The Meaning of D-Day in 2026: Eisenhower’s Promise vs. Trump’s Tyranny
While the MAGA movement rewrites history to justify white nationalism, America's true promise remains alive.
Edwin Eisendrath hosts It’s the Democracy, Stupid on Lincoln Square and WCPT820 AM/Heartland Signal. He’s the former CEO of the Chicago Sun-Times, a long-time management consultant, a former Chicago Alderman, HUD Regional Administrator and teacher in Chicago’s public schools. Subscribe to his Substack.
I once swore an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” Now fidelity to that oath means defending our Constitution and our way of life against others who, in bad faith, swore the same oath.
Chief among them, of course, is Donald Trump. Instead of supporting and defending our Constitution, his actions have repeatedly, consistently, and wantonly undermined it. That is the recurring finding of federal judges appointed by presidents of both political parties. Trump violated the constitution when ordered the military onto American streets. He did it when he flew people to a foreign dungeon without any due process. He did it when he imposed ubiquitous new tariff taxes on all Americans. The Constitution does not give the President the power to do these things. Every eighth grader knows that. And federal judges ordered him to stop. In the case of his summary deportation, he was stopped by a 9-0 vote on the Supreme Court.
Every person who serves in the federal government takes the same oath as I did. But in Trump’s administration there’s another oath- to the man himself. And on his behalf his Justice Department has been found by courts to have engaged in vindictive prosecution, and to have engaged in prosecutorial misconduct to punish his enemies.
None of this is news. But it is on my mind today.
Every American, not just those who swore an oath to the constitution, knows this is a perilous moment. Our democracy has been downgraded by scholars, and most of us can feel that it is not working as it should.
We sense that our Congress does not represent us, but, instead, is beholden to monied interests and to partisan mapmakers. We know that Trump and his oligarchs are piling up their own wealth even as they shift the burden of taxation onto the rest of us. We see shocking decisions from a Supreme Court that upend years of progress towards a more just society. Americans, no matter their politics, were revolted by the crooked deal that the President and his nominee for Attorney General made to cheat taxpayers out of $2 billion to create a slush fund for vigilantes and to forever shield Donald Trump and his family from accountability for the money he’s taken as President.
Not just Americans, but the entire world watches in horror as Donald Trump uses America’s military power without consultation, without strategy, and without purpose. Trump is widely seen and understood to be a man who embraces the use of force as an end in itself.
And, as he uses the coercive power of the Executive Branch to transform America into a nation bound together by fealty to a leader, where faith is dictated by the government and where social order is determined by race, the entire world is holding its breath.
Saturday was the 82nd anniversary of D-Day. The bloody day that American and our allies stormed the beaches of Normandy. In his general orders for the day, General Eisenhower told the soldiers they fought for “the elimination of the Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.”
In Normandy this year, Pete Hegseth had a different message. He told those gathered to honor the those who died to protect freedom in the world, that Europeans didn’t learn the lesson of D-day, because if they had, they would repel the invaders landing on their beaches today. He was telling them that World War II was fought not for freedom, but to keep Europe white. Just so, earlier in the week John Roberts cleared the way for Alabama to impose political maps not to allow free people to make their voices heard, but to ensure that political power is held by white Alabamans.
Around the world, and even here at home, people are asking whether the idea of America is dead.
It is a fair question, but we are brave enough to answer?
As we enter the midterm election season — a time of choosing among Americans — we are heirs not only to the brave soldiers who fought and died at Normandy, but of the founders who gave us our great promise, and of the nameless Americans who fought and died to be included in that promise. General Dwight D. Eisenhower wrote, “The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you.”
And so they are today.
To paraphrase the rest of Ike’s general orders on D-Day, the Trump administration and his allies on the Supreme Court are powerful. But this is 2026. Much has happened in the last year. The good people of America, including federal judges who honor their oaths, have inflicted upon Mr. Trump great defeats. In election after election, Americans came together to send his foot soldiers down. In courtrooms everywhere we have slowed his aggression. And across our land we have learned to organize, to stand up, to fight back. Ike said, “the tide has turned,” and so it has.
America is an idea and a promise that is very hard to kill. As long as families seek a better life, as long as people want to be free, as long as there are individuals whose prayers are unwelcome by their governments, America offers hope. Alone among nations, we were founded on the idea that all are created equal, and all have rights no government may take. On this continent, women and men fought to be included in that promise, and won the right to vote, to serve in the military, to fully participate in our democracy and with that the obligation fully to contribute to our society. Those contributions made us the most prosperous, creative, dynamic place on earth. And we are not about to let one man and the handful of terrible people who stand with him skim off the top.
Reflecting on this great anniversary, I can say with confidence that we will defeat Trump and his MAGA movement. And when we do, there will be both accountability and a return to our mission to be worthy of America’s promise.
Thanks, Edwin. Your words lift up hope.
Excellent post! I agree with every word. I'm hoping the 70% of us who aren't MAGA come together this November to drive a stake in the heart of fascism.