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Democrats speak with forked tongue.
On Sunday, former President Barack Obama denounced the Trump administration’s investigation of Rep. Ilhan Omar for immigration fraud as un-American.
In America, we don’t go after our political opponents, he said.
This from the man who sent his Internal Revenue Service after Tea Party protesters, and whose running mate, after he became president, treated traditional Catholics, COVID-vaccine skeptics and parents who spoke out at school board meetings as potential terrorists.
Not to mention raiding Donald Trump’s home and sending FBI agents to rifle through Melania’s underwear.
Now Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), speaking at the University of Chicago, is calling for targeted prosecutions of Trump staffers.
Slotkin observed that while Trump has presidential immunity, the people around him do not.
She wants those prosecutions to scare away young conservatives who might want to go into politics.
“I want them to be like, ‘Lord, that might be buying myself a ton of problems I don’t want, and so let me avoid participating in that.’ I want that deterrence message sent.”
In the old days, politicians used to encourage young people to go into politics on either side in the name of civic engagement.
The response was swift — and negative: “Sen. Slotkin, a self-avowed ‘defender of democracy,’ told me and other conservative students that we should live in fear of political persecution if we dare serve our country in the Trump administration,” wrote University of Chicago student Michael Bicksel on X.
“Sadly for her, we will never be intimidated by her Bolshevik-style tactics.”
You can call those tactics Bolshevik, or maybe fascist, but what they definitely are is un-American.
Using the power of the government to silence political foes is just that, though it’s certainly become more popular lately, especially among Democrats.
As I mentioned, Obama’s administration went after the Tea Party.
Biden’s team went after COVID-vaccine skeptics and critics of trans policy.
Slotkin just wants to scare young people away from being conservatives.
The goal seems to be something like Britain — a society where disagreeing with the government on social media gets you a visit from police, and possibly a jail term, just for stating a contrary opinion.
As The Post’s Karol Markowitz put it, “They told me the US was heading toward fascism and they were right.”
Ironically, Slotkin is an alumna of the Central Intelligence Agency, where the motto “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth will make you free” is carved into the wall.
It is a core American belief that you don’t learn the truth through censorship and intimidation.
You learn the truth through free and open debate and competition in the marketplace of ideas.
One would think a CIA alumna would understand, and support, these American principles. Instead she’s talking like a thug.
Trump, of course, can frustrate all this with a wave of pardons, and he’s widely expected to leave office with a flurry of them covering everyone in his administration, probably including himself.
There’s precedent for that, since Joe Biden — or at least Joe Biden’s autopen — did the same.
At least Trump will probably actually sign these, or at least know about them.
But Slotkin represents the kind of thinking that is bringing America closer to civil disorder, if not outright civil war.
For over two centuries, America managed to engage in a peaceful transfer of power without the outgoing parties having to protect themselves against political prosecutions by the incoming party.
The other way is dangerous.
History students will remember that Caesar crossed the Rubicon river to take over Rome, putting an end to the centuries-old Roman republic, because he received word that his political opponents were going to subject him to sham trials that might very well cost him his life.
This was the endpoint of a process in which Roman incumbents found it risky to leave office, because of fear of ruinous lawsuits and prosecutions.
In a book I coauthored with Peter W. Morgan in 1997, we wrote about the increasing politicization of the justice system and the creation of what were fundamentally political crimes and prosecutions.
We warned this practice would destroy faith in both the political and the justice system.
Things have only gotten worse since.
Sen. Slotkin’s speech amplifies the problem. Treating political opposition as a crime is wrong. It’s unAmerican. And it’s dangerous.
Slotkin should apologize, and she should be censured by the Senate.
Opposition isn’t a crime. But tyranny is.
Glenn Harlan Reynolds is founder of the InstaPundit.com blog.