Those Who Challenge and Protest U.S. Policies Are Not Terrorists, and They Are Certainly NOT Paid by Other Governments
Thin-skinned and heavy-handed, the Trump administration apparently feels like it is being singled out by those who dissent from its policies. As a result, Trump appointees are taking drastic “McCarthy” tactics to stop dissent.
In less than one month, alleging that dissent and protests are part of attempts of other governments “to overthrow the government of the United States,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio has sponsored two major initiatives to frighten those who oppose the Trump administration policies. The first salvo was orchestrating a conference with 60 countries participating in “The Resurgence of Political Terrorism .” The second was the report on Cuba that alleged virtually every group that has ever visited Cuba is paid by the Cuban government.
No One Is Paid to Protest—If One Is NOT Outraged, then You Are Not Watching
These allegations—of paid protest and traveling on the dime of another country—are unfounded, untrue and fly in the face of the history of protests in the U.S. and travel by U.S. citizens to see the effects of U.S. polices on other countries.
Trump’s erratic foreign policy including the disastrous attacks on Iran, attacks domestically cutting health and education, horrific treatment of migrants, daily outlandish statements on just about every subject and disregard for facts in virtually every issue, all provide good reasons for protests by outraged U.S. citizens.
No one needs to be paid to be outraged!!!
Dissent Is Not Illegal and Dissenters Are Not Paid by Other Countries
In particular, Secretary of State and National Security Adviser Marco Rubio, who has authored the latest “McCarthy-ite” report to quell opposition to illegal, immoral policies of his department and the Trump administration in general, seems to have lost his grip on the history of dissent in the U.S.
From his 15 years in the U.S. Senate, he should remember that many of every administration’s domestic and international policies have been lawfully and non-violently protested by U.S. citizens in the U.S. Congress.
Having been a part of many protests since I resigned from the State Department in March 2003 in opposition to a war policy—President George W. Bush’s war on Iraq—I know that these protests are NOT a part of attempts of other governments to “overthrow the government of the United States,” but are legitimate shows of concern about specific policies. Rubio’s allegations of other countries’ influence in these protests are unfounded and untrue.
I was not paid by a foreign government to resign. I resigned because I fbelieved the war on Iraq was illegal, immoral and a dangerous action jeopardizing the national security of the United States.
I have not been paid by any country to protest U.S. policies, nor do I know anyone who has been paid. Protest is a legitimate, time-consuming act of outrage about a policy that people use to bring attention to the policy, and hopefully effect change in the policy.
Marco “McCarthy” Rubio’s Tactics: Blame the Left When the Right Has Violently Attacked the U.S. Government
The first attack against legitimate protest came in the U.S. Department of State-sponsored conference on so-called “Far Left Terrorism” held in Washington, D.C., in July 2026 where Secretary of State Marco Rubio and White House pitbull Stephen Miller harangued the representatives of 66 nations about terrorists from the left wanting to overthrow the U.S. government.
In his opening statement Rubio railed: “This is a distinctive and unique evil. It has always been driven by a hatred above all else, a hatred for civilization itself. It is a revolt of the worst against the best, a revolt of the weak and the cowardly against the strong and the good.”
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller called left-wing extremism a growing threat aimed at “the overthrow of our system and form of government” that officials previously failed to sufficiently address. Miller railed, “We must stay the course and be completely unflinching in the pursuit of justice against these enemies of civilization. If the left is allowed to use the real or actual threat of violence to destabilize our institutions, then those institutions cannot and will not succeed.”
A White House press release stated: “Under the leadership of President Donald J. Trump, far-left extremism will be treated with the same seriousness and ferocity the world has long reserved for jihadist terrorism.”
Oops, Trump and Rubio Forget to Mention the Violent Attempt to Overthrow the U.S. Electoral Process by the Trump-Inspired Right-Wing Mob on January 6
Of course, neither Rubio nor Miller mentioned President Trump’s pardon of the more than 1,500 persons who did try to violently overthrow the United States electoral process on January 6, 2021, as they attacked the Capitol police and broke into and destroyed many offices in the U.S. Capitol.
The attempted overthrow of the 2020 election by seeking to nullify the election results through lawsuits in 62 federal and state courts was attempted by Trump’s loyal personal lawyers, including the disgraced and disbarred lawyer and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. The election fraud claims were stopped by rulings in all 62 federal and state lawsuits that no election fraud had occurred.
Rubio and the State Department’s Untruthful, Dishonest Report About Cuba, Paid Protesters and Cuba Has Been Trying to Overthrow the United States Government
The most recent and most ludicrous allegations of left-wing violence and protests being funded by other countries is contained in Secretary of State Marco “McCarthy” Rubio’s 100- page report entitled “Cuba: The Capital of 21st Century Communism” Rubio accuses the National Network on Cuba, National Lawyers Guild, CODEPINK: Women for Peace, the People’s Forum, IFCO/Pastors for Peace, and Democratic Socialists of America of being paid by the Cuban government whose goal, the report states, for 60 years has been to work to overthrow the U.S. government.
