Authentic Organizing Against Oligarchy

“I haven’t seen this many people at a protest since the Iraq War.” – A friend at Tacoma’s President’s Day 50501 protest

“General Strike! Boycott! Buy nothing on 02/28!” – Popular chat sentiments during the the “Corporate Coup in a Global Context Emergency Town Hall”

The Trump/Musk coup resistance finally exploded into the public consciousness last week, with a flurry of in-person and online protests, town halls and activist events nationally and worldwide. From “50501” actions and “Tesla Takedowns,” to federal worker uprisings and coordinated ICE raid resistance, a variety of messages, strategies and formations are taking root. These are exciting opportunities to develop the mass, energized, diverse working class base necessary to confront Trumpism. But many risk quickly imploding from a lack of historic knowledge, organizing structures, and coordinated economic escalation. Experienced leftists should do everything in our power to elevate these movements while helping prevent them from falling into such traps.

To be clear, this tension between excitement and structures is totally normal, and often how emergent movements contribute fresh ideas and energy into organizing. While we should always celebrate experimentation and creative mistakes, this critical juncture requires coalescing around messaging, strategies and escalation, and fighting the tyrannies of structurelessness and unclear demands that undermined many recent movements. When confronting authoritarianism, such paths not only breed the commonplace problems of liberal cooptation, “we tried that and it didn’t work” mentalities and protest fatigue, but also justify dramatically expanded state and extrajudicial violence against a militant, young, vulnerable base. That would be tragic.

To prevent this, experienced leftists must seriously, humbly step up with structures, skills, and messages. We must recognize that while these are urgent times, we enter them with stronger institutions, more knowledge, and greater cross-movement connections than in generations. We must leverage all of these, with an emphasis on moving from activism to organizing. We must break down barriers between the various new movements and connect them with existing ones. We must mobilize the labor left and direct energy away from arbitrary calls for boycotts or general strikes to powerful, coordinated, realistic economic escalation. And we must push to abandon narrow “constitutional crisis” orientations with legal solutions and embrace diverse, inclusive class struggle orientations with political solutions.

Last week, I attended several events driving these points home, including two protests here in Tacoma, WA and two community conversations with respected left scholars (an online “Corporate Coup” emergency town hall with Naomi Klein, Astra Taylor and Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, and a facilitated conversation with Angela Davis in Olympia). I was unable to attend federal worker pickets or Tesla Takedowns, but I will this weekend, and I believe both are more effective than mass protest on its own. Still, while all these formations and events are inspiring, there are gaps and pitfalls throughout. The new movements crave results but lack structures or tactics, while the established left seems more concerned with analyzing the crisis than stepping in to lead. We have an incredible opportunity to build an organized, inclusive left in the ashes of this crisis. Let’s not squander that. Let’s make mistakes while avoiding pitfalls… together.

Protests With a Point

Two local protests exemplified the beautiful, difficult contradictions of new movements. Our President’s Day action was connected to the 50501 movement (labeled such because it started with 50 events in 50 states on Inauguration Day). The purportedly decentralized, leaderless movement hosted hundreds of President’s Day actions with probably a half million attendees nationwide. Tacoma’s had at least 500 folks attending -making it our biggest since the peak of 2020 uprisings for Black Lives. Saturday’s smaller protest was organized spontaneously over Reddit by LGBTQ+ youth. While it was not connected to a formal movement, there were countless events big and small like it throughout the country that day alone.

The 50501 event resembled Iraq War protests in 2003, with a broad base among mainstream Democrats and well-meaning community members outraged by Presidential abuses of power and attacks on the rule of law. A longtime local activist told me she saw folks protesting that she hadn’t seen since 2003. And both protests felt like 2011-12 Occupy actions, with an anarchistic sensibility and powerful yet muddled messages centering wealth inequality (with ire directed at Elon Musk, rather than the “one percent”). These tones seem widespread at 50501 actions and -if anything– less prominent here in Tacoma, where experienced leftists advocated concrete, long-term organizing, and DSA members distributed signs resisting fascism, racism and capitalism. This may have frustrated attendees wanting to focus exclusively on Musk or Trump. But many more took signs and joined chants.

