Huffington Post, by Isaac Wright, 2.1.17
Resisting the direction of President Donald Trump and his administration is more than a partisan issue. That effort must be treated as such by those who join at the table in steadfast resistance and heartfelt devotion to the American ideals of peace, prosperity, fairness-under-the-law, equality, and democracy.
This is an important message for anyone who may have voted for Trump and now regrets it. Perhaps you believed all of his rhetoric was just bluster. It would not be hard to be so jaded by politics and politicians that you supported someone because you assumed he would never actually do the things he said. After all, if cynicism led you to the belief that all politicians lie, then it was easy to take comfort in believing that Trump was surely lying with the most outrageous of his campaign promises to ban people of certain religions, to shred the burden of constitutional principles he disagreed with or found inconvenient, and the like.
But that wasn’t the case. His first weeks in office prove Trump meant every word of his rhetoric. It is time to move beyond buyers’ remorse. It is time to take action.
One needs to look no further than Trump’s immigration ban to see the choice ahead for every American. Now is the time to decide between the ideals of the first inhabitant of the Office of President and the 45th inhabitant of that office:
“The bosom of America is open to receive not only the opulent and respected stranger, but the oppressed and persecuted of all nations and religions; whom we shall welcome to a participation of all our rights and privileges...” - George Washington
“I hereby suspend entry into the United States, as immigrants and nonimmigrants, of such persons...” - President Donald Trump, Executive Order, January 27, 2017
“Donald J. Trump is calling for a complete and total shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” - Donald Trump, public statement, December 7, 2015
If you have come to regret the decision of voting for Trump, please hear this: you can still make a difference. You are needed. Stand with people in support of the Constitution, in support of the concept of this nation, and in support of this grand experiment that is our democracy. Stand up and be counted.
Join with other Americans who want to preserve that which President Ronald Reagan once called a “shining city on a hill.”
Stand up and embrace the words of President John F. Kennedy who said, “Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future.”
The responsibility of the future is a heavy weight to bear in uncertain times. Indeed, these are uncertain times for refugees who flee oppression seeking the hope and promise of the American concept. These are uncertain times for those who fought with Americans against evil in their own homelands and are now by executive order separated from the nation to which they showed devotion. These are uncertain times for those separated from loved ones by policies driven by fear, contempt, and prejudice.
For all of these people and for future generations of our nation and our world, now is the time to bear the solemn burden of the future and embrace the struggle of democracy that comes with it.
Stand up. Speak out. Raise your voice. Resist. Register people to vote. Run for office. Run for office in a political party and make it what it should be.
To those of you who have been standing against the threat of Donald Trump and standing against his rhetoric for months, or even years, quit saying “I told you so” and redouble your efforts. Being right in the past doesn’t relieve you of your responsibility for the future. Do not be bitter about the past or the losses it bore. Instead be hopeful for the future and steadfast in the fight on which that future depends.
Those willing to stand against the threat of Trump must be willing to work together without the luxury of ideological purity tests, of re-litigating past primary fights, or of rehashing old divides that risk new ones. Perhaps we disagree on how best to make the economy work for everyone, but we agree it should work for everyone. Perhaps we disagree on how to best vet refugees seeking asylum from persecution. But we agree that seeking asylum from persecution was a principle of this country from our first President until today and it should remain tomorrow.