Commentary by Jerry Lanson

Here is how Donald Trump’s administration is “Making America Great Again.”

•By deporting a 4-year-old citizen undergoing treatment for cancer.

•By eviscerating, if not outright killing, “Meals on Wheels,” a vital program that feeds the sick and elderly.

•By unveiling plans to end the federal program that distributes life-saving Narcan, a cheap and highly effective way of preventing drug overdose deaths.

•By crippling supply chains.

•By arresting and filing felony charges against a judge for the unspeakable crime of allowing an immigrant in her court out through a side door.

•By investigating the main fundraising arm of the opposition Democratic Party.

And that’s all in just the last several days.

Perhaps you find some of these actions cruel, even inhumane. But Donald Trump’s True Believers still adore him. On Monday, Pew Research released a poll that found 72 percent of white evangelicals approve of the way Donald Trump is handling his job and 69 percent consider the ethics of his top officials to be excellent or good.

This in the same week in which a series of polls showed Trump’s overall support sagging to between 39% and 42% nationally, the lowest favorable rating after three months in office of any president in eight decades, even lower than Trump in his own first term.

The Pew Poll carries a stark warning to those who think they can sit back and wait for Trump to implode. Be forewarned. He almost certainly will plow straight ahead, disregarding the growing anger of an increasing majority of the country. Don’t be caught by surprise.

This is a cruel, callous and unlawful regime. It does not care whether it is popular. It’s more interested in keeping you – and American institutions – intimidated. That’s how dictators operate.

In a headline Monday, The Economist asked, “Who Will Stop Donald Trump’s Drive for Unchecked Power? Congress is Inert, but a Deft Supreme Court Might Contain Him.”

I, for one, am not counting on that, though judges at lower levels of the court system thus far have at times been heroic.

If the high court justices do stand up, they will need all of us – we, the people -- behind them.

Retaining at least a semblance of free speech and democracy will take unrelenting and widespread peaceful resistance in the days and months ahead. It will take all of us and test all of us.

By all means, take time to enjoy the Spring flowers. Just keep in mind that we ignore the fissures rippling across this country at our own peril.

Lanson’s Substack page, where his columns originally appear, is @fromthegrassroots.