One Year Later, The Resistance Looks Ahead

by Leah Greenberg, Co-Executive Director, Indivisible

After the 2016 election, my husband Ezra and I gathered a group of friends in our living room and asked: what do we do now?

At the time, we were focused on the making it through the first days of the Trump administration. We knew Trump’s worst threats could pose imminent danger on vulnerable communities. We weren’t imagining grand new possibilities for our democracy. We were thinking in days, not years.

We’d worked on Capitol Hill in the early Obama years, and watched in horror as the Tea Party movement rose across the country and reshaped what was politically possible. We disagreed with their ideology and their resorts to violent intimidation, but we thought they had a core strategic insight: local, defensive congressional advocacy worked. And at the end of the day, the success of President Trump’s agenda wouldn’t depend on Trump. It would depend on whether members of Congress chose to go along with it or not.

So we drafted a guide to local congressional advocacy, in which we demystified congress and gave people the practical information they needed to resist effectively, taking control of their home turf. We thought we were writing a casual reference book for our friends to share with their families. We were stunned when the document, the Indivisible Guide, went viral across the country and burgeoned into the Indivisible Movement championed by thousands of local chapters throughout the country.

What we didn’t understand when we wrote the guide was the power of building volunteer communities dedicated to action. Building progressive constituent power in every community in the country, these local Indivisible chapters became the “wild card” in the resistance against the Muslim travel ban, defunding of Planned Parenthood, DACA repeal, Affordable Care Act repeal and the latest tax scam. Through local rallies, town halls and protests infused with passion and creativity, they reshaped the national conversation by playing defense and fighting on issue advocacy in 435 districts. They demonstrated the extraordinary potential of constituent power in American democracy.

As we come up on the one year anniversary of the Resistance movement and of Indivisible, we have an opportunity to look around at the amazing, dedicated new leaders who have emerged across the country and the organizations they have created.  

In Virginia, Indivisible 757 showed up at their Republican congressman’s town halls in force. Then they supported their founder as she put her name on the ballot for state delegate, in a district where Democrats hadn’t even fielded a candidate in years. In Illinois, Indivisible Chicago created a system of phone banks to help alert progressives in red states to take action on health care. They also got engaged in fighting the deeply problematic Interstate Cross-Check voting program, and uncovered game-changing evidence about its security flaws that made national headlines. In California, Indivisible Yolo helped stiffen Senator Feinstein’s spine to resist the Trump agenda with calls and town halls, while also mounting a successful campaign to get an unaccompanied child from Honduras out of a local detention center and into a loving foster home.

Over and over, we’ve seen Indivisible groups build structures designed to act as bulwarks for resisting the Trump agenda at the congressional level, and then use those structures as platforms to support change in their communities and beyond. Now, the task for us is twofold – ensuring these structures are going to last, and turning our advocacy power into electoral power.

Indivisible groups saw their electoral strength at play this November with the sweeping progressive victories nationwide. Over 180 active Indivisible groups in Virginia engaged in this election through phone banking, texting, and canvassing for our delegate targets. They helped flip several seats from red to blue and elect progressive candidates who ran for previously uncontested seats or represent a more inclusive pool of candidates, such as Danica Roem as the state’s first openly transgender lawmaker, Elizabeth Guzman and Hala Ayala the first two Latina delegates, and Kathy Tran the first Asian-American woman delegate.

This year’s victories won by constituent power have proved that grassroots organizing works. And the pivot to electoral work has shown that people who organize to show up at town halls will organize to get out the vote – and they’ll win.

Democracy is not a spectator sport. If you want to see real change, you have to stand up, show up, or even run for office – even, and especially, when the odds are stacked against you. The movement is still in the making – and we can only begin to imagine the things we will do.

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Leah Greenberg is Co-Executive Director of the Indivisible Project and co-author of Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda. She previously served as Policy Director for the Tom Perriello for Governor of Virginia campaign, managed a public-private partnership on human trafficking, served as an Advisor to the State Department’s Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review, coordinated interagency engagement for the State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, and worked on the Hill for Congressman Tom Perriello.

