As many voices are calling for our country to find common
ground in this era of political polarization, I too wish for that commonality.
But I lament especially with the way Donald Trump has sought to trash
established institutions and practices, that common ground may have been
eviscerated to the point of no return.
I have shared on these pages before my view that the 30%
or so of Americans who continue to support Trump no matter what he does are
people who wish to live in a very different country than the one we had before
2017. They are the MAGA or Red Nation. My project since Trump was returned to
office has been to challenge people who work and reside in Blue places,
multiracial democratic spaces, to hold their ground against the Trumpian
onslaught.
This is because I believe we have come to the place where
we live culturally in two distinct nations: one Red and the other Blue. I
believe that those of us of a Blue persuasion must weather this Red Nation
storm in the belief that if we stick our guns, “this too shall pass.” Central to
the problem that Trumpist face is that Red and Blue nation people and those who
don’t neatly fit into either pole all live amongst each other. That is why I
believe that if Blue nationalists hunker down, continuing to do what they do,
take hits from Trumpian Red nationalism and wait out the storm, they’ll still
be around when Trump leaves office, though undoubtedly in a battered and weaker
state than before.
Two voices over
the last year have mapped a hopeful way forward in these perilous times. Joyce Vance, who you might know from
the podcast Sisters in Law and as an MSNOW legal commentator,
published a wonderful little book entitled Giving Up Is Unforgivable at
around the time Trump got re-elected. In it she surveys the depth and
breadth of our political institutions and the checks and balances built into
them. She cites the Civil War, two world wars, the Great Depression, Watergate
and the period after 9-11 as moments that placed great stress on national
institutions and argues they were able to respond to and endure.[1]
Vance focuses primarily on our political institutions. The
federal courts have done their job ordering many of Trump’s executive orders
and other acts be halted on statutory or constitutional grounds. Sadly, with
the big exceptions of tariffs and birthright citizenship, the Supreme Court has
appeased Trump by employing the fast track “shadow docket” to permit him to do
his thing illegally.[2]
The shadow docket has been used to allow mid-decade
redistricting favorable to Republicans since late last year.[3]
Its use is intended to further dilute the Democratic vote and lock in a
Republican majority for the foreseeable future. Still, Vance exhorts us to use
First Amendment rights to pressure Trump from all angles, especially she
implores us to vote.
We shall see if the massive Republican effort to distort
mid-term election outcomes in their favor works. People may be so unhappy with
Trump’s policies that they vote his Republican minions out of power.
Meanwhile, at the level of the big private institutions
of civil society we have also seen
capitulation of some major universities, law firms and media companies
under pressures from the Trump administration.
Last December David Callahan of The Nation raised the issue of
the role major private foundations can play in deploying their resources to
counter Trumpism.[4] This was
after the Department of Justice had announced that it was considering investigating
George Soros’ Open Society Foundation for supporting domestic terrorism and
illegal immigration. They also singled out the Freedom Together Foundation and
the Ford Foundation for scrutiny. Callahan questioned whether the foundations,
which are “creatures of the capitalism,” were up to “challenging the system
which had spawned them.”[5]
I’m happy to report that nearly two years into Trump 2.0
a number of big foundations are holding
up quite well. In May the Open Society Foundation announced a “$300 million
initiative to improve the daily lives of Americans and stand up for the rule of
law while strengthening rights and freedoms under attack across the United
States.” This “represents a meaningful expansion of the Foundations’ work on
democracy reform and economic justice.”[6]
Freedom Together Foundation CEO Deepak Bhargava swiftly
threw support for Open Society when it was first targeted saying it was a “blatant
efforts to weaken civil society’s ability to hold the government accountable.”[7]
In the summer of 2025 Freedom Together announced it was seeking to raise $250
million to help grassroots groups “push back against President Trump and what
they see as his steady drift toward authoritarianism.”[8]
Having announced its intentions the foundation seems to be stealthily going
about its business. So I have no idea of how their efforts have progressed.
I was not able to find information about the Ford
Foundation’s response to the administration’s threats. But if you peruse its
website today, you’re immediately confronted with the rubric “The Work of Our
Moment” with subtitle “The Importance of Democracy and the Rule of Law.”
Knowing that Ford operates globally one could think that heading applies to
anywhere in the world. But the adjoining photo features a brown woman and child
standing gleefully next to a sign reading “Vote Aqui” (Vote Here).[9]
Alas! I must once again point us to the wisdom of Antonio
Gramsci which relates so well to what the Blue Nation faces today. Trump’s Red
Nation ...
at
the moment of (its) advance and attack ... would find themselves confronted by
a
line of defence which was still effective ...
the defenders ae not demoralized, nor do they abandon
their
positions, ... nor do they lose faith in their own strength or their own
future.[10]
[1] Joyce Vance, Giving Up Is
Unforgivable.
[2] The shadow docket rulings allow the
Supreme Court to rule without
the benefit of oral argument and without offering legal reasoning for
decisions.
[4]
David Callahan, “Philanthropy in the Crosshairs,” The Nation, December
2025, pp. 32-37.
[5]
Ibid, p. 36.
[6] https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/newsroom/open-society-foundations-launch-300-million-initiative-to-advance-economic-security-and-defend-civil-liberties-in-the-united-states
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