Like both 2003 and 2011- the protests seem somewhat ineffective at channelling energy into coordinated plans or concrete demands. Attendees at both called for a February 28th boycott, or a Women’s Day protest, possibly a tax day protest, or general strikes. I share their ache for momentum, and was frustrated to hear not only that 50501 had nothing planned (they’ve since decided on March 4th) but was also nonpartisan and discouraged left organizations from recruiting. This leaves movements rudderless, and a “decentralized,” seemingly “leaderless” nature means they may face the incoherence of Occupy, or risk of NGO cooptation that Black Lives Matter activists rightly feared during both major movement waves. 50501 also seems to lack the militant energy and black, queer leadership that was the lifeblood of Black Lives Matter. This will hopefully change over time -and Saturday’s youth protest was decidedly more queer. But without connecting their energy to a diversified base, real escalation or structures, protests exhaust themselves reinventing the wheel.

Town Halls and Transformation

The Angela Davis conversation and Corporate Coup Town Hall were both the opposite of and mirrors to the protests. Davis discussed her long life of liberation scholarship, ranging from confronting red baiting, to prison abolition, feminism, and Palestine (and waived her speaking fees as contributions to the Rachel Corrie Foundation). The town hall panelists spoke from their own vantage points (debt, climate and racial justice), adroitly interweaving critiques on the structures and political conjunctures driving the crisis. They traced Trumpism to decades of neoliberalism and Democratic Party malaise, but also stressed recent left mistakes in missing majoritarian messaging and lacking prophetic messengers (with Bernie Sanders’ Presidential runs as outliers). Speakers at both events saw opportunities for a united, democratic socialist left to emerge from this moment. But they said almost nothing on concrete organizing or next steps.

It’s unclear if this lack of concreteness was due to event format, sheer fatigue, or avoidance of being prescriptive in a turbulent moment. But it seemed a disservice to the close to 1,500 people attending the online town hall and the many hundreds -including tons of eager, fired up college students- there for Angela Davis. This desire for direction was noticeable in the short audience Q&A with Davis and pervasive in the online town hall chat, where many attendees were basically demanding advice. Others stepped into the void with a myriad of liberal to ultra-left hot takes, including breaking with the Democrats (or not), buying exclusively local, and ubiquitous calls for consumer boycotts or general strikes. Very few noted that effective, mass economic actions doesn’t come out of nowhere. Even fewer called for getting organized. Friends and comrades attending other major left forums indicate this gap between speakers and attendees was common.

Avoiding (Neo)liberal Traps – Including Seemingly Radical Ones

Avoiding addressing this gap in expectation and knowledge risks reinforcing the individual as the locus of action and preventing successful mass organizing. Calls for movement decentralization, fixating on constitutional crises, and even advocating for arbitrary boycotts or strikes are all neoliberal ideological traps. Each emphasizes individual participation in a social compact over broad movement power. Each flattens the history of struggle into point in time events. And each runs the risk of demobilizing a diverse working class base, precisely when we need mass mobilization. While it’s understandable that last week’s speakers couldn’t cover all of this, the experienced left does have a duty to provide context and history about what works, what doesn’t work, and how we can most effectively resist.

If we don’t provide this guidance, the movements risk falling into what Feminist Jo Freeman dubbed “The Tyranny of Structurelessness.” Such ideologies centering the self as change agent or fearing organized power overtook many in the 1960s-70s new left, were pervasive in the Occupy movement, and tried to rear their ugly heads throughout both of the Black Lives Matter waves. Freeman’s classic essay should be required reading for aspiring organizers and is crucial in general crisis moments like this. Movements must have structures, leaders, and opportunities for development. They also need clear demands and plans to win. None of this means they are required to be rigid or undemocratic. Indeed, democratic participation is essential to building real power, but that is different than deciding demands with whatever random folks showed up at a protest or the call-and-response Occupy-style plebicite.

