Indivisibles,

It’s Sarah, one of Indivisible's co-founders and Chief Campaigns Officer,
and I cannot believe I am writing this, but we have to talk about Trump’s
newest plan to… repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Yes, again.

Frankly, after July 28, 2017, I never thought I’d have to write those
words to you in an email, but here we are. So, let’s get into it. 

For old time’s sake, this is going to be a long one -- but [ [link removed] ]if you want
to skip to the good part and chip in a few bucks to make sure we retake
our Democratic trifecta next November and never have to fight to save the
ACA again because that sounds absolutely exhausting, click here.
Otherwise, keep reading.

What the Hell Did Trump Just Say?

In case you missed it, over the weekend, Donald Trump posted to Truth
Social vowing to never give up on the fight to roll back the Affordable
Care Act (or, you know, the law that ensures more than 40 million
Americans have health insurance coverage and protects millions more with
pre-existing conditions). 

[2]Screenshot of Truth Social post by Trump that reads: "The cost of
Obamacare is out of control, plus, it's not good healthcare. I'm seriously
looking at alternatives. We had a couple of Republican Senators who
campaigned for 6 years against it, and then raised their hands not to
terminate it. It was a low point for the Republican Party, but we should
never give up!"

Aside from deeply stupid political strategy, Trump’s post is -- and look,
I know this may come as a shock -- a big lie. ACA costs aren’t spiraling
out of control.

Maybe Donald Trump and congressional Republicans could use a refresher on
how this went for them the last time.

How Indivisibles Everywhere Saved the Affordable Care Act (A Refresher)

Republicans learned the hard way in 2017 that messing with the Affordable
Care Act was a political disaster. It’s hard to explain the level of
constituent pressure and grassroots energy we saw on this fight. It’s
unlike anything I’ve ever seen. And more importantly, it was unlike
anything Republicans in Congress had ever seen. 

Let’s review the timeline.

[ [link removed] ]Segment of the Rachel Maddow discussing the 2017 Indivisible Guide

By January 2017, when the new Republican Congress was sworn in, thousands
of Indivisible groups were forming nationwide with people ready to fight
back against Trump’s agenda. Then, well, all hell broke loose.
Constituents (many of you reading this email!) across the country started
giving their members of Congress an earful about healthcare. 

[4]Washington Post article with headline that reads: "Rep. David Brat:
'The women are in my grill no matter where I go'"

Then-Representative Dave Brat, a Republican from my district in Virginia,
was feeling the heat as early as January of 2017 when he said, “The women
are in my grill no matter where I go.” Constituents got a little news
grilling bratwurst outside his office and asking him to listen to them and
save their healthcare. He didn’t, and he lost his job in 2018.

[5]NBC News article with headline: "'Do your job!' Rep. Jason Chaffetz
faces angry town hall crowd in Utah"

During the first congressional recess, when members of Congress went home
for what would have otherwise been a pretty uneventful constituent work
week, they immediately knew this time was different. 1,000 people,
including Indivisibles, showed up in Utah at then-Representative Jason
Chaffetz’s town hall. Hundreds of people stood outside with signs that
promised to defeat him in the next election. He announced his retirement
from the House two months later.

[6]CNN article with headline "Arkansas town hall crowd erupts at Sen. Tom
Cotton"

But it wasn’t just Utah. It was [ [link removed] ]Tom Cotton’s townhall in deep red
Arkansas. It was [ [link removed] ]Rep. Tom Reed’s in western New York. It was [ [link removed] ]Chuck
Grassley’s in Iowa. It was [ [link removed] ]Mitch McConnell’s luncheon in Kentucky. It
was [ [link removed] ]the crowd of 1,000 who pressed California Rep. Tom McClintock. In
Virginia, [ [link removed] ]freshman Rep. Scott Taylor had 800 people inside his first
townhall at York High School, with another 200 people standing outside. He
also lost his job in 2018.

The pressure was palpable. Everywhere.

[13]CNN article with headline "GOP Rep. Mo Brooks says town hall protests
may prevent Obamacare repeal"

By February, we knew it was working. Just a month after Donald Trump took
office, Alabama Republican Mo Brooks told a conservative radio host that
he didn’t know if Republicans were going to be able to repeal the ACA
because of the pressure they were feeling from regular people across the
country.

In March, congressional offices reported being swamped with constituent
calls 50-to-1 anti-Trumpcare.

[14]Indivisibles at a 'die-in' protest with cardboard headstones

In May, Indivisible groups across the country held die-ins at the offices
of House Republicans. National news again.

[15]News article with headline: "Ohioans protest healthcare bill with
sit-in at Sen. Rob Portman's Washington office"

In June, Indivisible group members in Columbus, Ohio, took a bus to
Washington and staged a sit-in at then-Senator Rob Portman’s office,
reading stories of Ohioans who Trumpcare would hurt (it feels worth noting
that Portman didn’t run for reelection). 

