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More than 50 Organizations Launch United Resistance Campaign as Trump's Cabinet Hearings Begin
 Groups pledge to work across issues as Trump takes office
More than 50 progressive organizations sent a strong message of united resistance to the Trump administration on the same day his cabinet hearings begin on Capitol Hill. In a video and public pledge, movement leaders including NAACP President Cornell Brooks, Greenpeace USA Executive Director Annie Leonard, and SEIU International President Mary Kay Henry pledged to defend everything they say that Trump most urgently threatens including civil rights, immigrants, women's reproductive rights, social equality, action on climate change, public health and safety, public dissent, and access to information.
https://www.unstoppabletogether.org/
As part of the United Resistance campaign, groups pledge to work together across issues, unify respective networks, and function in a multilateral fashion that provides a better future for America than Trump is offering. The campaign is launching the same week as the involved organizations are leading various initiatives to block Trump's cabinet appointees including Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson and Attorney General nominee Jeff Sessions.
More than 50 organizations have signed onto the pledge and several are featured in the video.
Advancement Project (National)
Asian Pacific Environmental Network
Brave New Films
Center for Biological Diversity
Climate Justice Alliance
Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA)
Color Of Change
Common Cause
Communications Workers of America (CWA)
Daily Kos
Democracy Initiative
Demos
Ella Baker Center for Human Rights
Every Voice
Food & Water Action Fund
Forward Together
Free Press
Friends of the Earth
Grassroots Global Justice Alliance
Green For All
Greenpeace, Inc
Indigenous Environmental Network
Jewish Voice for Peace
Jobs With Justice
Labor Network for Sustainability
MoveOn.org
NAACP
NARAL
National Domestic Workers Alliance
National LGBTQ Task Force Action Fund
National Network for Arab American Communities
Oakland Institute
Oil Change International
OneAmerica
One Billion Rising
Our Revolution
People's Action
People For the American Way
Planned Parenthood Action Fund
Public Citizen
Rainforest Action Network
Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) United
RootsAction.org
Sierra Club
The Story of Stuff Project
United We Dream
Working Families Party
World Beyond War
V-Day
350.org
https://www.unstoppabletogether.org/
Quotes From Participating Organizations:
"Trump is not on the side of the American people. After promises of "draining the swamp, his cabinet is now full of more billionaire lobbyists and executives than any administration in history. This President will never know what it feels like to worry about the water his family is drinking, to wonder if his house will survive the next superstorm, or if his child will face hateful bullying at school. It is up to each one of us to protect each other, to fight for each other, and to resist the ways in which Donald Trump threatens America," said Greenpeace USA Executive Director Annie Leonard.
"The American people elected Hillary Clinton president by a nearly three-million vote margin. The 48 Democrats in the new Senate received over 78 million votes combined, compared to the 55 million earned by the 52 Republicans. The American people have clearly rejected the GOP's values of hate, intolerance, greed and bigotry, and we are proud to stand with the American majority in fighting for inclusion, tolerance, compassion and hope."
- Markos Moulitsas, Founder and Publisher of Daily Kos
"Our movement to advance the fundamental values of justice and democracy, for the empowerment of immigrant and refugee communities, for Muslims and other religious minorities in the United States is ready to protect our families, to assert our presence, and to challenge our nation to live up to its values as a nation built by immigration. I'm heartened by the energy to resist in our own communities, and by the broad coalition of movements coming together to stand and defend each other, whatever the Trump Administration throws at us. At stake is a vision for our nation and world grounded in racial and social justice, committed to improving the lives of every American, and realizing a healthy and diverse future where everyone can thrive. We stand with our sisters and brothers in the intersections of racial, economic and climate justice."
- Rich Stolz | Executive Director | OneAmerica
"Solidarity forever must include solidarity now -- intensive, sustained and determined to defend past gains as well as make future ones possible. Everything that we hold dear is at stake." -Norman Solomon, Coordinator, RootsAction.org
"Green For All stands against Trump's effort to auction off our air, water, and climate to the highest bidder. We resist efforts to prioritize profit over human life and stand with frontline communities, those in small towns and urban areas who face the brunt of pollution, to fight for climate solutions that put them first. We will fight alongside the underdogs, those most ignored, to ensure that their voices are heard because we all deserve clean air, clean water and a healthy environment to raise our kids."
