Standing in the bright green grass where rows upon rows of white crosses mingle with white stars of David, I feel overwhelmed with a sense of loss. Literally thousands of soldiers were given their final resting place here.

The storming of the D-Day beaches in Normandy, France, on June 6, 1944, proved to be the turning point of World War II. The soldiers who stormed the beaches in the early hours of that day fought for freedom and democracy and against dictatorship and fascism. Thousands paid with their lives. Here, in the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial at Colleville-sur-Mer, the 9,387 graves, mostly of those who died during the invasion, are a stark reminder of the horrific cost of human life in the fight for freedom and the accompanying grief experienced by their families and descendants, friends, and comrades.

Today, as then, we as a country are experiencing collective grief. While there may be those who cheer on the destruction this administration has wrought and continues to wield, there are many of us who find ourselves in a state of grief.

While it has been said that the stages of grief are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance, I would argue that these stages may not be all encompassing and we may not move through them linearly. The “shock and awe” of the first 100 days of this administration is wearing off. It is exhausting and overwhelming by design. It is normal to grieve the destruction of our democracy as the US slides towards authoritarianism.

Some of us may be in denial and may ignore the news because it is just too overwhelming. Would-be dictators prefer a nation that either does not know the truth or has given up trying to discern truth. Ignorance is a tool that they use to gain power. Staying informed without feeling overwhelmed is crucial to resisting the whims of this administration. Also, resisting the temptation to normalize this administration’s ways is important. Otherwise, we are lulled into complacency. Not allowing ourselves to become numb to all the changes is essential to vigilance.

Some of us may be at the stage of anger. We may be angry at this administration and at those who voted for them. But at some point, many of these voters will come to the realization that the actions and policies of this administration are either not what they thought they were voting for or they will realize they are negatively impacted by this administration’s actions. When that happens, we must put aside electoral differences and welcome them into the big tent of resistance. 

We may be angry at the Democrats for failing to act. As the opposition party, the Democrats do not have a majority in either chamber of Congress and so they are limited in what they, as elected leaders, can do. It is often difficult to understand what, if anything, the Democratic party is doing to stop this slide towards authoritarianism and to feel anger towards their seeming inaction.

There are a few members of Congress speaking up, while others seem to be trying to figure out how to respond. Within the halls of Congress, Democrats are beginning to resist strategically and to proclaim the harm that the party in power is wreaking on the American people. They need to loudly participate in resistance to this regime, to be the party that stands with the average American, and to offer abundance as a stark counterpoint to the other party’s use of scarcity. Instead of taking away programs and fear-mongering, I hope they will provide concrete plans for practical uses of tax dollars that will benefit the working and middle classes, not the wealthy and oligarchs.


In the meantime, while we wait for Democratic party leadership to evolve (and for enough Republican members in Congress to resist), we, the people, need to put our anger and our grief over losing our democracy to good use. Peaceful protests and boycotts do have positive impacts. Protests in previous times were successful in gaining voting rights for women, people of color, and the LGBTQA+ community. Protests were also successful in bringing the Vietnam War to a close. In other countries around the world, protests have brought down regimes in Argentina as well as Ukraine (in 2014). Perhaps a more relevant example of the positive results of peaceful protests are the weekly Tesla Takedowns across the country and across the globe. They have been successful in highlighting how unpopular DOGE is and have been a key force in driving out its leader from the government while financially impairing his company, its stock, and his personal wealth. 

There is power in peaceful protests. Authoritarian leaders cannot take power unless the people allow it. Protesting is a way to vote in the court of public opinion. Channeling our anger in peaceful protests is a way to exercise our power.

I hope we never get to the last stage of grief called acceptance. We must not accept the destruction of our democracy. We must continue to use our voices to resist. By contrast, silence is complicity. Those who do not speak up against this slide towards authoritarianism are indeed enabling it. Whether they are members of Congress or members of the public, the time to speak up is now before it is too late. We cannot give up on democracy. We cannot let the thousands who died for freedom on the beaches of Normandy and elsewhere to have died in vain.

Dictators and oligarchs want us to be divided and feeling alone. When we channel our grief and anger into working for the collective good with the endgame of democracy, we will find our voice and our power. When we protest peacefully together, we generate hope and energy. There is power in our solidarity. Being part of something bigger than ourselves connects us to each other in ways not possible without this collective grief experience. It is indeed good grief.



WHAT WE CAN DO:

The federal budget and tax bill, aka “the Big Beautiful Bill” (or – the Big Brutal Bill), recently passed the US House and is currently in the Senate. If it passes in the Senate, it will cut SNAP by $300 billion, impacting over 40 million people that rely on food assistance. The bill will also cut Medicaid by over $700 billion over the next 10 years, impacting 72 million people’s health care, including kicking 10.3 million people completely off their medical insurance. It gives tax breaks to the wealthy, costing the rest of us $1.7 trillion. It will also increase the national budget deficit by $3.8 trillion. There are other issues tucked into this bill, like limiting federal courts’ power to enforce contempt citations as well as increasing ICE’s detention budget from $3.4 billion to $48 billion and their transportation and removal operations budget from $721 million to $14.4 billion.

Call your representatives in Congress to voice your opinion and to specifically call out this reverse Robinhood bill that takes from the poor and gives to the rich. The congressional switchboard number is (202) 224-3121. If that line is busy, call your representative at their DC or local office. Check their websites for contact info. 

5calls.org is a great resource when contacting your congressmember or senator. Current issues are listed on this website along with scripts by issue to use in your conversation with your representative. Let your voice be heard!

Check out Indivisible.org for peaceful protests and other events where you can get involved.

Check out NOPE (Neighbors Defending Democracy) to see how you can get involved.

Plan to participate in the “No Kings” rallies around the country on June 14 as a counter to the military/birthday parade scheduled in DC. (See Indivisible or NOPE for more info.)


JUNE IS PRIDE MONTH! Check out history.com.
​

Text and photograph copyright © 2025 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial at Colleville-sur-Mer, France, the largest American cemetery outside the US.


Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.



A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:

Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.

We often take things for granted. Maybe we do not fully grasp the history and hard-won fight behind it and just accept it as part of life today, never thinking that it could be taken away from us in the future.

Democracy is something we take for granted in the US until its fragility comes into focus and we fear losing it. There are many aspects of our democratic society that are currently being dismantled and every day brings new destruction of the pillars upon which our democracy stands. There are so many issues, but today we will focus on a particular one: under that large umbrella of liberty and individual civil rights is something that we often take for granted and the unsung hero who fought to provide it.

Labor laws as we know them today were not always part of our American heritage. The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911 in Manhattan highlighted the unfair labor practices of employers that literally endangered workers’ lives. During the deadly blaze, the 146 workers, mostly women and girls, were trapped in the building because the doors were locked to prevent them from taking breaks. All of them died. This horrific loss of life made a deep impression on a young woman who witnessed the fire. She would become a relentless and successful pursuer of workers’ rights in the US.

Frances Perkins (1880-1965) lived in NYC and worked in the NY office of the National Consumers League at the time of the Triangle Shirtwaist tragedy. She went on to work in the New York state government, holding positions where she was able to implement safety standards. She made it her life’s mission to advocate for the masses of powerless workers who faced harsh working conditions under the oligarchs who employed them. Employers were getting rich off the literal backs of their workers who were paid mere pennies for their long hours on the job. Because of her compassion, supported by her faith, Perkins succeeded in making a difference, not just in the lives of her contemporaries, but for all future workers in the American labor force.

Today, we might give little thought to whether there are overhead sprinklers or exit doors in our office buildings, warehouses, manufacturing plants, and other public buildings. As a direct result of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, Perkins established fire safety regulations in the state of New York which were adopted in all other states.

But her influence spread further than just fire safety. When Franklin Delano Roosevelt became the president in 1933, he asked Perkins to lead the newly created Department of Labor. On one condition, she replied: her laundry list of workers’ rights would be implemented. FDR agreed and Frances Perkins became the first female Cabinet secretary in US history.

Undaunted by the sex discrimination against her by many of her male colleagues, Perkins went to work to create a safer and more equitable working environment for her fellow Americans. Besides her intelligence, her super power was her ability to “read the room” and to observe and understand her adversaries so she could persuade them to her perspective, all with the end game of passing legislation that promoted laborers’ rights.

As a result of her tenacity, her art of persuasion, and her compassion for workers, Perkins succeeded in implementing all her agenda (except one). Because of her untiring work, we have laws regarding: a 40-hour work week (instead of 70+ hours), minimum wages, child labor restrictions, unemployment insurance, disability insurance, and perhaps her crowning achievement, Social Security. The one agenda item that eluded her was medical insurance for all, something that still eludes us today.

In December 2024, President Biden officially recognized Frances Perkins and her incredible achievements. While most people have never heard of her, Biden memorialized her life in a statue that is now installed in Ithaca, NY, home to Cornell University where Perkins taught after leaving her government career.

Today, I wonder if many of us take these accomplishments of Frances Perkins for granted, not realizing that the fight for fair labor practices was arduous. Sadly, Social Security, a benefit that positively impacts the lives of millions of retirees and their dependents, survivors of deceased workers, and disabled workers, has never been fully accepted by some conservatives, not in her time and not in our time.

