Almost immediately after Donald Trump was swept into office in 2016—despite losing the popular vote by a wide margin—he confirmed many Americans’ very worst expectations, amplifying tenfold the same nasty, hateful characteristics that had caused people to vote against him in the first place. The jarring contrast between Trump’s crude, classless boorishness, egomania, and self-aggrandizement and what Americans had experienced for eight years under President Obama could not have been clearer: this person was not only an unabashed racist and misogynist, but one who had absolutely no inclination to change or improve. We were going to be stuck with this horrible human being in our face for the next four years, and that did not sit well with the vast majority of us who had voted to prevent that from happening.
The immediate reaction was what became euphemistically known as “the Resistance,” then a loosely aligned movement reflecting the general disgust with Trump, his policies, and the odious people he surrounded himself with, including his repulsive family (most of whom seemed to share his basic traits). The first key segment of the electorate to express that resistance was women, manifested in most visibly in the Women’s March, a worldwide affirmation of revulsion against Trump’s misogyny that occurred the very day after he was inaugurated.
That march, which galvanized literally millions of women and men, was soon followed by organic, nationwide protests against Trump’s “Muslim ban” and horrendous immigration policies, just more confirmation of Trump’s virulent racism. Because Trump’s reaction was not to learn from his mistakes, but rather to always double down in demonizing those who opposed him, the resistance naturally doubled down as well.
RELATED: The GOP reckoning at hand is long overdue. Naturally, Republicans will still manage to fail
Even as these unprecedented expressions of opposition to Trump began to coalesce, Republicans (for the most part) went in the exact opposite direction, eagerly declaring their allegiance not only to Trump himself but to his awful behavior. Americans—mostly Democrats, but not all—watched in horror as nearly one-half of their fellow citizens gleefully embraced this cruel, amoral abomination until the entire Republican Party had been swept up into Trump’s grotesque, performative orbit. Soon their party had become indistinguishable from Trump himself. It was a terrible thing to witness: awful, but strangely revelatory and eye-opening nonetheless. And as a reaction to this wholesale Republican abandonment of human decency, what had started as a grassroots resistance movement against Trump’s policies became an even more all-encompassing, coherent, and formidable opposition to the Republican party in general.
By 2018, the ranks and collective resolve of all these people had completely solidified as the extent of Trump’s criminality and the existential threat Trump posed to the country, its democratic traditions, and its institutions became more and more obvious. Those people gathered themselves up, went out, and voted in 2018, to express their revulsion not only toward Trump but also the Republicans who had embraced him. Their anger resulted in a Democratic-dominated House. Then, over the next two years, Trump’s egregious fumbling of the COVID-19 pandemic and the concomitant rise of Black Lives Matter, protesting the rampant systemic racism by American law enforcement, further cemented that resistance, uniting disparate social demographics in their fundamental opposition to Trump and Trumpism. What may have served most of all to unite them was the disparaging, sneering treatment afforded to them by the right, as represented by a Republican Party that now had become fully weaponized—by an ugly alliance of right-wing media and Russian bots—against them.
In 2020 the Resistance finally delivered the harshest rebuke possible, tossing Trump out of office (after a single term), in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, electing a Democratic president, and, in 2021, electing a Democratic Senate for good measure. But Republicans by this time had irrevocably and suicidally committed themselves, hitching themselves to Trump’s preposterous Big Lie and challenging the very core of our country’s legitimacy: its free and fair elections. The violent insurrection Trump instigated on Jan. 6—in full view of the entire nation—was the final straw, as the craven reaction of Republican politicians showed they’d learned nothing from the voters’ verdict just months before. To add further insult, the Trump-polluted Supreme Court then weighed in, malevolently yanking away a basic constitutional right that people in this country had counted on for half a century.
RELATED: Outbursts and epilogues: Prosecutors and defense rest in Oath Keepers seditious conspiracy trial
You might think that in such an environment the pollsters and the press would have thought twice about writing off the same massive group of voters that had so clearly taken matters into their own hands just two years ago. But the overwhelming message permeating the media was that the Resistance had just petered out, hopelessly transfixed instead by the cost of a gallon of gas and the price of chicken breasts at the grocery store. Republicans were going to romp, running roughshod over us, we were confidently assured. There was simply no reason to hope; a giant “red wave” was about to sweep it all away, we were told, over and over again.
Instead, the same Americans, their numbers now grown from a homegrown resistance movement into an impervious voting bloc, brought the hammer down once again, marching into the voting booths and thwarting, in historically unprecedented fashion—and against titanic economic headwinds—those same Republicans and the man who still leads their party, Donald Trump. And now they had a new ally: their own children, many of whom were voting for the first time, some whose political education had begun with the Women’s March back in Jan. of 2017. They denied the Republicans the Senate, and left Republicans with a razor-thin, effectively unworkable House majority that already appears to be consuming itself with infighting.
The media are still shaking their heads in bewilderment. But the truth was always there, right before their eyes. The Resistance is alive and well. It’s no longer as loud, it’s no longer as demonstrative. It’s not playing for the cameras on Fox News. But even as the marches and protests have faded—temporarily, at least—into memory, the movement remains. Having now grown to an unfathomable size, and taken stock of its own power, its resolution remains uncompromised, internalized, and now stronger than ever. It’s not going to go away.
