SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
civil war
The Roberts Court Is Pushing the US Toward Existential Conflict
By gutting the Voting Rights Act and granting President Donald Trump irmmunity, the Supreme Court has helped set up a fight over the future of US democracy.
May 24, 2026
Is the United States headed for a second Civil War? According to a survey of likely midterm voters published by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, 57% of Americans believe it is. Sixty-nine percent say democracy is under serious threat; and an equal percentage of non-white voters say they fear rising white supremacy.
While President Donald Trump and his MAGA movement deserve the lion’s share of blame for such findings, the Supreme Court has done its part. Under the stewardship of Chief Justice John Roberts, the court has issued a blistering succession of dangerously polarizing rulings, ranging from presidential immunity, union organizing, the death penalty, environmental protection, and gun control to affirmative action and abortion rights. The resulting jurisprudential carnage has accelerated the nation’s rupture into irreconcilable belligerent tribes and prompted speculation that we are headed for another existential conflict.
The Roberts Court has taken a particularly malevolent interest in destroying the Voting Rights Act (VRA) of 1965. Last month’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais gutted Section 2 of the landmark legislation, which was amended in 1982 to permit the Justice Department and private citizens to challenge election laws that have the effect of diluting minority voting power.
The court’s 6-3 majority opinion by Justice Samuel Alito invalidated Louisiana’s 2024 congressional map that created a second majority-Black congressional district to operate alongside the state’s five white-majority districts, roughly reflecting the size of Louisiana’s Black population. The ruling handed a victory to the lead plaintiff in the case, Phillip “Bert” Callais, an election denier and alleged conspiracy theorist who had attended the January 6, 2021 “Stop the Steal” rally on the White House Ellipse that eventually snowballed into the insurrection at the Capitol. Barely concealing their racial animus, Callais and his co-plaintiffs described themselves in court filings as “non-African American voters” who were the victims of reverse discrimination. Louisiana has since moved to redraw its voting maps.
Neutering the Voting Rights Act represents the culmination of Roberts’ lifelong calling and warrants his ranking alongside Taney as the most disgraceful chief justice in history.
With the demise of the “effects test,” future Section 2 plaintiffs will have to meet the nearly impossible burden of proving that redistricting maps were created with overt discriminatory intent rather than for political purposes. And as the court held in a 2019 opinion written by Roberts in Rucho v. Common Cause, political gerrymandering claims cannot be brought in federal courts because, as the Republican majority sees it, they present nonjusticiable “political questions.”
Both Callais and Rucho built upon Roberts’ 2013 majority opinion in Shelby County v. Alabama gutting two other sections of the VRA that required state and local jurisdictions with histories of egregious voter discrimination to obtain advance federal approval—known as preclearance—before making changes to their election procedures. Like Alito in Callais, Roberts declared in Shelby that racial discrimination in voting was a thing of the past and thus special protections for minorities were no longer necessary.
The combined effects of Shelby and Rucho have led to a proliferation of voting roll purges, onerous photo ID laws, and limitations on mail-in ballots in red states across the country. Now, with Callais, election law experts predict that as many as 19 Democratic congressional seats in Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana could be eliminated, returning the former states of the Confederacy to one-party rule.
The court’s handiwork has sparked outrage and alarm. Rep. Bennie Thompson, the only Democrat in Mississippi’s congressional delegation, who will likely lose his seat to gerrymandering, has condemned Callais as “equivalent to a second Civil War.” Other observers have compared the current moment in the US to the 1850s, when debates over the future of slavery eventually led to secession and war.
Chief Justice Roberts has also drawn comparisons to Chief Justice Roger Taney, whose 1857 majority opinion in Dred Scott v. Sandford held that Black Americans had “no rights that the white man was bound to respect.” The Dred Scott decision helped precipitate the Civil War, and is widely considered the most infamous in the court’s history.
The parallels between Taney and Roberts are beyond hyperbole. Both men began their legal careers as zealous partisan political advocates. Before ascending to the Supreme Court in 1836, Taney was elected to the General Assembly of Maryland, and later served as a loyal foot soldier to President Andrew Jackson, first as secretary of war and then as attorney general, in which capacity he penned an advisory opinion that prefigured his Dred Scott ruling, arguing that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were inapplicable to Black people, even those living in free states.
