Leah Greenberg (5:00)

Yeah, let's go ahead.

Ezra Levin (5:02)

Okay, y', all, I'm gonna give a brief update before we get to Erica. Cause I think that's why y' all are here. We are less than a week out of from the murder of Alex Preddy and Minnesota is in this state of historic levels of resistance. And everybody is asking, okay, what do we do right now? What is the answer? Is Congress just totally useless and irrelevant? That's usually a fair bet, but the news is Congress is not useless and irrelevant. Right now. There is a funding bill for ICE that requires Democratic votes that is moving through Congress right now. The government shuts down in two days if there is an action from Congress. Last week on the first episode of this podcast and we were first talking about this DHS funding bill, we told you that minutes before we started recording this and joining y', all, we had found out that Jefferies and Whip Clark, these two leadership positions leaders within the Democratic House caucus, were not going to whip. The vote for the DHS funding bill, that was bad. We were opposed to it. We wanted to see them unify the Democrat caucus on this. They declined to do it. That's a week ago, y'. All. Time moves fast. That was a week ago. We told you at the last what's the plan? That we knew therefore it would pass the House and lo and behold, it did. It passed the House of Representatives with seven Democrats supporting it, providing the necessary margin to get from the House to to the Senate. That was last week. And as of last Friday, I'll be honest, the smart money was on the Senate Democrats just following suit, following those seven Democrats. That's what most people thought was going to happen. But we know that vote stank last week. It is even more rotten now. Literally the day after the Senate, the House Democrats failed to unify against it. The day after that was the day of the Minneapolis historic shutdown. That's thousands of businesses Tens of thousands of clergy and teachers and nurses and neighbors in subzero temperatures, up in just this historic way to push back against this authoritarian force. And the regime took notice. And they took notice in the most sadistic way possible. The very next day, DHS's secret police responded by murdering ICU nurse Alex Brady. And then the regime slandered him as a violent extremist while shielding his murderers from accountability. And it was not the murder and it was not the slander that shifted the political climate. It was the public response to the murder and the public response to the slander that shifted the political climate. Because after that, over the weekend, Senate Democrats of all stripes started coming out and saying, well, I can't support this. I'm against the DHS funding bill. Look, y', all Republicans are scrambling right now to figure out a way out of this. They are so worried. They are talking about that they're releasing new Epstein files. Do you know how fucked things have to be for Republicans to say they would rather talk about Epstein than ice? That's where we are right now. They are extremely scared about the political climate right now. So that's where we are. Vastly different situation than we were a week ago. So that brings us to literally today, right now, in this moment, Senate Democrats are unified opposing DHS funding right now. Unified. And look, I've been plenty critical, we've been plenty critical of Senate Democratic leadership. Right now they are unifying the caucus against. That is good. That is good. There are two ways this ends because funding for the government runs out this weekend. There are two ways this ends. Either one, Republicans cave and give in to Democratic demands to split the bills apart and actually make some concessions on dhs. Or Democrats gave and give Republicans more time for no reason whatsoever. So to be specific, a Democratic cave in this moment looks like, I don't know, two weeks of funding for dhs. They say, ah, we gotta let temperatures simmer down. We need to get some time to work on a deal together. Fuck that. That's capitulation. We don't wanna see that. What we wanna see is Democrats going on offense in this moment. And for right now, they're unified. So we should be backing them up. That's the key message. What's the plan? The plan right now is, is as long as the Dems are fighting, we are behind them 100%. So if you've got a Republican senator, you should be calling them right now. You can take a break, call them right now and say, stop backing up this regime secret police force. If You've got a Democrat whose name isn't John Fetterman. You should be calling them and thanking them for fighting back in this moment. Encourage them to keep fighting. And if it's John Fetterman, tell him to figure out where the hell his heart is because it's not in the right place right now. Okay, Leah, that's where we are with dhs, but we've got an incredible guest who's going to ground us and guide us. Do you want to introduce Erica?

Leah Greenberg (9:47)

All right. It is my pleasure to introduce Erica Chenoweth who is joining in their personal capacity. They are the Academic Dean for Faculty Development and the Frank Stanton professor of the First Amendment at Harvard Kennedy School. They are a world renowned, one of the preeminent experts in the world on social movements, nonviolent social movements in the face of authoritarianism. They have authored or edited nine books and dozens of articles on mass movements, nonviolent resistance, terrorism, political violence, revolutions and state repression, including most recently Civil what Everyone Needs to Know and on Revolutions. You may know them from the popular discussion of the 3.5% figure, which we will definitely get into today. Erica, thank you so much for being here with us.

Erica Chenoweth (10:32)

Thanks for having me.

Leah Greenberg (10:35)

All right, let me, let me kick off by asking you to ground us a little bit in where we are. Right, because what we are seeing in the Twin Cities is protest and organization. But it's more than that. It is a society wide mobilization and non cooperation to repel a violent occupying force. And we're hearing that neighborhoods across the Twin Cities have got like 4% of their residents in signal group chats coordinating rapid response. We're seeing mutual aid training, advocacy, business and economic campaigns, division of labor for specialized tasks. Just last week, a historic general pause in business, shopping, going to school, walk out in sub zero temperatures. Can you reflect on what this kind of mass opposition means? What was involved in making it possible, what it tells us about the potential and what's needed for actions of this level of disruption to happen on a national level.

