Slotkin and Fellow Democrats Dangerously Urge Troops to Defy Commander in Chief

President Donald Trump accurately characterized a video released by Democrat lawmakers this week as seditious behavior that fundamentally undermines the constitutional chain of command. The facts here are straightforward, and they are deeply troubling.

Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin, along with other Democrat veterans of the military and intelligence community now serving in Congress, released a video titled “Don’t Give Up the Ship” that explicitly encourages active-duty military personnel and intelligence community members to refuse orders from the Commander in Chief. Let us be clear about what this represents: a coordinated effort by members of Congress to insert themselves between the President and the military chain of command.

The video features these lawmakers making a direct appeal to service members, stating: “You can refuse illegal orders. You must refuse illegal orders. No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution.” The obvious question becomes: who determines which orders are illegal? These Democrat lawmakers are effectively positioning themselves as the arbiters of legality, encouraging individual service members to make independent judgments about the lawfulness of presidential directives.

This represents a fundamental misunderstanding of how military command structure functions in a constitutional republic. The Uniform Code of Military Justice does indeed require service members to refuse unlawful orders, but the mechanism for determining unlawfulness runs through the military justice system and the courts, not through the subjective interpretation of individual service members prompted by opposition politicians.

Trump responded on Saturday via Truth Social, stating that these “traitors” engaged in “sedition at the highest level” and “should be in jail right now, not roaming the fake news networks trying to explain what they said was OK.” While Trump’s initial posts suggested severe punishment, the White House later clarified that the President was not calling for execution of these lawmakers but rather highlighting the serious nature of their actions.

The President’s core argument remains sound: encouraging military personnel to independently determine which orders to follow based on their own interpretation of legality, particularly when prompted by opposition party members, fundamentally undermines military discipline and the constitutional framework that places the elected President as Commander in Chief.

Slotkin, who previously worked at the CIA and Defense Department, should understand better than most the dangers of politicizing the military chain of command. The irony of former intelligence and military officials now encouraging active-duty personnel to second-guess their Commander in Chief cannot be overstated.

The Democrats in the video claim they are defending the Constitution, but they are actually doing the opposite. The Constitution establishes clear civilian control of the military through the President. If military orders are genuinely unlawful, the proper channels exist for addressing such concerns through the chain of command, inspector general offices, and ultimately the courts.

What these Democrat lawmakers have done is attempt to create a parallel authority structure where opposition party members can directly influence military personnel to resist the lawful Commander in Chief. This is precisely the kind of behavior that erodes military discipline and civilian control of the armed forces.

Trump’s characterization of this behavior as seditious may sound harsh to some ears, but the legal definition of sedition involves conduct or speech inciting people to rebel against the authority of the state. Encouraging military personnel to refuse orders from the Commander in Chief certainly falls within that framework.

The subsequent bomb threat against Senator Slotkin is obviously reprehensible and should be condemned without qualification. Criminal threats have no place in political discourse. However, that incident does not change the fundamental constitutional problem with the video these lawmakers produced.

The facts remain: Democrat members of Congress coordinated to encourage military insubordination against the Commander in Chief. That is seditious behavior, and it should be treated as such.