America, I’ve spent my adult life fighting threats foreign and domestic, including understanding and acting against insurgents. I flew combat missions over hostile territory, commanded warriors in harm’s way, and took an oath to defend the Constitution against all enemies. Today I’m raising the alarm because the state of Minnesota is in the grip of a deliberate, sustained insurgency orchestrated by radical leftist networks and enabled by politicians like Governor Tim Walz and the political machine built by Barack Obama.

What we are witnessing is not random crime or isolated unrest. It is a classic insurgency: decentralized cells, ideological motivation, sustained low-intensity violence, and political warfare designed to erode legitimate authority, exhaust law enforcement, and create ungoverned spaces that advance a revolutionary agenda. The operational strategy is insurgency, but the effect is insurrection—organized resistance that prevents the execution of the laws of the United States and the state of Minnesota.

Remember 2020. Minneapolis burned for days while Governor Walz hesitated to deploy the National Guard, allowing rioters to overrun and torch the Third Precinct. That was not spontaneous outrage. It was the opening phase of a long-war strategy: probe defenses, identify weaknesses, fund agitators, and normalize violence as political expression. The same networks—many bankrolled by George Soros-linked organizations and other far-left donors—have kept the pressure on ever since.

Today, in 2026, the Twin Cities remain a combat zone for law-abiding citizens. Carjackings at gunpoint, flash-mob retail theft, gang shootings, and roving youth mobs terrorize downtown streets. Police are outnumbered, outgunned in the court of public opinion, and shackled by restrictive policies imposed by the state’s radical progressive leadership. Soft-on-crime prosecutors, elected with massive out-of-state dark money, systematically refuse to charge or incarcerate repeat violent offenders. The message to criminals is clear: act with impunity.

This is insurgency doctrine in action. Create chaos. Overwhelm the system. Force concessions. Demonize anyone who defends order. When police are vilified and defunded, when laws go unenforced, when citizens are abandoned to predators, legitimate government ceases to function in whole sections of the state. That is the textbook definition of successful insurgent strategy.

And the political enablers are unmistakable. Barack Obama’s political apparatus never disbanded. His fundraising networks, his community-organizing playbook, and his ideological protégés remain active. Obama personally campaigned for Walz, praised his “bold progressive leadership,” and helped solidify the Minnesota DFL machine that now prioritizes ideology over public safety. Walz signed bills that handcuffed police, eroded qualified immunity, and imposed “reimagined” policing that prioritizes perpetrator rights over victim protection. When violence flares, the left’s response is always the same: excuse it, contextualize it, or celebrate it as “resistance.”

Mr. President—President Trump—you were given a historic mandate to restore law and order. The American people trusted you to protect them when state leaders fail or refuse to act. Minnesota’s government is either unwilling or ideologically incapable of defeating this insurgency. The result is de facto insurrection: concerted, violent opposition to lawful authority that obstructs the execution of state and federal law.

You have the constitutional authority under the Insurrection Act of 1807 to intervene decisively. This is not about martial law or military dictatorship. It is about federalizing the National Guard—or, if necessary, deploying active-duty forces—to support overwhelmed local law enforcement, arrest violent offenders, clear the streets, and restore the basic conditions of civilized society.

I have worn the uniform. I know the gravity of putting American troops on American streets. But I also know the greater danger: allowing one state to become a permanent insurgent safe haven. If Minnesota is permitted to remain a laboratory for leftist lawlessness, the strategy will be replicated nationwide. Portland, Seattle, Chicago, and other cities have already tasted this poison. Do not let it metastasize further.

The citizens of Minnesota who still believe in America—working families, veterans, small business owners, parishioners—are begging for relief. They cannot walk their neighborhoods safely. They cannot rely on their elected leaders to defend them. They voted for you, Mr. President, because they knew you would not abandon them to ideological cowardice and revolutionary violence.

You stood against the deep state, the corrupt media, and the radical left when few others would. Now stand with the forgotten men and women of Minnesota. Invoke the Insurrection Act. Crush this insurgency before it achieves its ultimate objective: the overthrow of ordered liberty in the heartland.

America is watching. The Constitution you swore to preserve is under direct assault. Act now, Mr. President. The Republic is counting on you.

Col. Rob Maness (Ret.) is a combat veteran, former U.S. Senate candidate, and host of The Rob Maness Show.