“I Want That Deterrence Message”: Michigan Dem Slotkin Wants To Prosecute Trump Admin To Scare Off Young Conservatives

Authored by Jonathan Turley via JonathanTurley.org,

This election, Democrats have careened to the far left with calls to pack the Supreme Court, unleash a flurry of impeachments, and investigate Republicans. Few, however, have been as honest as Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D., Mich.) about the purpose of such threats. Slotkin recently said the quiet part out loud in an interview at my alma mater, the University of Chicago, admitting she wants to deter young people from even considering supporting the Administration… if they know what is good for them. Slotkin seemed to go full Col. Walter Kurtz in the middle of the interview.

The Chicago Thinker, an outstanding student newspaper at UChicago, posted an interview with Slotkin, in which she describes the strategy to deter young Republicans from getting involved in government, at least in supporting the Administration.

Like many of her Democratic colleagues, Slotkin is promising that, if Democrats are given back control of Congress, they will unleash a tsunami of investigations of Republicans supporting President Trump: In the clip of the exchange circulated on X, Slotkin states:

“I want to look at these signature cases and not just focus on the president, but on the people who enabled him. I want young people coming out of school to say, should I go work for the Trump administration? Like that sounds fun. I might get an opportunity. I want them to be like, Lord, that might be buying myself a ton of problems that I don’t want, and so let me avoid participating in that. I want that deterrence message.”

“That deterrence message” is all too familiar to many Republicans. After January 6th, the Biden Administration used the riot to unleash a scorched-earth campaign against Trump supporters and groups.

ON UCHICAGO CAMPUS: U.S. Senator from Michigan Elissa Slotkin hopes planned political prosecutions of republican leaders will scare young conservatives from getting involved in politics. @ElissaSlotkin https://t.co/p7NBJpDcQW

— The Chicago Thinker (@ThinkerChicago) October 17, 2026

In an interview with CBS News, Justice Department official Michael Sherwin explained that they wanted to send a message with the harsh treatment of Trump supporters.

He explained that “our office wanted to ensure that there was shock and awe … it worked because we saw through media posts that people were afraid to come back to D.C. because they’re, like, ‘If we go there, we’re gonna get charged.’ … We wanted to take out those individuals that essentially were thumbing their noses at the public for what they did.”

Of course, if Sherwin and his colleagues hoped to “Trump-proof” the nation, they failed in spectacular fashion.

However, that did not stop Jack Smith, who used his position as Special Counsel to seize the telephone records of Republican members of Congress while ordering carriers not to tell the members (some of whom were investigating Smith). We also learned recently that Smith collected information on over 600,000 Trump supporters and even tracked who bought MAGA hats.

Slotkin has been open about her desire to start a series of virtual show trials featuring Trump supporters to send a message to others. In a September 30 speech to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Slotkin compared the planned investigation to cleaning up Europe with what the Poles called “the Iron Broom”: “The goal here is to have a list of signature cases that go after some of the most obvious and harmful abuses of taxpayer dollars.“

To her audience’s delight, she dangled possible 20-year sentences for figures ranging from the former CIA officer named Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to even U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro.

This appears to be a case of those abused becoming abusive figures. I criticized the Trump Administration for its investigation of Slotkin and five other Democrat lawmakers over a 90-second video urging military members to refuse illegal orders. While President Trump called the video “seditious” and “punishable by death,” I viewed the video as clearly protected speech. In my book, The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage, I argue for the elimination of sedition as a crime.

Now, Slotkin has surrendered any high ground that she had after the grand jury declined to return an indictment in February. The problem, it seems, is that simply the wrong people or party were targeted in such investigations.

The interview is evidence of the devolution of our politics where leaders are now fueling an anger addiction and promising unblinking rage in government. With many of her colleagues, Slotkin has gone full Kurtz.

In the film Apocalypse Now, Colonel Walter Kurtz (played by Marlon Brando) explained the secret to his success in suppressing insurgents. The key was to act “without passion, without judgment, because it is judgment that defeats us.” In that way, he explained, he made “a friend of horror.”

As Kurtz said, “Horror [now] has a face” and it is seen in the gallery of our politics of rage.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the New York Times best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”