#47: Trump Has Underestimated Our Response to His Perfidy

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Just because all of this has become one of the most bizarre episodes in American political history doesn’t mean we can’t handle it and fix it.

Donald Trump’s removal of John Brennan’s security clearance would otherwise be seen as miscalculation, but Trump is not necessarily a calculator. Instead, the party he has taken over has permitted him to select his enemies almost randomly. Omarosa Manigault is a “dog”, no longer a “wonderful” person. Jeff Sessions is “scared stiff and missing in action” now, but before he was a man of “integrity, principle, and great resolve.” Justin Trudeau, Teresa May and Angela Merkel hardly know what to expect anymore, except that they will be meeting with someone who has no business being the President of the United States. The lashing out is now unrelenting. Lebron James? Jimmy Fallon? New Congressman Conor Lamb, now called “Lamb the sham.” Here are his 487 primary insults thus far. 

There is a reason his customary levels of anger and retribution are accelerating. His party is about to lose control of the House and might possibly (a longer shot) lose the Senate. He is not that astute at understanding the details of Senate and House rules, but he knows that Democrats controlling the House means that his powers will be diminished. Nothing close to the awful 2017 tax bill would have been passed if the House had been under Democratic control. Worse for Trump, as we win the House, the Chairmanship of the House Intelligence Committee will no longer be the toadying, unprincipled Devin Nunes. It will be Adam Schiff, relentlessly focused on Trump’s Russian ties. And House Committees have clear, protected powers to issue subpoenas to administration witnesses.

So, you can make it so that his good times are all gone, and maybe get him thinking that it’s time for moving on. His presence as president is anomalous, not the beginning of a movement that will rend the Constitution for decades. Instead, we will spend those decades re-joining the world community, re-invigorating our love for democracy, reversing the worst of his “make the rich richer” policies, and re-establishing environmental protections.

There are arguments out there that the blue wave might not end up as strong as is being predicted, but the recent primaries have been nothing but supportive of the claim that the wave will be big. As is often the case with off-year elections, this is all about turnout and using new voter registrations to boost our turnout advantage even further. The most recent primaries show it is working. To make matters even better, Republican retirements have left an unprecedented number of open seats. 

In Washington State, where CBS news tracking has seen only one Republican seat as competitive, impressive Democratic turnout revealed that there are three. For all that has been said about Republican loyalty to Trump, there are a declining number of Republicans. In the past year, there has been a 5% drop in the number of people who identify themselves as Republican or leaning Republican.

This wave is still there for us to produce. No distractions, no excuses. By now, it is necessary for this movement to have each of us be a fully engaged member of the resistance. Can we check all ten of these boxes?


□ You have made it a point to learn the specific ways in which actions by Trump and Congressional Republicans have diminished America, beyond the lies and the bullying. You can choose among your favorites when you underscore these matters to others. These include the further maldistribution of wealth through the tax bill; the pushing of millions of Americans away from the health care they need; the systematic attacks on environmental statutes; and the weakening of the coalition of Western democracies.

□ You have placed yourself in a circle of like-minded people who either get together to work, or who even without getting together empower each other regularly with new actionable information. Postcards are produced, calls made, complex matters sorted, resolve strengthened.

□ You have identified reliable external sources of news and information which will sharpen your personal campaign efforts, and you consult them regularly. You have avoided letting these sources swamp your day.

□ You shrug off distractions. You don’t know what Donald Trump thinks of John Bolton’s mustache. You don’t even care. You spend more time on campaigning, almost none on You Tube parodies. What’s the point of those? How hard is it to make fun of Donald Trump? When you are laughing, isn’t the joke on us, at least a little bit?

□ You rise above despair that someone is crumpling your Constitution and you relish that emerging from this dysfunctional government is within our capacity. You already are imagining what party you want to go to on November 6, but you remember that we have to produce the results before you celebrate them.

□ You have picked one or more promising campaigns to support. You know what that support entails, and so does the candidate and her or his staff. You feel good about the choices you are making,

□ You are actively trafficking in online voter registration links and are trying to find and motivate unregistered voters. If you are older, you are unafraid of connecting with millennials on this critical matter, to the point of making yourself annoying if necessary.

□ You are actively deploying your checkbook. Within your means, you have made yourself an investor in our future. You are making careful choices about where you are putting your money. You understand that the earlier you give, the better.

□ You continue to contact members of Congress as you find new ways to give them guidance. You know what actions they need to take between now and November (including passing a budget and fixing the DACA separations) and you intend to weigh in.

□ You allow yourself to dream about how this country will re-emerge. Rather than petrifying yourself with the worst possible news, you are embracing the best possible news and endeavoring to make it so.

Right now, while we are carrying on all of the above campaign activities, let’s do some fixing in areas where Trump has done damage and open up some new fronts.

