They Shoot ICE Agents, Don’t They? GOP’s New Smarts. Mainstreaming Antifa? Citizenship Shindig at George’s Place & More

Tariff turbulence (here, here, here, and here) and civic turbulence are at the top of the news this morning.

A clash between ICE officials and activists at a (legal) California marijuana operation called Glass Door Farm is the latest eruption of mostly violent riots:  

Protesters clashed with federal authorities Thursday during an immigration operation north of Los Angeles at a marijuana farm allegedly employing illegal immigrants. 

Multiple agents arrived at the Glass House Farms, a state-licensed cannabis facility which is considered illegal under federal law, in Camarillo. Federal authorities had a warrant for illegal employees, Fox News has learned. 

Another raid also occurred at another Glass House Farm in Carpinteria.

Townhall’s Matt Vespa writes that the Camarillo riot arguably led to an assassination attempt on ICE agents:

We’ve gone beyond leftists being annoying and hysterical regarding disrupting Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids. It’s now domestic terrorism. ICE conducted a raid on a cannabis farm in Camarillo, California, which devolved into a total circus. They tried to block vehicles, used human chain antics, and were being overall annoying. Then, things got violent. Video clearly shows an anti-ICE activist shooting at federal agents during the mayhem.

This mayhem follows closely on the anti-ICE ambush in Texas and other “protests” against ICE agents. Examiner Chief Political Correspondent Byron York considers the role of antifa in such protests. Alarmingly, York concludes:

There’s no doubt that antifa is a fringe, extremist group. Not isolated — there are cells of radicals throughout the country — but extremist. Now, the issue of opposition to Trump’s immigration enforcement has brought the fanatics of antifa more closely than ever in line with the beliefs of progressive Democrats, and perhaps those in the party’s mainstream, too. Would it be fair to call antifa the militant wing of the Democratic Party? Maybe so. And if it is not fair, it is closer to true than many Democrats would ever want to acknowledge.

What’s the appropriate remedy for these terrible developments? Well, here’s one suggestion:

Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) is now pushing for a law that would prohibit ICE agents from wearing masks and require them to display their identification on their uniforms. So, Democrats are now in favor of ID laws?

This should be called the Sitting Duck Bill.

This follows closely on the anti-ICE ambush in Texas and other riots against ICE agents.

Speaking of aspiring assassins, Ms. Must believes that a year later, we don’t know enough about Thomas Crooks, who tried to kill then-candidate Trump at the Butler rally. This is about all we are told:

Former FBI agent John Nantz said Crooks did not fit the profile of a politically motivated extremist.

“Crooks looked not so much like an ideologue, not so much like an individual who was being directed in some way to conduct an assassination attempt, but more like a person with anti-social issues that may have been seeking notoriety,” Nantz told Fox News Digital. 

More (but not all that much) about the six Secret Service agents who were suspended because of the Butler fiasco.

Who You Callin’ Stupid? With all the punditry devoted to the dissolution of the Democratic Party, is it time to think about the fate of the political party (formerly?) fondly known as “the Stupid Party”?

Yes, a funny thing happened on the way to the passage of the “One, Big Beautiful” act. The GOP did not blow itself up. Indeed, as the Wall Street Journal’s astonished Barton Swaim observes, the Republicans acted like a normal political party.” “What changed?” wonders Swaim.

The press would insist it’s President Trump’s ability to overawe his party:  

I would suggest another, more general reason for Republican cohesion. What has long kept Republicans on the Hill from functioning as their Democratic correlatives do—like a single-minded partisan machine—is that the news media, expert class and entertainment-industry elite are, and have been for decades, fully aligned with Democratic aims and dead set against Republican ones.

A consequential liberal initiative is virtually guaranteed gentle treatment: favorable descriptions from the media, endorsements from academic experts and cheerleading from high-profile entertainers. Tough votes are easier when cultural arbiters unite to assure you of your righteousness, and harder when they call you a monster. Voting for a measure opposed by liberal VIPs, or against one favored by them—academic hotshots, eminent intellectuals, Hollywood actors—isn’t something Democrats have to do all that often.

Yet in 2025 the Democrats’ use of the media and adjacent cultural authorities has had little effect.

We can’t ignore foreign developments this morning. The New York Post cover screams one word: “Barbaric!” It features a one-year-old casualty child, a casualty of “Putin’s horror” as laid bare by the latest Russian drone attack in Ukraine. A story inside includes a chilling video of an apparent Ukrainian spy gunned down on the street in broad daylight.

In other foreign news, a Wall Street Journal editorial ponders President Trump’s next move on Iran, urging more sanctions and other pressure. Move Over, National Injunctions: Closer to home, another Wall Street Journal editorial explores birthright citizenship. Would you believe a class action lawsuit challenging President Trump’s EO against birthright citizenship? The editors write:

The new lawsuit was filed by noncitizens who recently had a child or are expecting one. According to the complaint, the plaintiffs include a Taiwanese woman with a student visa who has lived here for 12 years and is applying for a green card. “Petitioners have satisfied the requirements for provisional class certification,” writes Judge Joseph Laplante, a George W. Bush appointee….

Winning class certification is a hurdle, but how high remains to be seen. The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure set out four prerequisites: A class must be “numerous,” and its members must share common questions of law or fact. Also, the representative parties must have “typical” claims or defenses, as well as the ability to “fairly and adequately” protect the class’s interests.

Judge Laplante provisionally certifies a class of babies born on or after Feb. 20 who would be subject to Mr. Trump’s order denying them U.S. citizenship. Will this hold up on appeal? Was Judge Laplante scrupulous? Perhaps that question will be coming soon to the Supreme Court, bringing birthright citizenship back to the emergency docket. Sorry to spoil your summer beach plans, Justices, and can someone please hand Justice Thomas a Wi-Fi hot spot before he drives off in his RV?

Veteran political columnist Michael Barone writes that the gender gap—first discerned by pollsters in 1980 when women voted lopsidedly against Republican Ronald Reagan—is growing wider and wider. Of course, the gender gap back then was so much simpler—what with only two genders back in the dark ages.

In a sad and moving piece in the Daily Caller, detransitioner Prisha Mosley writes that President Trump’s insistence that there are only two sexes could have spared her a lot of anguish:

Prisha Mosley believes the Trump administration’s moves to ban “gender-affirming care” for minors could have saved her from transitioning when she was a teenager, she told the Daily Caller in an exclusive interview.

“This is what I needed to happen when I was going through this, when I was struggling and I was vulnerable,” Mosley told the Caller. “My doctors came to me with lies, and I really wanted to believe them. I really wanted it to be true. I wanted it to be possible that I could transform into a man who was not mentally ill or traumatized, and I believed them.”

Mosley, Ms. Must is proud to say, is an ambassador for Independent Women.

Intriguing headline: “Could City-owned Grocery Stores Survive New York’s Shoplifting Plague?” City Journal’s Steven Melanga explains that it’s disorder and crime, not greed, that cause New York’s food deserts.”

In a counterpoint to the riots across the country supporting illegal immigration, please don’t miss James Eustis’ “Born Again in Liberty, What Immigrants Teach Us about Citizenship.” Mr. Eustis recounts a beautiful naturalization ceremony at Mount Vernon on the Fourth of July.