Barely more than a week after the election, on Nov. 13, Politico announced, “The Trump resistance goes flaccid.” On Nov. 29, the same outlet announced, “The anti-Trump movement is in tatters.”
Leaders of anti-Trump organizations beg—rather, demand—to differ. But first, some facts. Not factoids. Not “alternate facts.”
There was no Trump “landslide.” There is no Trump “mandate.” AP statistics as of Dec. 4 show the popular vote count at 76.9 million Trump, 74.4 million Harris. This, pointed out by Michael A. Cohen on the MSNBC website, was a 1.9-point victory, “the fifth-smallest in the last 100 years.”
Said the New York Times, “The incoming president and his team are trying to cement the impression of a ‘resounding margin,’ as one aide called it, to make Mr. Trump seem more popular than he is and strengthen his hand in forcing through his agenda in the months to come.”
Post-election, those who worked hard for Harris and other Democrats were shocked and hugely disappointed. There was, and still is, a period called grieving. But nationally and locally, people still profoundly opposed to Trump and his policies are revitalizing. The Resistance will look different. It may not, suggested Indivisible East Bay leader Nancy Latham, even continue to use the term “resistance.” Indivisible East Bay is the local chapter of a national grassroots organization formed in 2017.
But, “flaccid” and “in tatters”? Said Latham, “[These journalists] apparently don’t have any direct sources that can tell them what activists are doing now. They could [have called] Swing Left, Public Citizen,” or multiple other organizations.
In emails to members, Indivisible co-founder Leah Greenberg wrote, “I can tell you that once again, across the country, people are organizing.” In the last couple of weeks, she reported, “More than 50,000 people joined our call launching our new Indivisible Guide with Senator Warren. Over 10,000 people have told us they want to join or start a local Indivisible group. We’ve driven 20,000 calls to Congress to stop the nonprofit killer bill. These are the kinds of numbers you see when something big is happening.”
Greenberg pointed out, “If we had given up in 2017, we would have lost the Affordable Care Act.” The federal level, she stressed, “is not the only place where power resides.” States, counties and cities can fight back. “Trump will overreach,” she said, “and we will be there.”
Indivisible has also created a tool kit, “Democrats Safeguarding Democracy: A Blueprint for Blue States to Prepare for Trump 2.0” that includes immediate actions such as “utilize economic leverage,” “implement sanctuary policies for out-of-state visitors” and “establish state-funded legal defense funds.”
During the New Indivisible Guide Zoom launch, Elizabeth Warren was the guest. She said, “I am sad. I have fear. But the consequence cannot be that we fold up.” She emphasized demanding action from the Democrats in power: confirm judges, allocate climate funds, “push Democrats to use every single minute.”
Warren and other allies in Congress are already calling Trump’s bluff—such as on his promise to “temporarily” cap credit card interest rates at 10%—which is dead in the water of the Big Banks swamp.
David Moye, writing on the Huffington Post site, noted, “[Sen. Bernie] Sanders said he and other progressives will work with Trump ‘to the degree that [he] is serious about pursuing policies that improve the lives of working families in this country.’” Moye then quoted Sanders directly as saying, “However, if Trump pursues racist, sexist, xenophobic and anti-environment policies, we will vigorously oppose him.”
Concluded Moye: “We predict Trump could be feeling the Bern.”
Latham echoed Greenberg’s as well as Warren’s remarks. Indivisible East Bay is experiencing a large influx of people joining; 280 people signed up for a recent Zoom meeting. IEB has created “action groups” for climate, immigration and health/bodily autonomy, and is urging members to call Sens. Padilla and Butler—both California Democrats—to oppose H.R. 9495, the “nonprofit killer” bill.
Latham noted that IEB is cooperating with a number of other local groups, including Bay Resistance. Jane Martin, BR’s organizing director, said, “We are better prepared this time.” BR is working to convene a network of grassroots organizations. “Some are ready to go, and some are rebuilding,” she said.