1) Bring Immigrant Families Back Together
	There are numerous refugee advocacy organizations, and refugee resettlement centers for those whose legal status is not being challenged. It would be good to find out and support those who do that work. One could also support one of the many excellent organizations who are advocates or who offer legal assistance to undocumented persons, including those seeking asylum. Notably, there is a small, new, spirited organization which is determined to offer specific assistance to individual families which are in the slow process of being reunited, who are spread across the country and whose need is great. This is Immigrant Families Together  They have set up crowd funding accounts to meet the very real and detailed needs of refugee moms who are seeking to care for their children. You can click and support. Or you can get wonderfully focused and set up a “registry” to allow you and your friends to all boost the same mom.
2) Take Some Personal Action to Protect the Environment
	It is going to take a long time to put back in place the Environmental Protection Agency rules promulgated by Barack Obama and pulverized by Donald Trump. Right now, the best thing we can do toward that end is make the blue wave happen. We can also commit ourselves to personal action. Shaking our heads as the television shows us miles of plastics in the ocean does not turn out to be an effective strategy, and certainly Trump is not preparing to offer one. So, let’s look at a couple of pledges that force us to modify our own activity. OneLessStraw is taking pledges from individuals, businesses and schools to give up plastic straws, which we certainly don’t need. The Million Bottle Project needs your pledge to keep 20 million plastic bottles out of landfills by 2020.
3) Accept it is Time to Get All the Way Behind Beto O’Rourke
	Beto O’Rourke is trying to unseat Ted Cruz in Texas, which would be such a wonderful thing that one can barely permit oneself to dream of it. And he may be 6 points behind. But he does have a bit of a chance and does represent the kind of principled hugely energetic and imaginative candidate we long for. He has raised twice as much money as Cruz at this point by eschewing PAC donations and getting small donations from around the country. We’re from around the country so let’s give him some small gifts.

So, Rudy Giuliani has argued that truth isn’t truth. That got the expected single news cycle push back, and we moved on to the Manafort conviction and the Cohen plea. But it was a moment worth dwelling upon because it demonstrates the path that Trump has put us on. At any time, truth is whatever he says it is. If the whole world was a courtroom every one of his uttered sentences would be a perjury trap. The New York Times has fact-checked 250 statements Trump has made about Russia and the Mueller investigation. The man will say anything and immediately thereafter, he will believe it is true because he remembers he said it. Stay focused and he will find that he has underestimated our response to his perfidy.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

#46: We Intend to Go Out and Win an Election

Thank you for continuing to share these messages with your friends, if you are not already on our mailing list, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, A Path Forward to November 3, 2020, every two weeks, which means there will be a total of 100 missives before the Presidential election of 2020, in which our country will select a whole new course.

At least we don’t need to devote our precious time examining the pros and cons of supporting the sitting President. There are no pros. This is a dumpster fire in the White House. The occupant of the position is intentionally rejecting what it even means to be a president. We will never, ever let this stand.

How we collectively spend our time and money between now and November 6 could not be more important. Now that Trump has again called the press “the enemy of the people” it is not overreaching to say that the ink on the Bill of Rights is getting a little blurry. And there is so much more--- threats to the existence of a bloc of democracies that together attend to global security; the declining access by many Americans to health care; and Trump’s aversion to the opportunity for people of all races to be a part of one nation. 

Now we have been treated to Trump’s “everybody does it” tweeted defense about his son and other campaign officials seeking dirt on Hillary Clinton from people connected to a hostile foreign government. This is the same meeting that Trump had previously claimed was about adoption. Trump didn’t know about the meeting, and if he did, it wouldn’t have been collusion, and if it was collusion, it wouldn’t have been illegal, and he is tougher on Russia than anyone. That’s the story for now.

The terrifying and glorious thing is that we don’t have to wait the interminable 27 months until the 2020 presidential elections to stop much of this. What happens next isn’t just up to him, it is up to us. We’re writing this story too. All the more reason for us to do the things now that are most likely to matter on November 6, 2018. The less we waste energy and dollars between now and then, the bigger the blue wave.

Each of us has already been investing time and money in this outcome. This resistance is the largest political movement since the 1960’s. Collectively, we are spending a staggering amount of time on supporting individual candidates, registering voters, and writing checks. The giving intermediary Act Blue alone will channel over $1.5 billion to Democratic candidates and causes this year, over twice the amount in 2016.  

How are we doing in the choices we are making? The extent to which we generate the blue wave depends not just on energy and tenacity, but on devoting our considerable efforts to where they will have the greatest impact. These are seven steps that will guarantee that we will do our very best:

We don’t buy into the narrative that the policy debates within the Democratic Party are going to impair us. Instead, we will see the vigorous exchanges among liberals and progressives on health care and economic justice as what we should be doing if we want to stand for something in addition to being against Donald Trump. (Although being against Donald Trump is a hugely powerful cohesive force, no?)

We remember that it isn’t just about Congress. It’s about taking back state houses and state legislatures. This is even more the case because it is in state capitols that battles against voter suppression by Republicans will be fought. It is also where redistricting plans will be developed after the 2020 census.

We don’t allow ourselves to be distracted by Paul Manafort’s ostrich coat, or Ivanka Trump’s fashion line, or Alan Dershowitz’ arguments with former friends, or even whether Melania Trump watches CNN, though it is a delicious thought that she does.

