Time Now For Dems To Go Offense And Use Trump's Stumbles To Further Define Him With The Public

That this Trump thing is a huge, ugly mess is becoming far better understood

Morning all. I wake this morning believing that Trump is weaker than he was a week ago, and our movement stronger. Trump’s early, reckless economic approach has caused the economy to slow, inflation to rise, consumer confidence to fall and the markets to grow increasingly worried. After a bad week last week the major stock market indices are off again this morning, in part because the trade wars Trump has launched are escalating:

Beijing began imposing tariffs on Monday on many farm products from the United States, for which China is the largest overseas market. It is the latest escalation of a trade fight between the world’s two largest economies.

The Chinese government announced the tariffs last week, shortly after President Trump raised tariffs on Chinese products for the second time since he took office in January. The Chinese tariffs will include a levy of 15 percent on U.S. products like chicken, wheat and corn, as well as 10 percent on products like soybeans, pork, beef and fruit.

Beijing said that goods that had already been shipped before Monday and imported by April 12 would not be subject to the new tariffs. Because crops like soybeans, wheat and corn, in particular, tend to travel by sea, this means that China’s customs officials will actually collect few tariffs until shipments arrive in China after leaving the United States on Monday or later.

A spokesman for the National People’s Congress, which is now holding China’s annual legislative session, said last week that Mr. Trump’s latest tariffs had “disrupted the security and stability of the global industrial and supply chains.”

Another reason the markets are off this morning is that this weekend in various appearances Trump acknowledged his tariffs could bring higher prices and a recession. In this exchange from Sunday he sure doesn’t sound like he is abandoning his tariffs, does he? The markets are right to be worried…..

The impression that Trump is stumbling and making mistakes is starting to take hold in DC too. Here’s a screen shot of the Washington Post’s website right now:

And here’s an excerpt from that story, Trump touted sweeping tariff and DOGE plans - then adjusted as backlash grew:

President Donald Trump touted his administration’s early work in his prime-time speech to Congress last week, especially on two of his top priorities: tariffs to transform the global trade order and the work of the U.S. DOGE Service to cut spending at home.

Two days later, Trump had watered down tariffs on Mexico and Canada that took effect only hours before the speech, scaling back plans for economic transformation in the face of slumping stock markets worldwide. The same day, he also put new limits on DOGE, telling his Cabinet secretaries at a closed-door meeting that they — not billionaire adviser Elon Musk and his team — had control over which workers their agencies fire.

The moves represent the latest abrupt shifts by a president whose political career has been marked by sudden reversals. They also reflect how Trump is not immune to political, economic or diplomatic pressure, even at the height of his power — with Republican control over Congress, a conservative judiciary and a far more compliant Cabinet than in his first term. As Trump intensifies his efforts to remake the U.S. government, overhaul the systems that regulate trade and international relations and even expand U.S. territory, he’s running into new sources of opposition.

This weakness, these stumbles, these course corrections are why I believe Democrats must go on offense now and open up that sustained and aggressive Second Front that I’ve been talking about, one that talks to the American people about Trump’s ongoing betrayal of the country here and abroad. There is great urgency to stopping Trump’s illegal and unconstitutional assault on our government and his abandonment of our Ukrainian and European allies for he is breaking things that will be hard if not impossible to repair. And we must do everything we can to stop him.

It’s why I’m recommending we advocate for two things in particular when contacting our elected officials this week:

Release A Letter To America - Simply, borrowing from the Declaration of Independence, it’s time for Democrats in Congress to write A Letter To America detailing the “abuses,” “injuries,” and “usurpations” of the new Mad King and “let Facts be submitted to a candid world.” Our leaders need to honor their oaths of office, and fight much more aggressively to protect our Constitutional order that’s under unprecedented attack from Trump and Musk. You can learn more about this idea here and here.

Fight Trump’s Traitorous Embrace Of Putin And Historic Betrayal Of Our European and Ukrainian Allies - As we discussed Saturday we must force a serious debate about what Trump is doing in our name, and work to forge a bi-partisan coalition to minimize the extraordinary damage he is doing to America, our alliances and Ukraine itself. We should be asking our elected officials, of whatever party, to help lead this debate and challenge Trump’s truly historic and dangerous betrayal of America and our allies.

News this morning underscores the urgency of these two recommended actions and of opening up that Second Front. First, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the illegal and unconstitutional ending of USAID and most of its programs (and of course it is announced on Twitter to help put money into Elon’s pockets):

Second, on Fox News this weekend Senator Lindsay Graham, echoing something I’ve been writing here for days, warned that cutting off Ukraine would create a disaster far worse than our withdrawal from Afghanistan:

Here is how NBC News covered it:

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., on Sunday warned of potentially disastrous consequences for Ukraine if the Trump administration doesn’t restart military aid and intelligence sharing with the Eastern European nation.

“As long as the fighting is going on, if we pull the plug on Ukraine, it would be worse than Afghanistan,” Graham said during an interview on “Fox News Sunday.”

“Until we have a ceasefire, I would give Ukraine what they need in terms of intelligence and weapons to defend themselves,” Graham added. “In terms of Russia, I’ll be introducing sanctions on their banking sector and their energy sector next week, urging them to get to the table. If they don’t engage in ceasefire and peace talks with the administration, we should sanction the hell out of them.”

Third, this weekend we saw a new and very dangerous manifestation of the Trump Administration’s utter disregard for the law and the Constitution as a prominent pro-Palestinian green card holding Columbia University grad student was taken by Homeland Security without a warrant and literally disappeared;

A Palestinian protest leader at Columbia University was arrested by Department of Homeland Security agents Saturday night despite having a green card, his attorney said.