But we must not conflate movement structures with procedural ones. It’s also a trap to obsess over legal responses to Trumpism or use the constitutional crisis as a primary organizing tool. The many judges, reporters and Democratic Party leaders already beating those drums don’t need our help. No matter how true the constitutional crisis and imploding rule of law actually are, they’re unlikely to mobilize a diverse, working class base into the resistance, which still appears to be overwhelmingly middle class and white. Black, queer, trans, immigrant and countless other oppressed folks know all too well that the constitution and rule of law never worked for them. And people of all backgrounds voted for Trump knowing he didn’t plan on following either. A massive, growing portion of those voters regret their choices. We must organize them into a difference worldview and -crucially- pull them away from the fashy reductivism of Trump and his authentically vitriolic base. But focusing on the law won’t cut it.

We only need to look at the Congressional Democratic leadership’s predictably lackluster response to see the problem with proceduralism and legalism. They’re at best saying they’ll use procedural obstruction when possible (then largely failing to deliver), and at worst saying they’re powerless without an electoral majority. There’s a widespread fixation that the courts will intervene in the short-run as the party just holds on for dear life, often coupled with the cynical call for “retaking Congress” in two years. As recent as last Wednesday, major congressional leaders attended DC AFGE protests saying the best thing fired workers could do is make sure resoundingly boring tool Hakeem Jeffries becomes Speaker of the House in 2026. While I don’t want to take the extreme position of saying there may not even be a House to speak at in 2027, I also know following their approach may increase the risk. Legal obstruction only works if it’s helping buy time to build immediate, real power, not a voting bloc 18 months from now.

When Direct Action Actually “Gets the Goods”

So how do we get from Point A, of growing discontent and unrest in response to a horrific bludgeoning of the state and attacks on vulnerable communities, to Point D, a mobilized, organized mass movement united by demands, strategies and disruptions making the billionaire class quake in their boots? First, we need to give people a sense of their own political and economic agency, with an emphasis on what to do and what not to do. Then we need to double down on organizing and power building, coalescing around core demands, dates, and escalation plans.

Defensive actions protecting trans, immigrant and federal worker communities and offensive Tesla Takedown-type pickets provide the best starting places. Rather than simply protesting or boycotting, each requires people to engage in organized disruption on behalf of themselves or others. Doing this provides a sense of solidarity, power and -most importantly-efficacy. People have successfully blocked ICE raids in Chicago, Denver and across the country. Trans youth activists have forced New York and Seattle hospitals to reverse on “anticipatory compliance,” and made city councils (including Tacoma this week) adopt sanctuary statuses. Tesla sales and stocks are in a nosedive, hitting Musk’s pocketbook. And federal workers throughout Washington, DC responded to DOGE’s Coup Musk Klan takeover of their offices with wildcat actions. While many are still losing jobs, their unions are seriously taking up the struggle. The labor movement is awakening, and it is literally the only route to a successful general strike.

The experienced left needs to be laser focused on channeling resources and people into organizing structures and escalation towards real economic and political power. This starts with immediate workplace and neighborhood organizing in solidarity with and led by affected communities, then escalating to planful, coordinated disruption (acknowledging that things are shifting rapidly and defending against attacks on our most vulnerable communities should take precedence). Beating back immediate attacks is not only good in of itself, but also a galvanizing force towards going on the offensive and taking greater risk on behalf of an even broader community. These intervening steps are core components to later successful boycotts or strikes, or what recently passed organizing hero Jane McAlevey referred to as a “Structure Test.” While protest itself is important -and countless people will be protesting soon- it will only truly succeed if connected to power and plans.