Erica Chenoweth (11:31)

Great, thank you. So I think it's useful to just recall in general what successful movements tend to do in the type of context in which the United States is engaged right now. And we can see In Minneapolis and St. Paul the types of capacities that are needed to defend against autocratic consolidation around the country. So the first thing is related to mass and diverse participation. So who has been engaged in Minneapolis St. Paul is people from all walks of life, spanning across difference, spanning across different sectors. Faith, labor, teachers, medical providers, neighborhood and community groups. Local leaders, small business owners, veterans. The participation of people from all walks of life unleashes the power and creativity and the networks of everyone involved. The second thing that's been happening there that I think is very instructive and important is that, as you said, Leah, it's not just about people coming out on the streets in shows of mass protest that has happened, but there have been a huge range of methods with varying degrees of commitment and risk where people can fully express their agency. So we've seen protest, but we've also seen non cooperation. We've seen non cooperation boycotts against businesses or calls to boycott businesses that are going along with things. We've also seen the development of alternative institutions, mutual aid, and all kinds of other methods of neighborhood support that are allowing people to have both the resilience they need to meet the moment and the power through the networks to build more resilience. The third thing that's been happening is that the repression, when it has been happening, has been backfiring. This is important to note that backfire is not something that happens automatically. Usually states when they engage in repression, get away with it, because either nobody is watching or the people who are watching or the recordings that are taken don't get out. So what we have seen is that we've seen abuse and killing, and we've seen people prepared to make sure that that is observed, communicated widely, and that it breaks through information silos. It is absolutely important to point out that Alex Preddy, when he died, was doing that, and others around him were doing that. They were observing abuses to make sure that they are witnessed by the world. Actions only backfire when they are witnessed widely and made obvious that the state's violence was unjust and disproportionate to this situation. That then leads to this really critical shift in power, and that comes through defections, where people in positions of influence begin to change the way they're behaving. So we've seen this. There were police that came out, for example, and said that they were standing basically with the business leaders. Some Republican leaders in the state of Minnesota have either left the party or announced they're no longer running for governor. In one case, making it attractive to be a business that stands with its community is something that takes organizing. But we seen it shift the power in Minneapolis and St. Paul because it's made it basically impossible to go along with business as usual. Then the final point is discipline and resilience as repression escalates is something that is so important to maintain because when people have trained in nonviolent resistance, they've trained in de escalation. They understand the different methods of nonviolent action that are available to them and the different lawful forms of protest and observation. They know their rights. That means that they equipped with the tools that they need to support their neighbors, even as or even because the risk to their community are increasing. And that sense of discipline is exactly what has made it possible for the Democrats to refuse to fund ice Right, because it's clear which side is doing the abusing here. And that's because the community is organizing, not in the conspiratorial sense of organizing, in the how can I best help my neighbors? Form of organizing. That's what we're seeing there and what we'll see nationwide if this country gets out of this mess.

Ezra Levin (16:03)

Speaking of the impact of organizing, I'm seeing a lot of people in the chat note that I called out Fetterman. And Fetterman, of all people, also voted against the DHS fund funding this week. After spending a long time saying he would never vote for any bill that might encourage a shutdown, he voted against it as well. So, look, I will make an exception to what I just said. If Fetterman is your senator, go and call him and say thank you for being on the right side of this vote. We need to encourage and then hold him to it for future votes as well. Leah, do we wanna go to the second question for Erica?

Leah Greenberg (16:35)

Absolutely. Although I will just note there are some conflicting reports about the justification Fetterman provided for that. So I would just say you do in fact have to hand it to him yet. Let's see how things go. Thanks so much for that. I will segue to a related topic, which is that this week we announced the next no Kings for March 28, which is going to be the largest protest to date in American history. And this coming after no Kings 1, which was at that point one of the largest, no Kings 2, which was the largest to date at that point. Despite these historic displays of organization, Trump is currently escalating his attack on our communities and our democracy. And I think a question that we've gotten and that I would love for you to answer a little bit is, you know, what is the purpose of these large scale planned one day mass protests, even of this size?

Erica Chenoweth (17:30)

Yeah, I mean, you know, I think it's important not to underestimate the power of one day protests that are very large show of numbers, the ability to organize something that reaches across every corner of the United States and Shows that there are people who are willing to stand up for their neighbors and for their values and for their rights is very powerful, even in symbolic terms. But sometimes it also is important in material terms too. Studies have shown impacts on voter turnout at midterm elections and in presidential elections and state level elections. Research has shown impacts on legislative votes, the way that people who are in elected office decide to vote. In the end, research has shown impacts on shifts in public opinion. Now, this is true for research on social movements in general, but those three outcomes have been tied to just single days of protest in some studies. I'd also say that large scale protests, days like that, are a way for people to express their agency and invite others to do the same. And I would say that the more a country kind of backslides away from democracy, the more important it is to defend First Amendment rights by expressing them. Because when people don't engage in mass protests, that also sends a signal. And so it is important. And so we shouldn't underestimate the importance of it. We also shouldn't overestimate the importance of it. We know that single days of protest rarely build the type of power that's really needed to fully defend, protect or improve democracy, especially in a backsliding context. Movements are more than protest. Protest is a tactic. And what is needed are strategies to build momentum, build power, and put pressure on institutions and people in different social, economic, political and cultural pillars that can actually bring about the change that's needed. And so that's why I talked about in the Minneapolis St. Paul case, the different ways that we know that movements win. It's about building those capacities to build power, build momentum, build pressure, and ultimately have leverage over the outcome.

