David Harrison: Rules for Escaping the Abyss

This is the next of our series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. . 

If you are not already receiving these messages by email, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, Our Unfinished Work, every month.

This pit isn’t bottomless, though sometimes it seems so.

Any time you fall into an abyss, you will wonder whether it is or isn’t bottomless. Abysses have an earned bad reputation. You don’t want to think that extrication or escape is impossible. 

In this instance, related to the unthinkable “presidency” of Donald Trump, the way out is there for us, as long as we follow these simple abyss extrication rules:

1) Don’t spend even a minute dwelling on how you and others fell in, even if where and how you fell in is obvious. (See Joe Biden 2024 candidacy).

2) Assess your current situation carefully. Others with you may be distracted by dangers that are not real. (See Trump executive order usurping state constitutional powers on management of elections.)

3) Realize that it is a waste of time comparing your abyss to warranted concerns of the years ago, unless remembering how we prevailed will cheer and empower you. (See election of November, 2020)

4) Work with all those who fell or were pushed in with you. Dwell now on what you share. (See overwrought debates between liberals and progressives)

5) Don’t let weariness or resignation take over. (See most of us, December, 2024)

6) Identify the most promising paths (See below...)

The 2026 House of Representatives elections, in which we will take back the House and elect Hakeem Jeffries speaker. Poll averages place the generic Congressional vote at +4% for Democrats. Gavin Newsom and California will successfully respond to Texas redistricting and Republican gerrymandering will stall in the face of Kathy Hochul’s New York threats.

The 2026 Senate elections, in which we have found new energy from Donald Trump’s execution of North Carolina’s Senator Thom Tillis. Former Democratic NC Governor Roy Cooper is a strong candidate. Republican Senator Susan Collins is (deservedly)in trouble in Maine and former Senator Sherrod Brown is giving us a new shot in Ohio. If ultra-right winger Ken Paxton unseats John Cornyn in the Texas primary, Democrat Colin Allred will have a solid chance in the general election.

The Virginia governorship, in which voters will decide this November to select former Democratic member of Congress Abigail Spanbarger who holds a 10+ percent polling lead. This is a take back made possible by Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin reaching the maximum two terms 

The FY 2025-2026 federal budget (or continuing resolution), in which divisions among Republicans leave no way for speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader John Thule to get approval by the deadline date of September 30.

A growing number of appellate court decisions in which litigants have blocked Trump from proceeding in such areas as massive agency layoffs, unlawful rescission of appropriations, DOGE actions, and due process for deportees. The Supreme Court has stayed several of these rulings, allowing Trump to temporarily continue. Many of these cases will ultimately move forward with district and appellate courts already having found that those litigating against Trump are likely to prevail on the case’s merits.

Trump promised the American people that he would end the war in Ukraine his first day in office. Because he is unwilling to challenge Putin, his only option is unthinkable - to cede Ukrainian territory and thus reward the Russian invasion.

And then there are the tariffs, and their resultant inflationary pressure.

Of course, having Trump as president is agony. No one is saying otherwise. From vaccine rejection to throwing 10 million people off Medicare to ending our international role in fighting hunger and disease, Donald Trump is killing people as surely as if he was firing a gun.

Just because this seems endless doesn't mean we won't set our country free. At this point, we can be participating in and funding local organizers and getting behind individual candidates.

In addition, one of the most disheartening features of this past year has been these three Senators abdicating their core beliefs. Let's remind them of what they promised and sought by doing these three things:

1) Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine is chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee. Donald Trump just did a "pocket rescission" of over $4 billion in aid to poor countries. This means he will freeze the money, ignore the Budget and Impoundment Act that governs such matters, and let the clock run out. This action treats Collins and her Congressional Committee as minor functionaries rather than an equal branch of the US government. Call Susan Collins at 202 224-2523 and tell her that she is violating her oath of office by not standing up to Trump.

2) Republican Senator Lindsay Graham of South Carolina has been a lifelong truth teller about Vladimir Putin's threat to Eastern Europe. Graham was John McCain's close ally in making certain America never forgets the danger that Putin presents. He has since bromanced Donald Trump to remain "relevant". Call Lindsay Graham at 202-224-5973 and tell him that ceding Ukrainian territory to an occupying country is a desecration of American ideals.