When the government seeks to roll back Social Security by cutting funding, firing employees, or eliminating services, we must ask ourselves this fundamental question: What is the purpose of the federal government?

Does the federal government exist to protect human and civil rights? Does it exist to provide a safety net to its most vulnerable citizens? Should it provide protection to its citizens via the military and national security? Perhaps the role of the federal government is to do what we ourselves alone cannot do. And collectively, we can provide all of this through our representatives in government working to appropriate our tax dollars in ways that work for the common good.

Or, conversely, does the government serve to protect the interests of the wealthy at the expense of everyone else? In an oligarchy, the rich are out for themselves and will bend the government for their further enrichment. It is no longer a government for the people, only a government for the few.

This fundamental question on the purpose of government was turned on its head with the appointment of Frances Perkins as Secretary of Labor. She changed the trajectory of the labor force in profound and enduring ways which helped to navigate the US through the Great Depression, World War II, and beyond. By protecting workers, she paved the way for the creation of a middle class. By providing retirement benefits, she gave seniors the right to dignity, to not depend on their adult children, and to allow their adult children to prosper without the financial burden of their aging parents.

May we not take her hard-won victories for granted. May our compassion for the vulnerable and our own faith enable us to protect her legacy and the rights of workers today. May we take a stand against cutting Social Security benefits, Medicare, Medicaid, SNAP, Head Start, veterans’ benefits, and other programs that serve the common good. Billionaires do not need tax cuts funded by the rest of us. The Gilded Age is history. May it remain so.


If you are curious about the remarkable Frances Perkins and her fight for the rights of American workers, I highly recommend The Woman Behind the New Deal: The Life of Frances Perkins, FDR’s Secretary of Labor and His Moral Conscience by Kirsten Downey.

NOTE: The Social Security Act, passed by Congress in 1935, excluded certain workers, such as domestic and agricultural workers. As a result, 65% of Black workers and 27% of white workers were initially excluded from participating in Social Security.


WHAT CAN WE DO?
Call or email your representatives in Congress to voice your opposition to cuts to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, SNAP, Head Start, and veterans’ benefits, all of which are on the chopping block as they craft a new budget. This and other issues with possible phone scripts can be found on 5calls.org.

Check out Indivisible.org for peaceful protests and other events where you can get involved, including the schedule for boycotting the billionaires.

Give money to legal organizations on the front lines of court battles, such as American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) (not tax-deductible), ACLU Foundation, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Brennan Center for Justice, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), Democracy Forward Foundation, GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD Law), Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) (not tax deductible), Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), NAACP Legal Defense Fund, and State Democracy Defenders Fund.

Stay in the fight for our democracy. Even when it feels exhausting and overwhelming. Do it for your future self and generations to come. Resist. Persist. Never give up.




Text and photograph copyright © 2025 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of Lower Manhattan and the Hudson River as seen from the Empire State Building, New York City.


Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.



A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more

“’I never thought leopards would eat MY face,' sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party." This 2015 tweet about a fictitious political party by @cavalorn went viral. It applies even more today.

As humans, we have an uncanny ability to live in denial. We deny all sorts of things by pretending a problem does not exist like addiction, abuse, or a health problem needing medical attention. We pretend that something is not happening when it clearly is. And we deny the possibility that what is happening to other people could happen to us. Until it does.

In Germany, Martin Niemöller (1892-1984) worked as a Lutheran pastor. He voted for Hitler as chancellor in 1933 and was supportive of the Nazi party until he realized the party intended to control religion and the churches. He then regretted his silence, his inaction, and the resulting complicity. The following quote comes from speeches that he delivered. This version, from the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, UK, says it all:

“First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me.”

Niemöller was silent when groups he did not care about suffered at the hands of the Nazis. He only began to speak out with other pastors about the dangers of Nazism once he realized it would impact him personally. But by then, it was too late. He was arrested in 1937 and spent eight years in prisons and concentration camps, including Dachau, before being rescued by the Allies in 1945.

Too often, we stand by and watch as those around us are vilified and dehumanized. We watch from the sidelines as they are arrested, imprisoned, or deported. Our denial that this could be our same fate prevents us from actions that could help. Our lack of compassion blinds us to the reality that vulnerable people are being hurt. Perhaps fear of the consequences of speaking out silences us. Or maybe we identify as part of a protected or majority class because of the color of our skin, our gender, our sexual preference, our political or religious views, or our citizenship status. That will not save us from the leopards in blue suits.

A recent example of this “leopard” phenomenon is in Afghanistan. Since 2021, the government has forbidden girls to attend school after the sixth grade. Women are forbidden to leave their homes without a male family member as an escort. Their employment opportunities are also curtailed. More recently, the government pronounced that a woman’s face can only be seen and her voice can only be heard inside her own home, never out in public. As women’s and girls’ rights were being systematically dismantled, men might have felt safe. But very recently, the government ordered all men in Afghanistan to discard their Western clothes and don only traditional Afghan garb. Men must also not be clean-shaven, but instead, they must grow the traditional long beards. What was once their freedom to wear whatever they want and to groom themselves however they want has now been taken away.

As my mother always said, “If you give them an inch, they will take a mile.” These days, if we do not speak out, they will take more than a mile: they will take everything.

In the US, consider the increasing number of recent arrests and deportations of immigrants, some of whom clearly have legal status here. In all these cases, the detainees have not been given due process of law, meaning they did not receive an immigration hearing, were detained without officially being charged with a crime, and/or were not given the opportunity to speak with an attorney. Of the more notable cases, one was deported to their country of origin, one was violently interrogated and detained, another was arrested and transported to a prison over 1,000 miles away, while over 200 immigrants were deported to a notorious prison in Central America. The point is not whether they should be detained or deported. The issue is HOW they are being detained or deported: without being able to exercise their legal rights. In the US, someone is presumed innocent until proven guilty. Without due process, a guilty verdict is pronounced without any factual evidence being produced. It is a slippery slope that ends with taking away due process rights from anyone else here in the US, native-born or otherwise. When we do not have the rule of law, we no longer have a democracy.

These horrific events are intended as frightening examples of this regime’s power, but they are also meant to divert our attention away from the bigger picture: our democracy is quickly being dismantled. By standing in solidarity with others who also fear losing our democracy, we can push back against this would-be dictator. This means putting aside our political divisions and pending our differences in policy so we can together resist this slide towards dictatorship and oligarchy.

Will we succumb to the denial, silence, and inactivity that Niemöller came to regret? Will we regret not helping others? Or will we only regret not helping ourselves?

May our compassion expand to those who are vulnerable now, notably immigrants and transgender people. May we speak out for them now. May we link arms with our equally concerned comrades to resist this regime.

Let us not be like the fictitious woman in the tweet who was only concerned for herself and was shocked when the “Leopards Eating People’s Faces” came for her.

Alas, I hear knocking. Is it my door? Or my neighbors’?



WHAT CAN WE DO?
These are indeed frightening times as we watch our democracy being dismantled bit by bit.  It is normal to feel afraid or angry or both. It is also exhausting. This regime wants us to give up. As civil rights activist and former US House Representative John Lewis said, “Don’t give up! Don’t give in! Keep the faith! And keep your eyes on the prize!”

It is easier to give up and give into despair than to expend energy to do something. So first, take care of yourself. Take frequent breaks from the news cycle. Do what recharges you. And jump back into the fray.

This democracy is being tried in courts of law and well as in the court of public opinion. Your voice matters. More than ever.

As we have recently seen in the news, this regime is going after immigrants. Also at risk recently are universities (because dictators do not like an educated public) and prestigious law firms (whose clients could win in court against the regime). If they do not bend the knee, they are punished. But when they capitulate, the risks that this regime will go after others like them increases. Bullies must be stopped early on as they pick on a few at first to test the waters and to create terrifying examples of their bullying. It will only get worse. But, in solidarity, universities and law firms can resist and stand together. They have more power than they think.

And so do we. For the rest of us, speak out. Speak loudly. Resist. We may only have a small window of time to speak up and to protest peacefully. If you cannot wrestle up the compassion for those more vulnerable than you, then do it for yourself now. Your future self will thank you.

Unfortunately, those who seek power will stop at nothing and no one is safe, not even members of their own “class.” If we all have the “leopard” attitude, then we will certainly lose democracy and all our rights and freedoms. We all need to resist now.

Check out Indivisible.org for peaceful protests and other events where you can get involved, including the schedule for boycotting the billionaires.

Give money to legal organizations on the front lines of court battles, such as American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) (not tax-deductible), ACLU Foundation, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Brennan Center for Justice, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), Democracy Forward Foundation, GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD Law), Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) (not tax deductible), Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), NAACP Legal Defense Fund, and State Democracy Defenders Fund.

Keep calling your representatives in Congress. Each new week brings new issues upon which to voice our opinions. The issues and possible phone scripts can be found on 5calls.org.

Find your people. Stay connected. Take care of yourself. Use critical thinking skills as you stay informed by consuming news from reputable news sources. “The point of modern propaganda isn’t only to misinform or push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth.” – Garry Kasparov on Twitter, 12/13/16. We cannot let that happen.

Never give up.



