The protests are getting bigger and louder. On April 5, about 3 million people joined 1,400 protests and marches across the U.S., unleashing outrage at this country’s most fascistic, bigoted, and destructive president in memory. Resistance to President Donald Trump and billionaire henchman Elon Musk is all over the place—protests in the streets; mass phone calls, emails, and petitions; social media and news flooded with outrage and growing desperation over Trump’s assault on democracy and government.
In Washington, D.C., state capitals, and city halls, resistance is rising, and an array of nascent movements are budding. A nationwide group calling itself 50501 (50 protests, 50 states, 1 movement) has helped mobilize protests at city halls, state capitals, and in Washington, D.C. Local Indivisible groups, the Federal Unionists Network for federal workers, and immigrant rights organizations nationwide have stepped up actions. One small federal agency even blocked Elon Musk’s teenaged “DOGE” coders from entering the building. Resistance is rising.
While most Democrats seem either dormant or lost, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) have mobilized massive crowds in their barnstorming “Fighting Oligarchy” tour, drawing more than 34,000 in Denver, Colorado. The urgency of combating Trump fascism and creating an alternative is palpable and inspiring.
Even as we mobilize in the streets and in halls of power, and fight like hell to stamp out fascist fires, we must begin to build toward something.
Now it’s time to ask—where are these actions going, and how can they build power that can help change conditions now and in the future? What are the strategies beyond displaying our rage and disgust with an administration wreaking havoc and harming countless lives? What do we do and where do we all go after the big protests? As resistance rises, where does all this energy, momentum, passion, and potential power go? When will these movements coalesce, at least strategically when and where they can, to amass far greater numbers and impact?
With most Democrats mired in a reactive mode, looking grimly meager, wavering, and inconsistent in their response, grassroots movements and other resistance efforts are largely on their own, which could ultimately be a good thing. Yes, some Democrats are speaking out and pushing back, but so far with little concrete effect.
Don’t count on the Democrats to lead the resistance. Some, like Sens. Sanders, Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), and Reps. Ocasio-Cortez, Progressive Caucus Chair Greg Casar (D-Texas), and others will be allies, but what rises up and builds must be US—all of us. Remember Bernie’s clarion, JFK-like call, “Not Me, Us?” In the face of fast-boiling Trump fascism, everyone who cares about democracy, human and civil rights, and our ecological and existential future, must become some kind of activist, in whatever way we can. Trump’s vicious and vile onslaught is not just a test for the Democrats, it is a test for all of us.
While the initial uprisings provide a torchlight of hope in this dark oceanic tempest, and a growing community of shared outrage and compassion, there must be a move toward greater unity, coalition-building, and strategic thinking that builds concrete impact and power. All these protests, marches, emails, petitions, and social media posts will naturally be somewhat anarchic and disarrayed, but if they don’t build toward power, we won’t have much impact.
Other than blocking or hampering some of Trump’s political and legislative thuggery through the courts, what is the vision? What is the plan?
As I write this, I hear millions of liberals in my ear, insisting the plan is to win back the House, maybe even the Senate, in 2026. I’ll heartily support those efforts. But while winning the midterms will be a steep climb and a ray of hope, there is a real danger—and a dreary loss of power and imagination—in channeling the resistance into the next election cycle. This moment and the emerging movements are far bigger than that.
If the emergent movements can find ways to solidify, coalesce, and build power, they should do it outside of the Democratic Party, even while allying with it. Why? Because the Democratic establishment, while vastly better than Trump and MAGA Republicans for humans and the planet, are profoundly compromised and show no signs of transcending their decades-long immersion in corporate neoliberalism.
Since Bill Clinton captured the party and the presidency in 1992, the Democrats’ enmeshment with neoliberalism and corporate power has been disastrous—giving rise to much of the working-class alienation and rage (no longer just white rage) that helped propel Trump. Think NAFTA and other Democratic neoliberal policies that deepened corporate power and inequality, aiding Trump wins in 2016 and 2024. For anyone wanting a more progressive, egalitarian, and sustainable future, there is a real danger that the Democrats will lean right in 2026 to capture disaffected Trump voters and continue their moribund trajectory away from economic populism.
If the resistance amounts to restoring moderate corporate Democrats in power, while that is undeniably better than Trumpian fascism, it will only bring more neoliberalism with its lesser-evil abandonment of poor and working people and its erosion of social safety nets, economic equity, and populism.
All of this is fraught with tensions. Many moderates and liberals who are outraged by Trump would likely support a “Blue No Matter Who” return to the safe, familiar harbors of Democratic centrism—even though that corporate-abiding agenda failed disastrously under the electoral banner of former Vice President Kamala Harris.
It’s worth remembering that while Biden-Harris did some good domestic things on infrastructure and climate-repairing jobs, and preserved the Constitution, government services, and DEI, they also, hideously, enabled Israel’s genocidal annihilation of Gaza. Although Trump is incalculably more injurious and destructive, our resistance to his fascism and bigotry must not hold space for the Democrats’ support of genocide.
As we rage about Trump’s gutting of federal agencies and workers, the answer isn’t the centrist Clintonian “reinventing government” model that was, in some ways, a precursor to Musk’s grotesquely worse “DOGE.” If we are sickened by Trump’s racist dog-whistling attacks on brown immigrants from south of the border, the response shouldn’t be more Democratic enabling of the false notion that immigration is a problem or a “crisis.” If we are protesting MAGA Republican attacks on LGBTQ people and “DEI”—diversity, equity, and inclusion—then we must support these communities and principles while building a broadly unifying movement.
We are in a critical if confusing and uncertain moment. The resistance movements are just being born, the Democrats are in the wilderness, and we are years and many miles away from a clear political turnaround. We are in a fragile triage moment where democracy itself, and the future of the nation as we know it, is very much in question. There is no quick fix or easy answer.
We must do everything in our power to defy and resist the Trump-Musk-MAGA plunge into fascism. We must block terrible things wherever and however we can, in the name of saving lives and diminishing harm. We will win some battles and lose others. Even as we mobilize in the streets and in halls of power, and fight like hell to stamp out fascist fires, we must begin to build toward something. What emerges will find its own path and won’t be one linear thing. But if we want to save, protect, and support the people and places and ideas being thrashed and eviscerated by Trump, we must come together, coalesce, and strategize how to build a future that is more humane and democratic, and we must start doing that now.