Similarly, the young Roberts established himself as a dependable right-wing operative, clerking for Chief Justice William Rehnquist and afterward serving as special assistant to Attorney General William French Smith in the Reagan administration. There, he authored upward of 25 memos opposing the 1982 amendment that added the effects test to the Voting Rights Act in addition to ghosting op-eds for Smith and preparing administration officials for their testimony before Congress on the test. Later, as an attorney in private practice, he played an important role as a consultant, lawsuit editor, and prep coach for the GOP’s legal arguments in the run-up to Bush v. Gore, the case that decided the 2000 presidential election.
Neutering the Voting Rights Act represents the culmination of Roberts’ lifelong calling and warrants his ranking alongside Taney as the most disgraceful chief justice in history. As the civil rights activist and writer William Spivey argued in an essay published earlier this month in the online journal Level:
Taney held that no Black person, free or enslaved, could ever be a US citizen. He believed that Black people were not part of the political community and the Constitution was written for white men only.
Chief Justice Roberts has been more effective than anyone in disenfranchising Black people. Most of what Taney accomplished can be traced to a single decision that remained in place for 11 years before being reversed [by the 13th and 14th Amendments]. Roberts has spent an entire career whittling away at the Voting Rights Act of 1965, affirmative action and, most recently, the diversity, equity, and inclusion movement.
Roberts will also be remembered for composing the majority opinion in Trump v. United States in 2024 that gave the president near-complete immunity from criminal prosecution for his official acts. That decision, along with the evisceration of voting rights, has emboldened Trump to threaten the deployment of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the military to polling places and hatch other plots to rig the midterm elections and consolidate Republican power.
It may be premature to conclude a new Civil War is upon us, but a high-stakes battle for the future of the country is well underway.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Trump Is Rage Baiting the US Into a Second Civil War
In a healthy democracy, all sides generally recognize the legitimacy of the system itself, regardless of internal squabbles. In the United States, this is no longer the case.
Feb 22, 2026
A January 2026 Gallup poll showed that 89% of all Americans expect high levels of political conflict this year, as the country heads toward one of its most decisive midterm elections ever.
Gallup, however, was stating the obvious. It is a surprise that not all Americans feel this way, judging by the coarse, often outright racist discourse currently being normalized by top American officials. Some call this new rhetoric the "language of humiliation," where officials refer to entire social and racial groups as "vermin," "garbage," or "invaders."
The aim of this language is not simply to insult, but to feed the "Rage Bait Cycle"—tellingly, Oxford’s 2025 Word of the Year: A high-ranking official attacks a whole community or "the other side"; waits for a response; escalates the attacks; and then presents himself as a protector of traditions, values, and America itself. This does more than simply “hollow out” democracy, as suggested in a Human Rights Watch report last January; it prepares the country for “affective polarization,” where people no longer just disagree on political matters, but actively dislike each other for who they are and what they supposedly represent.
How else can we explain the statements of US President Donald Trump, who declared last December: “Somalia... is barely a country... Their country stinks and we don't want them in our country... We’re going to go the wrong way if we keep taking in garbage into our country. Ilhan Omar is garbage. She’s garbage. Her friends are garbage.” This is not simply an angry president, but an overreaching political discourse supported by millions of Americans who continue to see Trump as their defender and savior.
We are entering a state of regime cleavage—a political struggle no longer concerned with winning elections, but one where dominant groups fundamentally disagree on the very definition of what constitutes a nation.
This polarization reached a fever pitch at the 2026 Super Bowl, where the halftime selection of Puerto Rican artist Bad Bunny ignited a firestorm over national identity. While millions celebrated the performance, Trump and conservative commentators launched a boycott, labeling the Spanish-language show “not American enough” and inappropriate. The rhetoric escalated further when Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem suggested Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents would be “all over” the event, effectively ostracizing countless people from their right to belong to a distinct culture within American society.
The weaponization of culture and language was not limited to the stage; it split American viewers into two distinct camps: those who watched the official performance and those who turned to an “All-American” alternative broadcast hosted by Turning Point USA featuring Kid Rock. This "countering" is the very essence of the American conflict, which many have rightly predicted will eventually reach a breaking point akin to civil war.
That conclusion seems inevitable as the culture war couples with three alarming trends: identity dehumanization; partisan mirroring—the view that the other side is an existential threat; and institutional conflict—where federal agencies are perceived as "lawless," sitting congresswomen are labeled "garbage," and dissenting views are branded as treasonous.
This takes us to the fundamental question of legitimacy. In a healthy democracy, all sides generally recognize the legitimacy of the system itself, regardless of internal squabbles. In the United States, this is no longer the case. We are entering a state of regime cleavage—a political struggle no longer concerned with winning elections, but one where dominant groups fundamentally disagree on the very definition of what constitutes a nation.