This isn’t meant to silence the righteous anger folks feel about wanting to hit the oligarchs where it hurts. Calls for a February 28th economic blackout (basically a giant “Buy Nothing Day”) or even a federal tax boycott are exciting and potentially legitimate strategies (although less money for federal spending is literally one of Trump’s stated goals). Some of the organic consumer boycotts against corporations like Target for eliminating DEI programs have been impressive. But single day, individual boycott not connected to concrete demands or a bigger plan never work. The reason Tesla Takedowns work is because Elon Musk is the most important target for our rage, they’re hitting his pocketbook, and visible, on-site disruption means you’re not only withholding your participation, but getting other consumers and workers to withhold theirs. It is closer to a secondary strike boycott than a consumer one, which makes it a better strategy, and could even lead to real Tesla unionization. But even these have to be connected to an ongoing strategy.

Moving Towards General Strikes

Ideally, unions and left organizations like DSA will push for more meaningful strike escalation, including even the general strikes many of us deeply crave. Some of the groundwork has recently been laid, with the strikes among teachers throughout red states, healthcare workers in many more, and prominent, media blackout-breaking strikes by the Screen Actors Guild, writers and directors, and the United Auto Workers, along with the organizing at Starbucks and Amazon. UAW President Shaun Fain and Association of Flight Attendants President Sara Nelson have long advocated for a coordinated, nationwide general strike in May of 2028. They did so knowing how long it takes build working class political will, set up the infrastructure and logistics necessary, and structure test with escalating actions. They clearly did so thinking about presidential primaries, and potentially planning to face a hostile regime.

Trump’s rapid fire attacks and outright war on workers may drive organizers to move the 2028 strike up a few years. This would be a good idea. But there’s no way it can work in the next few months. Instead, the left must coalesce around strategies building a diverse, broad, engaged base that gets used to winning things – no matter how small or local they may be– and channels energy into escalation. My sense is that employers will do it for us, becoming increasingly belligerent this year, and making strikes increasingly necessary and effective. Only this kind of success, a taste for victory, can help drive anything close to a successful general strike, whether in a city, a region or nationally. But we may be in a position for general strikes in 2026, the 250th anniversary of the United States. While I’m an internationalist and generally skeptical of patriotic messaging, it’s easy to imagine messages like “strike back for democracy” or “strike back for America” resonating with basically everyone.

What can you do today? Get organized, of course!

So I offer these simple recommendations that I believe are both immediately vital and build long-run power. I suggest the experienced left pushes them whenever possible, and I list them here in much simpler language. Feel free to practice, poach or plagiarize it at will if you agree.

If you are in a unionized workplace, then make sure you know your union local and steward or representative, you contribute dues (and to a political fund, if you can afford it), and you attend meetings. It’s critical to ask what your union is doing to resist Trump, and downstream affects of Trump’s cuts and other attacks. If you’re in any major union, then members are absolutely impacted, and very likely people in your own community are already organizing.

If you’re not unionized, then start organizing. Do a little research to see what unions represent workers in your industry, and the best contacts for local organizers. Organizers are generally swamped, and likely over-run with union drives right now, so don’t give up if they don’t respond right away. Another route is connecting with projects like the Emergency Worker Organizing Committee (EWOC), started by the Democratic Socialists of America and radical union the United Electricians during COVID.

Lastly, there are plenty of left organizations out there who will embrace you with open arms, and gladly start steeping you in working class power, real democracy and -yes- Socialism. I’ve been organizing with my local DSA chapter for the last 8 years. It’s become my second home and the source of many of my most important personal and political relationships. Get organized today.

And, honestly, if you’ve read this far… you should really just join DSA today.

What can you do in the short run? Support defensive and offensive Action

The attacks on trans and immigrant communities will continue, and the movement defending them will become more vital than ever. Look for resources in your local community, starting with workers centers, radical LGBTQI organizations, and trans or immigrant union caucuses. That said, you must avoid accidentally spreading propaganda and fear in these communities, particularly when it comes to ICE raids. It’s critical to listen to and take the leadership of the folks in those communities… always, really, but especially now.