3) Republican Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana is a doctor who has spent his entire medical and political career advancing the use of vaccines. He has stood by while Trump and Robert Kennedy Jr. have taken apart the vaccine protections that he and his colleagues built over decades. Call Bill Cassidy at 202-224-5824 and tell him you know what is in his heart, and that he can't stand aside any longer.

There is no one waiting behind us if we step aside. Let's find our way out of the abyss.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

David Harrison: John Thune’s Confession

This is the next of our series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. . 

If you are not already receiving these messages by email, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, Our Unfinished Work, every month.

Dear fellow Americans,

Some of you have followed my very successful political career, at least since I was elected to the Senate in 2005. I cast myself as a George W. Bush Republican, eager to remove obstacles to his policies as he began his second term. What it meant to be John Thune was to have people describe me as a solid conservative with a moderate approach and a yen for building consensus. That is still who I am.

You might ask yourself how I as Senate Majority Leader could walk away from my past as the Senate agreed to its version of the Donald Trump proposal on taxes, spending and debt? It aims to extract many billions of savings from the help we give to poor people to get more money to comfort the comfortable. How could I square my own commitments to human compassion with the plan to cut access to food aid and remove medical assistance from ten million Americans? 

The easy answer is my job was and is to find consensus within my party. However, two things have happened in the past week that make that easy answer unacceptable to me. First, when my colleague Thom Tillis announced his no vote on the Senate floor, he told the truth about what Medicaid cuts would do to the least of our brethren in North Carolina. He said we are breaking the promise not to cut entitlements. For me, he raised the image of a child writhing in pain or even dying with caregivers hugging them through their last breath. I am haunted by those we will leave behind, as we shamefully field the media-tailored White House untruth that Medicaid will be unchanged for those for whom it is intended. The President gets to say whatever he wants (“We’re not cutting Medicaid”) but we are making the biggest health care cuts in history. Unbelievably, some of my colleagues are reveling in this.

We’ve grabbed food stamps away at the same time, reducing the rolls by over three million people. Unbelievably, the motivation in part is to have more funds to give to people who have long since stopped needing the money. We should require billionaires to go to grocery stores, stand in the aisles and take things from the grocery carts of those we are disqualifying.

What were once Republican conservatives have lost our party. There is no clearer sign than the Kabuki-theatre style drama we set up for Senators Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski. I think some Americans even bought into Lisa Murkowski’s “agonizing” vote to put the bill over the top, and Susan Collins’ “fight” for rural hospitals. At least Rand Paul stood for something with his no vote. Collins and Murkowski stood for nothing. At no point did I fear that they would extract major changes. As the majority leader, I would let Lisa Murkowski settle for her whaling captain tax break every day of the week. And take Josh Hawley, please. His principled plea to protect Medicaid ended up in a vote in favor of the enormous cut. Where did he really stand?

There’s more to say, but I won’t say it. Many of my colleagues had cheered the inventiveness of solar and wind energy entrepreneurs in our states, bolstered by the previous  administrations. We stood by while the bill assaulted those companies, which will force many to close.

It’s a hard business. I understand as a Senator that you don’t always win. I get it when my colleagues fear recrimination from someone who hasn’t hesitated to employ political punishment. I have felt the same lash myself. In December 2020 I announced that the election results would stand and was threatened with a primary challenge. I fought for the COVID vaccine. But the fact that I once stood up and didn’t this time makes being part of this awful month harder, not easier. 

The “resistance” doesn’t seem to get how much of this bill they can unravel as they take the House back in 2026. Many of the Medicaid changes are being phased in, to try to protect our swing district House members from what otherwise may befall them. They can be phased out as well. Some of the most severe cuts aren’t scheduled until 2027, which gives Democrats the challenge of getting the millions of independents and Republicans who receive Medicaid to register their disapproval before they feel the reality of being thrown out of the system. Resisters even think Elon Musk’s pronouncements and money will have a minor impact, which is not close to accurate. If Musk does what he says he will do, it will muddy every close race. 

If I were in the shoes of those who can publicly oppose what just happened, I would read and follow the recommendations in David Harrison’s missives:

1) Quit the Rending of the Garments

Donald Trump didn’t win a second term. We gave him one. Perhaps it is unwise to start a chorus of cries that our republic started on July 4, 1776, and ended upon the President’s bill signing on July 3. Might that not be just a little bit self-defeating?

