Insurrection Gaslight: In 'hellhole' of Chicago, Trump hotel rooms cost $600 per night, and only folks who believe in Trump’s apotheosis imagine themselves as ‘real Americans’.
Portland is on fire?
Responding to a question about his feelings on Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers (ICE) “making targeted arrests at courthouses in New York City and across the country,” Trump interjected to say, “Criminals. They’re arresting criminals,” before making the case for sending federal agents to Chicago.
28 September
“We want to save Chicago,” said Trump. “They had 4,000 people murdered over a very short period of time.” Notably, city data indicates that Chicago’s murder rate has dropped sharply over the past few years — nearly 50% lower than it was in 2021. As of 2025, the city has recorded 331 homicides, compared to 460 at this time last year.
Trump went on to compare Chicago to Mexico City and “anywhere in Afghanistan,” and called Governor JB Pritzker (D-IL) a “slob” and “incompetent,” saying he was “thrown out of his family business like a dog.”
On Thursday, a federal judge temporarily halted the deployment of National Guard troops in Illinois, blocking the Trump administration’s plan to send forces from Texas and other states into the region. The ruling came just hours after Texas National Guard members were spotted entering an ICE facility near Chicago. On Friday, Judge April Perry issued another written order clarifying that Trump’s actions “likely violate the Tenth Amendment.”
Meanwhile, ICE continues to escalate its operations in the Chicago area under “Operation Midway Blitz,” leading to mass arrests — over 1,000 since September. In a news conference on Monday, Pritzker was blunt in his criticism of Trump’s sweeping federal actions, saying that he’s “using our service members as political props and pawns in his illegal effort to militarize our nation’s cities.”
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Trump: "We're heading to Chicago, because we want to save Chicago. Do you know they had over 4,000 people killed in Chicago over a short-- 4,000 people. And I have to watch this slob of a governor stand up and say, 'Well, everything is okay.'"
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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) Oct 10, 2025 at 6:24 PM
Triumphant arch at the Peristyle of the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893, Chicago
President Donald Trump claimed that there were “4,000 people murdered” in Chicago over “a very short period of time” during a Friday appearance in front of reporters in the Oval Office.
The Apotheosis of Washington is the fresco painted by Greek-Italian artist Constantino Brumidi in 1865 and visible through the oculus of the dome in the rotunda of the United States Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.
America celebrates its pre-modern, imperialist past as 'God made Trump' and divines hacky arches
On the third anniversary of the January 6 insurrection, a group of Donald Trump’s supporters published a controversial video titled “God Made Trump.” The video is a defiant claim that Trump represents God, while his opponents embody evil. Trump shared the video on his social media accounts.
Regardless of how bizarre the video’s message may be to many, this type of political campaigning is not the first of its kind.
Deification of Roman emperors—apotheosis—became a standard practice that followed the death of an emperor. It started after Julius Cesar (who formally never held the emperor title but was one in all but name) was posthumously elevated to the rank of gods by his adopted son, Octavian Augustus (later the founder of the Roman Empire and the first Roman emperor), in 42 BCE.
The creators of the video about Trump attempted to (most likely unwittingly) fit it into the long tradition of exalted depictions of powerful leaders meant to legitimize their rule. The video references a famous line from a speech by Paul Harvey at the 1978 Future Farmers of America convention: “So God made a farmer . . .”, itself a riff on the Genesis creation narrative describing the actions God took on the eighth day. In the video, Trump is portrayed as a (the?) savior, with his arms spread out at one point like Christ the Redeemer.
www.aprilonline.org/...
