(Article by David Krayden republished from HumanEvents.com)

A police state does not envelope a nation like a dark fog overnight. It takes years, sometimes decades for a country to transition from a functioning democracy to an authoritarian state where people live in constant fear of being arrested – by some arm of the government.

Yes, that transformation was rapid in Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. In the former dictatorship, Adolf Hitler used the Enabling Act to eradicate political opposition in the Reichstag. Once firmly in control of the levers of government, the SS and Gestapo gripped German society and the Nazis began to assiduously rework the regular police forces, ensuring that party members were in all positions of authority. The secret arrests and interrogations, followed by trips to the emerging concentration camps, were not far long away.

In the Soviet Union, Vladimir Lenin immediately unleashed the Cheka, the communist secret police, on the Russian people and Tsarist internment camps in Siberia became Gulags.

In short, a police state is not just about having too many police officers; this column should not be misconstrued in any way as an argument to defund the police so that social workers can intervene in Chicago’s gang wars. With crime escalating, America could probably use more police officers, not fewer.

What it needs less of are security forces which are focused not on real crime like murder, robbery and rape, but on the political opponents of the regime.

That is what defines a police state: security forces that are focused on the political control of the population. A police state is both a stark reality of guns in your face and a state of mind.

And it stands in diametric opposition to the Jeffersonian ideal of small government and limited bureaucratic control envisioned by the Founders.

America literally has dozens of security agencies hidden under the cloak of the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Most of these organizations operate like police or paramilitary units that are armed, have the power to arrest and can detain you or seize your assets.

They can come to your door in full combat gear, armed with assault rifles and wearing flak jackets. They can enter your premises, intimidate your family and drag away their suspect.

Do you remember when the FBI arrested Trump confidant Roger Stone in 2019? If you don’t you can see it here.

If you didn’t know who was the subject of this raid, you might surmise that it was an organized crime boss or a drug kingpin. How about a serial killer? Would you believe a Trump associate who was suspected of being involved with the Russia collusion hoax?

Stone was guilty of being too well-dressed and all those FBI agents in their dusty black suits must have really resented that.

The FBI became famous during the years of prohibition and gangsters. It used to pursue America’s enemies; now it harasses and arrests ordinary Americans for voicing opinions that the Biden administration doesn’t approve of.

FBI Director Christopher Wray is desperately focused on Hamas terrorists at the moment but he has spent most of President Joe Biden’s term of office pursuing Americans who Biden has assessed as being dangerous – and he doesn’t mean just those white supremacists who supposedly reside under every Trump-supporting bed.

Wray has been a contemptible top cop who has presided over the corruption and decrepitude of a police force that still likes to think it is the best in the world.

It has become adept at targeting the hobgoblins of President Joe Biden’s febrile administration and becoming a festering pocket of government overreach. The FBI has chosen to persecute former President Donald Trump, all MAGA supporters, anyone who walked into the White House on Jan. 6, 2021, pro-life activists and parents who attended school board meetings to protest academia’s gnawing obsession with Critical Race Theory.

And what about that January 6 “insurrection.” We know that FBI agents were on the scene that day in 2021 egging on the protesters, taking them by the hand and leading them up the steps of Capitol Hill to enter the building. Wray wouldn’t deny that agents were participating in the protest and were effectively leading the protest when he was questioned.

This is not the work of a police force but of a secret police constabulary.

The undercover video from Sound Investigations that depicts the awkward and embarrassing confessions of a former FBI employee and contracting CIA officer is another case in point. Gavin O'Blennis claimed that at least 20 FBI agents were among the J6 protesters. If there were 20, there were 200.

He also brags about how the FBI encouraged the Sandy Hook families to bring a lawsuit against Alex Jones for his comments about the mass shooting.

But what is also fascinating about these claims is the suggestion that there is a revolving door between the FBI and the CIA. We have known for decades that the CIA has not limited its work to foreign espionage. It has targeted Americans who were not spying but merely working against the popular government narrative of the day. It even conducted mind control and drug experiments on U.S. citizens.

But if the FBI and CIA have become political operatives, the United States has a host of other security agencies ready and willing to knock on your door, search your domicile, and cart you away for some offense.

There’s the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosive (ATF) that routinely operates as a paramilitary unit. The Drug Enforcement Administration can also be mistaken for a platoon of Marines when it suspects there might be contraband in your garage.

Does the government think you may have cheated on your taxes? The Internal Revenue Service can send a contingent of armed agents to bring you in.

DHS has a plethora of armed security and defacto police agencies at its disposal. The U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement are chief among these. Most conservatives supported the creation of DHS under former President George W. Bush because it was aimed at a terrorist threat that seemed both tangible and comprehensible at the time. But it created yet another layer of government bureaucracy that can be aimed at anyone defined as a dissident by the government of the day.

But while DHS is happy to monitor American citizens it leaves non-citizens alone.

Don’t you find it passing strange and oddly ironic that these people – who are specifically designed to counter the threat of illegal immigration – are not using their guns to keep terrorists, killers and other illegals out of America?

One of the first things the already failing Biden did on his inauguration day was to sign a series of executive orders that reversed much of Trump’s legacy – especially with regards to immigration. Biden opened the southern border on day one and since then more than 7.2 million illegal immigrants have entered the United States via the southern border.

So if you’re an illegal, don’t worry about the police presence or arrest, or deportation, or even mild harassment. You’ll get a free flight – First Class – to anywhere in America, free healthcare, housing and New York City even has a $10,000 credit card available. You might even get to join the armed forces because you showed such perseverance in traveling to the U.S.-Mexico border and illegally crossing it.

But if you’re an American citizen, keep your mouth shut or the FBI might be accusing you of domestic terrorism. You may discover you shouldn’t have claimed those expenses on your last income tax form. And you aren’t allowed to own that firearm. The government is going to have to seize it.

A police state isn’t about having too many police officers on the streets arresting criminals. It’s about having too many security agencies in your life threatening you and keeping your mouth shut.

That’s precisely what America has become in 2024.

Read more at: HumanEvents.com