-Vien Truong, Director of Green For All
"The corporate cartel that works to wage wars, pollute the planet, concentrate the wealth, and restrict the rights of dissenters finds a way to all work together. Those of us seeking a better world -- a sustainable world at all -- must work together to resist the path the U.S. government is on and to project and push forward a better one. Our collective numbers give us power, and our interlocking issues give us a persuasive alternative. Shifting military spending to human and environmental needs makes a world beyond our dreams perfectly achievable."
- David Swanson, Director of World Beyond War
"The Sierra Club's mission is to protect both the natural and the human environment. That is why we stand in solidarity with organizations fighting for a fair and safe America that protects everyone. We stand with workers and working families, for women's rights and LGBTQ rights, with people of all faiths and backgrounds, for public health and economic fairness, and on the side of racial justice and immigrant families. To change everything it takes everyone, and that's exactly why we're going to stand up together over the next four years and fight to protect the people and places that we love.
- Michael Brune, Sierra Club Executive Director
"Democracy is strengthened by welcoming people of all backgrounds and views in building a country that recognizes the self-worth of every individual and every voice," said David Donnelly, President and CEO of Every Voice. "Unfortunately, Donald Trump has repeatedly shown that he has no interest in doing what's necessary to expand and protect our democracy--and in fact, in policy and words, he has done the opposite. We are committed to fighting everyday, united with allied organizations and millions of Americans, for a political system that works for all of us and we fill fiercely defend the rights of our fellow citizens to be heard, respected, and counted."
"Trump's presidency represents an existential threat to an open internet and an adversarial press," said Free Press CEO and President Craig Aaron. "Based on its appointments and actions so far, the Trump administration appears committed to undermining everyone's rights to connect and communicate. We're dedicated to fighting Trump's agenda on media and technology while supporting the resistance efforts of groups doing important work elsewhere. Trump has named numerous people to his administration and transition team with long histories of support for dangerous and often racist policies and actions. Many others have openly campaigned to gut essential public safeguards in every area from worker safety to the environment to telecommunications. All must be resisted from day one."
"The Trump administration promises to roll back our environmental laws, gut civil rights protections, and enrich the pockets of Wall Street at the expense of everyone else," says Wenonah Hauter, Executive Director of Food & Water Action Fund. "We can't let this happen--and together, we can resist the worst effects of his presidency. We'll keep the pressure on our elected officials to represent the majority of Americans that want safe food, clean water, a stable climate, and a democracy that works for all of us."
"As the chief law enforcement officer, the attorney generally has far-reaching decision making power over issues that impact every person in the U.S." said Kalpana Krishnamurthy, Policy Director at Forward Together, a national advocacy organization. "If appointed, he will be the final decision maker on if the FBI can profile Muslim members of our community, whether or not to sanction stop and frisk policies, oversight of our prisons, the Department of Justice and drug enforcement. He has a track record of disregarding civil rights, denying racism, and promoting a radical agenda that would undo many of the laws that have given voice to communities of color historically shut out of our democracy. His values don't reflect an America where all people can thrive and we are united in opposition to his nomination."
"The blueprint for failure is division and ambivalence in the wake of a united conservative agenda that is intentionally undermining our democracy and threatening our communities," said Judith Browne Dianis, Executive Director of Advancement Project's national office. "Our power to resist and reclaim our democracy is rooted in our shared commitment to dismantling interwoven systems of oppression. We are putting the new administration on notice: every day of the next four years, be prepared to confront powerful organized communities who refuse to be silenced."