RELATED: 'Right track' polling numbers jump following GOP's lackluster midterm showing
How are we going to win the Georgia runoff? By helping nonprofit groups in frontline communities get out the Democratic vote. Chip in $1 today to each of these amazing organizations.
The immediate reaction was what became euphemistically known as “the Resistance,” then a loosely aligned movement reflecting the general disgust with Trump, his policies, and the odious people he surrounded himself with, including his repulsive family (most of whom seemed to share his basic traits). The first key segment of the electorate to express that resistance was women, manifested in most visibly in the Women’s March, a worldwide affirmation of revulsion against Trump’s misogyny that occurred the very day after he was inaugurated.
That march, which galvanized literally millions of women and men, was soon followed by organic, nationwide protests against Trump’s “Muslim ban” and horrendous immigration policies, just more confirmation of Trump’s virulent racism. Because Trump’s reaction was not to learn from his mistakes, but rather to always double down in demonizing those who opposed him, the resistance naturally doubled down as well.
RELATED: The GOP reckoning at hand is long overdue. Naturally, Republicans will still manage to fail
Even as these unprecedented expressions of opposition to Trump began to coalesce, Republicans (for the most part) went in the exact opposite direction, eagerly declaring their allegiance not only to Trump himself but to his awful behavior. Americans—mostly Democrats, but not all—watched in horror as nearly one-half of their fellow citizens gleefully embraced this cruel, amoral abomination until the entire Republican Party had been swept up into Trump’s grotesque, performative orbit. Soon their party had become indistinguishable from Trump himself. It was a terrible thing to witness: awful, but strangely revelatory and eye-opening nonetheless. And as a reaction to this wholesale Republican abandonment of human decency, what had started as a grassroots resistance movement against Trump’s policies became an even more all-encompassing, coherent, and formidable opposition to the Republican party in general.
By 2018, the ranks and collective resolve of all these people had completely solidified as the extent of Trump’s criminality and the existential threat Trump posed to the country, its democratic traditions, and its institutions became more and more obvious. Those people gathered themselves up, went out, and voted in 2018, to express their revulsion not only toward Trump but also the Republicans who had embraced him. Their anger resulted in a Democratic-dominated House. Then, over the next two years, Trump’s egregious fumbling of the COVID-19 pandemic and the concomitant rise of Black Lives Matter, protesting the rampant systemic racism by American law enforcement, further cemented that resistance, uniting disparate social demographics in their fundamental opposition to Trump and Trumpism. What may have served most of all to unite them was the disparaging, sneering treatment afforded to them by the right, as represented by a Republican Party that now had become fully weaponized—by an ugly alliance of right-wing media and Russian bots—against them.
In 2020 the Resistance finally delivered the harshest rebuke possible, tossing Trump out of office (after a single term), in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, electing a Democratic president, and, in 2021, electing a Democratic Senate for good measure. But Republicans by this time had irrevocably and suicidally committed themselves, hitching themselves to Trump’s preposterous Big Lie and challenging the very core of our country’s legitimacy: its free and fair elections. The violent insurrection Trump instigated on Jan. 6—in full view of the entire nation—was the final straw, as the craven reaction of Republican politicians showed they’d learned nothing from the voters’ verdict just months before. To add further insult, the Trump-polluted Supreme Court then weighed in, malevolently yanking away a basic constitutional right that people in this country had counted on for half a century.
RELATED: Outbursts and epilogues: Prosecutors and defense rest in Oath Keepers seditious conspiracy trial
You might think that in such an environment the pollsters and the press would have thought twice about writing off the same massive group of voters that had so clearly taken matters into their own hands just two years ago. But the overwhelming message permeating the media was that the Resistance had just petered out, hopelessly transfixed instead by the cost of a gallon of gas and the price of chicken breasts at the grocery store. Republicans were going to romp, running roughshod over us, we were confidently assured. There was simply no reason to hope; a giant “red wave” was about to sweep it all away, we were told, over and over again.
Instead, the same Americans, their numbers now grown from a homegrown resistance movement into an impervious voting bloc, brought the hammer down once again, marching into the voting booths and thwarting, in historically unprecedented fashion—and against titanic economic headwinds—those same Republicans and the man who still leads their party, Donald Trump. And now they had a new ally: their own children, many of whom were voting for the first time, some whose political education had begun with the Women’s March back in Jan. of 2017. They denied the Republicans the Senate, and left Republicans with a razor-thin, effectively unworkable House majority that already appears to be consuming itself with infighting.
The media are still shaking their heads in bewilderment. But the truth was always there, right before their eyes. The Resistance is alive and well. It’s no longer as loud, it’s no longer as demonstrative. It’s not playing for the cameras on Fox News. But even as the marches and protests have faded—temporarily, at least—into memory, the movement remains. Having now grown to an unfathomable size, and taken stock of its own power, its resolution remains uncompromised, internalized, and now stronger than ever. It’s not going to go away.
RELATED: 'Right track' polling numbers jump following GOP's lackluster midterm showing
How are we going to win the Georgia runoff? By helping nonprofit groups in frontline communities get out the Democratic vote. Chip in $1 today to each of these amazing organizations.