President Donald Trump has promised to deport international students who participated in “pro-jihadist protests” on college campuses. Columbia was at the center of intense protests that broke out on campuses across the country last year over the Israel-Gaza war. The arrest came just one day after the Trump administration said it was canceling $400 million in federal contracts and grants to Columbia because university officials had not done enough to prevent antisemitism on campus.

Mahmoud Khalil, who as a Palestinian graduate student was a leader in negotiations between protesters and Columbia officials last spring, was stopped by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents who told him his student visa had been revoked, his attorney Amy E. Greer said in a written statement. When Khalil told agents that he was a lawful permanent resident, holding a green card, agents detained him anyway, she said.

Greer said she filed a habeas corpus petition on Khalil’s behalf challenging the validity of his arrest and detention. An ICE detainee locator website says Khalil is being held in Elizabeth, New Jersey. Greer was told Sunday morning he was there. But Greer said Khalil’s wife, who is eight months pregnant, a U.S. citizen and had also been threatened with arrest, tried to visit him there Sunday and was told he was not there.

If this looks and sounds like a “door knock in the middle of the night” and arrest of someone with opposing political views by an unaccountable domestic “Interior Ministry” rather than traditional law enforcement it is because that is exactly what this is. It was wrong for Khalil to be detained by Homeland Security/ICE; wrong for him to be detained without a warrant; and no the US government cannot deport legal permanent residents married to a US citizen without going to trial and getting a favorable ruling from an immigration judge. This is an ominous development, and it is why we must begin to establish in the public’s mind that Trump is acting lawlessly and unconstitutionally again and again and again.

Fourth, Dems are being given an opportunity to talk to the American people about Trump’s serious assault on the Constitutional order this week for they are being asked to sign on to a budget deal that Trump has no intention of honoring. Our Congress will be acting far more like the Russian Duma than the legislative branch in a functioning democracy this week, and Dems need to say so.

So, bottom line - time for Dems to go on offense, open up this second front, build on our momentum and leave the caution of our consultants to the wind. Our leaders took an oath to defend the Constitution and man oh man does it need defending right now, as do our historic alliances throughout the world.

Let’s end this section with a little morning Musky schadenfreude:

Let’s Get To Work People!!!!! - Let’s start with our current four recommended sets of actions:

1 - Fight The Trump/Musk Attack On Our Government And Our Privacy, End This Historic Crime Spree - Encourage your Senators and Representatives to let Facts be be submitted to a candid world in what I’m calling a joint Senate/House “Letter to America;” hold their own hearings; 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 on last Friday). 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.

2 - Protest, Loudly, Trump’s Embrace of Russia and Abandonment of 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 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.

3 - Organize Against The 17 Most Vulnerable Republican House Members - For those of you who live in AZ, CA, CO, IA, MI, NE, NJ, NY, PA, VA, WI please start talking to your local orgs - state and local Democratic parties, grassroots groups, traditional Dem allies - about mounting a campaign targeting the most vulnerable 17 Republican House Members to urge them to vote against whatever joint House-Senate reconciliation bill emerges in the coming weeks. We launched this new effort two weeks ago and while we should be urging all our Senators and Reps to vote against these emerging plans, those of you can work these 17 House Rs have a special role to play in this next phase of the battle over the budget. As we’ve discussed there is a lot of concern in the Republican House about the size of the Medicaid cuts required in the House outline passed last Tuesday and we need to keep working it people!

4 - Keep Calling Attorneys General In The States - Ask them to protect you and your data, tax returns and privacy, and to keep federally mandated monies flowing to your states and communities. For those in the 19 states that brought the successful Treasury suit thank them and encourage them to keep going. I still believe these 19 states should make criminal referrals of Musk/his posse to DOJ/FBI and raise the stakes.

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 right now:

Help Susan Crawford and Ben Wikler in Wisconsin - As a way of honoring our good friend Ben Wikler and supporting this critical April Supreme Court race in Wisconsin, I’m asking our community to donate to the Wisconsin Democratic Party today. The money raised here will make sure Ben has the resources he needs to keep his team in place so they can support this critical statewide race. I know many of you are already deeply involved here - thank you all.

Watch our new discussion with Susan and Ben. Thanks to a huge surge of support in recent days we have already raised $125,533, blowing past our original $50,000 goal and now our stretch goals of $100,000 and $125,000. We are now upping this to a new super-stretch goal of $150,000 by March 31st. Amazing work everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Help Get Ken Martin Off To A Strong Start - In this time of extraordinary challenge we need a strong DNC. Two weeks ago we set a goal of raising $100,000 by March 31st for our new Chair. Incredibly, over 1,000 of you have donated over $97,000 so far. Watch my interview with Ken about what he wants to do with the DNC, and chip in whatever you can to help Ken and the new exciting team at the DNC get off to a strong start. We now have a new stretch goal of $150,000 by March 31st after our very strong start for this effort (note that we did have some money clawed back due to an error in the amount someone gave!)

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 $61,000 so far towards our March 31st goal of $100,000 - thank you all. Let’s keep working it for Abigail!

Get Anderson Clayton And The NC Dems Fight The GOP’s Attempt To Steal A Supreme Court Seat - Last week 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 from last week 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 $21,000 so far - thank you all!

Help Hopium Celebrate Our 2nd Anniversary - In yesterday’s post I reflected back on our work together over these past two years, and made two asks:

1) Commit to bring in one new Hopium subscriber at the your current subscriber level this month. Help us grow this community, and bring our plucky, upbeat, hardworking spirit to more people across the US.

2) Upgrade your subscription to paid or paid to Founding (10% off annual paid subscriptions through March). The resources you provide allows me to work full time at Hopium and keeps our community vibrant, growing and making all sorts of good trouble every day.

Keep working hard all. Our work is making a difference, and I am incredibly proud to be in this fight with all of you - Simon