Whatever you think, it is not enough

Hands Off! protest day is today with events across the country. Writing this before the day takes hold means I do not know the outcomes. But I do believe what we see, however empowering it may feel, must be exponentially larger.

Perspective

As a young union organizer back, as they say, in the day, I was in DC for a building trades union conference. Local business agents pulled together 30 or so attendees to picket non-union construction at a nearby embassy. So we piled over and started a line. Also there, a European stringer news crew. A reporter where are the people? I told him everyone was here. The Europeans, having vastly different expectations for protest, packed up and left. Meanwhile, the local folks were pleased with the extra hands and thought it all went well. Ultimately, nothing changed. That day, I learned feeling successful is relative to past experience. And that feeling successful is not the same as success.

…feeling successful is relative to past experience. And that feeling successful is not the same as success.

Protests popped up everywhere the past months of Trump, which is good. I’m glad progressives are past their only-a-big-march-on-Washington fetish. Today, typically sleepy town halls with members of Congress are now Fire Marshal crowd sized. People protest government DOGE firings and show that federal workers live everywhere, not just the beltway. And, Tesla pickets drive down sales, which is simply fun. When compared to our recent past, this looks remarkable. Rachael Maddow does her rundown of protests across the country every night in a hopeful tone. People standing up is good to see. I am glad for it. But we cannot forget that our turnouts are exponentially smaller than are required to demonstrate a real change.

Look at Rep. Rich McCormick Georgia’s 7th District town hall in February. As Georgia Public Radio reported.

A raucous crowd of over 500 packed Roswell City Hall and overflow rooms for McCormick’s event. Many of the attendees expressed frustration and anger with President Donald Trump and McCormick’s support for him.

The Georgia 7th is a Republican district, with McCormick receiving 65% of the vote in 2024. So, 500 raucous constituents feels important, as a rebellion against Trumpism in the offing. However, the district has at least 149,535 Democratic voters, according to the last election. So the 500 raucous folks are barely 0.3% of just the Democratic vote.

All of these town halls with raucous attendees are in congressional districts with a good number of Democrats. One gerrymander strategy is put just enough Rs into a district for a comfortable win and spread Ds around the state. So every district, even very red ones have enough natively anti-Trump folks to make a larger than average event. Greater engagement is good to see, but until protests are exponentially larger, they indicate little. And we cannot delude ourselves otherwise. Remember, Democrats were buoyed by Harris campaign crowd sizes, and what did that matter in the end?

Representation

The only true indicator, through protest, Trump voters are converting into a bloc large enough to change elections are substantially larger turnouts for, well, everything. Otherwise, every thought needs to be more people. Progressives need to carry a constant disappointment until they regularly see crowds orders of magnitude larger than today’s.

We simply cannot infer much about voter sentiment from smaller turnouts and must always temper enthusiasm. Activism is good, but also can be illusiory. I am not saying activists and protests do not matter in changing voters minds. However, we must account for a base of pre-existing Trump opponents before we consider how successful any protest movement is.

Effectiveness

Do not forget we are dealing with a government of sociopaths who thrive on the hatred of leftists. There is no shame. No concern with keeping a good name because they all will get ovations at CPAC. And, Trump who knows he is not running again and cares little for the party he leaves behind, will never need another vote again. He is happy to steal and extort as much as he can then pardon himself going out the door.

No protest will matter to the current government unless they see January 6 people in the crowd. Short of that, they are probably hoping for a protest large enough and raucous enough to smack with a National Guard unit and then invoke the Insurrection Act.

Protest matters

Protesting is important. People seeing folks like them out with signs in large numbers has its effect. However, everyone who protests must make the effort to bring more and to bring people who are on the fence. A handful of protests are ephemeral and tell us little of the future. Growing consistent protests are what matter.

So everyone protesting today, enjoy the good trouble! Appreciate the solidarity and meet others you never knew before today. But always think who you can bring to the next one.