POLICE STATE (2023)

POLICE STATE is a documentary, co-written and co-directed by conservative author and filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza, showing how Democrat Party leaders, working with top bureaucrats in the FBI, CIA and Department of Justice, have used these police functions of the federal government to censor and even jail their political opponents, including average citizens who support their opponents or who become politically active in some way, even at the local level. POLICE STATE seems about 10 minutes too long, especially as the movie reaches its conclusion, but it uses eyewitness testimony from current and former government officials, and from citizens harassed by the FBI and the Department of Justice, to make a powerful case that Democrat Party leaders and self-serving federal bureaucrats are indeed trying to create a one-party police state, aided by the news media, Big Tech and wealthy donors.

The movie starts off with D’Souza showing historical clips from other one-party police states, including Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia and China’s Mao, the biggest mass murderer in human history. He uses the next 95 minutes of POLICE STATE to explore how the Democrat Party, under President Obama and President Biden and even under President Trump, used top officials at the FBI, the Department of Justice and sometimes even the CIA and the NSA (the National Security Administration) to target Trump, Trump’s family, Trump loyalists, Republicans, conservatives, pro-life Christian leaders, and parents who complain at local school board meetings about public school teachers and administrators indoctrinating their children with radical sociopolitical ideas about race and sex.

To make his case, D’Souza discusses with conservative author and radio host Dan Bongino, a former police officer and Secret Service agent, what Democrats and federal bureaucrats are doing. He also interviews whistleblowers in the FBI, investigative reporter Peter Schweizer, Republican Congressman Jim Jordan, former Trump official Kash Patel, Republican Senator Rand Paul, two people caught up in the court cases over the January 6, 2021 confrontations at the Capitol Building, a Catholic pro-life activist arrested by the FBI but acquitted, and two mothers targeted by the FBI after they started speaking out at school board meetings.

The movie includes dramatic re-enactments of FBI raids, led by a menacing FBI agent played by actor Nick Searcy. Also, political author and radio show host Dan Bongino, a former police officer and Secret Service agent, discusses the issue with D’Sousa several times in POLICE STATE. Bongino is also an executive producer on the movie.

POLICE STATE seems to run about 10 minutes too long. For example, the ending seems to drag out a bit as he discusses how the FBI targeted parents speaking out at school boards and pro-life activists like Mark Houck, a man who was acquitted of all charges. Also, the most heartbreaking interview D’Souza does is of an elderly man whom the FBI unjustly targeted for being outside the Capitol Building on Jan. 6, 2021. MOVIEGUIDE® thinks that interview might have made a better ending for the movie. Shame on the FBI for the way it treated this man! It’s thoroughly disgusting. Sadly, though, he’s just one of many victims of the federal government’s tyrannical overreach.

Ultimately, POLICE STATE does make a powerful case that Democrat Party leaders and self-interested federal bureaucrats are indeed trying to create a one-party police state. D’Souza shows that, in trying to create a one-party police state, Democrats are being aided by the news media, Big Tech and wealthy donors, among others. One could make a whole other movie exposing exactly how these particular actors support the creation of a one-party police state.

POLICE STATE has four light obscenities and profanities. It also shows some images from the murder of Jews by Nazi Germany in the 1940s. Finally, there are brief, light references to pornographic material in public schools, school libraries and school curriculum and to child sex trafficking through the southern border of the United States. This content warrants caution for older children.

Overall, POLICE STATE has a strong moral, conservative worldview. It stresses liberty and opposes big government, socialist and communist forms of tyranny involving a massive police state. Big government is a huge problem in today’s modern world. God warned the Hebrews about this in 1 Samuel 8:1-20. To sum up, in that passage, God warns the Jewish people that big government and high taxes will lead to tyranny, slavery and destruction.