"At Rainforest Action Network, we stand for people and planet. But today, we need to stand firmly in opposition to a systemic assault on our values from the incoming administration. We are pledging to oppose those who would deny science and deny climate change. We are pledging to oppose those who would gut environmental protections in the name of corporate profits. We are pledging to stand for civil rights, to stand for human and labor rights, and to stand with those directly impacted by global forest destruction and climate change." - Lindsey Allen, Executive Director, Rainforest Action Network
"We have witnessed one of the most contentious and emotional political races in our country's history. What we have learned is that, now, more than ever, we need to come together to uphold our shared values of freedom and equality for all. Arab and Muslim Americans have long dealt with xenophobia, Islamophobia, racism and bigotry. Throughout the presidential election, we were faced with many unprecedented obstacles, and yet we persevered and remained committed to improving and empowering our communities. We know we must maintain our spirit of advocacy and become stronger leaders for a more hopeful future." - Nadia El-Zein Tonova, Director of the National Network for Arab American Communities (NNAAC)
"America is great when it becomes more inclusive, more democratic and more just. The Trump administration threatens these values, and democracy itself. Against this threat, We the People will protect our democracy and the values we most cherish by exercising our democratic rights. We will stand together to reject efforts to denigrate, injure or exclude Muslim Americans, immigrants or any other targeted community. We will reject Trumpism and assert the central importance of love and solidarity, kindness and decency to who we are a country and a people." - Robert Weissman, President of Public Citizen
Dan Cantor, National Director, Working Families Party: "Donald Trump is a dangerous narcissist. We need to block his agenda of greed and division, and and we need to stand together to do it. That's the only hope for building a nation that works for all of us."
"Trump's presidency threatens immigrants, African Americans, Muslims, workers, women, children, the elderly, the disabled, LGBTQ people, and many others. Indeed, it threatens all that holds us together as a society. We the people - society -- need to defend ourselves against this threat and bring it to an end. Resisters to repressive regimes elsewhere have called such resistance to tyranny "Social Self-Defense." The struggle to protect our people and planet against the Trump agenda requires such a strategy. Therefore we are proud to join the United Resistance Campaign as a form of Social Self Defense." -Michael Leon Guerrero, Labor Network for Sustainability
"If Trump thinks this wave of opposition and resistance will burn out quickly and die, he's dead wrong," said Kieran Suckling, Executive Director of the Center for Biological Diversity. "We'll be there every day, every week and every year to oppose every policy that hurts wildlife; poisons our air or water; destroys the climate; promotes racism, misogyny or homophobia; and marginalizes entire segments of our society."
"We live in a global world where our lives are intertwined. An act of hate against one is an act of hate against all. So we stand here united with all voices of peace, tolerance, racial equity, and justice. We gain our unity from the diversity of our religions, of our sexual preferences, women's rights, and of our racial diversity. We allege to speak for all who are voiceless, marginalized, and criminalized. We are one force, united together for the betterment of humanity." -Anuradha Mittal, Oakland Institute Executive Director
"It's time to get back to the basics: everyday people with a plan, through everyday acts of courage, will eventually make history." - Ai-jen Poo, Director, National Domestic Workers Alliance
Greenpeace is a global, independent campaigning organization that uses peaceful protest and creative communication to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green and peaceful future.
+31 20 718 200081 Dead in Gaza in 24 Hours, Schools Targeted
"Why do they target us when we are innocent people?" said a Palestinian woman sheltering at a school attacked Tuesday. "We do not carry weapons but are just sitting and trying to find safety for ourselves and our children."
Israeli attacks have killed 81 Palestinians over roughly the last 24 hours, including an attack on a United Nations-run school shelter in Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, according to data released by the Gaza health ministry on Wednesday.
The Nuseirat strike, which killed 23 Palestinians on Tuesday, was at least the eighth Israeli attack on a school shelter in the last ten days. Six of the schools had been run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
"Why do they target us when we are innocent people?" Umm Mohammed al-Hasanat, a woman who was sheltering at the Nuseirat school, askedAl Jazeera.
"We do not carry weapons but are just sitting and trying to find safety for ourselves and our children," she said.
A Palestinian mother struggles to bid farewell to her son, killed by the israelis in an air strike that targeted the Razi UNRWA school in Nuseirat pic.twitter.com/LbRsw6INhg
— Sarah Wilkinson (@swilkinsonbc) July 16, 2024
Palestinians inspect the Abdullah Azzam Mosque and its surroundings after the Israeli occupation bombed the area in Nuseirat camp, leaving massive piles of rubble behind. pic.twitter.com/rMEfRK1p5G
— PALESTINE ONLINE 🇵🇸 (@OnlinePalEng) July 17, 2024
The Nuseirat attack was one of many in the last two days across the Gaza Strip.
A strike near Cairo School in the al-Rimal neighborhood of Gaza City on Wednesday killed at least nine, including three children. An overnight strike on a house in Al-Zawyda in central Gaza killed eight, while an attack on a house Wednesday in the Khan Younis area killed five. An Israeli bombing also killed two in the al-Shakoush area northwest of Rafah on Wednesday. Israeli tanks also advanced into northern Rafah, Reutersreported.
