Good Luck Today Everyone, A Letter To America, Pressuring Congress To Stop The Russian-Backed Wrecking Ball

It Is Time For Democrats In Congress "To Let Facts Be Submitted To A Candid World"

Morning all. As I discuss in my new video and post, 2 Things Are True Today, we both made progress this week and the damage Trump is doing to the country got far worse:

• Our movement has racked up some big wins in these last few weeks, we are getting stronger, their thing looks a lot more wobbly, and Trump’s hold on the public and his own party in DC is loosening (why we need to keep the pressure on - for little cracks can become big cracks)

• Trump continues to do extraordinary damage to the country and the world, and we must continue to summon the collective courage to respond with the level of urgency the moment requires

Like many of you I am off soon to participate in a Hands Off protest, mine at the Washington Monument. I hope to be able to camp out for the first hour or so on the right side looking toward the stage in case any Hopium folks are there. I encourage our paid subscribers to self-report their experiences today here when they get home and send me photos by hitting reply to this email. They will find their way to me and I can include them here in Hopium over the coming days.

Three things for you today. First, a list of my recent conversations that can help inform your weekend. My talk about tariffs with Rob Shapiro may be the most useful and timely now. Second, I am sending along my two posts about the need for Democrats in Congress to write a A Letter to America. I felt it was appropriate to return to this idea on a day where such a letter could have been read and referenced to at every rally and protest across the country. May it be an inspiration to you as you head out today. Third, our recommended actions and campaigns/party committees for those looking to do even more in the coming days.

I will note that yesterday a North Carolina appeals court ruled in favor of the Republicans in their outrageous challenge to our victory in a state Supreme Court race (something many of you contributed to). Here’s Politico this morning:

A divided North Carolina appeals court on Friday ruled that tens of thousands of voters in the state needed to verify their identity months after they cast their ballots, opening the door for the votes to be tossed — and for the election results to flip in a contested state Supreme Court election.

Incumbent Democratic Justice Allison Riggs appeared to have narrowly beat back Republican candidate Jefferson Griffin last fall, prevailing by 734 votes out of 5.5 million cast across the state. Griffin protested the election results, arguing that roughly 65,000 already cast and counted ballots should be invalidated on the basis of improper voter registration and identification.

The state board of elections rejected his challenge, but the North Carolina state Supreme Court in January ruled to block certification of the results, allowing for Griffin’s case to continue.

The state appeals court on Friday ruled 2-1 along party lines in Griffin’s favor, with the two Republican judges — John Tyson and Fred Gore — writing in their majority opinion that “the post-election protest process preserves the fundamental right to vote in free elections ‘on equal terms,’” and that “this right is violated when ‘votes are not accurately counted [because] [unlawful] ballots are included in the election results.’”

Tossing out wide swaths of ballots from voters after the election would be an extraordinary decision that would likely tilt the election to Griffin, who is also a state appellate judge. His efforts to challenge the results have drawn scathing rebukes from voting rights groups, Democrats and even some Republicans who say it changing the rules of an election after it has already been run.

One of our recommended campaigns is to donate to Anderson Clayton and the North Carolina Democratic Party to help pay for their ongoing defense of our important November win. Watch my recent interview with Chair Clayton about their fight to keep this seat. Allison Riggs herself is booked for a live Hopium interview this Friday but we will try to move that up now given yesterday’s ruling. Keep fighting all!

Hopium Conversations

• Dr. Rob Shapiro on Trump Declares War On The World

• David Rothkopf on Trump’s Dangerous Approach To The World

• David Leopold on Yes, People Are Disappearing in America

• Hopium House 7 Discussions with Reps. Derek Tran and Janelle Bynum

• Rep. Don Beyer on Fighting DOGE More Effectively

• Jon “Bowser” Bauman on Trump’s Attacks on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid

• Casey Michel on The Unprecedented Corruption Of The Trump Regime

• Dr. Michael Mann on The Right’s War on Science

• Jane Kleeb on The New Leadership Team’s Plans For The DNC/State Parties

A Letter To America

“Let Facts Be Submitted To A Candid World”

March 13, 2025 - In several posts over the last few weeks I’ve advocated that Democrats in the Senate and House come together to write A Letter to America about Donald Trump’s unprecedented attack on the US government and our Constitutional order. It is part of a broader need for Democrats to open up a Second Front against Trump, one that goes beyond our current, proper focus on his reckless economic agenda to include these attacks and selling out of America to Putin and his abandonment of our Ukrainian and traditional allies in Europe, the Americas and Asia.

What follows are the two posts where I wrote about this idea. I hope to have time in the new next few days to integrate this posts into a single more concise articulation of the idea, one I hope all of you will join me in advocating to Democratic Senators and House Members.

Post 1, Feb 21st (link)

I am unbelievably proud of all of you. I am deeply inspired by the actions you are taking and the self-reporting we all get to read on our chat each day. This community is stepping up bigtime in a time of extraordinary national challenge. Together we are moving the needle, and just need to keep working it peeps. For with pressure, little cracks can become big cracks, and little wins can become big wins. We are Americans. Fighting for freedom and democracy is what we do. Who we are.

It is why Congressional Dems must launch a serious national campaign now to talk to the American people about Trump’s savage attack on the America of the Four Freedoms; his betrayal of all of us; and his ongoing unconstitutional usurping of Congress’s powers. I have written and spoken extensively about all the things I think our Congressional leaders need to do now to rise to the moment, and defend this oath:

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.

And we in our calls to Congress each day are helping our leaders understand what is required of them now. But I’ve come to believe the next step Leaders Schumer and Jeffries must make is to write a letter to Trump, to their fellow members of Congress and the American people outlining why they believe what Trump is doing is wrong and unconstitutional. It should borrow from our Declaration of Independence, and lay out in clear language the case against our Mad King. It should be signed by every Democrat in both chambers. Every Congressional Dem should build days of action around it in their districts. It can be used by those fighting Trump’s illegal and unconstitutional acts in the courts. The national Dem grassroots can them amplify this call for patriotism and rejection of tyranny throughout all of our networks. It can become the rallying cry for proud patriots of all stripes to start rising up against our corrupt and traitorous leaders.

Here is a passage from our Declaration of Independence that then leads into a list of the Mad King’s “abuses and usurpations:”

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.—Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

Listing our Mad King’s “abuses and usurpations” is something that must get done, Leaders Schumer and Jeffries, “let Facts be submitted to a candid world.” It should be published early next week. Work all weekend. History is calling you, now. For as the inscription at the Department of Justice tells us:

Post 2, March 3rd (link)

Below I offer a series of things you can contact your representatives about today, either in person or via phone or email/online forms. The goal of these contacts is to help your electeds, of either party, to understand what is expected of them now.

One thing I think we should be encouraging our local Democratically controlled legislatures, city and county boards/councils to do is to pass condemnations of Trump. Go the record on whatever is of greatest concern - embrace of Putin, destruction of the US government, elimination of vital health research, mistreatment of workers. Whatever it is. As we discussed the other day these kind of bottom up public expressions of condemnation, of going on the record very clearly about why what Trump is doing is wrong, dangerous, a betrayal is very much in the spirit of how we last fought a mad king almost 250 years ago. We must become more comfortable going on the record with our fellow Americans laying out the case against him, spelling out what our Founders called in the Declaration of Independence “abuses and usurpations.”

This is my very first recommendation for what I think all Senate and House Dems need to do now. There needs to be a clear statement from half the Congress that they believe that what Trump is doing is unconstitutional, illegal, wrong and an extraordinary betrayal of our Constitutional order and all of us. This “letter to America” can become the rallying cry for all of our work together. It can become the amicus brief in every court challenge to Trump. It can become a clear statement to the world that American patriots are fighting this historical betrayal of our democracy but also of freedom loving people throughout the world. The people of America and the world need to hear from Democrats and other leaders of this pro-democracy movement that they understand the stakes of the fight we are in and are willing to leave it all on the line for the most important force for freedom humanity has ever seen. The absence of this clear, simple statement from our Congressional leaders is unacceptable and dangerous, and it is why I believe this “letter to America” remains our very first ask of all of Congressional representatives.

Godspeed - Simon

March 13, 2025

Recommended Hopium Actions and Campaigns - One note before we get going….Ben Wikler called me on Thursday morning to express his thanks for all that we did to help Susan Crawford win. We raised a lot of money, together, and many of you worked it really hard for her. Great work everyone. This was a huge and consequential win!

We’ve launched some new actions and campaigns, and are for now retiring a few old ones…here we go!

1 - Demand Congress Take Back Their Tariff Authority From Trump - I will be developing this new action in the coming days but simply - call your Senators and House Member today and demand they override and role back these incredibly dangerous and destructive tariffs.

2 - Fight The Trump-Musk Attack On Our Government, Our Privacy And Our Constitutional Order - Encourage your Senators and Representatives to follow Senator Booker’s lead and let Facts be be submitted to a candid world in a joint Senate-House Letter to America; to hold their own hearings; to file criminal referrals for Musk and his malicious posse to DOJ/FBI and amicus briefs in the court cases regarding the usurpation of their Constitutional authorities or file suits of their own (House Dems began doing this several weeks ago). Encourage them to hold a daily morning press conference to more aggressively challenge Musk’s ransacking of the USG that is making America less prosperous, less healthy, less safe and far less respected in the world.

3 - Loudly Protest Trump’s Embrace of Russia and Abandonment of NATO and Europe - Let your electeds know you are outraged by traitorous Trump’s selling out of Zelenskyy, abandonment of Europe and embrace of Putin; and that we cannot accept this level of appeasement of someone who is a clear enemy of America and the West, and certainly not an ally. Demand that Trump not let his Saudi meeting w/Putin become our Munich; demand that he not become our Neville Chamberlain; demand that we rejoin our European and NATO allies in support of Zelenskyy and democracy here and everywhere. The country is not with Trump’s embrace of Putin and we must be very loud, very, very loud now. See my new essay on the need to support our allies and not surrender to Putin, and my new interview with Rep. Adam Smith, the Ranking Member of the House Armed Services Committee, one of the most important foreign policy voices in our party.

4 - Our Work In The States, The Spring Offensive - I am going to rework this section as so much has happened since we called on our community members to organize in the 17 most vulnerable Republican House seats. Rallies and protests have exploded across the country. The DNC/House Dems/State Parties have kicked off People’s Town Halls in all 50 states. I have come to believe that we should be leaning on our state and local electeds to pursue these organized “condemnations” of the Trump regime and their betrayal of America. Let’s start talking now about what we are going to do on July 4th, a day with all of a sudden much more importance.

Paid subscribers should self-report their actions today in our daily chat. So inspired by how hard so many of you are working. I want to make a special plea to all Hopium readers in states with Republican Senators - please make your calls, every day. Even 50 to 100 people calling every day in every red state can make a difference. We have hundreds of Hopium subscribers in every state in the country and it’s critical that we all do our part now.

Next, for those wanting to do more traditional political/campaign work we have four Hopium-backed efforts we're rallying behind:

Thank Senator Booker For Standing Up For America - Senator Booker is up for re-election next year and many of you asked if they could channel their support and appreciation for him through Hopium. So I’ve set up an ActBlue fundraising page for him with a goal of raising $100,000 by June 30th. We’ve already raised $15,000 - thank you all. Let’s be there for Senator Booker as he been there for us at this critical time.

Help Abigail Spanberger Win Virginia - Virginia will be one of the big battlegrounds of the November, 2025 elections and we have a great candidate for Governor, Abigail Spanberger. Watch my interview with Abigail, donate, volunteer, and learn more here. Given how many federal employees live in Virginia, this race is also now on the front lines of the Trump/Musk assault on the federal government.

We’ve raised more than $74,000 so far towards our June 30th goal of $250,000 - thank you all. Let’s keep working it for Abigail!

Support The Hopium House 7 - We’ve begun our work to help flip the House next year by supporting and shoring up the 7 newly-elected battleground House Dems we helped elect last year. Catch our interviews with Derek Tran and Janelle Bynum and give to all 7 through a single donation on our new ActBlue page. Learn more about this important effort here.

We’ve already raised over $54,000 towards our $250,000 June 30th goal - thank you all!

Get Anderson Clayton And The NC Dems Fight The GOP’s Attempt To Steal A Supreme Court Seat - A few weeks ago we began a campaign to raise $50,000 for Anderson Clayton and the NC Dems. These funds will help the NC Dems get off to a great start in 2025 and help cover the costs of their fight to prevent the Republicans from stealing a Supreme Court seat we won together in 2024. Watch my new interview with Chair Clayton to get an update on the fight over the Supreme Court seat and her plans to win elections and counter Trump this year.

We’ve raised $31,000 so far towards our June 30th goal of $50,000 - thank you everyone!

Keep working hard all. So incredibly proud to be in this fight with all of you and good luck today everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Simon