Text and photograph copyright © 2025 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo from the Fleischbrücke across the Pegnitz river in Nürnberg (Nuremberg, Germany). I chose this photo because Nuremberg was home to both the Nazi rallies leading up to WWII and to the Nuremberg Trials after the war. The word “zeitgeist” on the building in this photo made me pause: has the zeitgeist of this current era shifted? Are we entering a new era marked by fear, division, and isolationism? Together, in solidarity and with courage, we can change that.


Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.



A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.

Cruelty and loyalty. Two hallmarks of this current regime. We have all witnessed the loyalty part where the only requirement for high-level government positions is loyalty to the king, not competency or experience. Just blind loyalty.
 
It does not require much digging to unearth ramifications of this regime’s cruelty. The billionaire waving a chainsaw at a recent event while gleefully reveling in his recent escapades as head of the “efficiency” effort is probably all we need to know.
 
But the casualties are not just budgets. The slash-and-burn method of cutting costs reverberates all the way down to people’s lives and livelihoods in the US and abroad. USAID (United States Agency for International Development) is one of the first casualties and the carnage continues. Literally. 
 
USAID is an independent federal agency that employs over 10,000 Americans who are deployed throughout the world and partner with many humanitarian aid agencies. Created in part by Congress through the Foreign Assistance Act and from an executive order by President Kennedy in 1961, USAID’s original purpose was to counter Soviet influence during the Cold War while creating soft power (trust and loyalty) for the US through socioeconomic development in low-income countries. USAID works across the globe to provide aid during disasters; food, healthcare, and education support to poverty-stricken areas; administration of funding allocated for geopolitical purposes; and assistance in helping low-income countries manage their resources. Some of these services are directly linked to national security and some ensure elections in developing countries are not fraudulent.
 
Historically, USAID has received bipartisan support in Congress with a budget between $40-60 billion, which is less than 1% of the total federal budget. (In 2023, an extra $16 billion went to help rebuild Ukraine.) While many other countries contribute a larger percentage of their budgets to foreign assistance, the US contributes the largest dollar amount.
 
On January 24, 2025, an executive order put all funding to USAID on hold, ostensibly for an efficiency review. In any organization, there is room for improvement and certainly efficiencies can be realized. But Congress, not the office of the president, is given the authority by the Constitution to create and fund federal agencies. The legal way to perform an efficiency study and to decrease funding is for Congress to act.
 
The “move fast and break things” mantra of an unelected billionaire has created chaos and traumatized federal workers, including USAID employees. Lawsuits have been filed to stop the funding freeze. But so far, this regime has not complied with any court orders to resume funding and the process by which agencies can request an exemption to the funding freeze does not work. Funds still have not been received by those granted exemptions.
 
The impact of shuttering USAID is felt around the world. Its employees are left without support, sometimes in dangerous countries and situations, and some must navigate evacuation on their own and without funding (including without their last paycheck). Even if they travel back to the US, they do not have the resources to pay for housing and oftentimes, they left most of their personal belongings behind. These hard-working civil servants do this difficult work at great risk to themselves and their families while providing extraordinary services abroad. They have served the US government and now they are cruelly cast aside as if their years of service meant nothing. This type of loyalty is obviously not valued.
 
The shuttering of USAID impacts other Americans as well. USAID pays $2 billion annually to US farmers for food they grow that is distributed through USAID agencies. When funding stopped suddenly, not only do these farmers have fewer prospects of selling their crops going forward, but they have not received payments for all their current shipments. Farmers and companies who supply food to USAID are left holding the bag. And $450 million worth of food is rotting in warehouses because there is no one to distribute it.
 
Around the world, this funding freeze impacts USAID partnering organizations. Without funding, many of these organizations are forced to shut down. A brand-new and much-needed hospital in Haiti was forced to close because now it does not have the funding to pay its medical staff. $200 million of emergency aid to feed over 700,000 children in South Sudan is stuck at a port in Kenya. In addition, it is estimated that 200,000 children will be paralyzed by polio while 2.3 million children per year will die of diseases because they can no longer be vaccinated.
 
The victims of this funding freeze are not just statistics. A 71-year-old woman from Myanmar who was living in a displacement camp in Thailand (since the military coup in Myanmar) was one of the first victims of this crisis. She frequently had to go to a nearby hospital for oxygen as she had a lung disease. When the funding freeze began, the hospital had to close and she was discharged. She died several days later because she could not get the oxygen she needed. Others in the same camp also have died for the same reason.
 
USAID partners operate hospitals and clinics that provide medical care, vaccines, and treatments for many illnesses, including smallpox, malaria, tuberculosis, and HIV. Their life-saving work also helps contain epidemics like Ebola. It is projected that the HIV treatments for 20 million people, including 500,000 children have been disrupted and as a result, there will potentially be a 400% increase in HIV-related deaths across the globe. Babies born with HIV have weakened immune systems; without HIV treatments, they will succumb to infections and other diseases that will kill them, most likely before they turn three years of age. One adult HIV patient begged the staff at the clinic to give her 18 months of medication so she could live to see her son graduate.
 
Knowing their aid supplies will be gone soon and their clinics will be shuttered, the staff at these clinics must make the gut-wrenching decision regarding which patients will receive their dwindling supply of medications. These workers are there literally to save lives but now they will grieve those they cannot save.
 
Providing food and medicine is a compassionate and humane response to the suffering around the world, but keeping people fed and healthy lowers the risk of wars and other unstable forces which increases Americans’ national security. By providing vital aid and by being often the largest donor in a country, USAID builds good relations between the US and other countries. Without this positive influence, the world will become less stable and the US will have fewer international allies.  Foreign assistance also keeps Americans healthy as it contains and even eradicates epidemics in other countries that, without this intervention, could spread to the US.
 
When the world’s wealthiest nation turns its back on its less fortunate neighbors, there will be consequences. People around the globe are already dying and many more will die. Thousands of dedicated workers are placed in dangerous situations without assistance from their home offices. They are now unemployed with no severance pay nor their most recent pay checks. The soft power provided to the US through USAID will now be garnered by two powerful countries who have historically not been American allies.
 
Cruelty, not compassion, rules the day. Providing aid to the world’s most vulnerable is a moral obligation as part of our common humanity. I keep coming back to Jesus’ words in Matthew 25:40 when he says, “’Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’ Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
 
We cannot be complicit in the destruction of this life-saving aid to millions of people around the world. They are neighbors. They are created in God’s image. They may be the least of these in terms of wealth, but helping them is the least we can do. And in helping them, we help ourselves. How can we afford not to?
 

 
ON UKRAINE:
Friday’s debacle in the Oval Office was staged to humiliate the Ukrainian president to force him to capitulate to Russian demands. The American president and vice president revealed their hand in supporting Russia in its aggression against Ukraine. In doing so, they sold out both the Ukrainian people, the American people, our European allies, and our democracy. It is beyond disgraceful. But democracy is not a spectator sport.  See below as to what you can do about it.
 

REMEMBER:
1 – The executive branch enforces the laws made by Congress. It does not create them. Executive orders by the president are instructions for how the executive branch is to operate; they are not laws.
2 – The legislative branch makes the laws and authorizes funding of the agencies and programs it creates. The executive branch has no authority to impound or freeze funds that Congress has approved.
3- The judicial branch interprets the laws and does not create them. They have the power to say whether the executive orders and laws are constitutional and therefore enforceable, or not.
4 – Each of the three branches of government is a check on the other.
5 – This unelected billionaire does not have the authority to access sensitive data within the executive branch or independent agencies nor does he have the authority to hire and fire federal employees. The Office of Personnel Management can only hire or fire their own employees, not those in other agencies, and should not be able to control the firing of employees across the federal government.
 
 
WHAT YOU CAN DO:
1 – Keep calling your representatives in Congress:

• Voice your support for USAID. Currently, the courts are involved but the regime is trying to keep the funds frozen.

 

• Express your embarrassment over last Friday’s meeting in the White House with the president of Ukraine. It is obvious our president and VP are on the side of Russia. Declare your support for Ukraine and ask your representative to stand with Ukraine and make a public statement accordingly. Also, remind them that the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) passed by Congress in 2017 means that the president cannot unilaterally lift sanctions against Russia without congressional approval.

 

• After the president this week suspended military aid to Ukraine, demand that Congress step up and send the previously authorized military aid to Ukraine. The president cannot unilaterally impound that aid.

 

• Tell them your outrage over the “efficiency” office’s gutting of federal agencies by shutting down programs and firing federal workers as well as the illegality of the actions of this unelected billionaire, including accessing your personal and financial data.

 

• Ask your House rep to vote NO on the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act which, if passed, would suppress voter participation by requiring in-person proof of citizenship to register to vote or to change a voter registration (for example, for a new address or if you have been accidentally purged from the voter roll). This negatively impacts half of Americans who do not have passports, expats and military overseas who cannot be in the US in person to change their registration, as well as women who changed their name upon marriage as their photo IDs will not match their birth certificates. There is no mention in the proposed law regarding using marriage certificates or change-of-name documents to prove legal name changes. The SAVE Act will effectively eliminate the use of mail-in registration, online registration, Automated Voter Registration (AVR) via motor vehicle agencies, and get-out-the-vote efforts. It must not pass.

