We can’t vote our way out of this mess

While the MAGA regime continues to inflict colossal damage, Trump’s government also looks increasingly unstable and vulnerable. There are growing signs of opposition to Trump’s dictates and dissent within the ranks of the Republican Party.  Democrats have amassed some election wins and polls suggest they could gain control of Congress in 2026. Democratic party strategist James Carville now counsels the party to stop “playing possum” and go all in on affordability (“pure economic rage”), the playbook Zohran Mamdani followed to win in New York City.

Popular resistance to Trump, including defiant mobilizations against ICE, mass protests, and even calls for general strikes, stands in stark contrast to the Democratic establishment’s craven response to the authoritarian attacks on us all. Playing true to form, elected Democrats did not challenge the new right wing government but followed Carville’s advice to “do nothing” other than bide their time until the mid-terms. They filed lawsuits and made speeches but put up no substantive resistance. Despite this, understandably given the seeming lack of alternatives, many are tempted to campaign for Democrats or run for office as a way out of this nightmare.

Regardless of the box we check on election day, we face a strategic question about where to devote our time and movement resources. The question is not new, but it has been sharpened by the present threat of authoritarianism. Should we prioritize the coming elections—campaigning for and electing Democrats—or prioritize laying the groundwork for mass disruptive protests and strikes? Orienting on elections may seem to offer a shortcut to social justice, but it risks drawing energy away from building the grassroots struggles that are the key to combating rising authoritarianism in the U.S. and globally.

Given Trump’s haphazard wrecking-ball remaking of the U.S. state, which has only fueled economic precarity for most people, rising Democratic Party prospects is not  surprising. Trump, of course, has planned for this.  His government is carrying out redistricting and voter suppression and has a record of advocating for armed agents to frighten voters from the polls.

But the capacity of victorious Democrats to rein in the far right agenda, even in the short-term, isn’t a given. The Trump administration has taken significant steps toward establishing unitary executive power, eliminated historical checks and balances, and deployed troops to quash dissent. And even if they do succeed in winning power and eventually the Presidency, the Democratic Party itself holds establishment positions on Israel, imperial competition, capitalist growth, and securing the borders, all of which run counter to the very movements that have launched the most effective resistance to Trump and the far right. On top of that, any elected official, even one with genuinely progressive intentions, stands to inherit a wrecked economic, social, and political system and will have very little room to maneuver.

Seen from an international perspective, it is clear that both right-wing and liberal governments are becoming more authoritarian. Far right politics and their allure are driven by structural and systemic contradictions and crises. That’s why we are seeing vicious austerity, attacks on immigrants, and crackdowns on democratic rights from self-proclaimed social democratic governments as well as those allied with Trump. As Richard Seymour notes, “Social democratic and centrist parties across Europe are, with some honourable exceptions, eagerly tailing the far-right.”

In the U.S., nationalism has a strong and disastrous pull on labor and progressive circles, for example when the interests of immigrants are counterposed to those of “American workers”—think of Shawn Fain defending Trump’s tariffs or Bernie Sanders praising Trump’s border policies.

The authoritarian threat is an international phenomenon which can only be effectively resisted by global mass working-class movements that are politically independent and founded on the principle of solidarity without exception. This means recognizing that as workers we share interests with our siblings abroad, not with our own rulers, and that our fates are interdependent whether we are in Palestine, Sudan, or Ukraine.

While the formal electoral process, particularly through the Democratic Party, will not defeat the right or meet people’s needs, it is also clear that our currently disorganized Left and labor movements are far from ready to launch the kind of response that is needed. But even in the midst of this nightmare, we have seen glimpses of a potent alternative. Rapid Response Networks, whistle protests, and other mass actions against ICE in Chicago, NYC, LA and elsewhere show the power of the mass mobilization of ordinary people on the streets and in workplaces. They show that we can slow down and in some cases stop deportations while building our capacity for future organizing.

These developments share the energy animating the global mass youth protests that have challenged everything from government corruption to social media bans to austerity, in several cases bringing down governments.

Capitalism’s structural crises of sluggish growth, low profitability, and ecological collapse continue to fuel discontent and political polarization. If harnessed to working-class organization and struggle from the left, those conditions can foster the forces capable of forging an alternative. But without working-class organization and struggle, capital’s unchallenged crises will continue to breed and sustain the far right, which is well organized and far bigger than Trump. There are more dangerous figures in the wings. Authoritarianism feeds off capitalist crises that cannot be resolved by capitalist parties but only by mass working class resistance—and even then not easily or quickly, given long accumulated and compounded structural problems.

The far right will not be defeated at the ballot box or by protests alone. As is the case for allied far right regimes across the globe, the Trump government is preparing to rule through increased force and violence with a minority, but stable, far right base, and, at least for now, the complicity of growing sections of U.S. capitalism and important sectors of the state, including, far too often, the courts.

The protests we have organized and participated in so far are essential but inadequate. The leading edge of these are the anti-ICE campaigns which need to be part of a long term process of building strategy, organization, experience, and independent political alternatives. Right now, the May Day Strong network is organizing labor actions and strike schools around the country. This is where we need to channel our time, energy, and resources, and we cannot afford to get distracted from this task by the illusive promise of electoral quick fixes.

Working class activity, in particular withholding labor, is the key factor. While strikes will occur alongside protests, civil disobedience, boycotts, rapid response networks, and other acts of individual and collective resistance, they have a unique power. Strikes directly impact production and sales. They hit profits, capital’s primary goal and means of subsistence and reproduction. They are at minimum a key defensive strategy to push back against harmful laws and policies, and when organized into general mass strikes, they are the working class majority’s most potent force for social change. The Polish revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg first recognized the capacity of the mass strike to connect economic and political demands and foment a revolutionary process.

While this may seem far removed from our current situation, the intervening century has shown the mass strike return repeatedly, including in the U.S. Just weeks ago a general strike in Portugal saw three million workers walk off the job and many thousands join a protest in Lisbon: the strike demonstrates the power of mass working class action to change the political climate and resist vicious anti-labor legislation.

If our labor movement is not yet ready to launch a general strike, the timeline to get there also can’t be predetermined. It could be sooner or later than expected. That is the nature of mass movements. But the general strike is certainly a point of reference in our current moment of crisis. Sara Nelson of the flight attendants union and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson have called for general strikes against Trump policies. The UAW has announced plans for a 2028 industrial strike. Such calls are helpful for legitimating and popularizing the strategy.

Any initiative that increases rank-and-file democracy and solidarity helps build our capacity. We have seen many inspiring examples, such as a teachers union linking opposition to national guard deployment and demands for funding for education through the call for a general strike, and others who have mobilized against ICE raids. Worker self-activity and collective action can protect labor rights and win better contracts—especially given the stacked deck of state and federal legal frameworks. And many actions are possible short of official strikes, from informational pickets to wearing union gear or buttons (teachers at Brooklyn Tech, for example, wear a lighthouse pin to symbolize a safe haven for immigrant students) to rolling sick outs or student walk outs. As well as workplace actions against policies or impending closures and consolidations,  strike schools and other educational events can teach about the history of rank-and-file union militancy and breaking anti-labor laws to establish workplace rights.

Beyond beneficial immediate impacts, such mass activity fosters independent Left politics, strategy, and organization. These are the preconditions for developing a systemic alternative to capitalism, one that can defeat authoritarianism and make the struggle for socialism—the radical democratization of all aspects of society—a possibility.

Further reading:

Robert Brenner. “The Problem of Reformism.” Against the Current March-April 1993, 43.

The Essential Rosa Luxemburg: Reform or Revolution and the Mass Strike