The current crisis is not a new phenomenon; it dates back to the historical tension between 'assimilation" within an American "melting pot" versus the "multiculturalism" often compared to a "salad bowl." The melting pot principle, frequently promoted as a positive social ideal, effectively pressures immigrant communities and minorities to "melt" into a white-Christian-dominated social structure. In contrast, the salad bowl model allows minorities to feel very much American while maintaining their distinct languages, customs, and social priorities, thus without losing their unique identities.
While this debate persisted for decades as a highly intellectualized academic exercise, it has transformed into a daily, visceral conflict. The 2026 Super Bowl served as a stark manifestation of this deeper cultural friction. Several factors have pushed the United States to this precipice: a struggling economy, rising social inequality, and a rapidly closing demographic gap. Dominant social groups no longer feel "safe." Although the perceived threat to their "way of life" is often framed as a cultural or social grievance, it is, in essence, a struggle over economic privilege and political dominance.
There is also a significant disparity in political focus. While the right—represented by the MAGA movement and TPUSA—possesses a clarity of vision and relative political cohesion, the "other side" remains shrouded in ambiguity. The Democratic institution, which purports to represent the grievances of all other marginalized groups, lacks the trust of younger Americans, particularly those belonging to Gen Z. According to a recent poll by the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE), trust in traditional political institutions among voters aged 18-25 has plummeted to historic lows, with over 65% expressing dissatisfaction with both major parties.
As the midterm elections approach, society is stretching its existing polarization to a new extreme. While the right clings to the hope of a savior making the country "great again," the "left" is largely governed by the politics of counter demonization and reactive grievances—hardly a revolutionary approach to governance.
Regardless of the November results, much of the outcome is already predetermined: a wider social conflict in the US is inevitable. The breaking point is fast approaching.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Creative Dissent and Mutual Aid: Lessons From Minneapolis for Surviving the Polycrisis
As the Trump regime promises to end its surge of federal agents in that city, perhaps it’s a good time to reflect: What have we learned that might be helpful in the Great Unraveling?
Feb 17, 2026
In a recent article I argued that the world is now crossing a threshold from decades of growth and increasing integration to decades of economic shrinkage and political breakdown. This shift will create stresses that extend in scale from ecosystems and international relations down to households and individuals. Everyone will be personally—and likely profoundly—impacted by the polycrisis.
There are three components to this tectonic shift: environmental, economic, and political. It’s useful to think of this in terms of disasters, e.g. natural disasters, economic calamities, and government repression or civil war.
Every disaster is unique, but some general observations apply. When a disaster happens, our normal sense of time is interrupted and our priorities get scrambled. Suddenly, nothing matters but the immediate necessities of escaping harm and helping others to safety. People’s attitudes tend to be sober, purposeful, and helpful; hysteria is rare. Everyone’s implicit goal is to get back to something approximating normal. Importantly, disasters also tend to evoke a similar community-minded response in people: At least in the short run, they work together creatively to meet one another’s basic needs.
Environmental disasters are sometimes the easiest for victims to mentally comprehend, though not always to recover from. After floods, fires, earthquakes, and chemical spills, immediate response efforts are led by the affected region and surrounding communities, while longer-term recovery typically depends on national governmental assistance. Neighbors pull together to make sure all are safe (see this account of my experience during the 2017 wildfires in my hometown of Santa Rosa, California).
Severe political conflicts can therefore be more psychologically devastating than environmental or economic disasters. But, as we will see, they can also evoke extraordinary levels of community solidarity and mutual aid.
Economic disasters can linger for years and can scar a generation, as occurred during and in the wake of the Great Depression of the 1930s, and in the currency collapses that have plagued several nations over the last century. The Global Financial Crisis of 2008 and the Covid-19 pandemic, though relatively short in duration, saw large-scale failure of businesses and disappearance of jobs. Again, it’s typically up to local communities to help meet people’s immediate needs until the national government can intervene to provide aid and stability.
Political disasters (including civil conflicts) are often different in significant ways. In some instances, they turn neighbor against neighbor, or communities against their national government. Government may hurt rather than help; indeed, government may be out to get you. Severe political conflicts can therefore be more psychologically devastating than environmental or economic disasters. But, as we will see, they can also evoke extraordinary levels of community solidarity and mutual aid.