 

• Ask your senators to vote NO on all executive branch positions requiring their confirmation. The incompetence and inexperience of these nominees disqualifies them for these high-level positions of power.

 

• Ask both your House rep and senators to vote NO on the upcoming budget. To pay for tax cuts to the wealthy and to corporations, Republicans in Congress are willing to cut programs and services used by millions of Americans. It plans to slash up to $880 billion in Medicaid spending over 10 years, which provides affordable health insurance for over 72 million people and funding to health care providers, nursing facilities, and hospitals. One in five people in the US receive either health insurance or long-term care through Medicaid. Two-thirds of patients in nursing facilities are on Medicaid. Reducing Medicaid to nursing facilities will result in closures, sending families scrambling to find other facilities (even if their family member is not on Medicaid themselves). Cutting funding to hospitals risks their closure. Rural hospitals are at particular risk; when hospitals close, patients must drive long distances to receive care and rural hospitals are often major employers so the local economy will be impacted. Other potential cuts are $238 billion to SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, aka, food stamps) and $330 billion in education. All of this is to pay for tax cuts to the wealthy. This is Robinhood in reverse. (If your rep’s office denies the current budget resolution contains the Medicaid cut, ask them where the $880 billion is coming from that the Energy and Commerce Committee is tasked with finding; Medicaid or Medicare are the only options for that large of a cut.)

 

• Regardless of which party is represented by your senators and US House rep (or whether you voted for them or not – they still represent you in Congress), calling them to voice your opinion makes a difference. 5calls.org has a list of current issues and talking points to use and can help you contact your Congress members.

 
2 – Consider donating to foreign aid organizations to fill in the gap. Charity Navigator evaluates charity organizations and has posted a list of charities affected by the USAID funding freeze.  Click here.

3 – Consider donating to organizations on the front line of filing lawsuits against the power grab by this regime, such as American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) (not tax-deductible), ACLU Foundation, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Brennan Center for Justice, and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
 
4 – Peacefully protest; see Indivisible.org and Political Revolution.
 
5 – Boycott products produced or sold by these billionaires.
 
6 - Stay informed.
 
 
 
Text and photograph copyright © 2025 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of field of blooming rapeseed near Sancerre, France; the photo with its colors are in support of Ukraine.
 
 
Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.
 
 
 
A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.
 
 
All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

After a long hiatus from my hobby of photography, I took up my camera again when I began to hike. As a late-blooming hiker almost 15 years ago, I struggled to keep up and the trails often took me out of my comfort zone. But when I got to the top of an elevated trail, the view was magnificent. All the hard work getting there paid off in all the gorgeous scenery and the images I captured with my camera, something I totally would have missed if I had not pushed through my fear and persisted during my climb to the top.
 
Persistence and overcoming fear are required today. Since the recent inauguration, the “shock and awe” of all the executive orders leaves me feeling exhausted. Perhaps you are, too. Maybe, like me, you are worried and frightened about the near future and what it means for you, your family, friends, and neighbors. The speed at which this administration is moving to destroy democracy and the federal government is designed to exhaust and frighten its opponents into submission. This tactic is called resilience targeting, typically used during disasters, that intentionally overwhelms people with chaos to keep them vulnerable. While it might feel easier to pull the covers over our heads, we cannot roll over and give up our power.
 
One sliver of hope is knowing that this president won only 49.9% of the popular vote, meaning more voters voted for someone else other than for him. This clearly is not a landslide victory, despite his fabrications to the contrary, which means he does not have an overwhelming mandate to do whatever he wants. Even a survey by the conservative Wall Street Journal showed that 75% of Americans oppose mass deportations, a key campaign promise.
 
A recent AP poll found that only 12% of Americans believe the president should take policy advice from billionaires. Yet on January 20th at the Inauguration in the Capitol building’s rotunda, the richest men in the world were sitting comfortably inside while many of his base with their purchased inaugural tickets were left out in the cold. Literally. That scene speaks volumes for whom this regime plans to support. And it is clearly not the American people, not even his base.
 
Contrary to distancing themselves from it, this regime, marked by cruelty and loyalty, is using the draconian Project 2025 to remake the government into one controlled by an authoritarian dictator and owned by his buddies, the wealthy oligarchs. (An oligarchy is a government run by a few wealthy and powerful elite.)
 
While this regime tries to usher in a “Golden Age,” there are some parallels to the Gilded Age of the late 19th century which saw the rise of industrialization and with it, the oligarchs of the day, often referred to as “robber barons” or “industrialists.” Men like Andrew Carnegie, JP Morgan, and John D. Rockefeller gained their wealth by exploiting workers, eschewing business regulations, and by bending the government through corruption to further enrich themselves. Then, as now, there was great wealth inequality. The wealthiest 2% controlled more than a third of US wealth. Now, thanks to trickle-down “Reaganomics” from 1981 and forward, coupled with GOP tax cuts for the wealthy, $50 trillion in wealth has moved from the bottom 90% of Americans to the top 1% from 1981 to 2021 before “Bidenomics” began to reverse the trend. Today, the top 1% controls 30% of all US wealth.
 
What we are seeing today is the rise of a dictator, aided by his oligarchs, all of whom are in it for power and money at the expense of the American people. Divide and conquer is their strategy by scapegoating and dehumanizing immigrants and trans people as well as blaming the “deep state” in the federal government. They exploit us as we fight each other over their made-up culture wars, shifting more wealth and power to themselves under this smokescreen that they are just doing business as usual (à la robber barons). They hope we will not notice that they are getting richer while many Americans struggle to put food on the table.
 
Their goal is to destroy democracy and all the institutions that support it to solidify their control. They bankroll the religious extremists who want to impose their far-right agenda called Christian nationalism (which in no way resembles Jesus and His teachings, but rather is an ideology based on white supremacy and patriarchy). Our rights and freedoms are being taken from us in the name of religious freedom and is another way for them to consolidate power and control. All of this started on Day 1, the day he promised he would be a dictator, the day he began this new reality show with the flourish of his Sharpie to a blitz of executive orders.
 
What exactly is an executive order and who can issue one? The president has the sole power to issue executive orders which are directives for how the executive branch is to operate and how they are to enforce (or not) the law. Congress can counter an order by refusing to fund an initiative or by passing a law to override a particular order. The courts can deem an executive order unlawful or unconstitutional.
 
One noteworthy observation is that despite the blatant unconstitutionality of some of these orders, no lawyer in the Oval Office stopped the president from issuing them. The guardrails of his previous term in office are gone. Now he is surrounded only by people who are totally loyal to him and who will not challenge him. Term 2 is exponentially worse and more destructive than Term 1.
 
The decrees issued since January 20th provide a wrecking ball that is literally destroying the federal government. While we think our institutions are solid, we are seeing in real time their dismantling which allows the oligarchs to take control while profiting from its demise. It also enables the president to consolidate his power. Without a functioning government, this country will indeed become the “failing nation” this regime has been saying for months. While the US is not perfect, it definitely was not a failing nation before January 20th.
 
“Flooding the zone” with so many decrees is designed to overwhelm us, instill fear, and intimidate us. But more importantly, many of these decrees consolidate power into the office of the presidency by taking power from independent federal agencies like the CDC, by seeking to control departments like the Justice Department, or by usurping Congress’ power, especially their power to fund the government.
 
This regime and its oligarchs do not believe in democracy. Rather, they believe that a few people (themselves) should control everyone else. They view diversity, not as enriching our society, but rather as weakening it. By deporting immigrants, firing employees in DEI departments, and purging the federal workforce without just cause, they can increase their power by filling jobs with conservative straight white men whose only qualification is loyalty to them, not to democracy.
 
After the recent horrific plane and Army helicopter collision over the Potomac River, the president, rather than showing compassion to victims’ families, blamed DEI for the accident, insinuating that women, people of color, and people with disabilities were somehow responsible for these untimely deaths. The regime continues to use sexist, racist, and ableist rhetoric to divide us. This cruel and hateful blame game obfuscates the real issues in this particular instance of the lack of funding for more air traffic controllers (one decree froze federal hiring), the lack of oversight (one decree fired all members of the congressionally-mandated Aviation Security Advisory Committee), and the lack of leadership (one oligarch pressured the FAA head to resign on January 20th because his space enterprise company had been charged with safety violations and slapped with a fine).
 
It is impossible to cover all the executive orders issued since January 20th, but generally, these decrees instruct independent federal agencies to stop important work that keeps the public safe, like orders to the CDC forbidding it to communicate their reports and to coordinate with the World Health Organization (another decree removed the US from the WHO, a post-World War II pillar needed for global stability and security). Some decrees directly target federal employees, either by unjustly firing them or offering them a “buyout” to resign (which was accomplished via a Twitter-esque email sent to most federal employees). All DEI programs were dismantled and those workers were put on administrative leave which disenfranchises those who rely on their services and support groups, including disabled veterans.
 
Other decrees strip rights of transgender people, including declaring there are only two genders (in an attempt to erase trans people), barring trans people from serving in the military (there are at least 15,000 people in the military who identify as trans), limiting access to gender-affirming care for trans youth, and ordering federally incarcerated trans people to medically detransition and be housed in facilities corresponding with their sex at birth (which puts them at risk of physical danger).
 