Ezra Levin (19:40)

Erika, look, we so appreciate you joining and grounding us in the research around social movements and anti authoritarian activism. We try to be driven by that. We don't. We don't try to just work with the movement and throw stuff at a wall. There is some throwing the stuff at the wall, but it's helpful to have a framework and an understanding of what works in other countries. And so thanks for joining us and answering our questions. We monopolize a bit of your time, but there's going to be a live Q and A now. So I'm pleased to say now we are turning to that live Q and A. If you're listening to this on the podcast, these questions have already been asked and answered. If you're here with us on the zoom right now, you get to ask questions and you get to vote on questions. And we just take the top voted questions. So ones that Erica, me and Leah can answer, we will answer. And ones that we can't answer, we'll still do our best. So with that said, Laura, you have the top voted question for us. You have asked. We frequently talk about how this movement can't just be against the Trump regime. It needs to be for something. The people of Minnesota are standing up for their neighbors and for their communities. And how can we and the Democratic Party use their example to motivate all of us for a better country? Leah, I'm curious about your take and Erica, your take. We talk a lot about the coalition of no that you want an ideologically diverse coalition that might not agree on everything is able to say no. What about the coalition of yes? How did those two things fit together?

Erica Chenoweth (21:08)

Well, there's a well known political scientist named Adam Jaworski who in his newsletter said being against unites being for divides. I think that's a really helpful way to understand the trade offs. On the one hand, being anti authoritarian can build a truly broad set of cast of characters that otherwise wouldn't necessarily come together to stop the consolidation. Once people begin to articulate whether there's agreement about what that broad coalition might fight together for, usually that's where we see blocks emerge. And my take on this is that both things need to happen kind of simultaneously and contemporaneously to one another, but not necessarily by the same set of actors at the same time. Because it's really important to stop authoritarianism and it's really important for there to be movements, groups and communities articulating a better vision for the country going forward and for those conversations to be negotiated and play out separately.

Leah Greenberg (22:13)

I would just add, I think there's a distinction between being for a shared set of values and for an articulated policy agenda. So if you go to a no Kings rally, what you are going to see is a lot of people who are for America, who are for their neighbors, who are for fairness, who are for community, who are for the Constitution, who are for more justice in the world. Right? All of those things collectively. What you're not going to see is a list of 10 different policies that everybody who is throwing in for no Kings has all agreed to back in the order that we've agreed to prioritize them. And that's because you simply would never get the breadth of people who collectively come together to promote no Kings to agree on that list. Now within that formation, there are a bunch of us who are also going to try and push affirmative policy ideas, commitments, visions of what's possible. Because we know that ultimately you are going to need to have a coalition that's putting forward a convincing story of how they're going to make your lives better, both in terms of policy and how they're going to actually make those reforms real. Because we know that a lot of times the gap that we experience is not necessarily that their policies sound good, but that people simply don't believe that they're going to happen. So I don't disagree at all that there is a need for that coalition to articulate the positive vision. But I do think that when you're looking at the immediate imperatives around can we get the largest number of people collectively to come together in defense of common values, but not necessarily in advancement of a shared policy agenda? That is a strategic imperative right now.

Ezra Levin (23:43)

Robert asks Robert from CBFD Indivisible San Diego it's really exciting to see the announcement of the date for the next no Kings rally. In addition to making it the biggest day of protest ever. What about including an impactful economic action as well, perhaps a day of boycotts, strikes the following Sunday and or Monday or the announcement of a targeted longer term boycott, Given that Indivisible will devote a lot of Energy to March 28, is this something that can be discussed with our no Kings partners that focuses on economic action? Robert, have you been listening in on our conversations internally? This is a live, live discussion, Leah, and I'm the one that accidentally reveals too much, so I might pass it over to Leah about how this fits in to our current strategic planning.

Leah Greenberg (24:26)

Well, what I can say is this is absolutely a live conversation across a bunch of folks within the broad anti authoritarian coalition and actions. What we collectively know is that economic campaigning and economic strategies are going to be really important to translate the people power that you see on the streets in something like a no Kings into really targeted and meaningful impact on key collaborators. We know that we've done some of that work to date, right? If you think about the Spotify campaign last year, which was about stopping Spotify from running ICE recruitment ads. If you think about the Avelo Airlines campaign, which was about stopping Avelo Airlines from conducting the deportation flights that many, many folks in the indivisible movement along with Sambra, North Carolina helped to popularize as a campaign idea and that we were proud to support along the way. We've already done some targeted oh, and of course the Disney campaign, which everybody here was part of that brief period where we canceled Disney and our Toddlers were not thrilled, but justice prevailed and Jimmy Kimmel went back on the air. And I'm still not sure our toddlers accepted that justification entirely, but we're moving on. Long story short, we completely agree that this is a tool set and a toolkit that we're going to have to continue to dig in on in whatever coalition formation is possible to really meaningfully drive it home. Because fundamentally, we want to be using all the tools in the toolbox right now.