People are veering away from “clicktivism,” she said. “There will be more in-person organization.” Agreed Latham, “People want community.” And she added, “There will be a wider range of things for people to do in this non-electoral year, opening up roles for more people.”
Jacob Klein, chapter organizing director for the Sierra Club’s SF Bay Chapter, said the local club, aware of coming attempts to roll back environmental protections and faced with an emboldened fossil-fuel industry, will focus on water protections, sea-level rise planning, decarbonization and municipal strategies. Its lawyers will continue their assistance in fighting legal challenges.
“Clicktivism can be helpful,” Klein said. “But it can’t replace on-the-ground activism. People are craving human connection and engagement.”
Lesser-known organizations, such as the national Rural Urban Bridge Initiative, are also coming to the fore. They emphasize the importance of understanding how Trump and his allies have used the breakdown of community structures to their advantage.
In a Dec. 4 webinar, RUBI hosted Cal Berkeley professor emeritus of sociology Arlie Hochschild, who spent months in rural Kentucky, the whitest district in the country and the second poorest, researching her newest book, Stolen Pride.
“Coal has gone out, opiates have come in,” she said. The working men who once prided themselves on their independence and ability to take care of themselves and their families now feel deep shame. “They see elite Democrats asking them, ‘What’s wrong with you that you’re stuck at the bottom?’”
Trump, said Hochschild, has been able to capitalize on and exploit this shame, “exploitation of the shame that results from loss.” The community that these men used to have at work is now only available to them in political discourse. She explained what she sees as a Trumpian “four-part ritual.”
First, Trump says something transgressive, even openly false, such as “They’re eating the pets.” Then, the media punditry shames him. Now, he is the “victim” of “shamers.” Finally, Hochschild said, “Trump initiates the roar back, turning shame to blame”—blame of those who called him out.
This, she says, is how he manipulates the emotions of those who also see themselves being blamed for their economic and infrastructure losses.
RUBI has made its main goal in creating a communication bridge, designed to understand this process and develop ways to change the feedback loop, demonstrating that Trump and his allies are not the ones pushing for policies that will improve the lives and futures of communities like Kentucky District Number Five.
On Slate, Christina Cauterucci pushed back on the “flaccid” narrative: “…[for] hundreds of thousands of Americans who got resistance-brained the last time around, the learning curve in 2025 will be a lot less steep. Progressive organizations are light-years further along in their plans for a Trump administration than they were in 2016, and people who were active during Trump 1.0 have years of activist muscle memory to draw upon.”
Jazz poet and activist Gil Scott-Heron summed up the challenge more than 50 years ago when he said:
“You will not be able to stay home, brother
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out
… because
The revolution will not be televised.”
This article should have included links to each of the organizations mentioned. Perhaps readers might have wished to contact the groups, or be notified of their future online and local events.
Good idea, thank you! We’ll add them now.
Might I just add that if Trump is serious about helping the working class–and indeed if the Democrats are serious about winning them back–then the elephant in the room is the need to cut the military budget. We spend more on our military than the next nine countries combined. Some $916 billion a year on defense spending. Which means that there’s no money left for education and training. Those coal miners in Appalachia that professor Hochschild is talking about needed vocational training in other growth industries like healthcare and technology. Countries like Norway (who don’t spend all their tax dollars on defense) provide free college education to their citizens. Schools and teachers are not based on local property tax revenue but come from the national budget. So many disaffected voters could use affordable health care, affordable childcare, skills training, and yes, affordable or even free higher education. We could do that if we had even half of the military budget to invest in our people–from the cradle to college. Our country would not be one of the most unequal places in the world (and inequality has only gotten worse over the years, under Dems or Republicans–as the rich get richer).
All this to say that I’m with Bernie and Barbara Lee in calling for a radical change in our country and national policy–drastically reduce military spending and instead invest our tax dollars in education (pre-school, primary school, high school, college) and workforce development. Then maybe the Democrats might actually win a landslide election because disaffected voters would see we’re serious about reducing inequality and ensuring that everyone has the right and a pathway to the American Dream. We would walk our talk.