Decrees related to immigration are designed to instill fear in both undocumented immigrants and those with legal status. Canceling the appointments asylum seekers made via the CBP One app for legal immigration means they are now stuck in limbo in Mexico. Raiding schools and churches to arrest immigrants instills fear in whole communities. The executive order to forbid birthright citizenship to babies born in the US (with caveats around their parents’ immigration status) is clearly unconstitutional but it will probably wind its way up to the nation’s top court which is not known for upholding precedent. Many of these executive orders are intentionally designed to test the limits of the Constitution.
 
Numerous orders have been met with lawsuits by nonprofits, states’ attorney generals, and individuals to push back on their legality and constitutionality. This was especially visible when one decree froze federal loans and grants to many federal programs, including Meals on Wheels and Head Start. Congress received a deluge of calls from constituents and impacted organizations. That pushback, coupled with lawsuits challenging the decree, caused the regime to backtrack and rescind it. There is power in our collective resistance.
 
In addition to the executive orders, the presidential pardons of more than 1,500 January 6th insurrectionists, including those who assaulted police officers, unleashes violent offenders into society and signals that any future violence done in the name of the regime can be done with impunity, making our communities less safe and creating a sense of lawlessness. This is ironic for the party of “law and order” and the president who claimed other countries were unleashing their criminals into the US.
 
The Right Reverend Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde’s sermon in a service at the Washington National Cathedral the day after the Inauguration gives me hope that there are courageous people who are willing to speak truth to power, in this case, from literally 40 feet away. Her example was a respectful reminder to the president that God is merciful and that we are called to treat each other with mercy, respect, and compassion, especially when we hold positions of power. I hope it emboldens other faith leaders to speak out.
 
Bishop Budde reminds me of how Jesus stood up to power on behalf of those being oppressed by the regime. She is a good example of how all of us can speak truth, with gentleness and kindness, and encourage others in our sphere of influence toward compassion and mercy.
 
We are at a “speak now or forever hold our peace” moment. We cannot sit on the sidelines while democracy crumbles. We must resist and persist. The mountain in front of us may look daunting, but together we can scale the obstacles to win back our democracy from this power-hungry authoritarian regime.
 
Like those who have come before us, whether colonists defeating a king for their freedom, soldiers fighting for democracy on foreign battlefields, or civil rights activists marching on Selma or Washington, we can prevail. This is our American heritage. The path will not be easy. But together we can make a difference. Our future and the future of those who come after us depend upon it.
 
 
WHAT WE CAN EACH DO:
 
1 – Take care of yourself. Do one thing every day that brings you joy. Create with art, crafts, and music. Learn something new.
 
2 - Support those who are engaged on the front line of litigation. Donating money to support the organizations that are filing these lawsuits will allow these nonprofits to pay their staff and to hire new attorneys. Their caseloads will be heavy. Give what you can to help them fight against this authoritarian regime. Even small amounts make a difference. Some notable organizations to donate to are:  American Civil Liberties Union* (ACLU), ACLU Foundation, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Brennan Center for Justice, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Democracy Forward Foundation, GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD Law), Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, League of United Latin American Citizens* (LULAC), Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), and NAACP Legal Defense Fund.
 
*For the orgs above noted with an asterisk, contributions are not tax-deductible.
 
Just Security is an organization that is tracking the lawsuits against the current regime. Click here to learn more.
 
3 - Support local news media and independent media who are boldly proclaiming the facts. Find and support writers, journalists, and podcasters who are standing up to power through their words of truth. They, too, need financial support and words of encouragement. Some of my favorite media are: Associated Press, Axios, BBC, Bloomberg, NPR, Politico, ProPublica, Reuters, and The 19th. My favorite independent writers are all found on Substack: Heather Cox Richardson, Robert Reich, The Contrarian (with Jennifer Rubin and Norm Eisen), and The Convocation (with Diana Butler Bass, Kristen du Mez, Robert P. Jones, and Jemar Tisby).
 
Many of the above also provide news and opinions via podcasts and videos. Other informative podcasts include: Assembly Required with Stacey Abrams (episode “Cory Booker on Winning the Messaging War Against Trump with Radical Empathy” was especially helpful), Pod Save America, and What A Day.
 
4 - Get involved in local communities that are pushing back. Or create one. There are good grassroots-type organizations that are making a difference. Many have a national presence, too. Check out the League of Women Voters (disclaimer: I am a member; views expressed in this post are solely my own) and Red Wine and Blue.
 
5 – Immigrants have rights if they are approached by ICE but they may not know what those rights are. For example, they do not have to speak with an agent from ICE or let them into their home without a proper warrant. To help educate any immigrants in your sphere of influence, you can print down “red cards” that are translated into different languages and spell out their legal rights. Check out the Immigrant Legal Resource Center here. Consider making a tax-deductible contribution toward their work.
 
6 – Call your representatives in Congress to voice your opinion and to encourage them to do the right thing when voting on bills (House and Senate), Cabinet positions (Senate), and judicial appointments (Senate). The congressional switchboard number is (202) 224-3121. If that line is busy, call your representative at their DC or local office. Check their website for contact info.
 
5calls.org is a great resource when contacting your congressmember or senator. Current issues are listed on this website along with scripts to use in your conversation with your representative. Check out https://5calls.org/ and let your voice be heard!
 
7 – Read books on democracy, oligarchy, authoritarianism, and Christian nationalism. My recommendations are: Democracy Awakening by Heather Cox Richardson, The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy by Robert P. Jones, How Democracies Die by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, Jesus and John Wayne by Kristen du Mez, Minority Rule by Ari Berman, On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder (this is a very short but informative book – I highly recommend!), Power Worshippers by Katherine Stewart, Shadow Network by Anne Nelson, and Tyranny of the Minority by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt. Money, Lies, and God: Inside the Movement to Destroy American Democracy by Katherine Stewart will be available on February 18.
 
8 – We all have a sphere of influence. Ensure you use yours to promote truth with compassion.
 
 
 
NOTE: Regarding immigration, the president signed into law on 1/29/25 the Laken Riley Act passed by Congress which now makes it possible for undocumented immigrants to be imprisoned or deported based merely on being accused, not convicted, of crimes, even petty crimes, like shoplifting. Immigrants’ rights to due process under the law are stripped away. This is a slippery slope to eliminating everyone’s due process rights. To see how your representatives in Congress voted, click here.
 
 
NOTE: If this post sounds alarmist, it is written to inform and to galvanize people to resist. My 9/4/24 post entitled, “Take Two”, might have sounded alarmist at the time regarding a possible second term for the now-president, but the horrific agenda outlined there in Project 2025 is now being implemented.
 
NOTE: If you need a refresher on Christian nationalism, check out my blogs entitled, “A Slippery Slope” (posted 10/4/23) and “Monsters, Inc.” (posted 11/1/23). Also relevant are my posts on how democracies die and what we can do to prevent it. See “Death of Democracy” (posted 1/3/24) and “Democracy Matters” (posted 2/7/24).
 
My blog posts can be accessed here.
 
 
FEBRUARY IS BLACK HISTORY MONTH – despite the Pentagon and the US State Department banning it this year!
 
Click here for a thoughtful article by Jemar Tisby on Black history month.
 
Also check out https://blackhistorymonth.gov/.
 
 
 
Text and photograph copyright © 2025 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of Reine, Norway, in the Lofoten Islands.
 
 
Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.
 
 
 
A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.

You are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.  Deuteronomy 10:19
 
 
Fleeing for their lives in the middle of the night, they head for the border towards safety, or so they hope. Will they be accepted in this foreign country where they do not speak the language nor look or dress like their soon-to-be neighbors? How will they survive? Will they find work? Amid the myriads of anxious thoughts and worse-case scenario fears, they hurriedly make their way over the dark and dangerous path to the land of promise and protection.
 
This is not the harrowing tale of a modern-day immigrant traveling a dangerous journey to cross the US southern border. Instead, this is an ancient story of a Middle Eastern family who fled to Egypt to save their child from being killed by a Roman ruler.
 
Mary and Joseph with the infant Jesus fled from Israel to Egypt immediately after the visit from the Magi as King Herod sought to kill the Christ Child, his presumed rival. Even though God, through a dream, told them to go, I wonder if Mary and Joseph may have experienced fear and worry along their journey. Perhaps the gold given to them by the Magi helped to tide them over until Joseph could find work as a carpenter. Maybe they found kindness from their new neighbors. Or maybe they found hatred and scapegoating instead. The Bible does not say. But it does contain quite a few verses on the importance of showing hospitality and even love to foreigners (i.e., immigrants).
 
A big part of the far right’s Project 2025 and the incoming administration’s agenda includes rounding up undocumented immigrants* whom they scapegoat for this country’s problems. In their previous term, immigrant families were separated at the border and children were held in wire cages. Today, many children who were separated from their families have still not been reunited with them, despite efforts to help them.
 
The incoming administration will most likely have the same people in charge of the border that were in charge in their previous term. Their plan is not only to separate families at the border, but to round up 11 million undocumented immigrants, detain them in camps, centers, and even prisons (it is no coincidence that the day after the election, the stock prices of two private prison firms skyrocketed), before trying to deport them. This is only the beginning: there are talks on the far right of rounding up those here legally and even newly naturalized citizens.
 
