Revolution Rising

Included in the November 2025 issue of The Atlantic magazine is an essay written by New York Times opinion columnist David Brooks. A similar essay in the NYT appeared shortly before the November Atlantic was published. The essay is entitled “The Rising: The Country Needs a Mass Social Movement – To Save Itself from Autocracy.” Drawing on the research about civil resistance by political scientists Erica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan, Brooks contends that the United States needs to build a nationwide resistance to the regime of Donald Trump and his move toward turning the United States into an autocracy. He characterizes Trump’s policies and actions as “a savage war” against long-standing institutions, government departments, and policies designed to gain profit and power for Trump. Drawing on the work of Chenoweth and Stephan, the history of revolutions in countries all around the world, and the ideas of revolutionary thinkers like John Locke, Saul Alinsky, and Karl Marx, Brooks identifies what he believes needs to happen for true revolution to occur in the nation.

I read this piece shortly before I went on a three-week vacation in Portland, Oregon, and Northern California. The president had referred to Portland as a “war zone,” and “a mess,” and proposed sending the National Guard to support the ICE agents already there. Despite the Oregon governor’s objection to Trump’s actions and a judge’s ruling stopping the presence of the National Guard, Trump sent them anyway. Protestors at the Portland location of ICE were creative and persistent, and made abundantly clear that ICE and its supporters were not welcome in their city. And they did so in creative ways. One day the protestors dressed up in Frog uniforms; another day, a group of naked bike riders stalked the ICE office. Several times the ICE officers were flustered and acted inappropriately and illegally, pushing and arresting people for just being present.

Sign at the No Kings March

And then on October 18, fifty thousand people showed up in the grass park along Portland’s Willamette River, wearing all sorts of costumes, carrying creatively worded signs, and calling for an end to ICE’s intervention into the lives of the people of Portland and calling out the general rudeness of the Federal Government. This same mass action was repeated by an estimated seven million people from 2700 communities across the nation  — urban, suburban, and rural,  across the country. Together these actions made clear there is great unrest across the country, and people are willing to stand up in resistance to the Federal government’s unnecessary and illegal actions.

At the same time there are more focused actions by groups calling for a ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war. Community meetings across the country are voicing disdain for the actions or inactions of the government. There are efforts to support undocumented migrants just seeking to make a life in this country. Rev. William Barber and his Moral Monday demonstrations in Washington and state capitals throughout the South are telling stories of those most affected by the deadly policies of the Trump administration: the poor, disabled, the sick, the mentally ill, the unhoused, unemployed, and addicted. These are only the efforts I am aware of and involved in, and there is so much more.

Thinking of all these resistance efforts, I wondered: What is David Brooks missing? Yes, there is a need for these various groups to come together and see their common ground, but that is already happening. It seems like Brooks is waiting for a political and well-known leader to arise, when in fact the movement that is afoot is developing leaders in all aspects of political and civic life. This movement is not one that supports a hierarchy but is a movement of collaboration and cooperation. The movement Brooks is looking for has arisen, but in a more community-based form. People of all generations, ethnicities, and backgrounds are coming together in an effort to assert our desire for a true democracy.

Now I must admit, despite my hope and optimism, I expect the situation will get tougher before it gets better. Circumstances will not change with an election or one big march on DC. There needs to be strategy, commitment, and perseverance. We need people who have often been at odds with one another to find ways to bridge their racial, ethnic, political, and economic differences for the greater goal of building and more equitable society. One key will be to bring those who have been most neglected and injured by the current administration to tell their stories. This is the genius of Rev. Barber’s Moral Monday campaign. They are not talking just about policy, but true stories about the unfair and onerous struggles of the most neglected in our society.

People coming together and telling their stories. The revolution has begun. As the struggle for freedom, justice, and equity continues, the Spirit is rising to take us to a new day and a new nation.

Marching through the streets of Portland