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Indivisibles,

My first monthly newsletter of 2023! Given the new year, I’ll remind you
of some ground rules for these newsletters, which Leah and I trade off
writing every month:

 1. We share our thoughts on the state of politics and the Indivisible
movement.
 2. We invite your feedback and engagement. Find me on [ [link removed] ]TikTok,
[ [link removed] ]Mastodon, [ [link removed] ]Twitter, or click the links below to send me a message
about this newsletter.
 3. We don’t ask for money. You get enough of that elsewhere.
 4. We include a cute picture of our now 2+-year-old son Zeke at the end. 

That’s the plan and I’m sticking to it. So let’s get to it.

Our strategy was a big success! Time to change it.

I usually have a non-fiction book going, and right now it’s Walter
Isaacson’s old-ish biography of Albert Einstein. Zeke is now interested in
the moon and stars, and I don’t know anything about astrophysics -- gotta
start somewhere! I’ll be honest, the physics is largely over my head, but
the guy was also a fascinating political leader -- a vocal opponent of
authoritarianism, militarism, and bigotry, and a proponent of individual
freedom and democracy. He was a quick wit too, which is why it’s
believable (but not confirmed) that he said “insanity is doing the same
thing over and over and expecting different results.”

I’ve been thinking about this because Indivisible is facing new political
realities this year. And rather than just keep on doing what we’ve been
doing for the last couple years, it’s up to us to adapt our strategy to
these new realities -- just as we have adapted to each new post-election
political reality since Indivisible began.

So on the way to discussing our new strategic thinking for 2023-2024, I
thought I’d take us through those adaptations we’ve made along our way
here.

2017-2018: Resistance

Indivisible started with a guide for how to engage in politics in 2017.
MAGA was ascendant. Democrats were scrambling and disorganized. The
conventional wisdom was that MAGA would kill top Obama accomplishments
like the Affordable Care Act. 

Indivisible launched with a strategy to resist -- a practical guide for
building and applying grassroots power in this political reality. For
2017, our strategic focus was four parts holding Republicans accountable
to one-part pushing Dems to fight back with everything they had.

2019-2020: Persistence

Then we won the House in 2018. We had saved the Affordable Care Act and
built an historic blue wave…and now we had to change from the strategy
that got us there because the political reality had changed (hell, we’d
changed it!). The threat of massively damaging legislation was gone -- the
Dem House could now block it. The opportunity to use this new Dem majority
was real. The main danger politically was that Democrats would decline to
hold Trump accountable or that they may fail to present a clear
alternative to MAGA extremism. 

So for 2019, we continued to hold MAGA Republicans accountable, but we
amped up the pressure on Democrats to impeach Trump for his crimes and to
put forward a bold, pro-democracy agenda in contrast with these MAGA
neanderthals. The theory was simple: Go on offense -- fight back and
demonstrate to voters that Dems were a respectable alternative to the
chaos and extremism of the other side. As a movement we persisted beyond
the initial threat of Trump, and evolved into a proactive, pro-democracy
operation. 

2021-2022: Insistence

Then we defeated Trump and won a Democratic trifecta, and with it our
political reality changed again. That meant we had to update the
successful strategy we had used for the previous two years that had led to
this trifecta. We now had a rare opportunity to actually enact legislation
with Democratic votes! MAGAs were consigned to the minority and Trump was
banished to off-brand social media. While January 6th proved that MAGAs
were a continuing, violent, dangerous force, the main political danger in
this moment was that Dems might fail to unify to use their new trifecta
power (see Sinema, Manchin, Gottheimer).

So for 2021 our strategy focused on the political opportunity of this new
moment. We pushed Dems to come together and pass legislation protecting
democracy and providing for the people. We encouraged Biden to go bold on
administrative actions, and we helped push, cajole, convince, and unify
the party to pass historic legislation. Heading into them midterms, we
advocated for a strategy of contrasting the Democrats’ accomplishments
with the extreme MAGAs. In short, we insisted that Dems use the power we
had worked for years to give them.