2) Support Roy Cooper

Perhaps the only good thing that happened for Democrats during the last month was Donald Trump unfairly torching John Thune’s friend North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis and blocking him from seeking re-election. The president had several good conversations with the highly respected Tillis before his severe attacks on social media, leading to the Senator’s decision not to run again. This seat replaces Susan Collins’ Maine race as the number one Democrat take back opportunity. Democratic former Governor Roy Cooper is popular. He won the governorship in 2016 even as Trump was getting the state’s electoral votes. Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump will find that Trump’s political appeal is not transferable. Supporters will have to wait a little while. Roy Cooper will make his decision to run in the next month

3)      Target Vulnerable House Members

Polling on the generic congressional vote is more favorable for us than it was in November 2024. From now until November 2026 there will be lists of which Republican congressional candidates are most vulnerable. Swing Left is already raising money for a fund that targets 15 Republican incumbents, all of whom won by less than 3% in 2024, and all of whom will be more vulnerable because of their recent vote to root out whoever is in need and take away whatever we had been giving to them. It’s the best targeting going right now. Eventually Swing Left will create “district funds” which will be set aside for individual races until someone wins the primary. The Cook Report is a little more conservative on which races are in play. At this point, the Democratic Congressional Campaign is also raising PAC money for targeted races. Understandably, they want to put as many races as possible into play. They have identified 35 districts to target. 

As the Supreme Court closed off Federal District Court judges issuing national injunctions, they identified other promising paths for the legion of litigators that remain in aggressive support of our Constitution. In addition to the above strategies, let’s stay tuned on that, and let’s channel our anger into action against the man who would be King.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington 

David Harrison: Some Help Is on the Way

This is the next of our series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. . 

If you are not already receiving these messages by email, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, Our Unfinished Work, every month.

Trump’s plan could not be clearer. Include in your one hundred executive orders forty that your lawyers tell you are unconstitutional. Assail the courts, even judges you appointed, hoping that the fear you are generating will yield rewards. Bludgeon your friends when you feel like it, as a tool to maintain your control over them. When you do something that generates disapproval from your supporters, pretend you didn’t do it. Lie liberally and shamelessly, and craft different versions of the same lie, tailored to the audience. Say you didn’t say what everyone knows you said. 

Blame the courts, Joe Biden, Congress, Jerome Powell, law firms, the media, and then Joe Biden again. Criticize Zelenskyy, praise him again, and then mock him. Deny him what he needs, causing soldiers and civilians to die. Then call yourself a hero.

Elevate revenge. Shut off the vaccines which can prevent the death of poor children around the world, then call that efficiency, or say it makes America great. Walk away from countries whose soldiers stood at our side during world wars and call your negotiating behavior an “art”. Surround yourself with sycophants. Remove your own loyal appointees if Laura Loomer has something bad to say about them. Favor dictatorships over democracy. Randomly fire people when you have no idea of what they do and how valuable they are. Praise yourself endlessly. Never apologize.

Some Help is on the Way

Too slowly but very surely, a bit of help is on the way. Liberals had decided that the courts would bow to Trump at every turn or that he would ignore any federal court order he didn’t like. Any worry about Trump is a fair worry, and District Court Judge James Boasberg is being pushed to the wall on the El Salvador prison plane. However, Trump and his minions have followed numerous temporary restraining orders and will continue to do so. There are several reasons for this.

• Federal judges have considerable powers in finding individual governmental officials in contempt, including Department of Justice attorneys, whom they can suspend or even disbar. 
• Financial markets hate uncertainty and would react unfavorably to any non-compliance by Trump.
• Ironically, the Supreme Court gained some credibility with many Republicans by developing their novel and expansive view of presidential immunity in criminal cases.
• Chief Justice John Roberts has already pushed back against Trump on his attack on federal judges. The late-night Supreme Court ruling blocking ICE deportation of scores of Venezuelans has added due process to the ICE equation. So has the release of several ICE detainees by Federal district court judges.

Given the questions asked by Supreme Court Justices at their recent hearing, it is likely that there will be new restrictions on Federal District Court judges protecting plaintiffs by issuing nationwide injunctions. It is popular to say district judges are overreaching, but they are not the ones who are pretending that the Constitution and Bill of Rights doesn’t exist. The Court will make it more difficult to enjoin the Trump administration nationally but will emphasize the process by which class action suits that cover all plaintiffs can advance. If there is little immediate national protection available, lawsuits will proliferate, and injunctions providing relief to only part of the aggrieved population will materialize. There will be patchwork action by the government focusing on geographic areas where their actions aren’t stopped by court order.

