A vote is loud, Trump supporters.

Whether that vote is cast joyfully, or with trepidation, or begrudgingly, or without all the information, or as a protest, it makes the same bold statements:This is my choice.I am with this person.I consent to their conduct.I co-sign their actions.I endorse them.

A vote doesn’t have qualifiers, caveats, or escape clauses. It simply says Yes or No.

And as we’re witnessing a rapid and expansive dismantling of our nation’s systems, a complete mockery of our Cabinet positions, a terrifying defection of decorated generals and dedicated public servants, a pervasive chaos enveloping everything from our social services to our healthcare to our Military to our essential needs to our standing in the world, the one question I keep wanting to ask you, his supporters is:

Is this really what you wanted?

Did you really want grocery and gas here to rise stratospherically while he dumps billions of dollars into foreign conflicts and his own bank accounts?Did you really want us dragged into an unnecessary, costly, and unwinnable war against a nation our highest Cabinet members and intelligence experts admit did not pose an imminent threat to us?Did you really intend for Latino families to be terrorized in their workplaces, schools, and homes, with no regard for due process or for legal and human rights?Did you really want the predators and perverts behind one of the largest human trafficking organizations in our history to be shielded from accountability for their brutality against our most vulnerable? Did you really want delusional billionaires and oligarchs to have access to our nation’s financial resources, trusted news organizations, and personal data?Did you really vote for the dismantling of programs that provide benefits to veterans, lunch to hungry children, and retirement funds for the elderly?Did you really want us alienated from the world by abandoning every global humanitarian and diplomatic partnership we have participated in?

Is this really what you voted for? Honestly?

Because if this isn’t what you voted for, you need to be vocal now.

Silence is not a luxury anyone can afford in days like these. If you voted for Donald Trump and you’re ashamed of that fact, or if you feel like you’re being unfairly criticized, I’m sorry, but that isn’t what this is about right now. Your guilt or your discomfort doesn’t trump your responsibility as a citizen of a nation you claim to revere. Your regret without a response is useless. No one is interested in shaming you, we’re interested in hearing you.

To be silent now, after voting so loudly, is irresponsible and unhelpful.Your silence doesn’t protect refugees or avoid disastrous Cabinet appointees or pay treatment bills for the soon-to-be uninsured.It doesn’t shield marginalized communities from hate crimes or uncover the truth about the pedophiles in our government, or ensure our kids don’t die from preventable diseases, or pull us from a half a dozen reckless acts of aggression on foreign soil that are costing billions of dollars and unthinkable human suffering.Your silence doesn’t encourage lawmakers to push against their party even if they feel they should, and it doesn’t show solidarity with activists in the streets spending themselves to advocate for equality and justice.It doesn’t discourage the President and his spokespeople from rolling out an unrelenting stream of lies or attacking those doing real, Constitution-guarding journalism.It doesn’t hold those in the highest levels of power and influence accountable for disregarding every procedure, rule of law, and safeguard established to ensure that citizens are protected from those governing them.

Your silence doesn’t do anything right now but allow you to divorce yourself from your vote, to avoid any accountability for the man you’ve chosen, and to perpetuate the erratic, reckless, criminal behavior that is endangering all of us.

What this means, friends, is that if you are indeed regretting your vote in any way, this would be the time to stand up and say so. Millions of us are out here doing the work of pushing back and standing with the marginalized, poor, and disregarded (including Trump voters). We’re marching, and we’re calling our elected officials, and we’re busting our butts to keep our Constitution intact, so that regardless of our political affiliations or religious beliefs or nation of origin, we all have access to the personal and collective liberties this nation promised.

And all the while, this President traffics in partisan rhetoric designed to keep us warring with one another, to divert our attention with manufactured culture wars, to fool us into believing the evil is beside us and not above us, to distract us from the truth that we are in equal peril.

And every day you say nothing, our Republic is more and more vulnerable, more and more compromised, more and more in danger of losing the elemental freedoms that we all treasure.

All this to say, I’m really sorry for your embarrassment, but even more concerned about your silence.

Your vote, for whatever reason you cast it, was loud.

And if you regret that vote or if you don’t consent to what you are seeing from this man and this Administration, your voice now is necessary too.

Please join those of us who are resisting together because we love America more than a political party, because we know we are all closer to being beggars than billionaires, and because we understand that this isn’t about some of us, it’s about all of us.

Please speak, and speak up.

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