Encounters at our Southern border have plummeted from 100,000 or even 200,000+ per month to around 10,000 per month this year. Trump committed his administration to carrying out 1 million deportations per year, but his first fiscal year fell short of that pledge with around 600,000 deportations. The previous fiscal year under Biden saw 685,000 deportations so this is not above previous norms. (It is important to note that previous norms are not a moral standard.)

Above the previous norm, though, is detention populations. Nearly 70,000 people are currently being detained by ICE, an all-time high. Conditions in detention centers are deplorable and inhumane, according to international and domestic reports. Most of the people detained do not have criminal records, and more than 170 US citizens have been swept up in raids. By my count, 31 people have died in ICE custody this year, making it the second-deadliest on record, and the deadliest since 2004 when 32 deaths were reported. (No deaths have been reported on the designated page since September—which may be a violation of reporting requirements—but more can be found on their news releases by filtering for the topic “detainee death notifications”)

Fighting Back:
Protests against discriminatory and violent actions by masked ICE agents in unmarked cars have erupted across the country. People are frequently gathering to protest detention centers in their areas. Americans have also established and built on existing rapid-response community task forces and know-your-rights campaigns to alert their neighbors of ICE activity and ensure everyone knows how to respond to immigration officers. Community members blow whistles and shout to alert their neighbors, as well as following and shaming the agents carrying out this administration’s cruel and discriminatory agenda.

Trump has initiated military strikes in the Middle East, South America, and Africa.

We’ve committed war crimes against Venezuelan and Columbian fishermen, killing more than 100 people in at least 29 strikes. International Human Rights groups have determined that these attacks are violations of international law and called for an end to this aggression. Instead, Trump has ramped up the assault with a blockade of oil tankards and threats of a ground invasion in what appears to be a push for regime change.

We’ve facilitated the continued genocide of Palestinian people, even as Israel violates a so-called ceasefire countless times after the release of Israeli hostages. The US has contributed to the weaponization of the miniscule amount of humanitarian aid allowed into Gaza which resulted in a months-long famine and still ongoing starvation. Journalists have been targeted and banned, so we’ve come to rely on the testimony of international doctors volunteering at hospitals in Gaza. We’ve also defended Israel by attacking Iran in June.

Strikes in Nigeria on Christmas Day were allegedly a response to ISIS groups targeting Christians. The groups in question have targeted Christians, but reportedly operates for the most part in Muslim communities targeting Muslims. While details are still muddy, it appears that these strikes were coordinated with the Nigerian government.

Fighting Back:
Protests against US aggression towards Venezuela have spread throughout the United States. Most Americans do not support this use of our military, and they’re talking about it.

We have begun to pay more attention to the voting records of our representatives when it comes to the Israeli genocide of Palestinians. Few representatives have clean hands, and context does matter. But constituents are taking a hard stance against reps who take AIPAC money or who have failed to denounce the genocide in Gaza.

From cuts to federal funding of public media, to billion dollar lawsuits against media companies, to exerting an extreme level of control over the White House Press Pool and weaponization of the FCC, the Trump administration has made its hostility for news media crystal clear. Many companies, particularly those with pending acquisitions, have bowed to the administration by settling unfounded or frivolous lawsuits. This month CBS was set to air a documentary about the deportation of immigrants from the US to CECOT in El Salvador, but pulled the story at the last minute when the government refused to comment.

Trump has also targeted students, professors, and entire universities by demanding compliance with his ideological agenda in order to maintain federal funding or student visas. He has threatened the accreditation and tax status of institutions like Harvard which have pushed back against these demands. Many universities have acquiesced by cracking down on student protests against the genocide of Palestinians and eliminating their DEI programs and standards. Early in the year, a slew of immigrants here on student visas were detained for their free-speech rights to protest or write op-eds.

Fighting Back:
Americans have been turning to independent journalists and holding legacy media companies accountable for their complicity in the furthering of the administration’s narrative.

Students are still protesting. They’re suing the administration for infringement of their first amendment rights, and so far they seem to be winning.

Trump campaigned in 2024 on ousting the enemy-within. This rhetoric has been used by dictators throughout history, alienating parts of the population to blame for all of the nation’s woes. Trump’s enemy-within is two-fold: immigrants and the radical-left.

The Trump administration pushes the rhetoric that most immigrants are criminals. They’ve used this falsehood to justify their cruelty as they ramp up immigration enforcement against people who have made a better life for themselves in the US. more than 70% of the immigrants detained in ICE custody this year have no criminal record, and only 5% have been convicted of violent crimes. The alleged criminality is a thinly veiled sham to sanitize blatant racism and discrimination.

The radical-left is really just the opposition to Trump. Last month, a memo from AG Bondi to the DOJ was leaked. It instructed the FBI to create a list of domestic terrorists, which it identified as people with certain beliefs (like support for bodily autonomy, gay marriage, and the separation of church and state) and to fully execute maximum possible punishment for things like picketing outside of a federal building. It also called for implementation of a cash-reward program for informants against these so-called domestic terrorists.

Fighting Back:
I’ve already detailed how people are fighting back against unjust immigration enforcement, but I’ll add that we’ve seen incredible pushback against the rhetoric itself. People are talking to each other about their friends, family, neighbors who are getting swept up and held in inhumane detention centers. They’re not criminals; many have been here for years and put down roots in their communities; and they don’t deserve this treatment.

The leaking of the Bondi memo, assuming it wasn’t intentional, is a form of resistance in and of itself. The people will not be dissuaded from resistance by fear tactics. We’re still standing up and fighting back.

The Republican majority in Congress has refused outright to perform their duties as a check against executive power. They’ve let Trump supersede their authority on war powers, something that isn’t new to Congress. But they’ve also allowed him to impound federally allocated funds, following up by legislating some of those budget cuts while also cutting taxes for his billionaire buddies and welfare programs for millions of Americans. Even some state legislators are bowing to Trump as he demands they engage in mid-decade redistricting to ensure they don’t lose their majority in the midterms.

The Democrat minority has a mixed record (to put it kindly) this session of pushing back against the regime. They have relied too heavily on a questionable judicial system to intercede, gambling with their limited leverage and ultimately losing the pot. They did shut down the government for more than 40 days in an effort to maintain existing healthcare subsidies for millions of Americans, but ultimately and inevitably failed. Dems have struggled with messaging for a long time. Their messaging around the shutdown, for example, could have been stronger. But people largely saw through the Republican messaging and blamed Republicans for the shutdown. I don’t think it was really a Democrat win; more of a Republican loss.

It’s also shocking how many of our representatives are elderly and without their mental faculties. We have congressional staffers covering up for their boss’s dementia. It’s not a new phenomenon; this has been going on for years and is for some reason a topic of debate among journalists for whether it should be covered. Every era of governance is crucial, but especially as we actively fight actual authoritarianism we need our representatives to be of sound mind.

Fighting Back:
With midterms coming up, people are ramping up for campaign season. Whether they’re running for office, volunteering for campaigns, or just talking about candidates seeking to unseat their incumbent representatives, constituents are looking for ways to re-staff Congress with reps who will be more willing and able to perform their Constitutionally-designated duties.

In all fairness, a growing number of Republican representatives are making their discontent with this Congressional session apparent. Some Republicans are resigning or deciding not to run for re-election, and some are pushing for discharge petitions to get around Speaker Johnson’s unwillingness to call a vote for things like the ACA subsidies. It’s not enough, but it’s not nothing.

The courts have delivered some losses to the Trump administration, but when the administration chooses to ignore court orders the judicial rulings seem to have been somewhat toothless. When a judge ruled on probable cause to find the Trump administration in contempt of court, an appeals court reversed the ruling. It’s still tied up in appeals nine months after the initial violation of a court order, and no one has been held accountable. The administration has been accused of defying at least 12 judicial orders, and has repeatedly and incessantly attempted to bully judges into submission. This paired with Congressional dereliction of duty amounts to an unchecked Executive branch.

SCOTUS has handed down an occasional loss to the Trump administration on its emergency docket, but more often it has issued judicial stays to allow the administration to continue its activities while the issues make their way through the courts—this is a permission structure, weaponizing the slow pace of the judicial system.

It seems like lower courts are often willing to stand up against Trump, but appeals courts and the Supreme Court are more inclined to let this administration break things. The SCOTUS conservative majority was cinched by Trump in his first term, and several of the judges have continued a pattern of deference to him. SCOTUS adopted its first ethics code in 2023 amid scandal and distrust, which remains insufficient and does not include oversight or enforcement mechanisms.

Fighting Back:
People recognize that the conservative majority of the Supreme Court is corrupt. Multiple Supreme Court judges have taken bribes or failed to recuse themselves when they should have, and Americans recognize that as a legitimate problem. The majority of Americans support term limits and a binding code of ethics on the Supreme Court.

In the coming months, I’ll detail major political events and the response of people like me and you who are unwilling to stand by and let the regime win. I’ll also note different ways to engage on issues as they play out. There is no act of resistance too small. We all must do what we can.

When democracy is under attack, what do we do? Stand Up, Fight Back!