The Great Unraveling of environmental and social stability will feature all three kinds of disasters. Currently, global breakdown is being accelerated primarily by an ongoing and worsening political calamity in the United States. In this article, we’ll go to the frontlines of conflict in Minneapolis to see how people are responding to a violent—even deadly—government-imposed crisis. As the Trump regime promises to end its surge of federal agents in that city, perhaps it’s a good time to reflect: What have we learned that might be helpful in future crises?
A City Under Siege
Recent events in Minneapolis and surrounding communities are being widely reported and analyzed. They’ve even been iconified in a Bruce Springsteen song. Our purpose here is to see what we can glean that’s relevant for the larger project of surviving the Great Unraveling.
First, some background facts. Following deployments of troops and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to Los Angeles, Chicago, and Portland, on January 6, 2026 president Donald Trump sent nearly 3,000 ICE and Border Patrol agents to Minneapolis—a medium-sized city of fewer than half a million residents. There is widespread speculation that the ICE surge was politically motivated, as Minneapolis is a bright blue* town in a blue state whose governor, Tim Walz, was the Democratic vice-presidential candidate in 2024. The massive deployment of federal agents dwarfed the city’s police force of 600 officers.
Trump and his officials have stated that the purpose of the ICE surge is to remove “the worst of the worst”—undocumented immigrants who are thieves, rapists, and murderers. However, officials have imposed unrealistic arrest quotas on agents, requiring them to round up more undocumented people than can be vetted for criminality—as well as US citizens and legal immigrants with green cards or refugee status. The Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a nonprofit research organization, has found that roughly three-quarters of individuals currently detained by ICE do not have a criminal record, and that many who do were convicted of only minor offenses, like traffic violations.
Federal agents have focused their attention on places where undocumented people are likely to be found: restaurants, Home Depot stores, schools, and churches. Often, agents simply grab anyone who looks brown-skinned. They sometimes break into homes without warrants and effectively kidnap the residents, who are then sent to makeshift detention centers; family members may have no idea where their loved ones are for many days.
As a result, many immigrants and non-immigrants alike feel as though they are living under occupation by a hostile army. People are terrified, businesses are closed, workers are staying home, rent payments are falling behind, and children are not going to school.
Resistance Breeds Solidarity
The response of the people of Minneapolis and its surrounding suburbs has been peaceful but organized and insistent. Neighbors are protecting neighbors.
Minnesota has a longstanding tradition of mutual aid and of neighborhood organizing, which intensified after the killing of George Floyd by a police officer in 2020. Residents are making a disciplined effort to avoid violence, even when protesters are being attacked. They’ve created a leaderless cell-based pattern of organization, communicating through Signal (an encrypted social media app). Participants use pseudonyms, and every effort is made to maintain anonymity.
Actions undertaken in response to the specific needs of the community fall under four broad headings: documenting the actions of ICE agents; protesting their presence; protecting vulnerable people; and helping meet those people’s daily needs for food, shelter, schooling, and doctor visits. Often these actions require courage and creativity, as when massed members of the group Singing Resistance walk frozen streets, raising the spirits of fellow community members with songs of solidarity, grief, and rage.
I recently reached out to a friend who lives near Minneapolis to ask about their experience in resistance networks there. The story of what is happening there is best told by someone who is in the thick of it themselves, so I am giving over remainder of this article their words. This is an edited transcript of the comments from my friend, who wishes to remain anonymous:
“My first encounter with ICE was in mid-December. It was a very cold day. I saw construction workers trapped on the roof of a house they were building, and ICE had surrounded it. Very quickly, observers started gathering and blowing whistles. The workers on the roof weren’t prepared to be up there for a long time, so observers were trying to throw them blankets and handwarmers. In the end, one of the workers had to be taken to the hospital for possible frostbite.
"If anything positive is going to come from all this, it’s the fact that people are going to be more connected and more willing to help their neighbors."
“Later, I got involved in response efforts. We have ICE agents staying in hotels where I live, and there are some nicer restaurants that they like to frequent. There were reports of ICE outside one local restaurant. We talked with employees, who said there’s a table of ICE agents eating. Then we were able to identify a car of ICE agents outside, and people started surrounding the car and honking. This was before any of the observers had been killed [i.e., Renee Good and Alex Pretti, both gunned down by ICE and Border Patrol agents], so I think we were a little bolder at that point. One man even got out of his car and walked right up to the ICE vehicle and yelled at them. Then the local police came, but the cops usually say they can’t intervene."