The media will paint the limiting of national injunctions as a significant Trump victory, but they will overstate the case. All these court suits include a judicial finding that the plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of the case. Trump has had almost no success getting appellate courts to overturn district court rulings. This will continue.

Where Legal Action Will Succeed

Trump has no chance of overturning birthright citizenship, and no chance of being able to use the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to authorize deportations without due process. There are several areas of progress. Six months from now, constitutionalists will have had great success in two of these areas:

James Madison would be pleased that due process has been elevated in the consciousness of Americans and even has been recognized by Trump’s Secretary of State Marco Rubio, whom Trump has not recently mocked.  Procedural due process is not limited to American citizens. It means the individual must receive notice of the government's action, have a hearing, and have their case decided by a neutral decision-maker.  

Happily, litigants are now getting traction on Trump’s illegal freezing of funds that Congress has appropriated. Here, Americans still see every announced cut as a completed act of perfidy, although some of Trump’s actions will be reversed. Among the Trump freezes that have already been thawed are $4 billion to universities through the National Institutes for Health, rules to lower University overhead, payment to USAID contractors, and FEMA funding to states. As bad behavior continues, courts will rely on the 1974 Budget and Impoundment Act, which Trump has ignored. It clearly delineates the steps a President must take to rescind appropriated funds, including gaining approval of both the House and the Senate. 

Resisters can celebrate that these litigative efforts will continue. Of course, the other major front for resisters is battles in Congress. The holdup of Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” is over issues that will resonate with voters in November 2026 and thus give Democrats back the House, unless they pull defeat out of the jaws of victory.

For months, the question for Speaker Mike Johnson is whether the enormous Medicaid cuts could fly under the flag of waste, fraud and abuse and thus allow Republicans to avoid this narrative --- Republicans are throwing eight million people off Medicaid. Parents won’t be able to take their child to the emergency room even if she is screaming in pain. Republicans are comforting the comfortable, transferring any savings from Medicaid cuts to enable tax breaks for the rich Americans that least need them.

Shamelessly, Trump insists that he doesn’t support any Medicaid cuts at all. What the Senate under John Thune has realized is that by including tax breaks for the rich, an increase in the debt ceiling, and deep social welfare cuts all in one big bill, there will be no avoiding the negative narrative. An option would have been to include the tax breaks with defense and border spending and put social welfare cuts in a separate bill.

All of which demonstrates what a charade it is. Republicans want to keep Trump happy and a majority of voters happy. The only way to do both under this level of scrutiny is to lie about the impact of budget cuts. Senate and House Republicans will ultimately agree on an approach because they will need to lift the debt ceiling by mid-summer. If there are a score of moderates, they will regret the cuts as being two harsh, and scores of Republicans will label the cuts insufficiently brutal and insane.

The budget reconciliation bill(s) they pass will sink the House Republican majority in November 2026. Plenty of damage will be caused between now and then, but our mid-term success will help us prevent future damage and regain the White House in November of 2028.

Let’s do these three things now. 

1) Push Democracy Forward

Attorneys General from Trump-battling states have been at the center of winning lawsuits against unconstitutional executive orders. It’s good to support nonprofit litigators too, including the coalition Democracy Forward. They have good political instincts and have filed 50 lawsuits so far. They are in it for the short term and the long term. Their coalition includes nearly every activist organization that is seeking the most robust legal strategy possible. Since misinformation and misunderstanding of threats is our enemy, it is good to know that the best guidance on legal challenges underway is the Brennan Center for Justice. 

2) Ask 12 Republicans to Keep Their Word

In mid-April, twelve House Republicans wrote to Speaker Mike Johnson stressing “we cannot and will not support a final reconciliation bill that includes any reduction in Medicaid coverage for vulnerable populations.” It is time to hold them accountable. Call their offices through the House switchboard at (202) 224-3121 to remind them that we are all watching. They are Reps. David Valadao (R-Calif.), Don Bacon (R-Neb.), Jefferson Van Drew (R-N.J.), Rob Bresnahan (R-Pa.), Juan Ciscomani (R-Ariz.), Jen Kiggans (R-Va.), Young Kim (R-Calif.), Rob Wittman (R-Va.), Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.), Nick LaLota (R-N.Y.), Andrew Garbarino (R-N.Y.), and Jeff Hurd (R-Colo.)