Ezra Levin (25:55)

You know, I think I might even take it a step further. I mean, we're currently. Our strategic orientation is that an authoritarian never willingly gives up power. And this is a guy who's headed for an absolute catastrophe in the midterm elections. He's going to lose the House, he's going to lose the Senate. There's going to be accountability. He does not want that. He's going to try to subvert the election or sabotage in some way. That is our current assessment. And if you are going to prevent that, if you're gonna prevent the authoritarian from cementing power in that moment, it's not gonna be enough to have a historic level of one day protest. You are going to have to have a more sophisticated operation that looks something more akin to what we're seeing on the ground in the Twin Cities. But at the national level, no. Kings is a tactic within a multiplicity of tactics, and we should be developing those tactics and the size of our movement going forward to that moment. So we're ready to, to actually push back and repel that attempt by the authoritarian regime in that moment. Beverly asked, what is the plan? That's the right question for this place. What is the plan if the Republicans lose the election and Trump declares the results in ballot. I will swear I did not read this question before. I just said what I said, what is the plan? If just before the election, Trump precipitates a war with a major power and cancels the election, what is the plan if Trump decides there is a new pandemic and the election has to be canceled? I think overall the plan is there is no referee in the sky who is gonna say, that's not right. You're not allowed to do that. You're breaking the rules bad. No, the only source of power that is going to organize opposition to that kind of threat to our democracy is organized people power. But, Erica, I'm gonna give you another bite of the apple. If you have specific thoughts of when authoritarians in other countries have used national elections as an inflection point to submit their Power. What works?

Erica Chenoweth (27:45)

Yeah. Well, among other things, there are really, I'd say two general patterns in which we really do see mass mobilization emerging in response to authoritarian threats. The first is when there is some kind of backfire or backlash to a killing, a politically motivated killing. And the other is when we see attempts to steal elections. And those are really powerful moments of coordinated mobilization because those are moments in which people feel that participating in something bigger than themselves to stand up for their values is required of their conscience. And that's when you sometimes see upswells of mobilization. I think the most important thing for people to know about the midterm elections, in my opinion, is that they're going to. There are going to be elections and people should participate in them and prepare to participate in them and know how to and should encourage others to do the same. I think people should be prepared to participate in the elections and elect people who are standing up for democracy. And I think the second thing to think about is that there needs to be a strategy for what happens if the scenario that you just read out comes to pass. But the first thing to do is to elect pro democratic candidates. Small D Democrats is what I'm talking about here. And that is itself going to be a challenge. And so people should be thinking about that and people should be thinking about the backup strategy for how to make sure that we know if the election is stolen and that we can protect the results. And that might require legal strategies, that might require people to engage in protest and non cooperation of varying degrees. And it might require communication strategies and coordination of the kind that we haven't really seen in this country for a long time. All nonviolent methods of resistance that can challenge an attempt to make an election invalid by an autocrat. And we have the ingredients in our country to make sure that people elect pro democracy candidates and that those candidates are seated. And we just need to go with confidence in knowing we can do that, even if it is a little bit uncertain.

Leah Greenberg (30:30)

I think you're hitting on something that we talk about pretty regularly, which is that we are not going to give the would be authoritarians powers that they do not have. Yeah, like Donald Trump does not have the power to cancel the election. Elections are run by states and localities. Donald Trump can make all kinds of crazy declarations and then the collective organizing and weight that we are building is going to be pushing back on that. Right. We talk about this in terms of an entire set of things we have to do this cycle. We've got to shape the election. We got to and by that I mean we got to get the candidates through the primaries that we need to see as future leaders. We've got to protect them all through the year. We're going to have to essentially play whack a mole with the various threats that we've collectively, we're collectively going to face to election integrity, election administration, voter rights across the country. We've got to win them. As as you mentioned, like, we should not forget the part where we actually just have to straight up win the elections in really, really big numbers and then we may have to enforce the results, which is to say on the back end, ensure that the people who receive the most votes take office. And there are a lot of different ways that threats could manifest on this front over the next year. And I could go through all of them and then we would read out, finish out the podcast and that would be the end of it. What we've got to have is the flexible organizing capacity and the kind of tactical capabilities and ability to innovate our tactics that is necessary to push back in a range of different ways.

Ezra Levin (31:56)

Mm. We've got a theme. Several questions on this front. So Gene is doing a follow up here. Next highest voted question. Threats to the 2026 election go way beyond voter access. They include legal and security threats. Starting to see the seizing of records yesterday in Fulton County, Georgia. How do you assess the risk? What can be done? Leah? We internally, we are preparing for a lot of threats to the election infrastructure for these midterms. The places that we are most worried about are places where Republicans and members of the regime control the election infrastructure. So that's especially in a place like Georgia, which at the state level is controlled by Republicans in a place like Iowa as well, in a place in places where there are competitive elections. And also who knows what the regime is going to do when that happens. The elections are months and months and months away. How do you prepare for that eventuality? What can you do now? How much of your brain space should be going to that versus Erica, to your point, just win the damn elections. Like focus on that. Curious. Erica, for your thoughts of if you were telling somebody you've got 100 units of effort to spend on preventing the undermining of our elections. How much of that is in traditional build up grassroots power and build up your voting power and get behind candidates, and how much of that is prepare for what they're trying to do?

