Chop Wood, Carry Water 2/7
We will save us.
Hi, all, and happy Friday.
How’re we doing out there?
Never mind—I know the answer. Gah. What a week! I wish I could give every one of you a hug, but in lieu of that please know that I’m sending love and strength. I know this is unbelievably hard—that we’re physically exhausted, emotionally spent, and deeply anxious. It’s a moment of great trial, and the fact that so many of you keep flocking here to get your “marching orders” day after day really sort of floors me. Many would stick their heads in the sand at a moment like this. Others would flee. You, though, are pouring through the doors, figuratively speaking, and crying “put me in, coach!” It’s deeply inspiring.
This newsletter, to name one example, has gained 43,000 new subscribers in the last thirty days. Wow! But it’s not just that. Ezra Levin, the co-founder of Indivisible, told us on the weekly call yesterday that every week they’re breaking new records for groups formed and new folks signing up.
tells me that “opens” on his newsletter, which delivers the news from a calm, fact-based perspective and suggests ways to deal with it, are exploding. Members of Congress from both parties are remarking on the number of calls they’re getting—the news is even picking it up. And speaking of Congress, Democratic lawmakers are starting to fight back meaningfully. I could go on. There are many reasons to be encouraged.This isn’t to say that the situation is any less dire. It isn’t—it’s bad. What it does mean, though, is that the opposition movement is gaining steam very, very quickly. That’s good. The general rule is that you need 3.5 percent of the population to become engaged in order to overthrow a dictatorship. We’re not there yet, (and we’re not yet in a dictatorship, either, no matter how much it feels like we are), but we’ll get there quickly at this rate, and in the meantime we can still disrupt a lot. Read this article. What we do now really, really matters.
We can and must, too, prepare for the groundswell of disaffected voters to come. It will arise, I fear, only after a good deal more pain is felt. But when Trump voters, unengaged Americans, and others start to realize that Musk and his VP are taking things away upon which they rely to survive they’ll start getting mad. When that moment comes we’ll need to encourage them to channel that rage into action, and welcome them to our movement with open arms.
Until then it’s up to us. But that “us” is growing very fast. That’s deeply, deeply heartening.
Speaking of heartening things, a group of us had a great meeting with Senator Schiff’s Chief of Staff yesterday. There were fifty people on the Zoom (we would have had several hundred more but the organizer capped the meeting); most of the attendees were Indivisible, Swing Left, or other group leaders, activists with years of experience, or Substack authors with large readerships (Robert Hubbell was there as well as I). Only about eight of us spoke, but we didn’t pull punches, and Patty, the staffer with whom we met, was absolutely great in hearing us and taking everything down. There are pretty detailed notes from the meeting here—they’re not without typos but you’ll get a good idea of what was said and by whom. Suffice it to say we were respectful but very blunt, occasionally withering, and very clear that Schiff needed to do better, fast. The message was absolutely received.
One last thing on this: Schiff’s staffer told us that his office phones are ringing off the hook, and that even if folks are just leaving a voicemail, “every single voicemail is being listened to. Every single one.” They are hearing us. Schiff is well aware that people aren’t happy with him and I think we’ll see some movement in the right direction from him soon—in fact, we already are.
All of this is to say that your voice has power, folks. Every lawmaker, no matter how popular or entrenched, has to get re-elected. They have to answer to their constituents. They can make it hard to reach them, they can pretend they don’t care what we think, but trust me: they do. They have to. So please keep calling, keep demanding meetings, and keep showing up at Town Halls. This is how we move the needle, if only slowly.
Ultimately, of course, we are the ones who will save us. But our lawmakers have an important role to play; they must be pushed to play it now. When lawmakers show no courage we must push them to find a sliver of it. When they show some we must push them to show more. Upon those showing tremendous courage we must shower thanks and praise. Every representative, in other words, needs to hear from us, repeatedly.
This is tough, folks. But we’re tougher. Write the below on a piece of paper and stick it somewhere you’ll see it often:
“The object in this mirror is stronger than it appears”
Because it is. I mean you are.
Now let’s get to work one more time.
Call Your Senators (find yours here) 📲 and Call Your House Rep (find yours here) 📲
[H/T to —this is mostly lifted directly from her brilliant post, linked below.]
Hi, I'm a constituent calling from [zip]. My name is ______.
I’m calling because Elon Musk is a criminal and I want Congress to do something about it. He’s engaging in industrial espionage via theft of proprietary technology paid for and belonging to the American public. He is violating privacy laws by stealing the private financial and personal information of every American. He is violating national security laws by accessing top secret documents without a security clearance.
Musk has no loyalty to the United States or to the American people. He’s using his position for personal financial gain. He has substantial conflicts of interest because of his business with foreign governments, especially China.
