Solidarity
Only 1,376 days to go...
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." ~Margaret Mead
I was listening to the attached podcast where they talking about some of the law firms that are caving into the administration’s extortion demands. The firms were worried about losing clients. I don’t know about you, but any law firm that doesn’t stand up and fight for themselves, for their profession and for the rule of law, makes me wonder how invested they would be in representing me or my needs.
Hundreds of law firms, former judges sign onto briefs in support of Perkins Coie
More than 500 law firms and 300 retired judges asked for leave to file two amicus briefs condemning Trump’s order stripping security clearances from and severing government ties with the major law firm, which previously did work for Democrats.
Trump’s crackdown on major law firms has raised alarm across the legal industry, but Big Law has split on how to respond.
Solidarity. While not all law firms signed on to this brief, those that did are standing together.
It reminded of Lech Wałęsa, who led the Gdansk shipyard workers strike against the communist government in Poland. The former electrician went on to form Solidarity, the first independent labor union to develop in a Soviet bloc nation.
In July 1980, facing economic crisis, Poland’s government raised the price of food and other goods, while curbing the growth of wages. The price hikes made it difficult for many Poles to afford basic necessities, and a wave of strikes swept the country. Amid mounting tensions, a popular forklift operator named Anna Walentynowicz was fired from the Lenin Shipyard in the northern Polish city of Gdansk. In mid-August, some 17,000 of the shipyard’s workers began a sit-down strike to campaign for her reinstatement, as well as for a modest increase in wages.
Despite governmental censorship and attempts to keep news of the strike from getting out, similar protests broke out in industrial cities throughout Poland. On August 17, an Interfactory Strike Committee presented the Polish government with 21 ambitious demands, including the right to organize independent trade unions, the right to strike, the release of political prisoners and increased freedom of expression. Fearing the general strike would lead to a national revolt, the government sent a commission to Gdansk to negotiate with the rebellious workers. On August 31, Walesa and Deputy Premier Mieczyslaw Jagielski signed an agreement giving in to many of the workers’ demands.
In the wake of the Gdansk strike, leaders of the Interfactory Strike Committee voted to create a single national trade union known as Solidarnosc (Solidarity), which soon evolved into a mass social movement, with a membership of more than 10 million people. Solidarity attracted sympathy from Western leaders and hostility from Moscow, where the Kremlin considered a military invasion of Poland.
In late 1981, under Soviet pressure, the government of General Wojciech Jaruzelski annulled the recognition of Solidarity and declared martial law in Poland. Some 6,000 Solidarity activists were arrested, including Walesa, who was detained for almost a year. The Solidarity movement moved underground, where it continued to enjoy support from international leaders such as U.S. President Ronald Reagan, who imposed sanctions on Poland. Walesa was awarded the 1983 Nobel Peace Prize, and after the fall of communism in 1989 he became the first president of Poland ever to be elected by popular vote. (source: History.com)
There is always strength in numbers. We saw on April 5th how many people are appalled by this administration.
Trump is bully and like all bullies, they’re cowards. We need to stand up to him - in solidarity.
Thought for the day in honor of his birthday…
“There is but One God. His name is Truth..”
~Guru Nanak
Must Read Article:
A Playbook for Standing Up to President Trump
Trump has adopted a more extreme approach to executive power in his second term. He has won some early policy victories, and he will win more. Nonetheless, he faces real constraints on his power. Indeed, the most likely path to American autocracy depends on not only a power-hungry president but also the voluntary capitulation of a cowed civil society. It depends on the mistaken belief that a president is invincible. Anybody who has dealt with a schoolyard bully should recognize this principle: The illusion of invincibility is often his greatest asset.