3) Keep This Person in Mind

One could fairly say that our 2024 presidential campaign effort was not without its glitches. It is also fair for this missive to wonder who might be exploring running for President at this very moment. Time to take a first look at what Governor Andy Beshear of Kentucky has to offer. He has won twice in a red state and has walked the picket line with the United Auto Workers. Yes, those two things are in the same sentence. 

It's a grind, but we are starting to accumulate some wins. Luckily no one convinced us it would be easy.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

David Harrison: This Will Not Stand

This is the next of our series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. . 

If you are not already receiving these messages by email, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. We share these posts on our blog, Our Unfinished Work, every month.

From the outset, Donald Trump’s countless executive orders and other malevolent actions were meant to overwhelm Greenland, Canada, Hakeem Jeffries, Charles Schumer, Emmanuel Macron, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, John Roberts, and you. 

Overwhelmed people can have difficulty getting their bearings. Absent immediate help, they begin to think their desperate situation is permanent. Once they hear that assistance is on the way, they could discount that news. Bizarrely, they can fall into acceptance of their situation and aid in quashing their own hope. Law firms, universities and small countries can even aid in devising the conditions of their own surrender.

There is a choice. Overwhelmed people can see new possibilities emerge. While assessing the enormous unavoidable damage that this country will continue to suffer under Donald Trump, they can find meaningful opportunities to fight back. Those opportunities are growing, and with them the sheer number of resistors. We are capturing our fury and put it to use.

That is where we are now. Even as he holds majorities in the House and the Senate, we know where Trump can be pushed downhill. 

• John Thune and Mike Johnson have squeaked by on budget and spending policy. They are now at an impasse with each other and the Senate and House Republican caucuses. The question is how to add to the mix the necessary increase in the debt ceiling and an enormous tax cut. There is no “one big, beautiful reconciliation bill” already teed up. The increase in the debt ceiling has led Johnson to promise the Freedom Caucus the House will make draconian cuts and to promise the small band of “moderates” the House will not.

• Some lies are more difficult to sustain. Donald Trump’s professed love of tariffs and his prevarications about their lack of cost to consumers will collide with Americans’ demand for imported products. Trump’s bludgeoning of other countries will diminish our access to their markets for years. Inflation will increase noticeably, markets and consumer confidence will decline, and the Fed will be forced to act upon their worries. Unbelievably, Trump sold himself to the voters as the penultimate manager of the economy. The number of Americans who believe they are “better off” under Trump’s economy has dropped 33% since January. There is more to come. 

• So far, resistors have underestimated what federal courts will do. Part of this judgement is based upon the Supreme Court doing extra duty to protect candidate Trump from criminal charges. The rest is Trump’s bluster, bargaining the courts will shy away from certain rulings that are unfavorable to him because of worries about his potential noncompliance. However, federal courts have a broad array of enforcement actions that make noncompliance nearly impossible. Further, the already battered markets would not stand for it. Finally, federal judges (including the Supreme Court) read history books too. Yes, they are going to advance Trump’s powers to replace the heads of independent agencies. 
  
  Once Trump and Musk comply with what civil service protections require, they will be able to dismiss tens of thousands of federal workers. But John Roberts and Amy Coney Barrett will emerge again. The Supreme Court will not allow any larger scale diminution of legislative powers, or the end of birthright citizenship, or the illegal impoundment of appropriated funds, or the elimination of well-established due process rights, even those afforded to undocumented persons. There have been at least fifty federal court rulings against Trump executive orders and other administration actions. 
  
  In almost all cases, judges have established that the plaintiffs are likely to prevail when the merits of the case have been examined.

As Trump starts the slide from the top of the hill, we can help push, for the good of the world. Let’s do these three things:

1) Get Back into Your Cell

Doing things together can be key to maintaining our intensity of effort. The outstanding political organization Common Power offers numerous real-time opportunities to groups of resistors from around the country to do work that counts. 

Indivisible has been there since the darkest days of December 2016 when Democratic leadership was absent. They have an excellent search feature to help us find like-minded, organized people. 

