyes focus, maybe you're looking at a vase, maybe you're looking at two faces. It kind of keeps flickering back and forth. Looking at the Trump administration is like that for me, though the flickering is between

This is democracy. The American people are getting what they voted for good and hard. Or this is authoritarianism, at least the road to authoritarianism. I can see the picture of a president doing what he was elected to do. Donald Trump ran unquestionably on mass deportations.

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