Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD) escalated his attacks on President Donald Trump during a CNN interview, claiming the president’s latest efforts to restore order are nothing short of authoritarian theater.

The Democrat lawmaker argued that Trump’s push to deploy the National Guard in crime-plagued cities like Chicago echoes the strongman tactics of fascist leaders. “I think Donald Trump and Stephen Miller and Trump’s handlers thought that he would conduct some kind of Mussolini-style military march across the country, subduing all the local populations,” Raskin said. “But it’s completely backfiring on them.”

Raskin insisted that Trump’s federal interventions have triggered greater resistance instead of compliance. He pointed to earlier actions in California, where Trump mobilized forces to confront sanctuary city chaos, claiming it “really not just mobilized L.A., but the entire state against them.” He also cited Trump’s federal takeover of policing in Washington, D.C., which he said galvanized the city’s leadership and renewed the push for statehood.

Now, with Trump shifting focus to Chicago, Raskin claimed the pattern is repeating. “It clearly unified all of those public officials in Chicago, throughout Illinois,” he said. “You saw the members of the congressional delegation, the senators, the attorney general, as well as the governor and the mayor. And so he’s really unifying America around the principles of home rule, people can govern themselves.”

The president, however, has framed his actions far differently. Trump has cast his deployments as essential to restoring safety and order after decades of Democrat mismanagement in cities where crime is skyrocketing. The president recently boasted that violent crime in D.C. dropped by more than 20 percent after his crackdown, insisting the results speak for themselves.

Raskin, long one of Trump’s most aggressive critics, framed these efforts as “outrageous authoritarianism,” designed to intimidate populations rather than protect them. By invoking Mussolini, he sought to draw parallels between Trump and one of history’s most infamous dictators—a comparison conservatives dismissed as unhinged political theater.

The broader clash highlights one of the sharpest divides in American politics today: whether federal action to restore law and order represents necessary leadership or an attack on local autonomy. To Trump’s supporters, the president is finally addressing lawlessness that Democrats refuse to confront. To his critics, it is evidence of creeping authoritarianism.

As the standoff between Trump and Democrat-run cities intensifies, one thing is clear: both sides see high stakes in the battle over control. And if Raskin’s rhetoric is any indication, the attacks on Trump will only grow more extreme the more success he has in driving down crime.