2) Fight Against Unthinkable Aid Cuts

It has been disheartening to watch Republican past supporters of the Agency for International Development stand by watching the agency be dismantled. It has been additionally disappointing to see the once somewhat balanced Marco Rubio forgetting everything he said previously about our country’s international role. Now comes the Foreign Aid Bridge Fund raising millions to do what they can to stem the loss of nutrient based foods, community health care workers, refugee assistance, vaccine testing and other assistance previously provided by USAID. This fund has several major partners and is well grounded in the work that demands immediate protection.

3) Don’t Let Unacceptable Actions Be Forgotten

It’s not just Marco Rubio who can’t remember what he did and said previously. Pete Hegseth can’t remember that the Department of Defense’s impending military attacks are classified and Mike Waltz can’t remember that calls should be secured. It’s heartening that the conservative Republican Senator Roger Wicker and conservative Republican Representative Mike Rogers are, as noted by Rogers, “still trying to find out what happened.” They are chairs of their respective Armed Services Committees and are duty-bound to stay focused. Call Roger Wicker at 202-224-6253 and Mike Rogers at 202-225-3261 to emphasize this point.

So, it goes. Donald Trump is stomping upon our nation and dismissing our longtime friends who have been by our side for a century. We will work every day to make sure this does not stand.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

David Harrison: Elon, You’re Really Killing Me

This is the next of our series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. . 

If you are not already receiving these messages by email, please click here to be added to our list. You can also follow me on Facebook where you can read and share these messages. The more people we can reach, the more we contribute to this growing movement. 

Donald Trump’s opening month was designed to leave you overwhelmed and in despair. The sheer extent of his malevolence has been epic, as has been his boorishness, his antipathy to the Constitution, his racism, his misogyny, and his blindness to other nations and to people in need.

If you don’t die in a flood, eventually you will take stock as the waters recede. If you can, you will check right away for permanent damage, mourn your losses, and try to achieve some measure of equilibrium. That’s difficult enough, isn’t it?

It’s worse with the Musk-like smell in the air, the armed assassin, bursting with self-importance, chortling, surveying the landscape and looking for unintended survivors. And then you get to hear that it isn’t what you say it is. That’s not a Russian dictator your nation is bowing to, and he didn’t attack Kiev. There are no nuclear weapons unprotected, no airways made unsafe, no epidemics invited, no tax cheats empowered, no hospitals closing, no parents desperately seeking medical help for a comatose child, and no vendettas pursued. Just one more day addressing inefficiency.

Already, our despair is not just outdated but unaffordable. Sheer fury stands as the only option, a guided fury that finds, exposes and addresses Trump’s vulnerabilities. However we got to this place, this is where we are. And we know exactly where we need to go. Substack-er Robert Reich got it right. Our progress is already measurable. 

Courts will block Trump’s executive orders in many areas, including his efforts to eliminate birthright citizenship. Happily, they will also require the Office of Management and Budget to release most of the appropriated grant and contract funds that Trump has blocked, citing the solidly constitutional Impoundment Control Act of 1942. Ultimately, this will save us from the embarrassing spectacle of Republican Senators using back channels to plead with Trump aides to release funds that the Senators have already appropriated.

Unfortunately, the Supreme Court has been bent on overturning their 1935 Humphrey’s Executor ruling, which required the President to establish neglect of duty or malfeasance before firing the head of an independent agency. The Court will rule that this standard usurps the President’s constitutional powers. The bigger issue here will be what the Court will do with Trump’s amendments to civil service protections, where he seeks to hugely expand the number of workers who are thought to be involved in “policy” and who thus would serve at the will of the President.

All the more reason for resisters to reactivate the Congress, which is not nearly as hopeless an objective as one might guess. At this point, Speaker Mike Johnson has a two-vote margin and must tend to the dispute between the “Freedom” Caucus who would massacre Medicaid and a small number of “moderates” who would protect it. Not shockingly, Donald Trump has lied, endorsing the budget proposal which would slash Medicaid after saying two days previous that it was not going to be touched. This is what is in Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill.”  

Worse for Johnson, this budget reconciliation process is his only way to increase the debt ceiling (and keep the government open) and his only way to pave the way for Trump’s tax bill, including the candies he passed out on the campaign trail. Johnson has no path forward. Doubly worse for Johnson, he has no way to pass the continuing resolution appropriating the current year’s spending without Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries supplying some votes.