Quote of the day:
Granddaughters of a Paul Weiss Patriarch Deplore the Firm’s Trump Deal
“When you met with the President you were first and foremost an officer of the court, not a CEO of a large commercial enterprise with a problem you wanted to put "behind" you like some class action suit. Nothing short of the integrity of the entire legal system is at stake…. It is impossible to reconcile your pact with the administration, made during a week in which attacks on law firms and the judicial system were only increasing, including violent calls for the impeachment of a federal trial judge, a position our grandfather held before he came to Paul, Weiss, with this clear directive in the Statement of Principles to privilege the profession he loved and the country he venerated….
In 1954, our grandfather wrote, ‘Every American generation has inherited from its predecessor the memory of freedom, of liberty, and of constitutional government; but every generation if it would retain these prizes of our civilization, must reacquire them in its own lifetime. This day when the winds are full of doctrines subversive of the Constitution, inimical to our liberties, is the time to redevelop muscle and determination to defend them. In their defense we shall survive.’
As you face other decisions going forward, unless you prioritize your ‘responsibilities both to our profession and our country’ and ‘redevelop muscle and determination’ to protect the ‘prizes of our civilization,’ we request that you cease invoking our grandfather's name to justify your actions. And, finally, we implore you to support publicly the law firms that are opposing governmental attacks for the clients they advise and the attorneys they hire and to defend the erosion of the rule of law in the courts.”
~Amy and Nina Rifkind, granddaughters of Judge Simon Rifkind
What I’m reading today…
We aren’t powerless. The place to start fighting back is with knowledge…If people are uninformed about what he’s doing, they won’t object. So our job is to be well informed, to understand what’s going on. Pick the issue that matters to you the most and do a deep dive on it, or pay attention to a number of different issues. Have conversations with friends—and with total strangers—about what’s going on. But don’t be complacent. That’s the dictator’s trap, and we are not going to fall into it.
The Confrontation Between Trump and the Supreme Court Has Arrived
The fact that the order was issued without dissent was remarkable. The Roberts Court has indulged Trump at nearly every turn, first writing the anti-insurrection clause out of the Fourteenth Amendment and then foiling his federal prosecution by inventing a grant of presidential immunity with no basis in the text of the Constitution. Justice John Roberts and his colleagues have deployed a selective proceduralism to avoid directly confronting the Trump administration, one that contrasts with their alacrity in cases where they are seeking their preferred outcome. Yet the confrontation they sought to avoid has arrived nonetheless, and even the Trumpiest justices, such as Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas, joined their colleagues in informing the Trump administration that what it had done was illegal and should be remedied.
Harvard Says It Will Not Comply With Trump Administration’s Demands
“No government — regardless of which party is in power — should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” said Alan Garber, Harvard’s president, in a statement to the university on Monday. Harvard University rejects Trump administration demands to change policies
So You Want to Be a Dissident? A practical guide to courage in Trump’s age of fear.
The climate of retribution has caused many to freeze: Wealthy liberal donors have paused their political giving, concerned about reprisal from the President. One Republican senator dropped his objection to Trump’s Pentagon nominee after reportedly receiving “credible death threats.”
…But the American approach to dissent will likely have to evolve in this era of rising “competitive authoritarianism,” wherein repressive regimes retain the trappings of democracy—such as elections—but use the power of the state to effectively crush resistance. Competitive authoritarians, such as Viktor Orbán, in Hungary, raise the price of opposition by taking control of the “referees”—the courts, the media, and the military. In the United States, many of the referees are beginning to fall in line….
There is hope, though. Political-science research reveals that autocratic leaders can be successfully challenged. Erica Chenoweth, a professor at Harvard University, has analyzed more than six hundred mass movements that sought to topple a national government (often in response to its refusal to acknowledge election results) or obtain territorial independence in the past century. Chenoweth found that when at least 3.5 per cent of the population participated in nonviolent opposition, movements were largely successful…data also show that nonviolence is more effective than violence, and that movements do better when they build momentum over time—think a long-lasting general strike or wildcat walkouts, rather than a one-time action. Successful campaigns weaken popular support for an authoritarian leader by encouraging different sectors of society—such as business leaders, religious institutions, unions, or the military—to withdraw their support from a corrupt or unjust regime. One by one, the sectors defect, and, eventually, the leader may weaken and their government may fall.
