Where is the resistance headed? And how does it get there?

A protest outside the Indiana State House on March 4. (@whodat35.bsky.social‬)

The resistance is growing. We’ve seen it in the last several weeks in the anger aimed at members of Congress during their recess, in the ongoing Tesla protests, and in a membership surge at resistance organizations.

More and larger protests are surely coming in the near future, along with civil disobedience and boycotts. Civil society and state attorneys general will keep suing to prevent Trump from breaking the law and violating the constitution.

But looking further ahead, there are two questions we have to ask ourselves:

1. When is it time to go all-out?

2. What does “going all-out” mean?

ACLU executive director Anthony Romero says one obvious trigger would be if Trump defies a Supreme Court order.

“The crisis moment comes when the Supreme Court rules and says, ‘The Trump Administration has flagrantly disregarded a clear judicial order, and thou must comply.’ And if they don’t comply, then we’re in a different moment,” Romero told the New Yorker recently.

“Then we’ve got to take to the streets in a different way. We’ve got to shut down this country.”

But how does that work exactly? Even Romero doesn’t know.

“We’re just beginning to think it through,” Romero said. “We’re talking with colleagues and other organizations. There’s got to be a moment when people of good will will just say, ‘This is way too far.’”

Does “shutting down the country” mean massive protest rallies? Does it mean massive civil disobedience? Does it mean a general strike? How do we get from here to there?

And what else besides defiance of the Supreme Court could be a catalyst for transformative action? I can think of several other conceivable occurrences that might qualify as going “too far”:

• Trump Invoking the Insurrection Act to deploy the military for civilian law enforcement

• Ordering the military to attack civilians

• Prosecuting a political foe for plainly specious reasons

• Shutting down a media outlet

• Launching massive immigration raids that sweep up law-abiding people

• A federal abortion ban

• Inflation rising precipitously

• The economy crashing

• Brutal, widely felt cuts to Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid.

Any of these things could happen quickly. What happens then?

One man already working to build a mass movement is Democratic Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Here’s what he told CNN recently:

At the end of the day, the struggle against Trump -- the struggle against oligarchy, which is led by Elon Musk, the struggle against authoritarianism, the fight to make sure that the working class of this country gets a fair shake -- that is not going to be won here on Capitol Hill.

It's going to be won by millions of people, all over this country, standing up and saying, “You know what? We fought and died for democracy. We're not going to move toward authoritarianism. We fought to create a country that works for all, not just the billionaire class.”

That's the struggle. And I'm going to be active, in trying to rally the American people to do just that.

Where do we go from here? I’d love to hear your thoughts, either in comments or at froomkin@gmail.com. I’ll be looking for answers in the coming weeks and months, just like you.

Heroes of the Resistance

Nicholas Enrich, the acting assistant administrator for global health at USAID, shared some dramatic internal memos with journalists at the New York Times and ProPublica. The memos estimated the casualties from the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw foreign aid and dismantle USAID. Among those estimates:

• up to 18 million additional cases of malaria per year, and as many as 166,000 additional deaths;

• 200,000 children paralyzed with polio annually, and hundreds of millions of infections;

• one million children not treated for severe acute malnutrition, which is often fatal, each year;

• more than 28,000 new cases of such infectious diseases as Ebola and Marburg every year.

Enrich was placed on administrative shortly thereafter.

James E. Dennehy, the top agent at the FBI’s New York field office, was forced out of his job because he angered Trump administration officials by supporting bureau leaders who refused to turn over the names of those who investigated the 1/6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Lucy Welch, the “snow reporter” at Sugarbush, one of Vermont’s big downhill mountains, used her pulpit to rail against Vice President JD Vance, who was coming to visit. As Bill McKibben reported, Welch used her snow hotline to tell callers that “Our special guest, in my humble opinion, does not reflect the values and the magic of this place, especially given the fact that he'll be skiing on National Forest Land which his administration is actively trying to dismantle among other things.” As McKibben wrote: “if a 25-year-old can risk her job to—quite politely—speak truth to power, the rest of us can figure out some things to do as well.”