There are tons of labor actions right now. AFGE and other federal worker pickets are happening almost daily in DC, and frequently in cities and towns throughout the country. You don’t have to be a federal worker or in a union to join one, and it’s very likely a great opportunity to connect to union resources. Bonus, your friendly neighborhood unionist is likely to know about other opportunities.

Tesla Takedowns are where it’s at! I’m joining my first with local DSA comrades and a whole host of activists this Saturday. And, like being a federal worker, you sure as shit don’t need to own a Tesla to protest Musk. It’s almost certain that these will expand nationwide in the coming weeks, and very likely they’ll expand to take on the profits of the other worst Trump enablers. Get you some.

Joining any of these gives you a sense of how a picket or strike feels, helps push others to take action, and develops your movement muscles. You can find opportunities to support federal workers via the Federal Unionists Network (FUN) . Or you can find your nearest Tesla Takedown.

Of course, protests like the 50501 events are an important part of the movement, and essential for demonstrating a mass base. People should absolutely support them when possible, and I will be attending many more. But it will always be with an eye towards concrete demands, escalating actions, and organizational structures. It’s also OK and important to ask these questions of rally organizers. If you have questions, other folks will, too. And anyone worth their salt will have a great answer ready for you.

What comes later this year? Escalations, unemployed organizing, base building!

One of the reasons organized group are so important is because they are where we express our power. Trump knows that. Musk knows that. The bosses know that. They’re going to aggressively go after unions, not only to eviscerate the labor movement, but because they know it’s the basis of energy for all other working class movements. That’s why it’s vital to plug into local union fights, connect them back to Trumpism, and turn the boss fight into a Trump and Musk fight.

There are major union contract fights coming up throughout the country. In my community alone, we’re facing contract negotiations for two of our biggest unions, United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 367 and the Tacoma Education Association. Grocery workers and teachers throughout the western US will also be bargaining. Both are among the more left unions in our community, and both were preparing their members for a potential strike long before the Trump election.

We have to be prepared for unemployed organizing. Despite a lot of press and Democratic hand-wringing or obfuscation, the Coupmongers have made many of their ultimate goals quite clear. The federal firings are part of a three stage plan that culminates in July, with their initial hopes of terminating many thousands of workers in specific departments. The national effects this –one of the biggest job cuts in US history– can’t be overstated. In my own Congressional District, federal workers are over six percent of the workforce.

There’s also long history of mass movements among the unemployed, social welfare recipients, disabled veterans and the working poor. The left should be researching these strategies and getting ready to deploy them.

Next year? Socialism or Barbarism.

Mass public sector layoffs mean the locus of struggle will expand far beyond the workplace, the town square, or the Tesla dealership. They’ll have cascading effects throughout the economy, as some analysis is already noting. The reserve workforce, gutting of the NLRB, and total ignoring of federal labor law by the Trump administration will drive employers of all types to threaten many of their existing workers with worsened workplace conditions or outright termination. We should be prepared for bosses, landlords and cops to be going on the offensive.

This probably sounds terrifying -because it is. But, as the Corporate Coup speakers noted, it also provides an opportunity to build a new society out of the old. If we’re continually engaging in meaningful struggle, economic action and organization building, then we can both mitigate the absolute worse of the attacks and build both the institutional and emotional fortitude for real solidarity. Because as the national DSA rightly noted recently, to beat Fascism, we need Socialism.

This isn’t to say that all organizing needs to happen through DSA or the labor movement. There are other places to establish and build power, and we really do need to embrace a diversity of effective tactics and make mistakes together. A revitalized Poor People’s Campaign could play a key role in broad, multi-racial organizing, particularly given its embedding in faith communities. The movements for tenants rights (including a fight I helped lead here in Tacoma) and tenant unions are bigger than anything we’ve seen in a century. We need to understand the history and present of these movements, including what went right or wrong, and what needs to be brought forward or left behind.

Then, once we’re all plugged in, fired up, and escalating… we can have a powerful movement with a powerful general strike.

Check out some of my other tirades against Elon Musk and for organizing in my blog. If you like ’em, you can subscribe for infrequent updates.