At one point, Miller told the assembled local police officers, “I see the guns and badges in this room. You are unleashed. The handcuffs you’re carrying, they’re not on you anymore, they’re on the criminals. And whatever you need to get it done, we’re gonna get it done.”

The 40-year-old stated that they had deployed over 13 government agencies, including the FBI, DEA, ATF, ICE, and the Department of Defense, which Hegseth has since rebranded as the “Department of War.”

“The gangbangers that you deal with, they think that they’re ruthless, they have no idea how ruthless we are,” Miller added.

“They think they’re tough, they have no idea how tough we are. They think that they’re hardcore, we are so much more hardcore than they are, and we have the entire weight of the United States government behind us. What do they have? They have nothing behind them. So we are gonna win, they’re gonna lose.”

At the Wednesday appearance, Hegseth thanked the assembled Memphis law officers for working in dangerous places “where politicians spend a lot of time second guessing… the impossible decisions that you have to make that they will never understand.”

Hegseth, Bondi and Miller spent around an hour in the Shelby County Office of Preparedness and left via the rear entrance, according to WREG TV.

Bondi said on X that 53 arrests had been made and 20 illegal firearms seized in the first two days of the Memphis Safe Task Force.

  • giantripdrop@piefed.social
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    17 hours ago

    No, this dude was not a bully. He’s a sociopath (maybe psychopath) who has had always had the means to overcome his antisocial disorder.

    You can see it in his responses, he feigns emotion. He acts in a way that he believes others perceive as confidence or authority but it just “feels” wrong as the other. Dead facial expressions followed by forced pauses for fake introspection which extremely animated facial expressions, then right back to dead face.

    • SuperEars@lemmy.world
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      12 hours ago

      I concur. I think it is telling that he didn’t choose to just stonewall the reporter with “No further comment.” He has a malevolent drive to push that narrative