Erica Chenoweth (33:20)

Yeah, well, I'd say we need 300 points, Ezra, 100 points on the division of labor, which is Parties need to run candidates who can win and who are pro democracy. So that's like really important. The second piece is on the division of labor with just grassroots mobilization of turnout and other things like that. And then the third is on both building the capacity to make sure that the various things that could happen between now and the next major elections in the country are anticipated and addressed and hopefully even prevented in important ways. Then we have another 300 points on the strategy of enforcing the result if we need to. I'm sorry to expand the pot, but I do think the gravity of it, the stakes of it, are very high. Right. And when I say it, I mean the outcome of the election and our ability to be prepared to make sure that we protect the results if we need to.

Ezra Levin (34:32)

Next. Good. Good. Christine asks from North Central Florida. I have been calling senators and demanding the termination of the current ICE missions and not funding DHS I until significant reforms are in place. When I called Democratic senators, I've been emphasizing that I have a faceless, flawless secret police force invading and terrorizing our cities and neighborhoods in the name of a law enforcement quote, unquote. Law enforcement is much worse than a shutdown and that they must not cave before getting what is needed. Is this the right message, Christine? What I would say is if you were a north central Florida resident, calling Democratic senators from around the country, while it might feel good, is not productive. We had a special folder when I worked in Congress. We had a special filing place for communications that came in from out of the state. We called it the trash can. Cause it was a trash can. We didn't pay attention to those. And that's not even a knock on those senators or House members who do that. That's how the democracy is set up. It is set up to represent constituents. If you are not a constituent and you call into them, they're like, I don't care about this. A good staffer will try to forge you back to your senators. Your senators don't give a shit about you. They're two Republican bootlicking fascist enablers. And so I understand why you would want to go and call Democratic senators. I understand where that comes from. It's not where I put my energy. If I were you, Leah, do you want to feel free to push back on any of that? But also, do you want to talk about how concerned should we be about the message? What is the right message? What is the role of calling a member of Congress in a moment like this?

Erica Chenoweth (36:07)

Sure.

Leah Greenberg (36:08)

The role of calling a member of Congress in a Moment like this is for them to understand as fast as possible the level of energy and outrage around the country on this. And I would say that I've gotten a lot of questions about what are the specific messages here, what are the specific frames, all of the different policy pieces that are moving. And I think it's probably worth taking one big step back and noting that a lot of what we're trying to do here is just hold together Democrats on an offensive play in relation to an issue that they only recently realized that they were going to have to make an offensive play on and that they have historically got a long record of being pretty skittish around. Right. If you've been with us all over the course of the year, you heard us talk about the Lake and Riley act, which was an incredibly problematic MAGA messaging bill, anti immigrant bill that was passed with a hefty number of Democratic votes earlier last year. And I think that reflected the general level of fear Democrats had at the time and have had for most of the last year around being perceived as insufficiently tough on immigration. So we're moving them very, very fast on this. And the most important thing for me is not necessarily landing the exact perfect message on the shutdown. It is collectively convincing them that there is a huge amount of energy, there is a lot of attention on them personally, their votes will be remembered, and that this moment properly being understood as a referendum on whether we are going to have a lawless, out of control, secret police force terrorizing people across this country and ripping families apart. The phrase that I've started using is like, you know, I think it's possible to try to play chess when you actually really just need to be playing bumper cars. This is a bumper cars moment. People just need to know that there is a lot, a lot, a lot of energy and it's coming at them.

Ezra Levin (37:59)

Lee has been saying chess versus bumper cars for a long time and I think it's an excellent analogy. Stephen asks, oh, I'm glad you brought this up, Steven. Can we see if Bruce Springsteen will let us use his new song as a no Kings anthem and maybe also perform it at one of our rallies? Erica, I am going to go to you, but just because I'm curious about, because of your, because of your connection to Bruce and I know you can really pull some strings for us. No, I'm actually, I'm curious about the cultural element of successful people powered protests. But before I get there, I have a more narrow ask for everybody here. I want all of these musicians at no Kings 3, if anybody. Let me put this out. If you have a connection to Jesse Wells, love Jesse Wells, get him connected to us so we can get him on stage. If you've got a connection to Bruce Springsteen, get him on stage. Let us know. Lucinda Williams has a new album out of Protest Songs. Get her connected to us. We wanna get him on stage. This is a time to start reaching out. These folks should be out there. I saw a great video recently that it was just like the most pathetic non rock and roll thing you can be doing in this moment is not calling out the fascist regime. If you want any kind of credibility, if you want to be anywhere near the sphere of cool and you are a public entertainer of any sort that depends on that as your identity or a piece of your identity, you should be out there now. You should be out there now. And we want you there. We want you there. So please connect them to us. We want to get them plugged in to this to make it as big as possible. Okay, Erica, with that said, I filibustered a bit to give you some time to think. What about the cultural side of protest?

