Actions and Reactions

The Trump administration seeks to undo the last eight years of progress by wrecking the economy and environment, and throwing millions off health insurance, to favor the interests of the rich. They also threaten to impose their own Christian religious principles by ending marriage equality and banning abortion.

Our President communicates mostly by spewing crass insults about Muslims, Mexicans, women, and reporters. His election has empowered bigots and haters who now openly credit Trump with their new freedom to vent their hate in word and deed.

The real threat to our democracy, though, is the rise of a new American fascism. There is evidence in a Trump divorce proceeding that he studied the speeches of Hitler. His own speeches strike similar notes about the frightening state of the world, the need to blame somebody for that, and that he is the only person who can save America from the looming disaster.

His authoritarian administration rails against any checks on its power. Even though a free press is essential to a democracy, he labels the press as the opposition, and any negative reporting as fake news. The judiciary should not presume to identify any of his actions as unconstitutional. When the Deputy Attorney General concluded that his Muslim Ban was indefensible in court, he saw it as personal betrayal and fired her.

My hope is that the resistance movement, the courts, the rule of law, and simple human decency will protect us.

Resistance groups are blossoming in America like wildflowers after rain. The organizations that have long supported civil rights and the environment are experiencing surges in donations and activism: the American Civil Liberties Union, Planned Parenthood, the Southern Poverty Law Center, Move On, and so on.

The new kid on the block is Indivisible. In the Indivisible Guide, former Congressional staffers explain how to resist the Trump agenda by influencing their own Members of Congress (MoC). The authors first posted the guide online around the time of the Inauguration. As of this writing, people who downloaded the guide (many of whom were never politically active before) have formed some 7,000 Indivisible groups all over the country, with at least two groups in each Congressional district. Members of these groups and other similar organizations bombard their MoCs with phone calls, emails, personal visits with their staff, and demonstrations outside their offices. During recesses, they demand and attend town halls (with or without their MoCs) to express their resistance to the Trump agenda.

And the resistance is working. The administration and Congress have been delayed, enjoined, or forced to backtrack on efforts against Congressional ethics oversight, immigrants and refugees, and the Affordable Care Act. The Senate has taken historically close votes on Cabinet nominees, and the Cabinet and other administration posts are being filled at historically slow rates.

It remains to be seen whether this administration will be undone by Russian interference in the presidential election, the many ties between Russian institutions and the Trump family and associates, and the massive profits the Trump Organization is reaping from the campaign and presidency. In the meantime, the majority of Americans who did not vote for the Republican President will continue to make our voices heard to protect the democratic freedoms that so many have fought and died to bring to this country that we love.