Don't Let Anyone Tell You the Resistance Is Dead

1,460 days left to go

So Donald Trump is President. Again.

The first time this happened, the economy was strong. None of us had been through a pandemic or record breaking inflation. Elon Musk didn’t own Twitter yet, TikTok was just a twinkle in our eyes. I won’t speak for everyone, but for me, Trump’s first victory was a wakeup call. There was a sense that some of us had taken our eyes off the road. We’d crashed the car, but we were alive, and if we just fixed the car, remapped the route and started again, we’d be fine. No one wanted to crash the car, it’s just what happens when you aren't paying attention.

For the next four years we paid plenty of attention. And in 2020, when Biden won, it felt like a vindication of all our hard work. We got back in the newly repaired car, on the newly paved road, took that curve again, and nailed it.

Except, as it turns out, the road is just like that. Poorly designed, covered in black ice, populated with drivers who have a very different and often very incorrect interpretation of the rules. The next curve is just as dangerous, and no matter how closely you watch it, you might still crash.

In 2024, we crashed.

Okay, I’m not going to belabor this metaphor any further. But I am going to point out that this Trump presidency is different - it is going to feel different. Trump did not win a majority of the voters in this country, but he did win the popular vote. He gained with almost every demographic. We’re more tired, we have less money. We’re older, and sadder, maybe. We have to contend more brutally with the reality that there are a not insignificant number of people in this country who want it to be like this, who want us to be mean and small and violent, who embrace fear and bigotry, who worship billionaires with no thought for our planet or our society or our future, however much they benefit from it. We can’t just fix this car. We have to rebuild it from the ground up.

(Okay, sorry, that was the last one)

Trump has only been president for about three hours at the time of writing this, but Republicans have already given us a pretty aggressive preview of what we’re in for. The administration has already planned an immigration raid in Chicago for the week following Inauguration Day. He said in his Inauguration speech that the U.S. will only recognize two genders, and is planning on signing a sweeping Executive Order to that effect. Last week Republicans suggested that they would use much needed disaster aid for the California wildfires to enforce preferred political outcomes in the state. Trump still plans to pardon the rioters who broke into the Capitol in an attempt to overthrow the duly elected government on January 6, 2021.

How all of this is going to lower grocery prices is still to be determined.

At this point you’re probably thinking to yourself - “Sara, your title implied that this would be a more hopeful piece, why do I feel horrible?”

Because it is really horrible. I keep trying to turn away from it in my head, to convince myself that it’s not that bad, that it won’t be that long. I want to skim the surface of it, to keep it from overwhelming me, and in the process find myself in another world entirely - one where this didn’t happen, one where no one I love is in danger, where we’re all safe, where our communities will thrive. But it did happen. We really did crash.

Here’s the thing though - it has been this bad, and even worse, before. As long as there have been colonies and a nation state here, this country has failed to live up to its promises. And as long as it has failed there have been people fighting back, people trying to make it better. As long as there has been slavery, there have been abolitionists. As soon as the U.S. became a democracy, there were people fighting to expand the right to vote. There have always been queer people fighting for their right to live life fully as themselves. The best part of our country is not the Constitution or the Declaration, it’s not hotdogs and fireworks, it’s not the military, and it’s not pop culture. The best part of this country is that it has never been left to its own devices. As soon as it started making promises, people fought to hold it to them.

The resistance is different this time around - less brash, less certain, less dramatic. And maybe that makes it harder to see, harder to find. But there has always been a resistance in this country and Trump, small and petty and cruel as he is, will not be the one to kill it. Our job now is to find the resistance within ourselves, to support each other as we nurture it, to find and support those who have been doing the work much longer than we have, and to nurture those who will keep doing it long after we’re gone. I promise it’s out there, and it will make you feel better to go find it, and ask: “what can I do to help?” Someone has the answer, and they are more than happy to share it.

It’ll take time, these next four years, to figure out what to do. We’ve filled in a lot of our infrastructure gaps. We’re getting folks ready to volunteer in elections with Vote Save America, and staff campaigns with Arena. We’re building a young progressive Democratic bench with Run for Something, and training people to put pressure on their elected representatives with Indivisible. All of these organizations are fantastic, and started in 2017 in response to the first Trump presidency, and all would be a great place to put some time and money.

But there are also a ton of organizations right in your local community - mutual aid groups and food pantries and abortion clinics and funds that have been around forever. In New York City we have organizations like Make the Road and the New York Immigration Coalition, NY Renews, BK Forge, and New York Communities for Change. Where you live there are plenty of organizations doing the work locally. There is a community waiting for your help, and all you have to do is show up.

The resistance isn’t about Trump, even though for some of us it felt like it. And it never has been about Trump. The resistance stands in opposition to all the forces and systems that would oppress us, and it fights for a better world, one where we can all thrive, where we are all seen as human, where we are all valued and cherished and supported. And as long as even one of us keeps that dream alive, the resistance is alive.

And there are so many more of us than that.

This week, find a local organization in your community and sign up for their email list, follow their social media if you’re still on those platforms, and sign up for a meeting or a volunteer shift or set up a recurring donation. If you’re having trouble finding one, drop a note in the comments and I’ll see if I can help. And if you’ve got one already, share that too! Let’s support each other’s communities and do what we can.

It’s going to be a long four years, and there will be a lot of hurt and a lot of harm. But we’re not going anywhere. And we’ll do what we can. As Rebecca Solnit said on the day after Election Day: “The fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything and everything we can save is worth saving.”

Everyone grab what you can and hold on tight.

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