Erica Chenoweth (39:41)

Yeah, I mean, there's a lot to say about it. I would say there is a saying that people are probably familiar with that culture eats strategy for breakfast. And a lot of times that's referred to as an internal movement thing, like a movement sculpture. It's a strategy for breakfast. But it's also kind of applicable to whether a movement can build the kind of popular appeal and speak to people's emotional state and whether they can speak to people's heart and help them to self identify with the vision that a movement is leading and laying out. And sometimes the only way for that to happen is definitely not getting people like me to come and talk about numbers and. And research. It's like having somebody write something that is super powerful as a song or as a poem, or doing some incredible public art or writing a new play and having that play censored and then doing a reading of it in public. These types of things have been central to most of the successful movements for democracy over the last hundred or so years because they are able to speak to how people feel about what's going on. And how people feel about what's going on is so much more important than how they think about it in terms of motivating them to stand up and do something with others. And when they see people they admire, talented people that they admire, willing to stand with them, that too can really attract different segments of the population into formation in ways that otherwise just aren't allowed. The last thing I'll say about it is that sometimes the best way to document what a country is going through is through art. Because sometimes it's really hard to put it into words.

Leah Greenberg (41:24)

That's a really fascinating thought. I'm gonna have to think on that one.

Ezra Levin (41:27)

Leah, if you could pick one artist, who would you have show up at? No. Kings 3. It's Ke Doll Ha. You love Ke Doll Ha.

Leah Greenberg (41:35)

Yeah, it's always Ke Doll Ha.

Ezra Levin (41:37)

Okay. And, Erica, for what's worth, you're a rock star to us, so thank you for being here. Eric from Orchard City Indivisible in Campbell San Jose, California, has the next question. It's now midterm election primary season. If any incumbent Democrat House members are not currently willing to go on record publicly in favor of impeaching Trump at all, even though they're currently not likely to have the votes in the House to pass impeachment, then will Indivisible target them for a primary challenge this year? If yes, then what is the process Indivisible will follow to pursue a primary challenge? If no, then why not? We, the people get the change that we want only when we hold those in power, including members of Congress, accountable to us. And Trump and his regime are committing impeachable offenses daily. Eric, I love where you're coming from here. This is primary season. This is primary season. And if you've been just thrilled with the performance of the Democratic Party over the last 14 months, you get to take this season off. You don't have to do anything. It's fine. You'll just vote for whoever comes out of the primary. That's cool. I respect it. Different people have different opinions. If you have been off at a feckless party, at a party that has failed to meet a moment, at a party that surrenders, when they have the upper hand, at the party that does not treat this moment like an existential crisis for democracy, then this is your moment. This is your moment to organize and demand a party that represents you. This is not about picking petty fights with people. This is about building a Democratic party that fights back. And the time to do that is the primaries. After the primaries, y', all, we're gonna rally around whoever wins. We're gonna. It's gonna be between a fascist or a coward in the Republic flavor of Democrat, we're very clear that's an easy choice. But the time to determine what flavor of Democrat we get is the primaries. There are more than 140 Democrats representing House districts that are D 10, Democrat 10. We call those safe districts. D' all do we have 140 fighters in the House of Representatives? You know damn well we do not. You know damn well we do not. Many of those Democrats are not gonna face a primary challenge because nobody is popping up because it feels like a, I don't know, a conflictual thing. Isn't the real enemy the Republicans? Isn't the real enemy the fascists? Why are we fighting among ourselves? That's how the thinking goes. And I hear that. And what I would say is primaries are where we get to determine who our fighters are that we're putting up against the fascists, up against the Republican enablers. And so I would highly, highly encourage you to get involved this season. Whether there's somebody representing you who you think is a weakening Democrat or whether there's somebody across the country who you want to put, put. I'm getting the hook if you want to support for, for leadership within the Democratic Party. Leah, specific to this question though, what is Indivisible's national's process for getting behind primary challengers?

Leah Greenberg (44:25)

Right, so our, our national process is really, it is a bottom up process. Right. So our overall take is we can have all the opinions we want, we can share all of our thoughts on in this space that we want. And also our takes on individual primaries or races are not as relevant as whether there is a local indivisible group on the ground that is getting behind a candidate and that is willing to put real time and effort and capacity into pounding the pavement to get them elected. And so the way that our endorsement process starts is not that Ezra and I go in a room and decide who we're going to back. It's that we look around and see where are the places where indivisibles are really going in and prepared to put some real work into electing the kind of candidate that they've determined is going to be a fighter. Now we've got a national set of criteria that do kind of address some kind of core must haves that really determine whether somebody meets some basic standards for kind of being a fighter. And it's about where does your money come from? Right. Are you accepting corporate donations? Are you accepting crypto or APAC or fascist funders? Are you committed to an accountability agenda? Right. Like, are we actually going to have consequences for folks going forward here? Stuff like that. But, but fundamentally we're not trying to send people like a 50 page policy questionnaire. I have filled those out As a policy director, I do not think they are actually a particularly helpful tool for ultimately shaping people's policy. I can tell you I remember some very painful moments where I was looking up the policy and trying to figure out what it was as I filled them out. Nonetheless, what we are going to do as indivisible national is come in behind some of the folks who are doing this and provide additional support at the national level to make sure that we get across the finish line. Now, the other thing I do want to note is this, this question is specific about impeachment as a criteria. And I actually think it's worth maybe like two minutes on how we think about impeachment right now, because this has come up a lot over the last month, in particular, as we're thinking about, as we're watching just a parade of horrors and crimes and really every month before that, because it's been a big parade. Our take is that Donald Trump has merited impeachment since basically like week two of his administration and week one of his administration. Right. And there's no shortage of different ways in which he has violated the standards for office and is meriting of impeachment. And so if the question is like, does he deserve it? The answer is absolutely yes. If the question is should we make a strategic focus to emphasize impeachment and campaigning for impeachment versus pushing back on ice right now, versus, you know, campaigning to try to stop the one big beautiful bill with Medicare cuts, versus some of the campaigning that we've collectively done that are on issues that are really tangible and salient and directly impactful to people who we need to hold with us or win into our coalition, that's a different calculation. And from our perspective, what we're really trying to do right now in this period where we don't have the votes to impeach, we should be real Democrats might get to more alignment within the Democratic Party, but we do not, in fact, control the House of Representatives or the Senate. So we're not going to successfully vote to impeach him right now during this time when we don't have the votes collectively to impeach. What we want to do is focus on the issues where we can either mitigate harm immediately or where we can build our political constituency such that we can maximize the coalition that is going against these folks for the period when we need to have accountability.