We have been here before. The internment camps in the 1940’s are a dark spot on this nation’s history where 120,000 Japanese Americans were stripped of their civil rights and property and relocated to crowded detention camps. Although some reparations were made decades later, the emotional and financial toll on these families is unfathomable. Apparently, this nation has not learned its lesson on racism. And those who do not know (or care about) history are doomed to repeat it.
 
Did those who voted for this mandate truly understand what they were voting for? In a post-truth world, perhaps some myth-busting is in order. Here are some common myths about immigration:

1. Immigration, especially at the southern border, is overrun with “illegal” immigrants trying to sneak into the US.
2. Immigrants take jobs away from native-born Americans.
3. Immigrants are murderers, rapists, and escapees from prisons and insane asylums.
4. Tight border controls, including a wall, will keep immigrants out.

 
Fear is a powerful emotion and has been used to raise false alarms over a “crisis” at the southern border. This view would have us believe there is total chaos at the border and that a stream of ruthless criminals invades this country every day. This is simply fear-mongering. The facts point to the failure of politicians to address the needs of the immigration system over decades, often for lack of care or understanding and lately, for the desire to use immigration as a political wedge issue.
 
Most immigrants (77%) arrive legally to the US and are issued visas. Of the ones deemed unauthorized, they have either entered the country without legal permission (and have no documentation), have overstayed their visas, have protected temporary status, or are awaiting the processing of their asylum claims. Those allowed to stay under asylum claims typically must wait 4-5 years or even as many as 10 years for their asylum claim to be processed. Currently, there is backlog of 3 million immigration court cases.
 
Immigration is typically cyclical and we are most likely to hear about it when there are larger numbers of immigrants at the border waiting to be processed. Politicians and journalists are typically silent when those numbers drop. Immigration ebbs and flows based on weather, perceived job opportunities in the US, and spikes in violence in immigrants’ countries of origin. When the weather is nicer, more immigrants are likely to leave their homes and make the trek to the US. Likewise, when the unemployment rate in the US is low, immigrants are more likely to try to enter the US because they believe more jobs are available.
 
It is important to understand that in the past, immigrants were invited to come to the US to fill worker shortages. Even today, it is expected that 18 million immigrants and their children will replace retiring baby boomers.
 
Contrary to current perceptions, up to half of immigrants are returned to their countries of origin upon arriving at the border. Some immigrants fly here rather than arriving on foot through Mexico. Some are in the US on student visas while many immigrants have jobs waiting for them.
 
The jobs immigrants typically perform are not ones that native-born Americans want to do. Immigrant workers are often employed in agriculture, construction, meat-packing plants, the hospitality industry (such as in restaurants and hotels), domestic work, child care, and elder care. These jobs help make the American economy go ‘round. Without these essential workers, economic growth would stagnant and perhaps plummet. We would see shortages of goods, particularly food, which would lead to higher prices. Fewer houses being constructed would drive up prices for both home purchases and rentals.
 
There is no evidence that immigrants are a fiscal burden on the government. In fact, most arrive ready to work, to provide for their families, and often to send money back to relatives in their home countries. Immigrants, including undocumented ones, pay taxes and contribute to Social Security and Medicare. But most undocumented immigrants do not reap any benefits from their contributions. They are not welfare burdens on the state. They pay more into the system than they receive.
 
Statistics show that immigrants commit fewer crimes than native-born Americans. They generally are more law-abiding than native-born Americans and do not want to attract the attention of the police for fear of deportation. While some violent crimes committed by immigrants have received much media attention, these crimes are not the norm. For example, in Texas where they track arrests by immigration status, undocumented immigrants have the lowest crime rates. Native-born Americans are twice as likely to be arrested for a violent crime than undocumented immigrants. Documented immigrants fall in-between the undocumented and the native-born in terms of crime rates. There is also evidence that immigration often makes neighborhoods and cities safer: where there are higher concentrations of immigrants, there is, on average, less crime and violence.
 
The incoming administration has conflated “asylum seekers” with inmates from foreign asylums when in fact, “asylum seeker” simply means someone who applies for and is awaiting asylum or protection in another country due to violence or political retribution in their home countries. Thus, this word mix-up increases the perception that immigrants are dangerous which is clearly not based on facts.
 
We often think that locking down the border is the best way to control immigration. Studies have shown that tighter border controls actually increase immigration. While this may sound counter-intuitive, evidence shows that when borders are more open and visas are more easily obtained, immigrants will not feel as desperate to enter because they know they can enter at any time. But when there are crackdowns at the border, immigrants may feel that this is their only chance to enter the US and their journey is more likely to involve more dangerous treks led by traffickers with higher numbers of immigrants entering at points other than official ports. Conversely, if the opportunity to immigrate is viewed as equally available in the future, immigrants may choose to wait. Also, when the border is more open, seasonal workers can enter and then return to their home countries, knowing they can return later.
 
Viable solutions to the problems of immigration are complicated and can only be achieved when we consider the facts rather than the myths.
 
Far-right politicians campaigning on the issue of immigration instill fear in voters of a border being overrun by criminals (and of pets being eaten by Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio). Dehumanizing immigrants makes it more palatable to promote the use of internment camps and deportations.
 
Rounding up undocumented immigrants is only the tip of the authoritarian iceberg. The rest of the incoming administration's agenda is equally chilling.
 
The immigrant baby-turned-rabbi stood up to power for the sake of the most vulnerable. Now it is our turn.
 
 
 
What you can do to help – Read up on immigration to know the facts. One helpful book is How Immigration Really Works by Hein de Haas. Call out disinformation and the myths around immigration when you hear them. Check out local agencies in your community that work with immigrants to help them find housing and jobs, learn English, or study for their citizenship tests. Consider volunteering or donating to these organizations.
 
 
 *I prefer to use the term “undocumented immigrant” or “unauthorized immigrant” rather than “illegal immigrant” because a person cannot be considered “illegal.” However, the phrase “illegal immigration” can be used to describe a process.
 
NOTE: In this recent election, over 80% of white evangelical Christians and 60% of white Protestants and white Catholics voted for the incoming administration despite the plans to round up undocumented immigrants and separate families in the process. Jesus’ mission as stated in Luke 4:18-19 is to stand up for the helpless, the marginalized, and the vulnerable. Many of those who claim to follow Jesus seem to have no compassion or mercy. “Love thy neighbor” feels particularly hollow.
 
 
Text and photograph copyright © 2025 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of setting sun over Saguaro National Park, Arizona.
 
 
Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.
 
 
 
A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.
 
 
All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

"I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant." – Dr Martin Luther King, Jr.
 
 
Devastated. Disillusioned. Defeated. The list goes on regarding my emotional state since the most recent US election. Trying to make sense of it, I follow the political pundits’ election postmortem. One thing, at least, is clear – lies and hate carried the day. Truth and love were sidelined.
 
In 1964, speaking at his acceptance speech in Oslo, Norway, Dr Martin Luther King, Jr, as the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, had the hope that “unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word…” Dr King’s hope was forged through repeated lynchings of Black Americans, through Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama, and through the untold and many injustices perpetrated since chattel slavery reached the shores of this country. Yet, Dr King was not pessimistic about the future. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 had just been signed into law by President Johnson a few months before. Perhaps that glimmer of hope emboldened Dr King’s enthusiasm that truth and love would ultimately win.
 
Dr King’s sense of truth was unarmed and the love he encouraged was unconditional. His faith in the hopeful prevalence of truth demanded nonviolence to the oppression he encountered for he knew that violence only begets more violence. He spoke truth to power to call out oppression and injustice. He loved unconditionally for he saw the image of God in all he met. He envisioned a time when there would be no divisions between races, genders, or nations because people would love without limits, restrictions, or borders. Dr King’s theology cost him his life. Yet his followers persevered.
 
Truth and love matter.
 
And they have mattered since the dawn of time. Two millennia ago, the birth of a Jewish baby in a stable coincided with horrific Roman oppression. This baby-turned-itinerant preacher taught his followers how to live and love, even in the worst of times. His purpose was to bring good news to the poor and to set the captives free, propositions that required changed hearts and minds. To love God and to love people, he preached, was the most important thing of all, along with providing for the “least of these.” He spoke truth in an era where truth was scarce. The poor and the curious flocked to him. The powers that be plotted against him. Undeterred, he spoke truth boldly, even to Pontius Pilate, who had become so impervious to the truth, that he dismissed this King of the Jews.
 
Armed only with truth and love, Jesus did not resist arrest. He was executed as a nonviolent activist, one who preached love, not hate; unity, not division; peace, not war. His unconditional love for the oppressed motivated him to speak truth to power. It cost him his life. His followers, after a huge setback, regrouped and persevered.
 
Like those who have come before us, we, too, must take on the mantle of truth and love. And we must persevere. Because even during a setback, we are still stronger than the forces of “evil triumphant.”
 
In this Advent season, may we not forget that this Christ Child was born into poverty and oppression to teach us how to live in truth and love. May we never waver in our pursuit of unarmed truth and unconditional love.
 