More Town Halls, Only Different

The Republican response to the backlash against Trump and Musk at town halls during the congressional recess is to not hold town halls anymore, at least not in person.

The Democratic response is to hold more of them.

Democratic attorneys general from Oregon, Arizona and New Mexico have announced they’ll be holding “Community Impact Hearings” in order to “hear from the public about the impact of federal firings and DOGE funding freezes across the country.” The first hearing is tonight in Phoenix.

Princeton historian Kevin Kruse posted on Bluesky:

Every single Democratic governor and attorney general needs to do this -- if only to make it clear to voters *right now* that the firings and funding freezes that are about to hurt their states badly are the work of Trump-Musk in Washington. Get ahead of this now, or get blamed for it later.

And is your congressional representative refusing to hold town halls? Former Democratic vice presidential nominee and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is offering to come to your district and meet with residents instead.

Being Pro Ukraine = Being Anti Trump/Vance

The vice president’s ski trip to Vermont began just hours after he and Trump shouted at Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office and expressed support for Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Vance was not greeted warmly by Vermonters.

Demonstrators gathered along nearby roads and on the slopes holding signs saying things like “Vance is a traitor go ski in Russia.” TMZ captured video of one skier yelling “JD, how’s it feel to be Putin’s puppet?”

Hundreds of people also gathered in New York, Washington, D.C., Beverly Hills, Chicago, and Boston on Saturday to express their support for Ukraine.

Tesla Protests Continue

As the Associated Press reported, demonstrators continued to gather outside Tesla stores across the U.S. over the weekend to protest Elon Musk and his slashing of the government.

“Saturday’s demonstration in Boston had a festive atmosphere, with a brass band playing music as protesters carried signs and chanted,” the AP reported.

There was a big turnout in Tucson.

Nine people were arrested during a raucous protest outside and inside a New York City Tesla dealership on Saturday, according to Reuters. Here’s some video.

In her newsletter, communications strategist Melissa Ryan offered up some ways to “Make Tesla Toxic”. They include:

• If you own Tesla stock, dump it

• If you have a pension through your union, demand that your trustees dump any investment in Tesla

• Call your city, county, state, and federal elected officials and demand they cut off any contracts with or subsidies for Elon Musk’s business empire—not just Tesla, but the billions he gets in subsidies and contracts for his data centers, solar farms, and rocket ships

Legal Challenges Keep Mounting

Just Security is now tracking 96 lawsuits challenging Trump administration actions. Among the past week’s highlights:

• Judge William Alsup of the Northern District of California ruled that the Office of Personnel and Management (OPM) had no authority to fire probationary workers at other agencies and that those firings were illegal. OPM rescinded a key memo, but the effect on fired probationary employees remains unclear. Alsup called probationary employees the “life blood of agencies.”

• Washington D.C. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson on Saturday ordered Trump administration officials to recognize Hampton Dellinger as the head of the Office of Special Counsel, a key whistleblower agency. Trump had tried to fire him. (Dellinger, for his part, has been trying to overturn the firings of probationary employees.)

• Washington D.C. District Court Judge Rudolph Contreras granted a permanent injunction restoring Cathy Harris as chair of the Merit Systems Protection Board after Trump tried to fire her, too. The board’s primary function is to protect federal employment practices from partisan politics by allowing employees to appeal adverse actions.

• Two legal cases are making the argument that Elon Musk’s power cannot be squared with the Constitution’s Appointments Clause. University of Pennsylvania law professor Kate Shaw explains here.

• On Wednesday morning, the Supreme Court rejected Trump’s emergency request to overrule a lower court judge’ order that he must unfreeze nearly $2 billion in foreign aid.

And speaking of lawyers, William R. Bay, president of the American Bar Association, continues to make bold statements against the Trump regime. His latest condemns the targeting of judges and lawyers the administration doesn’t like. He writes:

We can choose to remain silent and allow these acts to continue or we can stand for the rule of law and the values we hold dear. We call upon the entire profession, including lawyers who serve in elected positions, to speak out against intimidation. We acknowledge that there are risks to standing up and addressing these important issues. But if the ABA and lawyers do not speak, who will speak for the organized bar? Who will speak for the judiciary? Who will protect our system of justice? If we don’t speak now, when will we speak?