Ezra Levin (47:54)

Erika, I would invite you, you can comment on any of this if you'd like. I'm particularly interested having I've started talking more to to folks in pro democracy movements in other countries and this issue of a feckless opposition party, a divided opposition party, a status quo opposition party, that is disappointing. The grassroots organizing is an issue that seems to come up a lot. And so I'm curious if you have any thoughts on what is the role of a unified, aggressive opposition party and is it possible to achieve what we want without that?

Erica Chenoweth (48:30)

Yeah, it's a big question. I think there's some debate about it. My sense of it is that when the mechanism through which pro democracy movements have won is through the elections, it has happened because they were able to get the opposition party to act like one or they were able to unite opposition parties because a lot of these are parliamentary systems and they have weak and divided opposition parties to unite and create a bloc upon which they ran a single candidate. So what we have is something that's kind of different in the sense that we have really functionally a two party system. And within the Democratic Party there are factions. And so it's slightly different because the Democratic Party wants to organize those factions rather than having a popular movement pull them together and make them do something. And so I don't actually know what the appropriate strategy is, but what I do know is that it's generally movements that lead opposition parties into their opposition posture and allow them to get the power they need in order to effectuate the outcome through that as opposed to the reverse. Right. So it's usually not going to be in a context like ours, the opposition party itself, which is like by definition weak and in the minority and not in a position institutionally to make as much of a difference. The power for them is going to come from a mass movement.

Ezra Levin (50:09)

You heard it from Erica. Be the opposition movement that leads the opposition party where it needs to be. And then our editorial on that would be get involved in a democratic primary near you, adopt one or two that you think are the places where you want to invest some time and energy. Maybe they're where you are, maybe they're across the country. But find those, that's something that you can do right now. And look out for Indivisible's national endorsements. There will be a few coming out in the next couple weeks based on what we're hearing from locals. Erica Different Erica asks we need to unmask the vocabulary of the Trump regime and our politicians. We must refuse euphemisms like enhanced enforcement, security operations, or quote, unquote, public safety, and instead name these abuses as racial cleansing and state violence. This is a national moral emergency. Either we are naming the racial cleansing and organize to stop it, or we allow it to be normalized in our name. How can indivisible nationalist chapters help unmask the narrative? I think this goes even to the basic label of ICE as a law enforcement agency. They're not a law enforcement agency. We were talking that ICE has as much to do with law enforcement as the mob has to do with waste management. Like, it's not what they do. They are a secret police force that terrorizes communities. They're not enforcing the law. They're breaking the law and violating the constitution. Leah, what do you think the role of these, of language is in this fight right now?

Leah Greenberg (51:32)

Well, I absolutely agree that we've got to reject a lot of the terminology that they're using that's attempting to either couch this in terms of public safety or sanitize the sheer horror and inhumanity and racially motivated nature of what they are doing. Right. Like, this is a. This is a racial. An ethnic cleansing crusade driven by Stephen Miller and the white national, White Christian nationalist faction of the MAGA party. We can all be incredibly clear about that. That might not always be the language that I would use as I am talking to somebody who is not paying a ton of attention. Right. I might start with like, what the hell is going on in Minneapolis? They are shooting people in the streets and they're ripping kids out of their houses. Right. Like, because that's going to be more emotion. It's. It's more emotive. It is more like, very directly tangible to you. You may or may not have a framework for, like, what we're talking about when we talk about this isn't public safety, but you definitely have a framework for. I do not want to see children ripped away from their parents and taken off to a detention center away from their mom. So I would, I would think about kind of audience for exactly when and how we're doing what kind of outrage. But I do think that we should all collectively be incredibly clear about the nature of what is happening here. Erika, over to you.

Erica Chenoweth (52:47)

No, I think exactly what you said is right. We gotta make it plain, speak in as plain terms as possible about what's happening and in the most truthful terms as possible. And that's what will give the movement the legitimacy it needs to put forward an effective challenge and take us to a different place.