 
 
 
Text and photograph copyright © 2024 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of the Vågan Church, often called “Lofoten Cathedral,” near Svolvær, in the Lofoten Islands, Norway. Designed in the Gothic revival style and consecrated in 1898, this church is the largest wooden structure in Northern Norway. It was built large enough to accommodate (and include) all the fishermen who came there in the fishing season.
 
 
 
Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.
 
 
 
A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.

“My dear friends, your vote is precious, almost sacred. It is the most powerful nonviolent tool we have to create a more perfect union.” – John Lewis, civil rights leader, and Georgia congressman
 
 
John Robert Lewis (1940-2020) was born in Alabama and came of age during the civil rights movement. Inspired by Dr Martin Luther King, Jr, Lewis became a Freedom Rider in 1961 and was the youngest speaker at the March on Washington in 1963. He co-led the first march from Selma to Montgomery in 1965 (known as “Bloody Sunday”), where, after crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, he was beaten by police who fractured Lewis’ skull. Undeterred, Lewis went on to become a national civil rights leader, and in 1987, he was elected to Congress and served until his death in 2020. He was a fierce advocate for equal rights, especially voting rights. John Lewis’ leadership and participation in the civil rights movement helped pave the way for the Voting Rights Act that was signed into law in 1965 by President Lyndon Johnson, giving Black people the hard-earned right to vote.
 
Voting allows us to have a voice in our democracy. In some very close elections, candidates have won by a very small number of votes. Every vote counts. And who we vote for up and down the ballot, from the office of the president on down to local school board officials, makes a difference in the quality of life in our country, in our communities, and in our own personal lives.
 
In previous posts, entitled Take Two and Standing on the Precipice, we discussed the policies of the presidential candidates. What their plans are if elected president is important. But also significant is the president’s power to appoint for life terms, with Senate confirmation, justices to the US Supreme Court and judges to the federal Courts of Appeal and District Courts. Who we elect as senators, given their role in judicial appointments, is also critical because the power these judges wield over our everyday lives cannot be overstated.
 
The US Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts has leaned conservative over the years, but with three justices appointed by the GOP candidate in his first term, the Court now wields a 6-3 very conservative majority that has upended laws passed by Congress and stripped federal agencies of some of their power. The Roberts Court has made the following notable decisions:
1 – Their 2024 case on presidential culpability - gives broad immunity from criminal prosecution to former presidents who commit crimes during their official acts as president.
2 - Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo (2024) – overturned the principle of Chevron deference, a 40-year precedent that allowed federal agencies’ experts, under the power vested in each agency by Congress, to interpret ambiguous laws and determine policy without judicial review if their interpretations were reasonable; now the courts have given themselves the power to interpret ambiguous laws if they disagree with the agency’s policies, setting up the process to be partisan. Any federal agency, like the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), is subject to this ruling.
3 – Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022)- overturned Roe v. Wade, a 50-year precedent, to abolish federal protection for reproductive rights and the freedom of bodily autonomy; the power to determine reproductive rights now rests with each state.
4 – Shelby County v. Holder (2013) – stripped the Voting Rights Act of 1965 of the pre-clearance requirement by allowing states with previous voting rights violations to make voting law changes without federal approval, thus paving the way for an increase in voter suppression laws such as the purging of voter rolls, the implementation of voter ID laws, the reduction in the number of polling places (mostly in predominantly Black precincts), and new restrictions in early voting.  
5 – Citizens United v. FEC (2010) – struck down a key provision of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (2002) that prohibited corporations and unions from contributing directly to campaigns, thus allowing the rise of super PACs (political action committees) to receive large donations and to spend those funds without accountability.
 
Today, billionaires and corporations use their dollars to influence elections in outsized ways and have unfairly tilted the playing field in their favor. These wealthy influencers are not unlike oligarchs in countries without democracy nor are they unlike the American industrialists that controlled US politics a hundred years ago. By influencing elections, these wealthy donors ensure their self-interests are protected. It is more imperative than ever for the rest of us to vote to make our voices heard over these special interest groups.
 
While the Senate has responsibility for confirming Supreme Court and federal judges, both the Senate and the House of Representatives can either support or hinder the president’s agenda depending on the legislation they pass (or not). Congress has the power to create federal agencies that directly impact our lives, such as the EPA, the Food and Drug Administration, and many more. It controls the purse strings to fund the US military, Social Security, Medicare, the federal share of Medicaid, disaster relief, and military aid to US allies, to name a few. Who we elect to Congress matters.
 
Just as having representation in Congress is important, so too is the representation we have in our own state legislatures. For example, since the overturning of Roe v. Wade, state legislatures decide reproductive health care rights. To date, 13 states ban abortion entirely while eight states restrict it; all these states have Republican-controlled legislatures. Not surprisingly, the states with the most restrictive bans have higher maternal and infant mortality rates and greater prevalence of economic insecurity. It is not hyperbole to say that other rights and freedoms will be on the chopping block in Republican-controlled state legislatures, such as the definition of marriage, and the accessibility of IVF and contraception.
 
Who we elect up and down the ballot in our state matters, like state attorneys general (AGs) who can decide to pursue a case or not. For example, Ahmaud Arbery was a 25-year-old Black man who, on 2/23/20, was murdered while out for a run in Brunswick, GA. For two months, his murder was not investigated nor criminal charges pursued as a favor by the state AG for one of the killers who is a retired law enforcement officer. Outraged that no investigation had begun, Arbery’s family and social justice activists played a role in starting the investigation that would ultimately bring Arbery’s murderers to justice.
 
From fixing potholes to enforcing the rule of law, and so much in-between, states have tremendous power to impact our personal day-to-day lives, but those elected to local offices matter, too. From local taxes to school board decisions, from zoning regulations to rent control, as well as police, fire, and emergency services, local elected officials have the power to influence our lives. And like at the state level, who we elect as county sheriff, judge, and district attorney impacts how the rule of law is carried out in our communities which can impact safety and crime levels.
 
Democracy works best when all eligible citizens vote and their votes are counted. But not all eligible voters can vote. In some states, voter suppression laws make it difficult for people to vote. Voter registration rolls are often purged of “inactive” voters who may not be aware their registration was purged and they may not have enough time to re-register before the election. Check your voter registration on Vote.gov.
 
Since 2020, there has been a concerted effort by the Republican Party to reject mail-in ballots, typically on technicalities. Ballots have been rejected if a voter did not correctly date the outside of the ballot envelope (PA), if the witness to a mail-in ballot did not fill in a complete address (WI), if the inner secrecy envelope was not sealed properly (NC), or if the birth date of the voter was not correctly written on the outer envelope (GA). It is no secret they are trying to disenfranchise Democratic voters to increase Republicans’ chances of winning elections by invalidating otherwise valid ballots, particularly in swing states where a handful of votes can determine the outcome.
 
It seems that the Republican party is pulling out all the stops to win. But the extremists are not limited to those internal to the US. There are external forces at work to influence the election. The US Department of Justice recently opened a case to investigate Russian interference in our elections. While that is certainly not new, what does seem to be new is the method of influence. Money from Russia was funneled through various other countries before it reached two American companies who then used the funds to pay large sums of money to as many as six far-right social media influencers to promote lies regarding the US election.  Since many people get much of their news from social media, this method of influence threatens to interfere with this election on a whole new level. And this influence can be very effective, divisive, and destructive. Ensure you and those you care about get information from reliable and trusted news sources. See note below for suggestions.
 
Truth matters. Most authoritarian and fascist dictators come to power not through military force, but by way of the ballot box. They use the rules (or change them) to their advantage to win without violence. But first they discredit the free press and confuse the electorate with their lies. Their continual lying about everything creates so much chaos that people do not know what to believe. That state of confusion causes people to either believe the lies or give up trying and give in to the demands of a soon-to-be dictator.
 
As we begin to cast our ballots this election season, carefully consider your choice of candidates for all the races listed on your ballot. Make sure that the candidates you vote for support democracy. Anyone who denies that Joe Biden won the 2020 election, claims the election was stolen from the 2020 GOP candidate, or refuses to answer whether Biden won does not support democracy and should not be elected.
 
To be clear, no widespread fraud occurred in the 2020 election. Over 60 lawsuits claiming election fraud were thrown out of court by judges of all political persuasions because there was no evidence of fraud.
 
The Republican candidate was convicted on 34 felony counts for a 2016 election coverup and is currently awaiting sentencing. He has been indicted for 2020 election subversion in GA. In federal court, he has been indicted for inciting an insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 2021. A candidate who cannot admit he lost a free and fair election, who refuses to peacefully transition power to his successor, and who commits crimes to stay in power is not fit for office. And neither are his enablers. (The SCOTUS decision regarding presidential immunity is particularly pertinent.)
 
While many politicians may stretch the truth, his pathological lying has dire consequences, from maligning legal immigrants from Haiti (that incites violence against them) to spreading lies about the hurricane relief efforts (which hinders relief efforts, incites violence against FEMA workers, and ultimately hurts hurricane victims) to deceiving voters on his planned actions if elected (think Project 2025). And yes, he will institute a national abortion ban, use the military both to round up immigrants for deportation and to punish his political opponents (or anyone who disagrees with him), fire thousands of federal employees, and get rid of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare).
 