Let the Sun Shine on Democracy

by Desmond Meade, President, Florida Rights Restoration Coalition

The current grassroots effort to restore the ability to vote to over 1.68 million Floridians grew out of Florida’s failure to remove the remaining elements of Jim Crow policies.

Florida has disfranchised more than 1.68 million Floridians. With the distinction of being the worst state in the country as it pertains to restoring civil rights, Florida requires an individual to wait either five or seven years. In addition, Floridians are burdened with an approximately six-year application processing time that virtually extends the time frame to 11 to 13 years. To make matters worse, during the four years prior to the current administration coming into office, the average amount of individuals whose rights were restored slowly trickled to a measly 48,000. And during Florida Governor Rick Scott’s first year, the number of individuals whose rights were restored numbered a paltry 52. Indeed, it comes as no surprise — though it nevertheless should remain a shock to our conscience — that Florida’s disfranchisement policies remain the harshest and most anti-democratic in the country. The projected progress of Virginia, therefore, calls on us to reflect upon the lack of progress in Florida and why automatic rights restoration should be a paramount priority in our “sunshine” state.

While there are many reasons to support automatic civil rights restoration, I want to focus on two. First, civil rights restoration plays a vital role in ensuring successful re-entry back into society by encouraging formerly incarcerated individuals to become healthy citizens who make positive contributions in our communities; in the process, public safety is also greatly enhanced. But don’t take my word for it. In 2013 Virginia’s own Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli echoed the findings of former Florida Governor Jeb Bush’s Re-Entry Task Force in stating that “about 95 percent of those who go to prison come back out into our communities,” and just like the task force recognized, Cuccinelli agrees that civil rights restoration “benefits society as a whole by potentially reducing recidivism.” Florida Parole Commission’s own study revealed that Florida’s recidivism rate was reduced from 33.1 percent to 11.1 percent among those whose civil rights were restored.

Second, automatic civil rights restoration reflects the spiritual basis of redemption and forgiveness, which we should strive to preserve at the core of our humanity and society. Too often our policies are misinformed by knee-jerk condemnations of and callousness toward individuals with prior felony convictions, without considering that individuals — after making mistakes and serving their sentence — can change for the better. The reluctance or inability to adequately factor redemption and forgiveness into policies has unfortunately led to grossly disproportionate punishments by unfairly conferring upon formerly incarcerated individuals a permanent criminal status, a form of stigmatization that degrades not only such individuals but also the communities in which they live and our nation as a whole. Consider for a moment that, in Florida, almost 70 percent of incarcerated individuals were convicted for nonviolent offenses. Consider that, in Florida, our government routinely strips away rights even for offenses such as driving with a suspended license, disturbing the nest eggs of turtles, burning a tire in public, catching a lobster whose tail is too short, and most recently, for releasing heart-shaped helium filled balloons in an attempt to show affection for a loved one.

As a Christian I am reminded of when Jesus was on the cross and the thief asked for forgiveness. Jesus Christ did not tell the thief that he had to wait five or seven years before being able to enter heaven. Jesus Christ said, “This day! you shall enter heaven.” As Christians, we did not have to wait a probationary period before being forgiven. How then can we justify making an American citizen who made a mistake, and serve their time, wait more than a decade before being allowed an opportunity to have the right to vote restored, or a fair opportunity to provide for their family? How can we expect forgiveness for our sins if we are not willing to forgive others? Like former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, I too believe that when someone commits a crime they must be punished, but, echoing his expressed sentiments, I also believe that those who have completed the sentence for their crimes “deserve a second chance to fully rejoin society and exercise their civil and constitutional rights.”

The right of an American citizen to exercise arguably the most critical expression of citizenship should not be denied. Nor should the decision on whether an American citizen regains the rights to vote be left in the hands of a select few politicians whose decisions are often arbitrary and motivated by partisan politics and corporate interests. Over a century ago, the Framers of Florida’s Constitution drew a conceptual line in defense of individual rights, saying to arbitrary and autocratic power that, from whatever official quarter it may advance to invade vital rights of American Citizens, “thus far shalt thou come, but no further.” Traylor v. State, 596 So. 2d 957 (Fla. 1992).

