Now What?

by John Maelan, Washington County Dems Communications Committee Member

Yep, he won, good people, and you can believe me, I’m not any happier about it than you are. Despite the money we donated and the time we put in making those calls and knocking on those doors, Donald J. Trump has once again won the electoral college vote–and the popular vote as well!–and will be the next president of the United States as our Constitution mandates.

And yes, folks, this is bad… really bad.

His last “administration” was marked by cronyism, corruption, chaos, failure and death. And frankly, I personally expect the next four years to be much darker and scarier than the last time this bozo sat in our White House. After all, it’s not like he’s become more moderate or rational in his views as he’s aged. Oh, Heavens, no. If anything, his rhetoric was twice as bonkers in 2024 as it was in 2016. His recent rants about the 2020 election being stolen, Haitian immigrants eating pets, and post-birth baby executions were, to any thinking person, a clear display of all the filth his tiny brain wallows in. But, nonetheless, Trump still managed to convince enough of our fellow citizens that night was day and that right was wrong, so that he could get re-elected.

Exasperating, I know.

Naturally, it helped his cause that Republicans all across the nation, from state legislators to Supreme Court justices, worked overtime to bend and twist our election rules to disenfranchise thousands of American voters. It also helped him that so many on the right—who ought to have known better—carried water for this felon for years. They created an entire media ecosphere wherein deranged conspiracy theories masqueraded as fact-based journalism. They preached from mega-church pulpits about the Christian virtue of voting for a sex offender. And they went onto mainstream news platforms to make excuses for and to petty-fog Trump’s every transgression. And it worked. So, today the question becomes: what can good people do about it now?

Answer: we resist!

Just as we did before, we resist as much of the MAGA malarkey as possible for the foreseeable future. We will carry on the fight like we did in 2017, 18, 19, and 20—knowing all the while it’s going to be a long haul. And in that spirit, we will expose every lie and we’ll accept none of the infringements on our rights as human beings. We will continue to support candidates and causes that align with our American values and we will refuse to stand by as our neighbors are abused for their ethnicity or their beliefs. And don’t get me wrong, good people, this is a fight we may not win. That’s right, I will honestly tell you that victory is never guaranteed… but then again, it never was. But what is guaranteed is that we will be remembered. We will be remembered as the ones who stood up, faced the lies and the tyranny, and could not be scared into submission. We will be remembered as the voices who cried in the wilderness so loudly that the fascists suffered shattered eardrums on our account. And we will be remembered as the ones who would not quit!

So, go ahead, Democrats, have a good cry. Embrace loved ones and find what comfort you may to get through the shock. And then roll up your sleeves, because it’s time for all of us to get back to work.