Resistance is necessary, but it's not enough
In the face of Trump's authoritarianism, liberals need a principled movement and a plan for governance.
Hi, fellow Americans! Would you like our country to become an authoritarian police state? A nation where federal agents can knock on your door and search your home without a warrant? A nation where everyone has to carry around their proof of citizenship at all times, or risk being arrested by federal agents on the street and thrown into a dungeon? A nation where peaceful protesters are at risk of being maimed or even killed in the street? A nation where the President invokes emergency powers to crush protests with troops?
Those all sound like lurid exaggerations when I type them out — the kind of thing crazy Resistance Libs would rant about on Bluesky. And yet consider the most recent news from America’s immigration crackdown:
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is defending reports that people have been asked by federal agents to prove their citizenship status as Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations continue in cities across America…
On Jan. 3, a Texas detainee died in ICE custody in what a medical examiner is likely to rule a homicide, according to The Washington Post; on Jan. 7, Minneapolis resident Renee Nicole Good was shot four times by an ICE agent while attempting to drive away from officers, and was soon pronounced dead; on Jan. 9, a 21-year-old anti-ICE protester was permanently blinded and allegedly mocked by agents after he was shot at close range by non-lethal ammunition, according to his aunt; and on Jan. 14, a Venezuelan man was shot in the leg during a struggle with ICE officers.
Footage of agents clashing with protesters, crashing into vehicles and going up to homes in cities like Minneapolis [has] spread through social media, and Trump has threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act in Minnesota to squash anti-ICE protests with military force.
The truth is that some Americans probably do like this. There is no freedom gene that courses through the blood of those whose ancestors fought in the Civil War. A deep reverence for liberty does not flow from the water of the Mississippi River. There are some who quietly nod their heads and grin when they see protesters beaten savagely by government thugs, relishing the thought that “the left” is being put in its place. There are those who smile at the notion that an invasion by the anti-White hordes of the Third World is being finally turned back by our valiant Boys in Masks.
But there are fewer of these than before. The furor over the killing of Renee Good and the ICE raids in Minnesota and elsewhere has not died down and vanished into the bottomless pit of the news cycle like almost every other outrage during the long Trump Era A recent poll found that 82% of Americans have seen the video of Good’s killing, and by and large they agree with the obvious interpretation that the killing doesn’t look like self-defense. Many more Americans say the shooting was unjustified than say it was justified:
Those numbers are just the tip of the iceberg. America is getting increasingly fed up with Trump’s immigration policy in general:
ICE’s name is becoming toxic, with a majority of white voters and even 25% of Republicans disapproving of the agency:
Trump’s internal polls appear to show the same. Here’s reporting from Axios:
President Trump's team recently reviewed private GOP polling that showed support for his immigration policies falling. The results, reflected in public surveys, bolstered internal concern about the administration's confrontational enforcement tactics…
The private polling suggested a rupturing of the coalition of independent, moderate and minority voters who were key parts of Trump’s victory in 2024. Such voters will play a big role in determining whether Republicans keep their slim House majority in November’s midterms…
60% of independent voters and 58% of undecided voters said Trump was “too focused” on deporting illegal immigrants, the poll viewed by Trump’s team found.
Joe Rogan, the nation’s most popular talk show host and a prominent Trump supporter in 2024, is among those for whom the stormtrooper tactics of the immigration crackdown have gone too far:
Nor is the ICE storm the only thing that Americans despise about the second Trump presidency. Even most Republicans are opposed to Trump’s threat to seize Greenland from America’s allies:
And Trump’s already-dismal numbers on the economy continue to deteriorate.
To many Democrats and progressives, the news that America is turning against Trump comes as a balm of reassurance amid the otherwise grim drumbeat of headlines. Resistance Liberalism was right about Trump — he was a corrupt, brutal authoritarian at the head of a fundamentally racist movement. Media bullshit can deceive some of the people some of the time, but in the end, being right about things tends to shine through.
Many Dems no doubt hope to ride the wave of dissatisfaction with Trump to victory in November, and perhaps in the 2028 presidential election as well. Polls show that Dems have surged past the GOP in terms of party identification, and that a record-high 28% of Americans label themselves ideologically “liberal”. Gen Z is ideologically more progressive than Millennials on most issues.
Perhaps the American people, bamboozled by right-wing media narratives, simply had to discover the error of their 2024 choice the hard way, and Democrats simply need to sit and wait for the masses to come home.
Look more closely, though, and you can see that neither Trump, nor Trumpism, nor the Republican party is collapsing, the way support for George W. Bush’s presidency collapsed at the end of his second term. The Resistance Libs were completely right about Trump, but they still haven’t managed to come up with a compelling alternative, either ideologically or in terms of a plan for governance. And this is probably putting a ceiling on support for the Democrats.
The evidence shows why Resist Liberalism is not enough
First let’s look at some numbers, and then let’s talk about some principles and ideas.
