Republican sparks liberal meltdown as he repeats famous ‘send in the troops’ battle-cry… ‘this time for real’

A top Republican has fanned the flames of liberal outrage by urging Donald Trump to ‘send in the troops… this time for real’ to end the Los Angeles riots.

Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton has called for the president to deploy active-duty soldiers if the 4,000 National Guard members and 700 Marines who are currently mobilized in the Democrat city do not manage to end the violence.

Writing in the Wall Street Journal, the 48-year-old Army veteran said Trump should invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act which allows the military to suppress uprisings when a state is unable or unwilling to do so. 

It comes five years after Cotton made the same argument amid the violence, looting and arson attacks which unfolded in the wake of George Floyd’s murder by a Minneapolis police officer on May 25, 2020. 

He penned a New York Times op-ed titled ‘Tom Cotton: Send In the Troops’ in June 2020, which sparked widespread rage from liberals online – and from dozens of NYT employees who said they were ‘deeply ashamed’ that the paper published the piece. 

History is repeating itself this week as Cotton’s WSJ article titled ‘Send In the Troops, For Real’, which says the LA riots are ‘worse’ than the Black Lives Matter uprisings, has once again prompted a flood of criticism from liberal readers. 

Several people slammed Cotton’s approach as ‘fascist’ and un-American, while others went further by calling for him to resign – though several Arkansas residents also voiced support for his call to arms. 

‘You, sir, just said the most unconstitutional, disgraceful and foul action the US government could take against its citizens,’ one person wrote on X. 

‘You should resign in disgrace. Have you no shame?’

Another X user accused Cotton of ‘sending Air Force on your own people’. ‘Shame on you,’ they wrote. 

‘You want American troops to fire on American citizens? That’s a horrible idea. Someone will be killed, then you’re fighting a martyr,’ a third person said. 

‘No matter how much you believe in your justification for the violence you inflict on others, in the end history will remember you as the bad guy.’

‘Lol come on – LAPD is clearly handling it,’ another person wrote. 

‘Keep your fascist fantasies for when there is serious unrest. the founding fathers would be appalled at your wish for military force to control the civilian population.’

Meanwhile, Cotton’s Republican supporters praised him on X for using ‘common sense’ in the face of violent protests.

‘Great article,’ another person agreed. A third person praised the article as ‘law and order coming through’. ‘Cotton knows how to restore peace,’ they added, along with an American flag emoji. 

‘This guy is so accurate,’ one X user said, while another said: ‘Slay king’.   

Cotton’s WSJ opinion piece is the latest in the war of words between Golden State Democrats and the federal government. 

The rhetoric reached a boiling point on Sunday when Governor Newsom called for Trump’s border tsar Tom Homan to arrest him. 

It came in response to an MSNBC reporter telling him that Homan said he wouldn’t rule out detaining California officials who got in the way of law enforcement. 

Trump has so far mobilized 4,000 National Guard members to quell the riots, along with 700 US Marines. 

Newsom slammed the move as fulfilling ‘the deranged fantasy of a dictatorial president’. 

Along with other Democrat lawmakers, Newsom has claimed the protests are ‘peaceful’ and accused Trump of ‘manufacturing’ a crisis while using fascist tactics against American citizens. 

Republicans have hit back by sharing footage of rioters waving Mexican flags as they circled burning vehicles on dirt bikes amid the carnage. 

Cotton laid out their argument in stronger terms in his WSJ opinion piece. 

‘Violent insurrectionists turned areas of Los Angeles into lawless hellscapes over the weekend, with anarchists setting fire to vehicles, throwing scooters and debris at police, and looting businesses — all while waving foreign flags,’ he wrote. 

He argued that the riots in LA are worse than the Black Lives Matter protests in the wake of Floyd’s death because of the presence of Palestinian and Mexican flags. 

‘Democrats also stood idly by or even celebrated as the Black Lives Matter riots ransacked our cities five years ago,’ he wrote. ‘If anything, these riots are worse.’ 

‘At least the BLM rioters didn’t wave foreign flags.’ 

The protests in LA are ongoing, and have inspired anti-ICE demonstrations other cities including New York, Boston, Chicago, Dallas and Atlanta. 

Some demonstrations involved a few dozen people, while others attracted thousands. 

LA Mayor Karen Bass said a curfew had been put in place from 8pm until 6am in an effort to quell the unrest. 

‘If you drive through downtown LA, the graffiti is everywhere and has caused significant damages,’ Bass said, adding that 29 businesses were looted on Monday night alone. 

Demonstrators are protesting against Trump’s immigration policies, which they said are breaking migrant families apart.