Talk about turning the facts on their heads, as is well-documented, 14 successive U.S. presidential administrations since 1959—Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton, Bush 2, Obama (first term when CIA policies were still in effect, but changing in Obama’s second term with diplomatic recognition), Trump 1, Biden and Trump 2—have attempted to overthrow the Cuban government in the 60+ years of its revolutionary existence.
The current attempt to overthrow the Cuban government by the United States is centered on the brutal total blockade of fuel going to Cuba which has left Cuban citizens without electricity for operations in hospitals, for food preparation, for the ability to conduct normal life activities. Making life so miserable for the Cuban citizenry that they overthrow their government would fulfill the long-standing hopes of Cuban-American Secretary of State Rubio.
Rubio Is Not Honest About His Background As a Cuban-American
Marco Rubio has been less than forthright about his heritage as a Cuban-American in his quest for the overthrow of the Cuban government.
Marco Rubio, “Mr. Righteous against birthright citizenship,” is a “birthright citizen” born in the U.S. of non-citizen parents who had emigrated from Cuba under the Batista dictatorship in 1956, not from the 1959 revolutionary government.
Marco Rubio, “Mr. Tough on illegal immigrants,” his own grandfather entered the U.S. illegally and was ordered to be deported but was saved from deportation by an amnesty during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
Marco Rubio, “Mr. Kill the Boat Drug Runners of the Caribbean,” his own brother-in-law was convicted of drug-running and his sister implicated but never charged.
Marco Rubio, “Mr. I Know All About Cuba Because I Am Cuban-American,” has been to Cuba exactly once. Where in Cuba did he go? He spent a few hours at the U.S. prison on the U.S. Naval Base at Guantánamo.
No doubt, more will come in the next two years as Rubio, Miller and others in the administration seem to think they can get away with outrageous bullying of individuals and organizations that do not agree with them and that challenge them in non-violent ways, in contrast to the January 6 gang.
In particular, there are always protests against the horrific effects of brutal sanctions that the U.S. government uses in the hope to make life so difficult that citizens of other countries will overthrow their own governments, whether it be Cuba, Venezuela, Iran or Nicaragua.
Israel’s Paid Influence on U.S. Citizen Perceptions Seems to Be Okay with Rubio
However, Rubio no doubt is thinking that, since his buddies in the Netanyahu’s government have paid Trump’s former campaign manager, Brad Parscale, millions of dollars in a specific program to influence U.S. public opinion and stop the massive decline in Israel’s “likeability,” that other countries will pay off U.S. persons to work clandestinely on the same scale.
Parscale’s firm was hired by Israel for $6 million in September 2025 and then signed a $15 million contract with Israeli firm Havas to conduct a digital campaign on behalf of the State of Israel according to the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). Parscale and his team sent conservative influencers who suggested positive language about Israel for posts on social media sites such as X, Instagram and TikTok. The influencers are then compensated based on how many “likes” each post gets from readers.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has dramatically increased spending on influence operations. Earlier this year, Israel increased by almost five times its “public diplomacy” influence budget from $150 million in 2025 to $730 million in 2026.
But even the The Times of Israel says it is too late for a “facelift,” as a Pew Research Center poll reported that 60% of Americans now view Israel unfavorably, up seven points in a single year, with only 37% viewing it favorably, after Israel has committed genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, pillaged and plundered homes, farms and animals in the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian West Bank, destroyed southern Lebanon and helped to get the Trump administration up to its neck in the war on Iran,
Keep Challenging Illegal, Immoral and Criminal Policies
The two recent major attempts of the Trump administration to quell dissent show how important challenging illegal, immoral and criminal policies has become and how important it is that we push back hard against these attempts at intimidating citizens to silence their dissent.
However, despite these brutal, heavy-handed attempts to silent us, dissent is spreading to regular citizens. In a recent letter to the editor of my hometown newspaper, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, which serves a large U.S. military population, a resident of Hawaii summarized the challenge very well: “The true domestic enemy includes those who monopolize political and economic power. The real enemy includes individuals who misinform, threaten and disenfranchise the less powerful. The true enemy are those who are antidemocratic, have little or no concern regarding the welfare of others and enrich themselves, family and a few friends at the expense of the general population.”
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About the Author
Ann Wright is a retired United States Army colonel and retired U.S. State Department official.
She was one of three State Department officials to publicly resign in direct protest of the 2003 Invasion of Iraq.
Since that time Colonel Wright has been a dedicated peace activist.
Ann can be reached at annw1946@gmail.com.