Harvard faculty sue Trump administration over funding cuts threat
The move comes weeks after the Trump administration cut $400 million in federal grants to Columbia University amid its antisemitism probe of the New York campus.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon warned that cuts to Harvard would be similar.
Active Empathy is life-changing
The deportations do not only violate the most fundamental rights of due process. They also exemplify MAGA officials’ utter lack of humanity for anyone who does not look, sound, and think as they do. It is the antithesis of empathy—the worst governmental abuse of power in my lifetime directed at people least able to defend themselves.
Trump Is Back. So Are Millions of Protesters
What makes this show of force especially notable is how the demonstrations spread through so many different local communities, including in some typically MAGA-friendly terrain. … Of course, there are a lot of complicated reasons for the cynicism and despair that currently characterize American life. But what the protesters are unhappy about is quite simple: Trump and Elon Musk are on a crusade to gut broad swaths of the federal government, threatening vital components of the welfare state, including Social Security and Medicare. Recent polling has pointed to public frustrations with Trump and the DOGE-ification of American life.
In unity, there’s strength to confront Trump. In disunity, cowardice
Frighteningly, though, not a single one of the nation’s top 20 firms by revenue have signed on — including Kirkland & Ellis, Latham & Watkins, Gibson Dunn, and Sullivan & Cromwell. Nor did Skadden Arps, which recently struck a deal with Trump to avoid an executive order. Nor did Paul Weiss, which was the target of an executive order before it reached a deal of its own.
Two other firms chose to cave to Trump’s demands even before being hit with an executive order. Last week, the two firms — Willkie Farr and Milbank — cut deals with Trump promising to dedicate $100 million of pro bono work to causes that Trump supports.
The big firms that refused to sign on to the friend-of-the-court brief worry that signing the document will draw Trump’s ire and cost them clients.
Barack Obama calls on Americans to defend democratic values in face of Trump agenda
Barack Obama has called on US citizens, colleges and law firms to resist Donald Trump’s political agenda – and warned Americans to prepare to “possibly sacrifice” in support of democratic values. The two-term former Democratic president painted a picture of the Trump White House looking to upend the international order created after the second world war – and a domestic political reconfiguration in which ideological disagreement falling within mutual respect for free speech and the rule of law being eroded.
How does a moral person live with this? How do we not become complicit?
The answer, I think, is to do whatever we can to protect those who are vulnerable to this cruelty. We speak out against Trump’s use of criminal investigations to punish public servants who helped expose his venality. We make our communities into sanctuaries that limit local law enforcement’s cooperation with federal immigration authorities. We urge our universities to protect free speech and expression of everyone, at whatever the cost. To the extent we can, we fund groups that are helping poor families around the world get the medical assistance they need.
We call our senators and members of Congress to tell them to retrieve their constitutional authority over government spending. We tell them to stop the brutality in Gaza, Ukraine, Yemen, and everywhere else America is either encouraging it or failing to discourage it. We tell them to stop Trump’s criminal investigations of opponents.
We protest. We organize. We mobilize. We do what we can to put good people into office and keep them there, and we help regain control of Congress in next year’s midterm elections.
In other words, we become organized activists against Trump’s organized cruelty.
10 rules for dealing with Trump’s demands for capitulation
Trump’s unquenchable thirst for power, dominance, and intimidation. Here are 10 rules for dealing with this.
Trump redefines fraud in quest to crush "Deep State"
President Trump is using his second term to delegitimize the very concept of white-collar crime. Trump's belief that he was a victim of "lawfare" has tainted his view of the justice system. Paired with his crusade to crush the "Deep State" regulatory complex, Trump could enable a golden age of financial fraud, ethics watchdogs fear.