We pick our targeted races carefully, now that the primaries are ending. Swing Left has identified the 78 House races where we have the best chance to take back seats. There are other such lists, and there are analyses like the Cook Report which would claim that only 40 or so such seats are truly competitive. We should stay with the higher number, and believe in what we can do, so we will not leave behind a candidate who could have won. However, we should not be spending any amount of our time and money on any House race outside the 78 unless (in the uncommon case) we can verify with independent polls or other concrete evidence that the race should be targeted because it has become winnable.

We remember that the Senate is in play, too. It is all about Joe Manchin and Jon Tester winning in West Virginia and Montana, and then Democrats winning 6 of the 7 states that Real Clear Politics rates as toss up states. Mitch McConnell isn’t wrong when he says that it might all come down to whether Democrat Heidi Heitkamp will survive in North Dakota, where Trump retains inexplicable popularity. That’s why Trump was so mad at the global Koch brothers for boosting Heitkamp by withholding their financial support from her opponent Kevin Cramer. (The Koch brothers! Oh, the company we keep…)

We don’t forget that it is a turnout election. Right now, there is an enthusiasm gap which means that Democrats and Democrat-leaning Independents are more excited about voting in the fall than Republicans. We need to continue to fan that enthusiasm. Talking about the blue wave as an unusual phenomenon of which voters want to be a part is a good strategy.

And even after we remember all of these things, we still won’t be done. If we are donating money, we must understand how our chosen candidate is fairing in raising money and what her/his plan is between now and November. If we have any choice in the matter, we will give money now (since campaign treasuries have been depleted during the primaries) rather than waiting until October.

If we are doing postcards or calls from a distance, we will remember to expect a quality effort from the targeted campaign, or the intermediary that is providing the names. We expect to know what our preferred message is and any other information on the approach we are expected to take. We must be given information on what kind of voter names we are being provided so we can do our best job.

It is a good thing to travel to a neighboring Congressional district or even another state to help, but only if we know in advance how we are going to be deployed. Campaigns have a difficult time managing rapid increases in volunteers. Talking to one of the campaign’s volunteer coordinators is essential. We need to know that the campaign we select has figured out these matters so won’t be the seventh volunteer in a week to deliver campaign materials to a household.

Volunteering and donating go hand in hand. Modest sums matter, especially at this point when our candidates are looking to broaden their support. Here are three things we can do today:

1) Find the Intermediary Organization that Works for You
	Sorting out races is difficult. Depending on how much time you want to spend, it isn’t such a bad idea to get a little help from people who work on this every day. Who does a good job of collecting and distributing funds to carefully selected candidates? Swing Left, an upstart from the beginning, continues to impress with its “district funds” project, distributing funds to the most competitive candidates. If you like the idea of proximity, they will help you find the swing district closest to you. Years ago, Emily’s List was an upstart too, and now they are a veteran funder helping sway elections on behalf of pro-choice Democratic women.  There are also inventive projects that help activists in Democratic enclaves find and support state legislative candidates in other districts. Sister Districts is looking for money for these candidates, but they are also looking for volunteer help. They have organized working teams in several areas. It is not too late to search and find some kindred spirits with whom you can work.
2) If You Donate to Just One Candidate, Let it Be Heidi Heitkamp
	We could beat Dean Heller in Nevada and pick up the open seats in Arizona and Tennessee. We could defend Joe Donnelly’s Senate seat in Indiana, and Claire McCaskill’s seat in Missouri. A lot of good things can happen, but we could still fall just short of taking back the Senate majority if we lose Heidi Heitkamp’s very tight race in North Dakota. She won by 3,000 votes in 2012 in a state where Barack Obama was losing to Mitt Romney by 60,000 votes, so has proven herself to be an able campaigner. Yes, this is a race that will attract donors from across the country. But, yes, we still need to send Heidi Heitkamp our $50 or whatever we can put together. She is giving it everything she has, so let’s give her something that we have.  If thinking about the small but real chance we have to win back the Senate is capturing your undivided attention, it certainly would not hurt at all to send some money to Claire McCaskill too.
3) Sign Up to Back Up Michelle Obama
	As reviewed in a previous missive, Michelle Obama has a massive new project to register voters, called When We All Vote. She is backed up by everyone from Lin Manuel Miranda to Tom Hanks, and now she needs to be backed up by all of us.  When We All Vote is sponsoring a huge Week of Action from September 22 to 29. They need event sponsors and volunteers. It’s time to sign up to see what’s going on and see how we can help.  It is important to remember that in taking this on as her singular project during election season, Michelle Obama is setting a different course than what was advocated by Democratic campaign strategists. They have seen voter registration and even get out the vote efforts as the sideshow, not the show. They would rather have the former First Lady endorsing candidates and participating in campaign rallies. What she knows is this year is different. Her organization, and Rock the Vote, and the League of Women Voters, and scores of other efforts could make an exceptional difference in districts that heretofore have been Republican-leaning. Many of these have lower Trump approval ratings but nonetheless need a jolt to the voter base.

Donald Trump is going to spend from now until November 6 doing rallies for mean-spirited candidates and making things up. Robert Mueller will file a hugely consequential report. For our part, we intend to go out and win an election.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington