What Do We Do Now?

In the closing weeks of the campaign, Donald Trump was pretty clear about his fascism, as well as his plans to govern as a fascist if returned to the White House.

Yesterday, in thunderous fashion, enough Americans endorsed that vision to give him that opportunity.

There’s nothing comforting to say here. We can tell ourselves stories about how we got through his first four years, so we can do it again. But this time he’s committed, and this time he’ll fill the roles around him with people equally so. There won’t be the guardrails that mostly held the last time around, and he’s had years to recognize that when he breaks the rules, none of our institutions have the will or power to hold him to account.

America is in for a dark time. So is the rest of the world, dependent on America to protect it from the forces of authoritarianism.

I’m terrified for my friends in marginalized communities, particularly my trans friends, who were the target of a relentless barrage of hateful and repugnant campaign ads from Republicans, and be even more of a target under the new regime.

I’m terrified for women—for my daughters—who will live a president and vice president who made misogyny not just central to their campaign, but to ideologies and very identities.

I’m terrified for the liberalism that has been the single greatest cultural, economic, and political force in history, liberating and lifting up millions and billions. Nothing in the illiberalism Trump has proposed will make the world better, and most of it will make it far worse.

And I don’t know what to say in the face of that—and in the failure of so many of my fellow citizens to demonstrate a basic grasp of policy and decency and morality.

What I do know is that, right now, we need strength, and courage, and moral clarity. And we need each other, because that’s all we have to get through this. It’s okay to feel scared and defeated, but there’s work to do, and there’s no one to do it but us.