When Is the Rolling Coup Dangerous Enough to Require States Declaring a State of Emergency?
GOP Seizure of Elections, Illegal Wars, and the Most Expansive Unpunished Corruption Scandals in U.S. History, at what point do we need to respond more rapidly?
Members of the New York National Guard form up on the East Front of the US Capitol in Washington, DC, on January 11 [Shawn Thew/EPA]
There’s something that can stop the United States from fully becoming a dictatorship, and it’s being left unused. We shouldn’t leave these tools on the table.
Before we get to what that specific tool is, let’s look at the situation.
Governors have declared states of emergency for far less than any single one of these. Together they represent the largest sustained assault on constitutional governance in American history.
None of these are separate crises. The Epstein files are the web we’re caught in. Many of the people starting these wars and funding the authoritarian takeover are in those files. That’s the key. The DOJ takeover, the firing of FBI agents, the smearing of survivors, the consolidation of power, the war: all of it traces back to people protecting themselves from what those files contain.
How does Congress stop him? They pass a law and he ignores it. They impeach him and the Senate won’t convict because Republicans hold more than the thirty-four seats needed to block it. They hold him in contempt and the DOJ, which works for him, refuses to enforce it. They issue subpoenas and he tells people not to show up.
If we accept that as the whole story, then yes, we’re in a dictatorship today. But accepting that premise means forgetting what this country actually is.
The United States is hundreds of independent governments, and fifty of them are dual sovereigns with their own constitutions, their own criminal codes, their own courts, their own prosecutors, their own police, their own prisons.
Every one of those fifty governors has the power to declare a state of emergency. That declaration unlocks broad, fast, unilateral authority: the power to create special task forces, direct state resources, bypass bureaucratic timelines, and act without waiting for legislative approval.
The founders designed the country this way because they knew this exact thing could happen, and the answer they built is in every state capital in the country. That’s the tool. Fifty governors who can each declare a state of emergency on their own authority and act immediately. It’s the reason the United States doesn’t have to accept a dictatorship just because a transnational terrorist criminal organization called the Republican Party and its oligarch owners have captured the federal government.
If states lay down, it’s over. But they haven’t laid down yet. They just haven’t picked up their strongest weapon.
The Epstein files are the web we’re caught in, and the people in those files are the people driving every crisis on that list. The oligarchs funding the takeover. The officials who buried the investigation and covered up the evidence to protect themselves. The people starting wars to change the subject.
A governor who declares a state of emergency can stand up a special investigative task force and go after them directly, because every state has its own criminal code, its own courts, its own grand juries, and the pardon power stops at the state line. This is how you cut the emergency off at its root. You stop fighting each crisis separately and go after the people causing all of them.
Twenty-six governors won’t ever do this, because they’re part of the same transnational criminal organization causing and profiting from the crisis. That leaves twenty-four. Twenty-four is enough.
One governor launching this investigation is the law working as designed. It’s also the first time in this crisis that the other side plays defense instead of offense. Every additional governor is a force multiplier. Two and the administration’s resources are split. Three and they’re split again. Every state that joins divides their attention further, multiplies the pressure, and makes every other participating state safer.
Is Trump going to arrest twenty-four governors for investigating child sex trafficking? Hell no. And if he tries, that makes the story bigger, not smaller.
Then the whole thing cascades. A line attorney who received the order to shut down the federal investigation sits in front of a state grand jury. That person, facing state felony charges no pardon can reach, names the person who gave the order. That same person gets subpoenaed in a different state. The people in the files start calculating whether cooperation is smarter than silence.
How many different states do you think Trump’s criminal behavior has intersected with? How many criminal prosecutions does it take to topple an oligarch? I’ll give you a hint, it’s somewhere between “we haven’t been charging them” and “dozens across multiple states.”
Evidence generated in California that points to crimes in North Carolina gets sent to North Carolina. For those states with Republican attorneys general, they’ll be getting forwarded evidence of child sex trafficking that another state handed them and they get to publicly explain that choice to their own constituents. The investigations don’t stay in blue states because the crimes didn’t stay in blue states.