Musk is about to do to the federal government what he did to X—a company that has lost 75% of its value since he took over. Unless Congress gets him out of our government now, our country will meet the same fate and every member of Congress who failed to act will bear the blame for it. Stop Musk’s crime spree now. Thanks.
Extra Credit ✅
With the Superbowl coming up this is a good time to let people know that Tubi, a streaming platform many will use to watch the game, is owned by Fox News. Fox is, in fact, relying on Tubi to boost their profits and recruit young people into the Fox propaganda network as cable itself fizzles out.
Please share the below article on your social media!
The top lines are:
Rupert Murdoch’s Fox Corporation owns streaming platform Tubi
Watching ad-supported Tubi funds Fox News and promotes Rupert Murdoch’s hate-for-profit media empire
Fox uses Tubi as a pipeline from movie and sports programming to the right-wing Fox media ecosystem
Fox courts minorities on Tubi and seeks to gain their brand loyalty
Fox is establishing a long-term, captive audience normalized to the Tubi-Fox brand
Messaging! Messaging! Messaging! 📣
This piece from messaging expert
is a must-read. While I have repeatedly referred to what Musk is doing as a coup, I think her suggestion that what’s really happening is a “crime spree” (see our script above) will resonate more with average Americans. Check it out—this is great stuff.
Give 💰!
Indivisible has emerged as a pivotal leader in the fight against the Trump/Musk crime org. They are my lodestar right now, and I’m not alone. No other national organization is doing more to organize the organizers. They’re the reason there were 250 meetings at Senators’ offices this week and a huge protest at the Treasury Department. They’re leading people like me and laying the groundwork for the 3.5%. We need them.
Today they launched “the Payback Project,” a new campaign to hold Republican Senators like Susan Collins (ME), Thom Tillis (NC), Dan Sullivan (AK), Jon Husted (OH), and Joni Ernst (IA), accountable for every piece of the Project 2025 agenda that Trump, Musk, and Vought are able to implement due to their complicity.
Donating to Indivisible is one of the most strategic things we can do right now. They’re looking to raise money for this new phase. Please give if you can.
Win Races! 🗳
Reminder: Swing Blue Alliance has ongoing phonebanks for Susan Crawford, who’s running for the Supreme Court in Wisconsin. We really need to win this race. Please sign up to help us do so. Decisively defeating Republicans in elections right now is one of the most important things we can do.
Here are some links from SBA:
Phone bank to recruit poll workers for Susan Crawford
They’ll train you and support you every step of the way if you sign up. Try it!
Chop Wood, Protect Voting Rights! 🗳️
The SAVE Act is a dangerous bill that threatens voting rights (we sent a Resistbot letter about it yesterday.) A great org called Declaration For American Democracy is asking for your help to stop it.
There are two key ways to get involved:
In-District Lobby Meetings: They’re helping constituents meet with their members of Congress to urge them to oppose the SAVE Act. By filling out this form, they can provide you with the resources and support you need to have an effective lobbying visit.
Join Common Cause Phonebanks: Help mobilize voters by making calls to communities impacted by restrictive voting laws.
Please consider lending a hand!
Resistbot Letter (new to Resistbot? Go here! And then here.) 💻
[To: your Senators] [H/T] [Text SIGN PHMEIQ to 50409, or to @Resistbot on Apple Messages, Messenger, Instagram, or Telegram]
I urge you to vote NO on confirming Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of Health and Human Services. I can’t believe he made it through committee! What are we even doing, here?
In his confirmation hearings, Kennedy railed against Medicaid without fully understanding what the program was or who it served. After a career profiting from spewing dangerous anti-vaccine disinformation that has led to countless deaths, he still refuses to acknowledge vaccines are safe.
The secretary of HHS is a major role that oversees the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health, Head Start, and other vital government programs that support Americans’ public health, safety and well-being.
If the administration’s current trajectory is any indication, Kennedy will immediately inject fear, chaos and distrust across the nation. Would we trust him with the pending bird flu crisis or the next coronavirus pandemic? Can we trust him to keep kids safe during cold and flu season? Is he going to condition assistance to our fellow Americans on conspiracy theories and junk science?
I do not think the nation should risk our public health by having such an unqualified nominee lead HHS. I am urging you to vote NO on confirming RFK Jr.
OK, you did it again! You’re helping to save democracy! You’re amazing.
Talk soon.
Jess
I can't recommend Robert Hubbell's Substack highly enough. At a time when it seems everyone is trying to scare the pants off me for clicks and donations, Robert delivers the news like an actual adult—responsibly, completely, and intelligently, but without scare tactics or self-aggrandizement. He's a good writer, too. If you're not already subscribed, do yourself a favor and click through. You'll find it well worth your time.
Call the Republican congresspeople too and rant at them, clog their phone lines. They’re the ones who need to hear from us most!