The latest string of attacks included another on Tuesday in which Israeli forces killed about 17 in a strike on a "safe" zone in al-Mawasi, a coastal area west of Khan Younis where refugees have gathered.
Even before Tuesday, Gazans were facing one of the deadliest weeks since the war began. Israel bombarded the al-Mawasi camp on Saturday, killing more than 90 Palestinians. Israeli forces also killed at least 17 people on Sunday in an attack on the UNRWA-run Abu Oreiban school in Nuseirat, which was housing thousands of displaced people; most of the dead were women and children, according toAl Jazeera.
UNRWA announced last week that Israeli forces have targeted two-thirds of the schools it administers in Gaza and attacked its facilities 453 times overall since the start of the war. Nearly 200 UNRWA staff members have been killed, the U.N. agency said.
The agency reiterated its call for a stop to Israeli targeting of its facilities in a social media message on Tuesday: "Nowhere is safe. The blatant disregard for U.N. premises and humanitarian law must stop."
Nearly 70% of @UNRWA schools in #Gaza have been hit since the war began.
Over 95% of these schools were used as shelters when hit. 539 people sheltering in UNRWA facilities have been killed.
Nowhere is safe. The blatant disregard for @UN premises and humanitarian law must stop. pic.twitter.com/EKiSiOm2kc
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) July 16, 2024
News of the atrocities in Gaza came as Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Wednesday issued a 236-page report on the atrocities of October 7, in which Hamas-led armed groups killed roughly 1,200 Israelis and kidnapped more than 250. The report's authors found that the groups had committed "crimes against humanity" and "war crimes" in their attack in southern Israel.
"Human Rights Watch research found that the Hamas-led assault on October 7 was designed to kill civilians and take as many people as possible hostage," Ida Sawyer, HRW's crisis and conflict director, said in a statement accompanying the report's release. "The October 7 atrocities should spur a global call to action for an end to all abuses against civilians in Israel and Palestine."
JD Vance Supports Tracking Abortion Seekers
"Donald Trump and J.D. Vance have a dark and dystopian vision for America's future, in which women are hunted across state lines for accessing basic healthcare," said one Democratic lawmaker.
As Republicans feted U.S. Sen. JD Vance Tuesday night at the GOP's national convention, welcoming the author and venture capitalist as presidential nominee Donald Trump's running mate, one of Vance's proposals for the future of abortion rights in the U.S. made national news.
Citing reporting from The Lever, MSNBC anchor Rachel Maddow warned viewers about Vance's endorsement of a request by at least 19 Republican attorneys general who asked the Biden administration to allow them access to the medical records of people who travel across state lines, including to states that allow abortion care.
"They want the right to follow women from their states all over the country to see if they might be getting an abortion somewhere. or might be getting any other kind of reproductive care anywhere that they want to bring criminal charges about, so they can use those records for prosecutions," said Maddow.
Last year, she added, Vance joined other GOP lawmakers in pressuring the Biden administration to withdraw a rule it introduced after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. The rule prevents state and local police in states that ban abortion from using medical records to prosecute people who have obtained abortion care elsewhere.
"If Donald Trump and JD Vance are elected in November, they will have the power to withdraw the Biden administration's privacy rule on this issue," said Maddow.
Maddow's warning is "not overstated," said David Sirota, founder and editor-in-chief of The Lever.
As Common Dreamsreported Tuesday, despite recent attempts by the Republican Party and Trump to suggest their ultimate goal is not to prohibit abortion care nationwide, Trump's selection of Vance as his vice presidential nominee elevated a lawmaker who has endorsed a 15-week nationwide ban and has opposed any exceptions for victims of rape or incest.
Vance's support for rescinding President Joe Biden's medical privacy rule exemplifies the "dark and dystopian vision for America's future" that the senator and former president have, said New York state Sen. Liz Krueger (D-28).
"This aspect of the post-Dobbs world is often treated as hyperbole in mainstream news coverage, something that might be theoretically possible but not something that's actually going to happen," wrote Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo of the attack on medical privacy. "But Vance was one of only eight senators who thought [the Biden rule]... endangered 'valid state laws protecting life' and would 'limit cooperation with law enforcement.'"