Everyone in the chain faces accountability: the people in the files, the oligarchs who funded the operation, any Supreme Court justices implicated in those files, and every person in the FBI and DOJ who was willing to cover it up. Patel. Bondi. All of them.
We don’t make decisions to investigate or prosecute criminal activity based on politics. It’s immoral to do that, and doing exactly that is how we ended up where we are today. Every person in the DOJ chain who shut down the Epstein investigation and participated in covering it up made a political decision to protect criminals. Governors who act are doing what law enforcement does when the people responsible for investigating have been compromised.
When the dust has settled, we won’t be the most powerful nation on Earth anymore because that ship has sailed. What we will be is a democracy with a functioning justice system. That’s way better than saying “the pedophile in charge of the country started a war, we better get out the vote this November and hope they haven’t rigged the game too much!”
The war in Iran is the tail wagging the dog. They started it to keep us from looking at the files. Don’t let it work. Let one governor open the Epstein files. Let five. Let twenty-four. Maybe one or two Republican governors start getting referrals for the most horrific crimes they’ve ever seen and decide they’d rather help prosecute than explain why they didn’t. If actual Nazis could be flipped, so can some of these people.
The distraction loses its purpose the moment the thing it was designed to protect is under investigation. You want to end the war? Investigate the files. You want to save elections? Investigate the files. You want to open the internment camps? Investigate the files. You want to end the dictatorship? Investigate the files. It all leads to the same place because it all comes from the same place, and the people behind all of it belong behind bars.
I don’t expect your governor to do this right now. The point of sending this is to get them thinking about it and to show them what their constituents want. Enough of those messages and a governor and their staff are thinking about it. Enough of that and they are talking about it. Thoughts become conversations, and conversations can become actions over time. That’s just the natural progression of human behavior. This is how we normalize the behavior we want from our politicians. This is how we shift things in our preferred direction.
Please, contact your governor. Send them this article. Tell them this qualifies as a state of emergency and we need them to act.
I have sent this article to tens of thousands of people directly. I also personally messaged Washington state Governor Ferguson. I’m texting this to two friends right now and getting them to do the same.
Right now, people are sitting in detention camps who are being beaten and abused and who knows what else. American citizens have been shot on their own streets by federal agents who won’t face charges. The people whose names are in those files never got justice.
Every one of those people needs us to spend five minutes right now doing something that could actually change this.
Here’s what you can do, in part or whole. No pressure if you aren’t up for it. For those who are able to act, if you mention your action in the comments then it can help inspire others to follow your lead.
You can contact your governor.
You can also send this to two people and ask them to send it to two more. Gmail has a feature that lets you send an email to everyone you’ve ever exchanged emails with.
You can post it, announce it, whatever you feel is appropriate.
We need to let people see us taking action, because that’s what makes the next person do it too. We need governors receiving thousands of these messages. We need it posted about so much that podcasters and YouTubers and even some of the oligarch media start reporting on it. You can make a difference. You can make all the difference. You can influence the situation. Please join us. We need you, and we need you to invite others.
Find contact information for your governor here: https://www.usa.gov/state-governor if the link doesn’t work you can just Google “Contact (your state) Governor” and it should be one of the first 5 results.
Here is what I sent to Washington state Governor Ferguson today using the contact form at governor.wa.gov:
Governor Ferguson,
Governor, we are in a state of emergency. Please consider what line in the sand would merit you declaring it as such. The threats to our national security, our elections, the economic stability of our state, the safety of our residents, all of it is sufficient justification for an official state of emergency requiring the kind of immediate, broad authority that only an emergency declaration provides. We need Washington state to aggressively investigate and criminally prosecute the crimes in the Epstein files, and refer out to other states when the evidence intersects with their criminal codes. This is the web connecting every crisis we’re facing, and pulling on it is how we restore democracy and protect the people of Washington state.
