OPINION: Protestors demand a return to the rule of law

Twice in just four weeks, local citizens have protested along Coeur d’Alene’s busiest thoroughfare. A thousand turned out on April 5. Hundreds showed up in the rain on April 19.

Our voices are joining millions more reverberating in cities and towns across the country.

What do we want?

We want a nation where people don’t get abducted on their way to immigration court appearances. 

We want legislative town halls where lawmakers listen and black shirts don’t haul out dissenting voices. 

We want representatives who have the courage to check a would-be king who is abusing executive power. 

In short, we want a government that follows the Constitution, and also respects it. 

The Idaho Republican Chair Dorothy Moon forcefully stated her allegiance to the rule of law in a recent Coeur d’Alene Press column: “America is a nation of laws.”

“You either support the rule of law, or you don’t. It’s time to stop making excuses and start enforcing our laws once and for all,” she said.

Chair Moon went on, “As Republicans, we believe the law applies equally to all, regardless of class, sex, ethnicity or personal connections.”

Democrats wholeheartedly agree. We protest to send the message that Republican elected leaders must live up to Moon’s statements.

Moon and the rest of the Republican Party fail to realize the glaring irony in their defense of the rule of law: Republicans cannot pick and choose which laws they like and ignore the rest.

Locally, we’ve seen what happens when the law is flaunted. We extend our support and well-wishes to Dr. Teresa Borhenpohl as her case moves through the court system. She was violently attacked in the GOP Town Hall in February. But she is not the only one. Her case is just one of the many we are beginning to see around the country as Trump’s government scoffs at discourse and the rule of law and instead chooses the rule of muscle and tyranny. 

Chair Moon and the Republicans need to answer a few questions.

If immigrants are following the law and appearing at their scheduled court hearings, why then are they being abducted in the lobbies as they arrive at courthouses?

If freedom of speech is enshrined in the First Amendment to the Constitution, what are we to make of a public official who forcibly suppresses speech at a public town hall?

If the rule of law is so important to Republicans, why do they support a felon President who doesn’t care about being in contempt of court?

The answer to all of these questions is the naked truth: For Republicans the rule of law does not apply equally to all. 

Republicans only support the “rule of law” when the rule of law supports them. In their minds, the greater good of America is of no consequence. As long as they can “own the libs" or hurt their enemies, the laws can be disregarded. 

This must stop.

Until it does stop, we will protest. Because we were watching our beloved country descend into something unrecognizable.

And we won’t stop protesting until once again, our nation lives up to the ideals of its Constitution, its Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, and the civil rights progress we’ve made together. 

We will constantly fight to create a more perfect union.

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Evan Koch is chairman of the Kootenai County Democrats.