"He's for real about this stuff," wrote Marshall, denouncing Vance as a "menstrual surveillance hawk."
Why Bernie Sanders Is Thanking Elon Musk
The Vermont senator said Musk has done "an exceptional job of demonstrating a point that we have made for years—and that is the fact we live in an oligarchic society."
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders on Tuesday took the unusual step of applauding Elon Musk—but not for reasons that the Tesla CEO and world's richest man would likely find flattering.
In the wake of
reports indicating that Musk plans to inject $45 million per month into a new super PAC supporting former President Donald Trump's bid for another four years in the White House, Sanders (I-Vt.) thanked Musk for doing "an exceptional job of demonstrating a point that we have made for years—and that is the fact we live in an oligarchic society in which billionaires dominate not only our economic life and the information we consume, but our politics as well."
"And let me be clear. While the size of Musk's financial contribution is particularly egregious, he is not alone in attempting to buy this election to further his own needs," Sanders continued. "Other billionaires are also playing a significant role—in both political parties. Oh, I know... here goes Bernie Sanders again about Citizens United and the role of money in politics. I have no shortage of critics who accuse me of being boring and of hammering away at the same themes year after year after year."
"They're probably right. I am repetitious, but that’s because the problems we care about are only getting worse," he added. "Let's be clear. It has never made sense to me, then or now, that a tiny clique of people should have incredible wealth and power while most people have none."
"While people like Elon Musk try to buy elections for Donald Trump, people who work for low wages, have no health insurance, can't afford prescription drugs, and can't find affordable housing are giving up on politics."
Citing unnamed sources, The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg reported earlier this week that Musk has pledged to donate $45 million per month to America PAC, whose founding donors include ultra-rich tech investors who are part of Musk's social circle. The New York Timesseparately reported that "one leader of America PAC told a friend that the group expected to have a major donor who would make donations in four batches, adding up to as much as $160 million over the course of the campaign."
The Journal and Bloomberg stories—which Musk denied with a meme that included the words "fake gnus"—followed reports that Musk had already given the super PAC a substantial sum of money despite his March declaration that he is "not donating money to either candidate for U.S. president."
Musk formally endorsed Trump on X—the social media platform Musk owns—following an assassination attempt against the former president this past weekend in Pennsylvania. Conspiracy theories about the attempt on Trump's life proliferated rapidly on X, with the help of Musk himself.
The Tesla CEO's name
did not appear on America PAC's disclosure filings for June, which could mean that he donated to the PAC earlier this month.
Musk, who is worth over $250 billion, is one of more than a dozen billionaires supporting Trump and his newly chosen running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio). Axios and the Times reported Tuesday that Musk personally lobbied Trump to make Vance his vice presidential pick.
Musk and other U.S. billionaires got $1 trillion richer during Trump's first four years in office, gains fueled by massive tax cuts he signed into law in 2017.
Why are billionaires like Peter Thiel, Rupert Murdoch, Stephen Schwartzman, and the owner of this website rallying behind Trump?
Yes, the tax cuts. But there's more.
The more Trump tears down democracy, the safer the oligarchy becomes.
— Robert Reich (@RBReich) July 16, 2024
Sanders wrote in his email Tuesday that Musk's influence on the 2024 election could be particularly pronounced given his ownership of X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.
Musk, Sanders wrote, has used the platform "to amplify the voices of conspiracy theorists who deny the results of the last election and spread the dangerous idea that Democrats want to allow mass, undocumented migration to the country to replace, electorally, the votes of white people."
"The reality is that while people like Elon Musk try to buy elections for Donald Trump, people who work for low wages, have no health insurance, can't afford prescription drugs, and can't find affordable housing are giving up on politics," the senator continued. "They see the rich getting richer as they use their wealth to buy influence, and wonder whether anyone in Washington even knows what is going on in their lives."
Sanders argued that to end the pernicious political influence of Musk and other billionaires, it is essential to elect candidates who support overturning Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the 2010 Supreme Court decision that spawned the super PACs now playing a massive role in the nation's elections.
"It is an issue that should concern all Americans—regardless of their political point of view—who wish to live under a government that represents all of the people and not just a handful of powerful special interests," Sanders wrote. "Taking action is not just good politics, it is also good policy. Because the truth is, campaign finance reform is the most important issue facing us today, because it impacts all the others."