The Cruelest Month
T.S. Eliot famously called April the cruelest month. He clearly never lived through January 2026.
President Donald Trump started the year desperate to shake off the “lame duck” curse. His answer was simple. He went further than ever to implement what aide Stephen Miller calls the “iron laws of the world.” Strength. Force. Power.
And for a moment, it worked.
The Gangster Move
There is no denying the sheer force of America’s hard power. Just ask Nicolás Maduro.
In a daring special forces raid on January 3, the Venezuelan dictator was plucked from his “gangster paradise” and thrown into a New York jail cell. Secretary of State Marco Rubio took a victory lap. Critics were stunned. It was a move that defied the naysayers and signaled a new era of American dominance in the Western Hemisphere.
But while the President flexed his muscles abroad, his grip began to slip at home.
Horror in the Streets
The cost of this new “iron law” became visible on the snowy streets of Minneapolis.
First, it was Renee Good. The Minnesota mom was shot dead in her car after a confrontation with federal agents. Less than three weeks later, ICU nurse Alex Pretti died in a hail of bullets while trying to protect a woman from a Border Patrol agent.
Two Americans. Dead.
The administration tried to label them as domestic terrorists. But the cellphone videos told a different story. To the President’s opponents, Good and Pretti became instant martyrs of the new “ICE age.”
Then came the image that broke the nation’s heart. Five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, wearing a Spider-Man backpack, detained with his father in a suburb. He is now sitting in a Texas facility, reportedly depressed and confused by forces he cannot understand.
The Pivot
The backlash was instant. Even Fox News polls showed Republicans turning against the aggressive tactics.
Enter Tom Homan. The President’s border czar usually brings the heat, but this time his mission is to cool things down. Dressed in a suit rather than a tactical trench coat, Homan suggested the White House is ready to de-escalate.
“We are not surrendering the president’s mission on immigration enforcement,” Homan warned. But he promised a drawdown of federal forces if local authorities cooperate.
A Global Rebellion
While Homan managed the crisis in Minnesota, the President’s foreign policy hit a wall in Europe.
Trump demanded that Denmark hand over Greenland. He refused to rule out military force. He even suggested he deserved the island as a consolation prize for missing out on the Nobel Peace Prize.
“We want a piece of ice for world protection, and they won’t give it,” Trump told a stunned crowd.
Europe didn’t blink. Leaders stood firm. Markets panicked. And a new vision for the world began to emerge from the chaos.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney summed it up best.
“The middle powers must act together,” Carney said. “Because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.”
The Law of the Jungle
Back in Washington, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey took direct aim at the administration’s philosophy.
“Stephen Miller has pushed for this concept, calling it the iron law of the world that might makes right. Stephen Miller is wrong,” Frey declared. “Time and again, America has rejected the law of the jungle.”
January is over. But the battle between raw power and the limits of the law is just beginning.