From, Christopher Armitage
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Governor, we are already in a state of emergency. The question is not what additional line must be crossed before it is recognized, but how many warning signs must accumulate before decisive action is taken.
The threats facing our country and our state are not theoretical. Tens of thousands of people are being held in federal detention facilities while concerns continue to be raised about access for oversight and inspection. Serious questions have emerged regarding the conduct and accountability of federal law enforcement operations, including incidents involving the use of deadly force and officers whose identities were not readily visible to the public. Federal actions affecting critical programs have created uncertainty for states and the millions of residents who depend on them, while concerns about government data security, voter information, and election administration continue to grow.
At the same time, the integrity of our democratic institutions is under increasing strain. The public is witnessing growing conflicts over elections, transparency, governmental accountability, and the balance of power between the states and the federal government. The safety of our residents, the stability of our economy, the security of our elections, and public confidence in our institutions are all being challenged simultaneously.
For these reasons, I urge you to consider whether the circumstances warrant an official state of emergency and the use of every lawful authority available to protect the people of New Jersey. I also urge New Jersey to aggressively investigate and, where evidence supports it, criminally prosecute any crimes that fall within its jurisdiction, including matters arising from evidence contained in the Epstein files and related investigations. Where evidence points to violations of other states' laws, those matters should be referred to the appropriate authorities for further action.
No individual—regardless of wealth, political influence, or position—is above the law. The people of New Jersey deserve transparency, accountability, and a government willing to follow the evidence wherever it leads. Restoring public trust requires bold leadership, vigorous enforcement of the law, and an unwavering commitment to democracy, civil liberties, and equal justice.
The people of New Jersey deserve leaders who will act now—not after the next crisis, but before it. The warning signs are already here. The responsibility to protect the public, defend democratic institutions, and uphold the rule of law cannot wait.
We’ll already know by midnight 4 July 2026 - one way or another.
The COUNTDOWN CLOCK will ring at that time.
What version of America that then exists better be on a radically different trajectory than is currently the case.
https://substack.com/@bfjr7/note/c-282052620?r=1j82d8&utm_source=notes-share-action&utm_medium=web
btw, Governor Ferguson and AG Jones will be receiving comprehensive letters from me before the weekend on precisely this topic.
Sent to my Governor:
Governor, we are already in a state of emergency. The question is not what additional line must be crossed before it is recognized, but how many warning signs must accumulate before decisive action is taken.
The threats facing our country and our state are not theoretical. Tens of thousands of people are being held in federal detention facilities while concerns continue to be raised about access for oversight and inspection. Serious questions have emerged regarding the conduct and accountability of federal law enforcement operations, including incidents involving the use of deadly force and officers whose identities were not readily visible to the public. Federal actions affecting critical programs have created uncertainty for states and the millions of residents who depend on them, while concerns about government data security, voter information, and election administration continue to grow.
At the same time, the integrity of our democratic institutions is under increasing strain. The public is witnessing growing conflicts over elections, transparency, governmental accountability, and the balance of power between the states and the federal government. The safety of our residents, the stability of our economy, the security of our elections, and public confidence in our institutions are all being challenged simultaneously.
For these reasons, I urge you to consider whether the circumstances warrant an official state of emergency and the use of every lawful authority available to protect the people of New Jersey. I also urge New Jersey to aggressively investigate and, where evidence supports it, criminally prosecute any crimes that fall within its jurisdiction, including matters arising from evidence contained in the Epstein files and related investigations. Where evidence points to violations of other states' laws, those matters should be referred to the appropriate authorities for further action.
No individual—regardless of wealth, political influence, or position—is above the law. The people of New Jersey deserve transparency, accountability, and a government willing to follow the evidence wherever it leads. Restoring public trust requires bold leadership, vigorous enforcement of the law, and an unwavering commitment to democracy, civil liberties, and equal justice.
The people of New Jersey deserve leaders who will act now—not after the next crisis, but before it. The warning signs are already here. The responsibility to protect the public, defend democratic institutions, and uphold the rule of law cannot wait.