The failure to enact Build Back Better in its entirety (or close to it) isn’t on the sole shoulders of the Biden administration. To say it is is a cop out insofar as it takes any responsibility off the shoulders of the broader coalition, including the left that elected Biden, but became legislative observers in the post election period. This isn’t an academic matter, but germane to future trajectory of our country.

The place of left and progressive people is in the organizations and coalitions that mobilized milllions for the NO Kings Day rallies. It is there that they will find the anti-MAGA coaliton in all its diversity as well as the political wherewithal to defeat Trump and MAGA.This doesn’t preclude their own independent political formations, but it should underscore that these formations will take on life and gain in strength to the extent that they are a part of this mass, militant movement of millions and its organizations.

The overarching challenge of this moment is to further build a multi-class people’s coalition to the point where it has the capacity to throw Trump and the MAGA movement on the defensive and ultimately decisively defeat this incubus of evil and American style fascism.

Such a turn of events and fortunes will take sustained initiatives and struggles on multiple levels. Crucial in this regard, but NOT a substitute for sustained mass actions in other arenas of struggle, are the special gubernatorial elections this fall in New Jersey and Virginia, not to mention the elections in some major cities around the country. Their outcome will give us some measure (for better or worse) of where we stand in the overall struggle against Trump and MAGA.

Obviously, anti MAGA activists should leave their imprint on these elections.

Sweeping negative characterizations of the Democratic Party fail to take into account the diverse trends/groupings that exist under that tent as well as the overarching challenge — decisively defeating Trump and MAGA — at this moment and what logically follows —the imperative of broad unity. Such a blindspot is not only analytically shortsighted, but also tactically wrongheaded insofar as it narrows down the potential and necessary opposition to Trumpism.

“It’s time for a comprehensive national civic uprising. It’s time for Americans in universities, law, business, nonprofits and the scientific community, and civil servants and beyond to form one coordinated mass movement. Trump is about power. The only way he’s going to be stopped is if he’s confronted by some movement that possesses rival power.”.

So wrote David Brooks, who’s no radical, in a oped article in the New York Times. 

“Peoples throughout history,” he goes on, “have done exactly this when confronted by an authoritarian assault. Drawing from the work of Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan, Brooks goes on to write, “These movements used many different tools at their disposal — lawsuits, mass rallies, strikes, work slowdowns, boycotts and other forms of noncooperation and resistance.”  

“These movements,” he continues, “began small and built up. They developed clear messages that appealed to a variety of groups. They shifted the narrative so the authoritarians were no longer on permanent offense.” 

But Brooks, citing “Chenoweth and Stephan again, tells us that such movements require “one coordinating body that does the work of coalition building.”

Which brings me back to the present resistance movement. 

While massive and far flung, the present opposition to Trump and MAGA lacks, as I see it, a “coordinating body.” How to change that is a challenge and above my pay grade. But I would offer this observation: it won’t happen without the participation and leadership of a broadly representative mix of organizations and leaders, not least from Black and Brown communities and the labor movement.