Economic Brownout

The social-media inspired, pro-DEI “economic blackout” on Feb. 28, during which participants were urged not to buy anything for one day, had some impact, USA Today reported – although one of the chief targets, Amazon, appeared unaffected.

Similarweb, a digital marketing intelligence company, analyzed traffic at the top 100 e-commerce sites and found that overall traffic was down 6% compared to a year ago and 4% compared to the Friday before.

"There was a slight impact" year over year," Similarweb principal data-driven equity analyst Aria Ertefaie told USA Today. "I wouldn't necessarily call it a huge impact since negative 6% is not unheard of, but it is still a weakness."

More boycotts are planned. Stay tuned.

What’s Next?

Benjamin Wittes is no screaming liberal. He’s the editor of Lawfare and a creature of the national security establishment. So imagine my surprise when I ran across his piece over the weekend advocating for immediate “non-violent non-cooperation” with the Trump agenda.

What does that look like? Here are four of his seven bullet points:

• Large numbers of people driving very slowly to work in a coordinated fashion. Very slowly. At, say, the minimum lawful speed.

• Trans activists releasing thousands of crickets at a conference in London; I know of no law against the release of crickets in this country, though I’m obviously not giving anyone legal advice.

• Die-ins in strategic locations at strategic moments.

• Unscheduled marches in locations where marches may cause inconvenience and can be lawful depending on precisely where and how one conducts them.

Truths to Remember

In a New York Times opinion column, author Margaret Renkl (gift link) shares “a running list of truths I don’t want to lose sight of while a fake wizard and his grossly unqualified team speak lie after brazen lie to the people who elected him and to the rest of us, too.” Among them:

• Vaccines save lives.

• Climate change is making natural disasters more disastrous.

• DOGE isn’t making government more efficient.

• Russia invaded Ukraine.

Democrats and Their Guests

Some Democrats chose to boycott Trump’s boastful and fact-challenged joint address to Congress on Tuesday night. Others waved signs. One dared speak up and got ejected. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) held a virtual town hall instead of attending.

And quite a few made their views known through their invited guests, including fired federal workers and Medicaid recipients. For instance:

• Rep. Joe Courtney (D-Conn.) invited Gabriel D’Alatri. “I’m a proud Marine veteran, father, husband, and former IRS federal worker. My job helped everyday Americans access essential services and allowed me to support my wife and six-month-old daughter,” D’Alatri said in a statement. “My wife and I had plans to buy a new house. We just had a new baby. To be fired puts extreme pressure on our family. All I want is to return to work and do my job.”

• Sen Mark Warner (D-Va.) brought Ashly Ranalli, a park ranger and cancer survivor who lost her job and her health insurance because of Trump and Musk.

• Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) brought Cheri Bryer, who was able to access residential addiction treatment, enter recovery and return to work through Medicaid.

• Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) brought Dominic Rampa, a teenager who relies on Medicaid to cover treatments for a number of health conditions associated with nine genetic disorders.

Laugh or Cry

MSNBC newsletter editor Ryan Teague Beckwith has published an amusing post about how “resistance to the second Trump administration appears to be leaning more heavily on humor than it did in his first term.”

Most notably, if you missed it: An AI-generated video of Trump kissing Musk's bare feet, titled "Long live the real king," appeared for several minutes on internal monitors at the Housing and Urban Development Department headquarters on Feb. 24.

Advice from Elissa Slotkin

In the Democratic response to Trump’s joint address to Congress, Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan offered three pieces of advice for people who feel democracy is worth saving but don’t know that they can do about it:

First, don’t tune out. It’s easy to be exhausted, but America needs you now more than ever. If previous generations had not fought for democracy, where would we be today?

Second, hold your elected officials, including me, accountable. Watch how they’re voting. Go to town halls and demand they take action. That’s as American as apple pie.

Three, organize. Pick just one issue you’re passionate about — and engage. And doom scrolling doesn’t count. Join a group that cares about your issue, and act. And if you can’t find one, start one.