2023-2024: ???

This strategy exceeded most expectations! We oversaw a historic period of
national legislation, and then we held back a red wave with massive
political upsets up and down the ballot across the country last year. The
country largely rejected MAGA and its attacks on abortion rights and
democracy. Still, we failed to get Sinema and Manchin onboard with ending
gerrymandering and passing democracy reform, and so the Republicans did
eke out a slim majority in the House. 

That brings us to now -- a new year, a new congress, and a new political
reality. So, yet again, we need a new strategy for how to engage
effectively. We’ve resisted, we’ve persisted, and we’ve insisted these
past six years. So now what do we do?

Well, I’ve run out of good descriptive words that rhyme with “resistance,”
“persistence,” and “insistence,” but that didn’t stop us from publishing a
new strategic guide this week: [ [link removed] ]A Practical Guide to Defeating MAGA
(PDF). Democracy reform and any good, substantive legislation is off the
table for this period -- the MAGAs in the House will veto it. But we have
the presidency. We have the senate. And we have a historically weak
opposition. We’ve got opportunities, and we have a pathway to more.

Our end goals are simple: 

 1. Minimize the damage done by the GOP House
 2. Ensure GOP senators and representatives pay a political price for
their MAGA politics 
 3. Rebuild a pro-democracy federal trifecta in 2024
 4. Pass democracy reform and codify Roe the following year

None of this is easy, but it‘s all achievable, and we all have a role to
play in achieving it. Your own opportunities for effective action will be
different based on your own political realities. For those with Democratic
representation, you want your representatives fighting back, refusing to
cut deals that give the MAGA House cover. You want your Dem senators
introducing and supporting good, popular legislation that shines a light
on how out of touch the House is. For those with Republicans, you may be
able to push them depending on how politically vulnerable they are. For
instance, there are 18 Republicans representing Biden-won districts who
will have to face voters again next year -- we can make them squirm. For
those with extremely bad representation (ahem, I’m writing this from
Texas), you can make them look ridiculous while engaging in the longer
term organizing work to build power on your own turf.

The [ [link removed] ]new guide (PDF) goes into greater depth on a lot of this, and we’ll
be rolling out trainings, explainers, and other resources, to go deeper
all throughout the year.

What we shouldn’t do is simply regurgitate the exact same strategies we
used in 2017-2018, 2019-2020, or 2020-2021. Those strategies were wildly
effective for their time -- but the times have changed. We’ve had success
after success after success these past six years precisely because we’ve
repeatedly adapted to the times.

So in service of that adaptation, I am going to ask for one little favor.
Could you give me some feedback on how relevant and helpful this
newsletter and new guide is to you? You are welcome to send in more
feedback if you’d like -- when you click any option it’ll take you to a
form (and I’ll personally read all the replies!). But even just giving me
a quick click on one of the options will tell me a bit about how this is
landing -- no need to go through the rigamarole of providing more personal
information or feedback if you’d rather not.

[ [link removed] ]Love it!

[ [link removed] ]Meh.

[ [link removed] ]Hate it!

Thank you. This newsletter has been all about change and newness, so let
me end on a constant over the last six years. The common denominator for
every single national Indivisible strategy has been a vibrant, locally led
movement of Indivisible groups organizing and building power around the
country. You built these strategies and made them real with your work in
your home turf alongside your engagement, advice, and support. Yes, the
chaos in the House is embarrassing, but MAGA and Trump are weaker than
they’ve been since we started. They are in decline, and the pro-democracy
forces in this country are ascendant. That’s you. That’s us. That’s this
movement. 

In solidarity,
Ezra

PS: Zeke got a lot of presents over the holidays. Far and away his
favorite was from his aunt -- stickers of his own face. I am currently
wearing several at his insistence.

 [9]Zeke laughing in a gray shirt with a firetruck on it

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