Trump, Johnson and even Senate Majority Leader John Thune are talking like they have a majority and a mandate that does not exist. We can help clarify things for them by doing these three things:

1) Protect Medicaid from Trump and Musk

What could you say about a nation which would seek to cut a person with no money who needs to go to the doctor to help pay for tax cuts for the wealthiest? Find the right Republican member of Congress and call their number to reject that proposition. You can remind them that Donald Trump said he wouldn’t touch Medicaid.

• Call Rep. David Valadao of California, who has already spoken out. Reach his office at 202-225-4695
• Call Rep. Marianette of Iowa, who won in 2024 by less than a thousand votes. Her number is 202-225-6576
• Call Don Bacon of Nebraska, who has shown in the past that he can stand up. Reach him at 202-225-4155

2) Save Lives by Protecting Vaccines

Republican Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana is a doctor, who has fought for vaccines his entire medical career. He vouched for Robert Kennedy as HHS Secretary, saying that he had gained important concessions on protecting vaccines. In one of his first acts as HHS Secretary, Kennedy formed a task force to reconsider vaccine requirements. Call Bill Cassidy at 202-224-5824 and tell him what he knows, that lives are hanging in the balance and that a nation is depending on him. Here is a vaccine protection tool kit, and here is the bad news about measles in Texas, helped along by the anti-vaxxers. 

3) Build Our Country for the Future

We can and will take back the House in 2026, and that’s not so far away. Attention is always being paid to donations to political organizations and candidates. These are not charitable donations for those that itemize contributions to eligible nonprofits. However, there are important ways to use charitable contributions to bolster organizations that are trying to protect democracy at a critical time. See the attachment to find six important examples of tax-exempt organizations who need your assistance. For those over 70 ½ they can even accept a share of your required minimum distributions (RMD) from your retirement account.

No one is saying we can’t have hearts that are breaking for our country and for our planet. Instead, we are saying that this cannot and will not stand. We are all in for guided fury that finds, exposes and addresses as much as we can of what has befallen us.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

David Harrison: Here are the Rules

 This is the next of our series of missives on our unfinished work to restore the promise of our country and its government. Each will focus on a single element of the many opportunities and challenges that lie ahead. . 

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You could watch the news and become dispirited, and it wouldn't be just because of Donald Trump's awful assault on America. 

Jill Biden is known to be angry at Nancy Pelosi for her lack of "loyalty" displayed in getting Joe to withdraw from the race. This is preposterous. We should be outraged at Jill and Joe Biden and their aides for serving democracy and all of us up on a platter. If Nancy Pelosi made an error, it was in not starting a quiet campaign to block Joe a year earlier in 2023, when he had promised to be the bridge to new leadership.

Even in running against an un-constitutionalist, the margins were too narrow for Democrats to field an 81 year old burdened by a serious bout of inflation coupled with obvious cognitive deterioration. How about just reading epic tragedies laced with deep irony, rather than acting them out? As much as we can puzzle that voters bought Donald Trump's con, our initial wounds were self inflicted.

So, what now? Led for the time being by lawyers seeking injunctions, the resistance is reforming. It demands our full commitment until we are out of this mess. A condition of our success is learning how to better sort out which of the mass of Trump's executive orders and other actions are contestable in court; which need Congressional approval in the face of slim majorities; which are subject to the reaction of voters and the market; and which take advantage of those powers of the presidency that are most difficult to constrain. Making these distinctions is an essential part of resisting. Note these examples:

• Trump's quest to end birthright citizenship will be blocked by the courts. As federal district court Judge John Coughenour (a Reagan appointee) has already emphasized, Trump has no path. The constitutional protection for these babies is unambiguous. Trump will be blocked by the courts as well in his effort to destroy the Civil Service, since the statutory protection for civil servants is also clear. But there is little protection for the fired inspectors general and there Trump will prevail. Trump's massacre of environmental protections will bring effective but uneven legal challenges, depending on the environmental laws he is citing or ignoring.

• Though Mike Johnson's house majority is tiny, the media and the markets are following anticipated social welfare budget cuts and corporate tax reductions as though they have already happened. The media seem to think the choice is one giant budget reconciliation bill (Mike Johnson and the House) or the same content spread over two bills (John Thune and the Senate). However, members of the House Freedom Caucus have already ignored the Trump/Musk entreaties on lifting the debt ceiling and they will continue to do so, Right now, on the budget there is no path forward for Trump, even if he shuts down the government he is running. There is a very real chance that Johnson will have to turn to Hakeem Jeffries at some point in the process.

