Like the Revolutionary War, the Battle Against Trump Will Feature His Loyalists Vs. Those Loyal to Independence

I just finished Ken Burns’ documentary series, “The American Revolution,” and I have to agree with his assessment that our nation’s founding is complicated, violent, and would leave some of today’s citizens — like me — with mixed feelings about winners and losers, and key players in the conflict.

Black slaves were promised freedom if they fought for the British. Native tribes were offered protection from the land-hungry Americans if they fought for the British. Yet there were slaves and tribal leaders who recognized the promise of “all men are created equal,” and fought for the Patriots, hoping for the best.

And how should I regard Thomas Jefferson, who authored the Declaration of Independence and understood very clearly that it should apply to more than white men of property, but to all?

Jefferson was playing the long game and entrusted posterity to eventually do the right thing. And we’re still trying to do the right thing for all, despite the efforts of Trump, racists, fascists, and Christian militants to drag us back to the 1800s.

Unlike the regionalized Civil War, which pitched North versus South over the issue of slavery, the American Revolution triggered tremendous violence of neighbor versus neighbor, over the question of who was loyal to British rule or in favor of independence. Neighbors who had been friendly, helped each other, and even intermarried before the revolution took shape, were now willing to abuse each other, throw punches, and shoot each other, burning down farms and businesses and driving each other away into exile, all over this question: Freedom or Loyalty.

It was not pretty.

This new year of 2026 is not going to be pretty either, nor will it be a year for spectators. We cannot simply assume that a Blue tidal wave is coming to rescue us in November, and then we can start fixing the wreckage left by Trump, Project 2025, the Supreme Court, Republican Congress, and the techbros that find democracy and the Constitution inconvenient. They are not going to be idle and will strive their utmost to win in November, by fair means or foul, but mostly foul.

We have to mobilize the Blue states, their governors, attorneys general, and legislators, to get damn creative in confounding those who are Loyalists to the foes of the Constitution and law itself.

For example, look at that bipartisan effort in Montana to nullify Citizens United within the confines of Montana. If every Blue state did that, by citizen initiative or legislation or state Constitution amendment, we could put a serious hitch in the get-along of the Robber Barons of today.

Because Blue states are the economic powerhouses of the country and generate more federal tax revenues than are spent in Blue states, Blue states could withhold federal tax dollars and hold them in escrow, denying funding to Red states and to Trump.

Blue states could impose stringent regulations on Artificial Intelligence operations.

If Trump uses executive orders to ban federal regulations protecting consumers, labor or the environment, Blue states can pass legislation applying those regulations within Blue states.

Or how about if Blue states band together to ban official Blue cooperation, ditch the weapons of war, ban concentration camps within Blue states, and if ICE agents violate Blue laws, arrest them, and confiscate their equipment.

Back in 1850, when Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act, Northern states refused to cooperate with Southern slave-catcher agents who went north to recover fugitive slaves. Basically, the North invited Southern agents to take a long walk off a short pier. Northerners who hadn’t thought much about slavery became angry activists, rescued re-captured slaves from kidnappers, invigorated the abolitionist movement and Underground Railroad, and inspired the creation of the Republican Party.

We have to take the offense folks, not simply react and play Whack-a-Mole to Trump and Republican initiatives. We have to identify what people want, start delivering it in and via Blue states, then promise to deliver at the national level.

And if the Democratic National Committee and leading Democratic leaders can’t embrace taxing the rich and implementing Medicare-for-all, then we need a new party.

By the way, the last words in the Burns docu-series on the American Revolution were from Benjamin Rush, a founding Father: “The Revolution is not over.”

Indeed.