Hey folks,

I’ll confess: I unplugged after Wednesday last week. I spent time with family. Ate too much. Played a lot of games with 2-year-old, duck-obsessed Lila and 5-year-old, Zelda-obsessed Zeke. I started on David McCullough’s 1776 and the new Ken Burns documentary (and KPop Demon Hunters). “The choir keeps singing when one of us takes a breath,” a local Indivisible group leader told me years ago. I took a breath.

Turning back to the world now, I’m just gonna say it: There’s a different flavor in the air. Something’s shifted -- the regime is clearly weakened. From the largest protest in American history in October, to the decade-best election night a few weeks ago, to Trump’s surrender on the Epstein files bill, to Marjorie Taylor Greene’s resignation -- the regime isn’t looking quite so permanent and irresistible as it did a couple months ago. 

Look at the East Wing Ballroom debacle. It was only a few weeks ago we saw the wrecking crew they tried to hide as news broke of the blatantly corrupt funding scheme. The list of companies and individuals giving Trump money for his $300m boondoggle is too long for me to write out here, but it includes tech giants like Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Coinbase, and the Winklevoss Twins. The three companies targeted by We Ain’t Buying It -- Amazon, Target, and Home Depot -- all donated to Trump’s inaugural or to the ballroom or both. Spotify too. Much of big corporate America this year has fallen in line behind this corrupt regime.

This was “smart” business thinking. Go along with the grift and graft to get along with the all-powerful regime.

But I was struck by a recent interview with JPMorgan’s head, Jamie Dimon. Dimon is no resistance hero -- he’s a businessman making business decisions. And one of those business decisions was to decline to contribute to Trump’s ballroom scheme. Dimon’s reasoning: 

“We have to be very careful about how anything is perceived. And also how the next DOJ is going to deal with it…We’re quite conscious of risks we bear by doing anything that looks like buying favors or anything like that.” 

Now just to be clear, declining to participate in obviously corrupt endeavors is the lowest possible bar. But for the last year, elite after elite failed to clear it. So it’s a good sign that someone like Dimon is actually thinking about future consequences for illegal actions. As the regime stumbles and Trump sinks to his lowest approval ratings yet, more potential co-conspirators are going to fear “how the next DOJ is going to deal with” this regime’s illegal and unconstitutional actions. I welcome that.

We’re under no illusion that Trump and his regime are now harmless. Trump’s response to his declining popularity has been to double down. He’s gutting oversight of the secret police force. Pete Hegseth is personally directing “extrajudicial killings” (Rand Paul’s words). The regime is going after decorated veterans who dare encourage active members of the military to obey the law. And Trump is aggressively lurching toward war in Venezuela.

Which is all the more reason for us to keep going. The more people see Trump as a spent force, the less he’ll be able to get away with. 

Which brings us to the political earthquake that comes tomorrow if we elect Aftyn Behn to Congress. No Democrat ought to have a shot in Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District -- it went for Trump twice by double digits. And yet, Aftyn -- Indivisible’s first Tennessee organizer and the founder of our national raucous rural caucus -- has a shot. The most recent polling shows this race is close. Close enough that the Republicans are suddenly dumping in millions, dropping smears on Aftyn, and getting Trump to make last-minute urgent attacks on her.

A close race will send shockwaves through Republican boiler rooms. If Aftyn wins, a whole bunch of so-called “safe seat” Republicans will realize their seats are not so safe -- Republicans like Troy Nehls in Texas. Corporate leaders looking on will see the blue wave coming too. They will reassess how smart it is to do logistics or recruitment for the secret police force, or sponsor quid-pro-quo projects with the White House.

It’s our job to make clear that democracy is reasserting itself. If, like me, you took a breath last week -- welcome back! The choir kept singing, and we’ve got new ways for you to join in this week!

In solidarity,
Ezra Levin
Co-Executive Director, Indivisible

Your weekly to-dos

1. This is the final day of the We Ain’t Buying It economic black out: Avoid shopping at Target, Amazon, and Home Depot this Cyber Monday. Today closes out the busiest shopping week of the year, and we’re going to continue demonstrating the consumer power of the pro-democracy majority in this country by withholding our dollars from companies that are complicit in Trump’s authoritarian power grabs. (If you're having trouble with that link, try this one.) 
2. Experienced phonebankers needed: Let’s get out the vote for Aftyn Behn and flip TN-07 blue! Tonight is our final phonebank for Aftyn Behn, a former Indivisible organizer who could score a major upset in Tennessee's deep red seventh district. A win in tomorrow’s election would narrow the GOP House majority to a sliver and send a powerful message to the Republican Party about how politically toxic Trump’s agenda has become. 
   
   Note: Our phonebanks are normally open to all and start with a training for new phonebankers. Tonight we have a limited number of households remaining to be contacted, so we’re skipping the training and suggesting that only experienced phonebankers join (we wouldn’t want anyone to go through the entire training and then discover we’ve run out of numbers!). 
3. Take your activism to the next level by joining a local Indivisible group. It’s resolution season, and if one of your goals for the new year is becoming more engaged in your community and doing more to save democracy, it might be time to connect with an Indivisible group near you.
4. Support immigrants under attack this Giving Tuesday. We normally don’t include fundraising asks in our weekly to-dos, but with the Trump regime escalating its attacks on immigrant communities, we want to encourage this movement to support the Defending Our Neighbors Fund. The fund helps individuals and families caught up in our increasingly draconian immigration system get the legal assistance they deserve.

Upcoming events for you

These nationwide events, calls, and training sessions are coming up soon. For even more Indivisible happenings, check our national calendar and get in touch with Indivisible groups near you!

Follow us on Bluesky, Mastodon, and Threads to keep up on the latest information, and text “INDIVISIBLE” to 59798 to opt-in to our text messaging program, where we send rapid response actions a few times a month.