In early February, Trump and Elon Musk's DOGE team effectively shut down the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the post-recession agency created to protect Americans from predatory financial practices.
Trump then paused enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, claiming the 1977 anti-bribery statute had been "stretched beyond proper bounds" and was hurting U.S. companies' ability to compete overseas.
In March, Trump fired two Democrats from the Federal Trade Commission, taking aim at one of the government's top watchdogs for corporate fraud, consumer deception and antitrust violations.
On the Hill, Democrats cannot merely play defense. They must force Republicans to vote on whether to return the power to pay tariffs to Congress. They must box Republicans into separate votes on hugely unpopular measures ranging from Medicaid cuts to elimination of ACA subsidies to slashing of critical medical and scientific research to tariffs. Republicans are already nervous, very nervous, thanks to the tariff disaster; now is the time to test just how closely, and for how long, they are going to play dumb and adhere to Trump’s noxious positions.
Big Backlash at Big Law Democrats
The frustration that Democratic officials have felt as some of the country’s most prestigious law firms have cut deals with Donald Trump to avoid his retribution is quickly morphing into anger that top Democrats at these firms won’t quit in protest.
That anger has been directed at a cadre of individuals, including former Attorney General Loretta Lynch and former Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, as well as recent second gentleman Doug Emhoff—all of whom continue to hold posts at firms that have cut deals with the White House. Democrats argue that their refusal to leave those cushy posts is an act of selfishness that has undercut the party’s argument that the country is facing an existential crisis and that institutions and their leaders must be compelled to stand up to Trumpism.
Trump’s Silencing of Voice of America Is Another Gift to Authoritarians
U.S. President Donald Trump’s efforts to shut down Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Voice of America marks the end of an era for the U.S. soft power that helped bring the Cold War to a close. For many decades these broadcasters were more than just media outlets across Central and Eastern Europe. They were lifelines to news from the world outside the Soviet bloc that connected families, sparked hope and brought about political change. While much of Western Europe has forgotten their influence, they have remained stalwarts across the region, especially in countries like Hungary, where Prime Minister Viktor Orban has worked consistently to undermine the free press.
Mark Zuckerberg’s Former AI Lawyer for Meta Is Now Taking on Elon Musk, DOGE, and Trump
“I think it’s important,” he continues, “for everyone to do their part to resist the administration’s effort to dismantle the rule of law.”
An Uprising at a Big Law Firm Targeted by Trump
On Friday morning, the Wall Street Journal reported that Latham & Watkins, Simpson Thacher, and Kirkland & Ellis were also nearing deals with the administration that would involve each firm agreeing to $125 million in pro-bono services. The paper said that the firms were “also asked if they would contribute to a fund for people alleging they were harmed by diversity, equity and inclusion practices, but they resisted.” Trump, who has already said he wants to direct pro bono work toward trade negotiations and securing new coal projects domestically, later announced that all four firms had agreed to the settlement. The total of $500 million in pro bono work they agreed to comes in addition to the $340 million in pro bono services Trump has already secured.
Not all institutions are complying. Some schools, such as Wesleyan, have refused to abandon their diversity principles. And organizations including the American Association of University Professors have filed lawsuits challenging Trump’s executive orders, arguing they violate academic freedom and the First Amendment. But these remain exceptions, as the broader trend leans toward institutional caution and retreat…
German universities, which entered the 20th century in a golden age of global intellectual influence, did not resist the Nazi regime but instead adapted to it…The transformation of German academia was not a slow drift but a swift and systemic overhaul. But what made Hitler’s orders stick was the eagerness of many academic leaders to comply, justify and normalize the new order. Each decision – each erased name, each revised syllabus, each closed program and department – was framed as necessary, even patriotic. Within a few years, German universities no longer served knowledge – they served power…
When universities start regulating not just what they say but what they teach, support and stand for – driven by fear rather than principle – they are no longer just reacting to political threats, they are internalizing them. And as history has shown, that may mark the beginning of the end of their academic independence.