“On another occasion, there was a report of ICE agents outside a [Mexican] restaurant. I was the second observer on the scene; there was already a lady there with her megaphone, making noise. We had identified three ICE vehicles in the parking lot. So, we started driving around trying to get their plates so we could have them in our records and verify they were in fact federal agents. The goal was to make enough noise to hopefully get the agents to leave. We’re honking and flashing lights at them, and they’re flashing lights at us. They were obviously irritated. Within 20 minutes, between 15 and 20 additional cars showed up to observe and show support for the cornered workers. One by one, they slowly left, and community members helped the workers who were trapped inside to get home safely in cars that weren’t identifiable to them."
“We’ve got a couple of contacts who live in big apartment buildings and who are vulnerable, and they’ve been go-betweens for fundraising. We’ve been able to fundraise to help people pay rent. It’s a domino effect: People are worried about going to work. They stop going to work, and restaurants temporarily close because a lot of their workers are vulnerable. As a result, they can’t earn money, and they’re at risk of losing their job."
“We get specific calls like, hey, we have this family that needs this or that, and people can raise their hands either to fund that, or to drop it off to the liaison who then distributes it, all to keep people’s information private."
“The ICE agents are adapting all the time. They’re changing up their cars, and they’re switching plates. There have been occasions where they are driving around without any plates at all. They were all wearing masks, and now a lot of them are wearing plain clothes to try and blend in more. But as they adapt, we do too."
“I think the community building going on has been impressive because, unlike what the media says, none of us have been paid a cent for this and never expect to be. At a protest the other night, one guy said, ‘There’s no amount that anybody could pay us to not show up for our neighbors.’ I don’t know why people can’t comprehend that people would be doing this just because they care about the well-being of others."
“It’s been an evolution. As people get more involved, they see the different pieces of the puzzle, and then they can contribute. The biggest thing for the people who’ve been leading it longer is that they’re getting burnt out. Many involved already have full-time jobs, and they’re also putting in full-time hours for this effort. So, the longer-term observers are keen to get more people in leadership roles so that the work can be distributed. And the ability to do that has come from just building trust with people you initially may only know anonymously through the phone. That trust comes from showing up repeatedly, putting in the time and effort, and vouching for each other."
“This is a community effort. I don’t think anyone is trying to be recognized for what they’re doing. Everyone involved knows that this is the right thing to be doing. There are a lot of people out there, especially in our government, who try to spin what’s going on here as being terroristic in intent, or that we’re just trying to interfere with government operations or hurt people. But that is so antithetical to what anyone here is actually trying to do."
“There’s risk involved, and the distributed leadership model helps diminish that because then individuals can’t be targeted as easily. But I know some of my local elected representatives have been involved, and they’ve been subject to threats, because they’re public and they’re not hiding their identity."
“Even when the imminent threat of people constantly being taken dies down, there’s going to be more need for community organizing and mutual aid. And so, hopefully, this is cementing a framework that we can continue to expand upon as needs in the community grow through whatever challenge may arise. I think if anything positive is going to come from all this, it’s the fact that people are going to be more connected and more willing to help their neighbors."
“Having these federal agents here and knowing my community is under extreme surveillance is unfamiliar and infuriating to me, but I know it is something like what many marginalized groups have contended with for decades or centuries."
“It is increasingly difficult to leave the house and drive somewhere without viewing every car with suspicion. We wave and smile as I pass through vulnerable neighborhoods, to show we are here to help and not harm. There is a sense that we are always ‘this close’ to an agent feeling justified to smash in our windows or detain us for simply practicing the rights the US Constitution entitles us to. We fear what may come next, what the retribution may be. It is frustrating knowing that if we call the cops with concerns regarding the illegal or unethical behaviors of these agents, we will be met with no response."
“But there is a power in this resistance, a feeling of deep connection and kinship to those around you, even if you just met or only know their online alias. You know you are on the same side of this battle for basic human rights. There’s a feeling that so many people have your back, even if they have never met you. Seeing extreme bravery from regular people encourages your own commitment."
“The biggest feeling of all, though, is the feeling that none of us are doing enough. Despite our efforts, people are still being taken from their families every day to potentially disappear in the system."
“The other frustrating thing, to me, is that this shouldn’t have to be our priority. It wouldn’t be if our United States government were set up in a way that wasn’t so focused on exploiting and ‘othering’ people for money and greed. We could be putting all this energy toward trying to build a more sustainable world rather than just protecting people from being abducted. But this is the imminent threat right now.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular