It’s still possible, despite my daily exposure to horrific announcements from the Trump administration, for a White House press conference to make me sick with dread. On August 11, the president announced that he was taking federal control of the police force in Washington, D.C., and deploying the National Guard to its streets. As has become routine, Trump attempted to give legitimacy to his entirely gratuitous actions with executive orders, one declaring a nonexistent “crime emergency” in Washington, the other “restoring law and order” by directing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to activate the D.C. National Guard. As Trump’s press conference meandered on, various Cabinet members peppered their remarks with praise—that Trump is “saving” the city, etc. Some blocks away, at Lafayette Square, residents of our nation’s capital protested the coming occupation of the district. “While this action today is unsettling and unprecedented,” said D.C. Mayor Murial Bowser, “I can’t say that given some of the rhetoric of the past … we’re totally surprised.”