Over the 2 week recess in July, Indivisible groups held more than 170
events nationwide to pressure their members of Congress [ [link removed] ](watch the
highlight video we created way back then here). They made hundreds of
thousands of calls. No Republican Member of Congress could go anywhere
without being asked about their position on repealing the ACA and facing
constituent anger. 

We drove nearly half a million calls to key Senate offices in Arizona,
Colorado, Maine, and Alaska and held countless events, sometimes in the
100-plus-degree Arizona heat.

[17]Sen. McCain voting against repealing the ACA

Then, it paid off. 

In the early morning hours of July 28, Senate Republicans finally failed
to pass their ACA repeal bill after three Republican senators -- Collins,
Murkowski, and McCain -- who had been the target of absolutely deafening
constituent pressure since day one of the new Congress, voted against the
effort. 

They tried it again after that -- and we drove another half-a-million
calls and hosted scores of additional events pressuring senators in swing
states and telling them to drop it. 

On September 26, Lindsay Graham announced they didn’t have the votes. 

And on September 30, 2017, at midnight -- because of that budget
resolution that Senate Republicans had passed in January to make it easier
for them to repeal the ACA -- Trumpcare was officially dead. 

Saving the Affordable Care Act Changed What Was Politically Possible and Just
Might Do It Again

But we weren’t finished winning.

[18]CNN article with headline: "Latest House results confirm 2018 wasn't a
blue wave. It was a blue tsunami"

In 2018, Democrats won control of the House with a net total of 41 seats.
This 41-seat gain was the Democrats’ largest gain of House seats since the
post-Watergate 1974 elections and was the first time since 1954 that they
flipped a chamber of Congress in a Republican president’s first midterm.
As CNN wrote, it wasn’t just a blue wave. It was a tsunami.

So -- and I cannot stress this enough -- what the hell is Donald Trump
thinking? 

I won’t pretend to know. But I’ll tell you what Indivisible is thinking.

[ [link removed] ]I know this email is really long, so if you were fired up paragraphs
ago and just want to chip in a few dollars to help us win in 2024, click
here.

Trump gave us a political gift on Saturday, and we’re not taking it for
granted. Indivisible is going to spend the next year reminding voters
about Donald Trump’s plan to take away their healthcare (and institute a
national abortion ban and exact revenge on political enemies and build
mass deportation camps for immigrants). 

While Trump and his MAGA enablers in Congress are focused on their
absolutely terrifying [ [link removed] ]“Project 2025,” we will focus on Project 2024:
doing the work of knocking doors and getting out the vote to retake our
trifecta. 

Look, I can’t tell you for sure that we will win, but I can tell you that
we’ll leave it all out on the field. To do that, we need the kind of
energy and pressure that we pulled off in 2017 when we killed Trumpcare
and in 2018 and 2020 when we won huge victories on election day. It’s been
a long six-and-a-half years -- we know you’re tired -- but Trump’s latest
Truth Social post should be a wake-up call.

What You Can Do Right Now

For all of our sake, we need to win next November, so we don’t have to
fight to save the ACA again. And real talk, we need to have a plan B. 

Here’s what you can do to make sure, no matter what, we’re ready:

 1. [ [link removed] ]Chip in to fund our work in 2024 to elect Democrats up and down
the ballot with the same kinds of tools and infrastructure that killed
Trumpcare and took back the House in 2018. The truth is that there’s
not as much money or energy in the ecosystem as there was in 2020 --
we get it -- but the stakes are just as high, and our plans are just
as big.

 2. [ [link removed] ]Find your Indivisible group. These are the folks in your community
organizing right now to win. These are the same folks who killed
TrumpCare the first time we had to. They know what they’re doing and
need your help in 2024 and beyond. If there’s no group near you, reply
to this email and ask for support in setting one up. Tens of thousands
of people did it in January of 2017, and you can too.

 3. [ [link removed] ]Tell us you’re all in to do the work to win. In a few short weeks,
we will start rolling out our plans and turning on tools to hit the
ground running in January to support key races across the country.
Sign up to be the first to know when we do so that you can do all you
can to make sure I don’t have to send an email in 2025 about
Republicans’ next plan to take away our healthcare. 

If 2017 taught us anything, it’s that we have to take the threat of a
Donald Trump presidency, and promises like repealing the ACA, seriously.
There’s too much at stake. 

No sitting on the sidelines.

In solidarity,

Sarah Dohl
Chief Campaigns Officer
Indivisible

P.S. -- Even if you can’t give, we’d love for you to forward this email to
5 friends and encourage them to get involved. I also made this into [ [link removed] ]a
TikTok video, just in case you want to share it!



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