Trump's Rasputin seizes the moment: A week of chaos may suit Steve Bannon's master plan

Alt-right guru turned Trump adviser is using both the "Muslim ban" and bogus voter-fraud charges to spread disorder

HEATHER DIGBY PARTON

There was so much going on in President Donald Trump’s first week of presidential decrees that it was hard to keep track of it all. The most acute problem, in that it immediatelyaffected people’s lives, was the executive order issued on Friday that banned entry to the United States for immigrants, refugees or visitors arriving from a list of certain Muslim-majority countries designated as having terrorist activity. On Saturday when it became clear that the ban was taking effect immediately and people were being denied entry or told at their point of origin that they could not board U.S.-bound planes, all hell broke loose.

Nobody understood the rules. Passengers were being held and interrogated. Chaos ensued at international airports all over the country. Protesters gathered en masse at terminals to show their solidarity. Immigration lawyers arrived to help detainees and their families navigate a system that nobody understood — because it was arbitrary and constitutionally dubious. The world reacted with disbelief.

Finally several federal judges issued stays, for a variety of reasons, in response to suits filed by civil liberties and immigration attorneys around the country. Even hawkish constitutional experts were appalled.

It was a shocking moment in American history.

But we shouldn’t have been too surprised. Trump had promised to ban Muslims from entering the country during the campaign, famously making a speech after the San Bernardino terrorist attack saying it had to be done until the U.S. “could figure out what the hell is going on.” He modified his remarks later, apparently at the urging of Rudy Giuliani, who bragged that he told Trump he could only ban Muslims by nationality rather than religion (while offering priority to those who practice a different religion) or he’d run afoul of the Constitution. Now the Trump administration has absurdly proclaimed that it was just following Barack Obama’s lead (an assertion refuted by the Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler.)

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http://www.salon.com/2017/01/30/trumps-rasputin-seizes-the-moment-a-week-of-chaos-may-suit-steve-bannons-master-plan/