Ezra Levin (53:06)

Peter from Indivisible San Pedro notes that Schumer and some Dems are making noises about compromise with the gop that they won't push hard Enough. I'm going to summarize. How do we get Schumer to not just compromise in this moment and give an off ramp is the basic question. Here's the answer. Schumer. Look, we've talked about Schumer plenty on this call and elsewhere. I do not think he's been a good leader. Indivisible was one of the first national organizations, I believe, the first in the country to call for Schumer to step down from leadership after an overwhelming vote. We called again when the Senate Democrats surrendered when they were winning the shutdown last year. But we have to understand Schumer not as somebody who is leading the caucus in this direction, but I would think of Schumer as kind of a malfunctioning weather vane. He is responding to the winds that are blowing around him imperfectly. And if you want him to go in the right direction, if you want the Senate Democrats in general to go in the right direction, you have to change the weather. You have to make it abundantly clear what are the consequences, not just for Schumer, but for every member of the Democratic caucus in the Senate and the House so that they understand that this week, who cares about next week or next month, but this week the easiest thing for them to do is to fight back against the regime. If the easiest thing for them to do is to capitulate, that's what they're going to do. We have to make it easier for them to follow us, which means being as organized and focusing as much pressure as possible. I do wanna. I know we're running out of. If you have a comment on this, that's fine. But I really want to end with this Minnesota question, if possible.

Leah Greenberg (54:43)

And I think this is a great one for Erica.

Ezra Levin (54:45)

Yeah, this is a great one for Erica. Carl asks. And this is Carl from Indivisible Minnesota. 3. So thank you, Carl, for joining and for the work y' all are doing. Carl asks, how can we re emphasize to our event participants the reasons for the no Kings core principles? Quote, a core principle behind all no Kings events is a commitment to non violent action. We expect all participants to seek to de escalate any potential confrontation with those who disagree with our values and to act lawfully at these events. Weapons of any kind, including those legally permitted, should not be brought to events. So the nonviolent, fundamental strategic imperative of the no Kings work and organizing this moment.

Erica Chenoweth (55:28)

Yeah. So in this country there are lots of really good studies that show that by maintaining nonviolent discipline, even as repression escalates, movements are more likely to win. There's a really important study by a guy named Omar Wassau who studied this in the civil rights context, and it's such an important piece of work for folks to be familiar with. And in it, what's clear is that there were both public opinion impacts and electoral impacts. But there's also other impacts. There are impacts on the level of what people carry with them after the conflict is over. That's not in his paper, but is in other people's papers about the sort of long term impacts of what kind of country do we want to live in after after there's no need for a movement like this anymore. I'll tell you what I would like to do. I'd like to live in a country at peace with my neighbors. The way that we struggle will totally determine the type of country we are on the other side. There's tons of research to support those claims in lots of different ways.

Leah Greenberg (56:50)

No better note to end on than that. Erika, thank you so much for joining us.

Ezra Levin (56:57)

This has been a fantastic what's the Plan? Erica, I really do appreciate you grounding us and guiding us forward. We will do our best to put the research that you've shown us into work in action. And I think everybody on this call will as well. For people listening on the podcast, you can find us every Friday. For people who are like, oh gosh, I would have loved to ask a question of Erica. You can ask live questions every Thursday at 3pm Eastern time. We join these live. We go through the questions as they're submitted. We are all in this together. We're all figuring out together. But there are more of us than there are of them and we're going to win, folks. So see you next week. If we don't see you in the streets before then, thanks everybody. Indivisible is partnering with Illuminata Media to produce the what's the Plan podcast. If you haven't checked them out, they have a lot of other great podcasts from cool folks like Julia Louis Dreyfus, Mandy Patinkin and Kathryn Grote, Sarah Silverman, Samantha Bee, Hasan Minhaj and a ton of others. You can subscribe on Apple podcasts or check them out@lemonadapremium.com what's the plan is.

Leah Greenberg (58:00)

A production of Indivisible and Lemonada Media. We're your hosts Leah Greenberg and Ezra Levin. Massive thanks to Indivisible national team members who help us put this together each week and to the Indivisible group leaders around the country leading the movement on the ground against our would be fascist rulers. Hannah Boomershein is our producer. Army Mix is by Ivan Kurayev. Jackie Danziger is our SVP of Content and Production. Executive Producer is Stephanie Whittles.

Ezra Levin (58:24)

Wax what's the Plan Is presented by Indivisible, a national movement organization supporting thousands of locally led indivisible groups to defeat this regime, protect our communities and realize a real democracy for America. Don't just listen, Join, recruit and lead. You can learn more and get involved@indivisible.org work help others find our show. Leaving us a rating and writing a review helps, preferably a good one. And you can find Indivisible at Indivisible Team and Limonada at Limonada Media across all social platforms. We'd recommend staying off Musk's Ex for your own mental health and the good of our democracy. But thanks so much for listening this time and hope to see you next week.

Leah Greenberg (59:08)

Hey there, it's Julia Louis Dreyfus. I'm back with a new season of Wiser Than Me, the show where I sit down with remarkable older women and soak up their stories, their humor and their hard earned wisdom. Every conversation leaves me a little smarter and definitely more inspired. And yes, I'm still calling my 91 year old mom Judy to get her take on it all. Wiser Than Me from Lemonada Media is out now. Wherever you get your podcasts.