This Is Why Dictatorships Fail
The Republicans who lead Congress have refused to use the power of the legislative branch to stop him or moderate him, in this or almost any other matter. The Cabinet is composed of sycophants and loyalists who are willing to defend contradictory policies, even if doing so makes them look like fools. The courts haven’t decisively intervened yet either. No one, apparently, is willing to prevent a single man from destroying the world economy, wrecking financial markets, forcing this country and other countries into recession if that’s what he feels like doing when he gets up tomorrow morning.
This is what arbitrary, absolute power looks like. And this is why the men who wrote the Constitution never wanted anyone to have it. In that famously hot, stuffy room in Philadelphia, windows closed for the sake of secrecy, they sweated and argued about how to limit the powers of the American executive. They arrived at the idea of dividing power between different branches of government. As James Madison wrote in “Federalist No. 47”: “The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary in the same hands … may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.”
The missing Black demonstrators in anti-Trump protests
Nearly five years after fueling the largest protest movement in American history, Black activism stands at a generational, emotional and strategic crossroads. Many of the Black Americans who flooded the streets in 2020 have stepped back from the renewed anti-Trump protests — torn between the urgency of the moment and the spiritual toll of relentless, often fruitless resistance….Some organizers say Black activism is shifting away from mass mobilization and toward quieter strategies: economic pressure campaigns, digital organizing and coalition-building behind the scenes.
In South Carolina, a Once Thriving Textile Hub Is Baffled by Trump’s Tariffs
This was textile country, and the cities of Union, Spartanburg and Greenville were at the heart of it….Trump’s goals have clashed with the current economic reality in places like Spartanburg and Greenville, S.C., heavily Republican areas where foreign companies have turned the onetime textile hubs into wealthy, industrial heavyweights. Should those levies go back into effect, locals worry that they will threaten the very businesses that saved the region, home to some 1.5 million residents, all to revive a bygone industry that few people miss.
Today, companies like BMW and Michelin — from Germany and France — are the economic engines of the region. Since BMW opened its plant in Spartanburg County in the early ’90s, it has invested more than $14.8 billion into its South Carolina operations. The plant has more than 11,000 jobs, its largest single production facility in the world, according to the company. And it is the country’s largest car exporter by value, with $10 billion in shipments last year.
So the local business community was stunned when the White House’s top trade adviser, Peter Navarro, attacked BMW’s manufacturing process in an interview this week.
Trade war threat sinks consumer confidence, alarms Wall Street
The comments from the Wall Street titans came after a tumultuous week in which Trump imposed massive tariffs on most major U.S. trading partners — then backtracked hours later amid a sell-off in government bonds and stocks. Trump also ratcheted up tariffs on China, setting off a trade war between the world’s two biggest economies, with Beijing responding in kind.
Freak sell-off of ‘safe haven’ US bonds raises fear that confidence in America is fading
The upheaval in stocks has been grabbing all the headlines, but there is a bigger problem looming in another corner of the financial markets that rarely gets headlines: Investors are dumping U.S. government bonds.
Normally, investors rush into Treasurys at a whiff of economic chaos but now they are selling them as not even the lure of higher interest payments on the bonds is getting them to buy. The freak development has experts worried that big banks, funds and traders are losing faith in America as a stable, predictable, good place to store their money.
“The fear is the U.S. is losing its standing as the safe haven,” said George Cipolloni, a fund manager at Penn Mutual Asset Management. “Our bond market is the biggest and most stable in the world, but when you add instability, bad things can happen.”
Tom Suozzi on fighting MAGA in a district Trump won
We have to dig out examples of Republicans that are disagreeing with the administration and highlight them as much as possible, because it gives credibility to our arguments that this is just plain wrong.
What I am listening to…
What I read every day…
