Bottomless Mimosas vs. Bottomless Authoritarianism: You Decide

If you're on the fence about going to the No Kings Day Protest TODAY - please read.

TLDR: If you’re not planning on attending the No Kings Day Protest today because protesting is “not your thing” - please hear us out. We can no longer afford to make our participation in democracy optional. Democracy is NOT someone else’s job. It’s OUR job. And sadly donating and voting are not enough. If it were, we wouldn’t be staring down at the barrel of fascism. And we all saw what happened in 1930s Europe because people did not act to stop Hitler when they had the chance.

So please reschedule your plans - sign up now and bring friends! There are over 2,000 No Kings Day protests in 20 countries and on 5 continents.

Why You Showing Up to the No Kings Day Protest Today Matters

• Now is the time. We are at a tipping point and have an opportunity to capitalize on growing discontent with the Trump Regime. Trump and his minions have already done enormous harm, but they have not consolidated power and are now faced with a growing global backlash. Trump’s approvals are way down on all fronts, the Republican 2026 budget is unpopular, the tariffs are a disaster, and Americans do not like what he’s doing on immigration or with the military. So, Trump is scaling up aggression to force us into submission. And as bad as that is, it is a tremendous opportunity because we have seen throughout history that people do not like seeing the military used against their own citizens. As Ben Raderstorf writes at Protect Democracy (highly recommend following and supporting their work):

  In countless cases — from Mexico to Egypt to Tunisia to Argentina to Russia — violent overreaches by security forces contributed to the eventual downfall of autocrats. Here in the U.S., images of the violence by police against peaceful Civil Rights protestors woke the rest of the country up to the autocratic reality of the Jim Crow South. In China, the Tiananmen Square Massacre shook the authoritarian regime so badly that, even to this day, any mention of the event is tightly censored both online and off. The Chinese government quite literally seeks to erase that history….All it takes is for the attempt at violent militarization to be instead met with a peaceful, civic, and political bulwark that refuses to either bow down or take the bait. Then the gamble will fail and our democracy will endure. Everything hinges on how we show up.

• We have to show that Trump is weak and we are strong. His use of the military this past week in Los Angeles and at Ft. Bragg (in addition to the firing of generals and senior military personnel whose views don’t “align” with MAGA) is extremely dangerous because he is setting the stage to use the military as his own personal Gestapo. But as

  Jonathan V. Last
  said:

  That project can only thwarted by massive public opposition. Both officers and the enlisted ranks must be made to question whether or not they are on the right side. Such doubts will only arise if Trump is massively unpopular.

  And Trump can only be made massively unpopular if there is a massive display of popular opposition to him.

• Protest is the greatest weapon we have against fascism. As we laid out in our last newsletter, history shows us sustained non-violence protest by a critical mass is the only way to stop tyranny.

• No one else “has got this”. If we have learned anything the last few months, it’s that those in power will not save us. The courts are sort of holding up, but only so long as the Roberts’ SCOTUS majority doesn’t chime in. We’re hanging by a thread and it will take every single person who claims to care about this country, democracy, civil rights, rule of law, science, equality, freedom, and choice to stop the MAGA fascist agenda.

• People have to use their privilege and show up. Talking here especially to our fellow White folks. We have the most privilege in this country. We are also largely responsible for electing Trump twice. White people are also powering MAGA. Today, we need to show a critical mass of Americans - especially White people - showing up for democracy and for each other. As

  Jonathan V. Last
  writes:

  In order for [the No Kings Day protest] to succeed it must break through to into the consciousness of normies, independents, and Trump voters who are already feeling remorse.

• It’s not fair to expect others to do the heavy-lifting of democracy while we go on with our lives. We have seen people in Los Angeles and around the world show up to protest - putting themselves in the line of fire - because they have to. We have watched grassroots organizers work year-round to get out the vote year after year while most people watch from the sidelines. It wasn’t enough in 2016 and 2024 and it’s most definitely not enough now. The only way out of this fresh hell is by stepping out of our comfort zone and doing our part.

• Size matters. We need millions and millions of people to show up today. We must show that we are not going away and we are not giving in. As

  Jonathan V. Last
  underscores:

  Size, by contrast, has no valence: Mass is power. Full-stop.

  Size is persuasion. It creates bandwagon effects. It sows doubt in the minds of the opposition. It opens new avenues of resistance. Size is also, in itself, a provocation. If 100,000 people show up in Washington to celebrate Trump’s military parade, but 5,000,000 people turn out across the country for No Kings rallies, who looks strong and who looks weak?

One thing that we have never stopped believing in is the power of US so join us today in showing that We the People have more power than the people in power. Sign up here and bring friends then get brunch and toast to our bottomless power and resolve!

Always in your corner,

HH & ML

Find your No Kings Day Protest location and time here.