• Trump has broad authority to change Denali's signage. (Be sure to click here right now for John Snell's better sense of Denali) 

• On foreign policy, to Zellensky's chagrin, Trump's presidential powers allow him to chat with Putin regularly. He can bully Denmark and Panama with relative impunity, and his presidential powers to apply tariffs are broad. Here his problem is that a lie repeated a thousand times remains a lie, even when your Senatorial sycophants are swooning. The primary impact of Trump's tariffs placed on Mexico and Canada is to increase costs for the American consumer, thus spurring inflation. The stock market will correct downward, and Trump will be chastened to the extent that is possible. That's why tariffs are a better as a bullying position for Trump's trade negotiations than they are an actual step to be taken.

• In certain cases, the public's response will cause Trump to sand off the sharpest edges of what he otherwise would do. That's the case with deportations. Once he gets beyond deporting felons (which is an old practice) and turns to the seven million undocumented workers and their families, people will be herded and employees will be removed from jobs. Farmers will say they can't complete the harvest, families will be torn apart, and thousands of people will hit the streets. As with Trump's last term, everyone from Oprah to Melania will watch this all on the news and will seek a pause.

What to do right now? First, don't forget we need to take back the Virginia governorship by electing Abigail Spanberger in Virginia to replace the term limited Republican governor Glenn Youngkin. Then, for now, you could also look for who needs help among the many organizations who are filing or are intending to file to block Trump in court.

It is a good thing that attorneys general from the states will be major players on selected issues, as they already have been on birthright citizenship. During Joe Biden's presidency, the Supreme Court narrowed the circumstances under which states have standing to challenge federal actions, but they still will be there a lot.

Those inclined to provide financial assistance to litigating organizations need to decide whether to boost organizations who will seek to block Trump in multiple areas or in one specialty area like federal civil service or climate change. The larger litigants include the American Civil Liberties Union and the very well respected Brennan Center at NYU. An interesting player on multiple fronts is Democracy Forward, a coalition of litigants whose purview is even broader than that of the ACLU and Brennan Center. 

Often there will be multiple litigants. This is the case with the three separate promising lawsuits filed against Musk and the "Department of Government Efficiency". These suits have a statute behind them that forces transparency upon government advisory commissions. 

At this point, the major fighter against Trump's attempted takedown of the civil service is the National Treasury Employees Union. (NTEU). There has yet to be anything filed to try to defend our country's role in the World Health Organization. 

Several environmental organizations are headed to court. Ironically, they will seek to take advantage of the Supreme Court's Biden-era ruling in the Chevron case, which scaled back considerably the power of the Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency to broadly interpret environmental laws when carrying out enforcement.

The litigation will grow in coming months and there will be early successes. Slowly and certainly, these and other avenues to put MAGA in decline will become clearer.

And we will all be there to do just that.

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington

Where we go from here

Dear friend,

After years of blogging about our collective fight against MAGA, and after receiving comments from hundreds of you, I feel like I know you. You are not going to be surprised that the election results broke my heart just a bit. We had a chance to put Donald Trump behind us at long last, and we weren't quite able to get it done. This outcome will definitely require a recovery period.

But I already recognize that it's not just frustration and sorrow that have invaded me, it is anger! After I momentarily hung my head, I lifted my head. This will not stand. We will not let our country be destroyed and our constitution be shredded by a man whose love for himself and indifference to others are monumental. As Kamala Harris said today, this is not about the end of a fight, it is about the beginning of one.

That's a fight we join right now. In 2018, after two years of Trump's incumbency, we all worked to achieve the Democratic "tsunami", taking back 40 House seats and regaining Nancy Pelosi's speakership. That can be our result in 2026, a giant step in restricting Trump's powers. The obsession toward that end must start now. There's a lesson out there about no wound-licking, just pride in what we stand for, and hard work to back it up.

Join me in starting now. I am changing my blog to a simple email format, and you will get it somewhere around the 25th of each month. As in the past, it will evaluate the current outlook and offer things each of us can do. You don't have to do anything to subscribe but if you want to un-subscribe (perish that thought) there will be that option at the end of each email. This is also a great time to get your friends to join the list.

Best to all

David Harrison
Bainbridge Island, Washington