Today, the time to draw a definitive line in Florida has come. Automatic rights restoration enhances our public safety, affirms our humanity, and promotes democracy. Standing by disfranchisement, standing on the sidelines, ignoring cries for democracy, and delaying restoration of rights will only serve to further entrench injustice. Instead, let’s stand together on the side of justice and make sure that when the sun shines in Florida it beams democracy on all its citizens.

Follow me on Twitter @DesmondMeade

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Desmond Meade is a formerly homeless returning citizen who overcame many obstacles to eventually become the current State Director for Florida Live Free Campaign, President of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC), Chair of Floridians for a Fair Democracy, Chair of the Florida Coalition on Black Civic Participation’s Black Men’s Roundtable, and a graduate of Florida International University College of Law. Full bio >>

The Case for Community

by Leah Hunt-Hendrix, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Solidaire

When we think of “human rights” we often think about the rights of an individual, up against a community, a government, or a corporation who might seek to violate those rights. These rights are something we say we deserve, simply because we are human. But to truly address our individual rights we need to also think about the health of our communities.
 
Over the past five years, I have spent my time raising awareness and resources for organizations that are trying to transform the fabric of society.  When Alexis de Tocqueville traveled around the US in the 1830s he commented on the thick webs of communities and civic organizations. But today, as Robert Putnam notes in Bowling Alone, our society has become increasingly fragmented. We are more and more characterized by an individualism that leaves each of us to fend for ourselves. Our country is increasingly polarized. It’s hard to imagine an America more divided than we are in this moment.
 
The task today is to reconstitute a sense of the common good. But to do so, we must examine the structures that hold injustice in place, and think about communities as the site of power to challenge those structures. Community is the space in which we create agreements, laws, and consequences; it is the space in which we can take collective action to shift policies and norms. Individual flourishing and community flourishing are bound together, inextricably interwoven.
 
At this current juncture, I believe restoring a sense of community or the common good will require at least three things: First, we have to fight for greater economic equality. Ganesh Sitaraman writes in The Crisis of the Middle Class Constitution that the founders of our republic believed that we would be a country of relative equality. They didn’t need to address class warfare in the constitution because they assumed that we wouldn’t have starkly opposed classes, as existed in the old world. But today, the contrast is astounding. The top one percent controls 38% of the nation’s wealth. While some have billions, others are working three minimum wage jobs to get by. In this context, Nick Hanauer worries that “the pitchforks are coming.” We are at risk of social collapse under the weight of this inequality and we must take significant action if we are to avert this crisis.
 
Second, an “all boats rise” strategy is not enough. We know that systemic racism pervades our society and it must be dealt with directly. In Dog Whistle Politics, Ian Haney Lopez shows how racism is used as a wedge, to divide those with shared interests. Seizing on the tendency towards white supremacy, the ruling class has sown antagonism between low income people in a way that has allowed those in power to roll back regulations on corporations, cut the tax rate, and allow for an unprecedented state of corporate control. Lopez argues that we will not be able to truly address today’s inequality without addressing the role of racism. We have to tackle our prejudice head on, understanding the fears that might motivate it, but unwilling to allow those fears to prevail.
 
Finally, to address these first two structural problems, we need empowered communities. There is a tendency, at least in philanthropy, to try to solve problems through technocratic solutions. But most of the issues regarding the abuse of human rights involve unjust power differentials. Whether it’s sexual assault and harassment, or rights to privacy, or economic rights, we will not rectify inequities without organized constituencies that are demanding change. As the saying goes, power does not give itself up willingly. “Inside-the-beltway” strategies, which focus solely on policy or high-level diplomacy, will fail unless there is sufficient community-based power holding decision makers accountable. To truly change oppressive structures, we need to build mass movements with a vision of a more just society for all. 
 
It is a sad and scary moment in our history. Threats abound: from climate change, to political upheaval, to our fragile economy. The only way through this is together.  

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Leah Hunt-Hendrix is the co-founder and Executive Director of Solidaire, a donor community dedicated to funding progressive social movements. She has her PhD from Princeton University, where she studied political theory and philosophy, and wrote a dissertation on the concept of solidarity. The focus of her work is on progressive political power, economic justice and racial justice. She is from New York, and has lived around the world, including in Egypt, Syria, and the West Bank. She currently lives in San Francisco.