While most were out celebrating freedom with fireworks, about 50 or 60 protesters walked peacefully outside the gates of the Joint Forces Training Base in Los Alamitos on July 4 to use their freedom of speech to protest the use of ICE and the National Guard troops stationed now being trained to wage street war with other Americans.
Organizers Stephanie Wade and Amy Stevens, of OC Indivisible Coalition, said it was a protest, not against the troops, but a protest to disagree with the way they are being used.
“With a masked, secret police abducting people off the streets to ship them, sans due process, to foreign gulags and the National Guard deployed to Los Angeles in a provocative attempt to incite fear and violence, many of us felt that the most patriotic thing we could do on Independence Day was to protest the un-American activities now being run out of our local base,” said Wade.
“I want to be very clear about something,” said Wade after the protest. “I did this not because I’m antagonistic to the 4000 National Guardsmen that are operating outside of this base, Joint Forces Training Base here in Orange County, California.
“I did this not because I don’t support the troops,” he continued, “I did it because I support the troops and what I really want to make certain of is that none of them make the wrong decision if they’re given an unlawful order,” said Wade.
‘I spent nine years in the Marine Corps and am very proud to say that I was an infantry officer who served with distinction. I wasn’t protesting the troops, I was protesting to support them.”
As ENE has reported since the federal initiative began, certain detachments of the military and immigration police are using JFTB as a base of operations. Federal officials have made a major investment in the base, creating massive tents for housing, mess halls, training and presumably for other purposes.
Wade said protesters wanted to send a specific message to the 4000 guardsmen who may be “acting on orders against the interests of the people in Los Angeles every day. Just this week, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass and the city Council held a news conference to protest a show of force in MacArthur Park while Gov. Gavin Newsom has repeatedly tried to regain control of the state’s National Guard to redeploy them to other missions.
Wade was joined by other protestors who said they disapproved of the federal initiative.
“Many of us in Orange County didn’t feel very celebratory this July 4th – our immigrant neighbors being brutally kidnapped while just trying to live their lives and support their families,” said protester Amy Stevens.
She said peaceful demonstrations have been interrupted by police forces with “less lethal” weapons and tear gas, our cities occupied by our own military. I couldn’t party while I felt so much rage and anguish,” she said.
“What else could we do but follow the example of the earliest Americans and protest government overreach and discriminatory practices,” said Stevens. Some folks organized, others planned last-minute pop-ups,” she said.
She said tensions are building within growing areas of the county.
“In Villa Park, a man named Mel stood on the street corner he’s been on every Friday for weeks, this time with dozens of supporters; in Irvine a last-minute sign-wave and food drive drew over 800 people and filled 16+ vehicles with food and essential items for those affected by ICE raids; in San Clemente a family resisted alone and a lone woman walked an intersection in Huntington Beach; there were many other groups big and small throughout the county,” said Stevens.
“And in Los Alamitos, 75 people gathered to send a message to the armed troops sent to quell Constitutionally-protected speech, possibly with violence: You don’t have to follow unlawful orders, your oath demands it of you,” said Stevens.
That was a message that she and the other protestors wanted to get to the troops as many in this group expected the situation to get worse.
Stevens, who lives in Villa Park, said she has founded The Indivisible Coalition to give people a voice as the federal initiative continues.Wade and Stevens could not point to any unlawful orders given, but they say if the situation deteriorates, it is not out of the question.
Wade said he used the example of the order given by former General Mark Milley and the Secretary of Defense used to “disobey one of President Trump’s orders like my sign says General Milly and Secretary of Defenses for how to disobey one of Trump’s unlawful orders in 2019 and 2020 when the President suggested shooting unarmed protesters.”
Wade, a former Marine, said troops have a duty under the Uniform Code of Military Justice to disobey that and any other order they know or ought to know is unlawful. “I say that because the fate of our democracy may soon depend on young men and women in uniform refusing to follow unlawful orders, he predicted.
While it has been widely reported that President Trump asked Joint Chairman Milley and Secretary Mark Esper about shooting protesters in the legs, there is no documentation that the President ever actually gave the order after Milley and Esper provided their infamous input.
“I want these young guardsmen, and most of them are extremely young…I want to fortify them with the courage, and I want them to consider under what circumstances they would disobey an unlawful order,” she said.
“They have an obligation, and they all know it,” said Wade.
“I don’t want them to make the wrong decision and do something like shoot unarmed peaceful protesters and then have to live with that kind of a moral injury for the rest of their lives,” said Wade, not to mention you know I think these protests are going to grow and grow and they must grow and then they’ll grow exponentially.”
Although no such orders have been documented, the former Marine warned “if they resort to nothing but naked violence against unarmed Americans, that’s when these protests will explode,” citing other examples when this has happened.
SIn past conflicts, when the organs of state and institutions determined they should deploy violence against their citizens, that “they have a positive obligation to disobey. It is unlawful to do so,” said Wade, suggesting that was intent of the protest to let the National Guardsmen inside know of their choice.
It is incumbent on all of us–civilian and veteran alike–to remind these young warriors that they are meant to protect, not repress the American people,” she said.
If any such orders are given to act upon citizens, Wade said American troops will have a duty, under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, to disobey that and any other order they know or ought to know is unlawful.
“I say that because the fate of our democracy may soon depend on young men and women in uniform refusing to follow unlawful orders and I say it because I don’t want them, in the heat of crisis, to make a wrong decision that they will carry as a moral injury for the rest of their lives,” she said.
“Ultimately, I think in the end, these Guardsmen are not going to side against the American people, I don’t believe they will.”
Lt. Col. Dan Fox, JFTB base commander, said National Guard troops “absolutely retain the right to protect themselves, but I can assure you they are under no orders to shoot anyone,” he said in response to the protest.