His lies paint a hellscape that does not exist to frighten voters with imaginary threats, all so he can save the day, just as other authoritarian dictators in other countries have done. The truth is immigrants are not taking over this country; without them, our economy would tank. They also have lower crime rates than native-born Americans. In case anyone has amnesia, his immigration policy in his previous term included a travel ban on people from predominantly Muslim countries and the practice of separating families at the border, both policies he has said he will reinstate if re-elected. Also, he kept immigrant children in wire cages. To date, there are children still separated from their families because their families cannot be located. By contrast, Kamala Harris plans to strengthen border security while improving the legal process to citizenship.
 
The American people deserve a president who makes fact-based decisions, who supports all people in the US regardless of political party affiliation (not just those loyal to them), and who leads with integrity. Kamala Harris has the intelligence, compassion, character, and experience to become the 47th president of the US.
 
There is a lot riding on this election. Our democracy, rights, and freedoms are being assaulted from within and from without. As citizens, it is our responsibility to be informed voters and to get out and vote. Many races will be decided by just a handful of votes. Your vote matters. It is the “most powerful nonviolent tool” you have to ensure your voice is heard. Use it wisely.
 
 
 

NOTE: Respectable and reliable news sources include, but are not limited to: Reuters, AP, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Guardian, Axios, CNN, NPR, and BBC. Many of these news organizations have free e-newsletters. I also highly recommend Heather Cox Richardson’s daily e-newsletter on Substack entitled Letters from an American. (See https://substack.com/@heathercoxrichardson )  Also, Brené Brown interviews Dr Richardson on her podcast, “Unlocking Us” which is worth checking out.
 
NOTE: The John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2023 is a bill that was proposed in Congress that would restore the requirement struck down in Shelby County v. Holder so that going forward, federal approval would be required before a state could implement voting rights changes if they have previous voting rights violations. This important bill would help prevent states from gerrymandering districts and using voter suppression tactics; it passed in the House, but not in the Senate. If it were brought up for consideration again, Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris would support this bill. Her opponent would not.
 
NOTE: My previous blog posts that are relevant to this election can be found HERE (scroll down to find the specific post):
Standing on the Precipice (Oct 2024), Take Two (Sept 2024), Reality Check (Aug 2024), and A Good Kind of Stumbling Block (July 2024).
 
 
November is Native American Heritage Month. Check out:
https://nativeamericanheritagemonth.gov/about.html
 
 
Text and photograph copyright © 2024 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of the Acropolis in Athens, Greece, the birthplace of democracy.
 
Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.
 
 
 
A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.

"Our nation stands on the precipice of an authoritarian, white Christian nationalist government of the few or a participatory, multiracial democracy for the many."- Jemar Tisby, historian, and author of The Color of Compromise, How to Fight Racism, and The Spirit of Justice


As I hike down the narrow trail, the vastness and sheer beauty of the Grand Canyon is breathtaking. (Hiking back up is also breathtaking, but for a different reason!) On the trail, I witness people climbing up on adjacent rocks for photos. I am quite satisfied standing further back from the edge. Staring down the precipice is not for me!

As historian and author Jemar Tisby reminds us, we as a nation are standing on the edge of a precipice. Democracy can either fall to its death or it can stay on the path to a more perfect union. We as voters will decide the outcome on November 5.

In the previous post, we discussed the Republican-generated Project 2025 as well as Republican presidential candidate’s own manifesto called Agenda 47. Now it is time to turn to Democratic candidate Vice President Kamala Harris’ policies.

Kamala Harris calls her campaign a New Way Forward “that protects our fundamental freedoms, strengthens our democracy, and ensures every person has the opportunity to not just get by, but to get ahead.” Hers is an “Opportunity Economy” where she is focused on policies that will help the middle class, which include (at this writing):
•    Restoring the Child Tax Credit and the Earned Income Tax Credit
•    Increasing the Child Tax Credit to $6,000 to families with a newborn
•    Ensuring no one earning less than $400,000 per year pays higher taxes
•    Rolling back tax cuts to billionaires and corporations to pay for the above
•    Increasing the supply of housing while cutting red tape to allow more 
      housing to be built
•    Giving first-time home buyers a $25,000 credit towards a down-payment on
      a home
•    Encouraging new small businesses by increasing the startup tax deduction
      from $5,000 to $50,000
•    Preventing corporations from price-gouging during emergencies
•    Imposing a federal ban on price gouging food and groceries (and expanding
      on what 37 states currently do)
•    Reducing prescription drug costs for all Americans
•    Expanding the Affordable Care Act and making permanent the Biden-Harris
      tax credits that lower premiums
•    Expanding Medicaid’s post-partum coverage to help decrease the maternal
      mortality rate
•    Protecting Social Security and Medicare by collecting more in payroll taxes
      from the wealthy
•    Supporting the right to organize unions, increasing the minimum wage,
      implementing paid family and medical leave
•    Supporting quality education and working to reduce student debt
•    Investing in affordable child care and long-term care
•    Tackling the climate crisis, advancing environmental justice, protecting
      public lands and public health, and holding polluters accountable.

In addition, Harris plans to safeguard our basic freedoms: the freedom to vote, the freedom to love and marry whom you wish, and the freedom from government interference in making personal health care decisions, including reproductive care.

The economy is still a top issue for many voters. According to The Washington Post, last week an open letter written by “more than 400 economists and former U.S. policymakers endorsed Harris for president,” called her “a strong steward of the U.S. economy,” and stated that her opponent's policies “risk reigniting inflation and threaten the United States’ global standing and domestic economic stability.”

The contrast between the two candidates could not be starker, and not just on policies. A candidate’s background and character are also important. Harris, raised by a single mother in a middle-class family, has been a public servant during her entire career as a district attorney, the attorney general of California, a US senator, and finally as the US vice president. By contrast, her opponent inherited millions of dollars, declared bankruptcy six times, was impeached twice as US president, has been convicted of rape in a civil trial, has been indicted on criminal charges in four different cases (including interference with the 2020 election), and has been convicted by a jury of his peers on 34 counts of business fraud that he perpetrated to influence the 2016 presidential election. He is a convicted felon awaiting sentencing.
 
The September 10th presidential debate between Harris and her opponent illuminated these contrasts further. In the allowed two-minute time allotments, Harris shared some of her policies, displaying that she cares about and will work for the American people, particularly the middle class. With empathy, she shared about the plight of pregnant people who, because of abortion bans, cannot get the care they need and end up “bleeding out in a car in the emergency room parking lot.” Her opponent was busy spouting lies about how Haitian immigrants in Springfield, OH, were kidnapping and eating pets and how babies carried to term are “executed.” He was called out by the moderators for these lies. There were, however, many other lies he spewed that evening that were not called out. (To watch the recorded debate, click here.)

Words matter. Now, the Haitian community in Springfield is rightfully afraid of violence against them. Recently, there were bomb threats in several locations there, impacting not just these legal Haitian immigrants but everyone in the community.

His incorrect use of words is so misleading and his economic policies are so baffling that some of his word usage deserves to be called out. On the economics front, he says his plan to place a 60% tariff on Chinese imports and a 10-20% tariff on all other imports will be a tax paid by other countries and those funds will end up in US federal coffers. While tariffs can be beneficial when placed on competing products produced overseas, like on all electric cars from China to protect the US electric car industry or on all steel imports to protect the American steel industry, an across-the-board tariff would increase the price of goods coming into the US. These price increases would ultimately be passed on to US consumers. Estimates vary, but the cost to the average American family would be between $1,700-$3,900 per year. Implementing these tariffs would cause significant inflation and would yield no benefit.

Another example of how he does not understand economics was on display in a recent interview with the governor of Arkansas when this candidate said he plans to lower food prices by cutting imports. Reducing the supply of food will not lower prices. It will have the reverse effect: food prices will increase for those items that are in short supply.

In discussing immigration, he has misused the term “asylum seeker” by saying that asylum seekers are people let loose from asylums (mental institutions) in Central America and Mexico who are entering the US from the southern border; these people include the mentally ill, rapists, and murderers. The actual meaning of asylum seekers describes people who are escaping violent situations or political retribution and who are seeking asylum (refuge) in another country. By misusing the term “asylum seeker,” he dehumanizes and demonizes the immigrants who are escaping horrific conditions to live in the US. This ultimately creates resistance to help them and promotes American isolationism.

He not only slurs his words frequently, he usually speaks in word salads that are incomprehensible. The media often turns his rants into more coherent messages but listening to him in real time, like at the Economic Club of NY, leaves neurological experts wondering if he has dementia.

In addition to his reckless use of words, the debate showed in real time how easily he can be manipulated as Harris consistently kept him on defense. When she baited him on the crowd size at his rallies, he became totally derailed because crowd size is a barometer of how exalted he is with his base. As Harris pointed out during the debate, he only cares about himself. As another example, he influenced his supporters in Congress to vote down a bipartisan border security bill that would have provided funding and created solutions at the southern border. By putting his desire for re-election over the needs of this country, he shows he is more interested in using a problem than in solving it.

What I find just as frightening as his policies and his ignorant economic ideas is the fact that he has surrounded himself with people who are all too eager to take advantage of him, ostensibly through flattery, to get the power, position, and money they crave. This is even more noticeable than in 2016 and consequently, a second term would be significantly worse than his first term. We have just witnessed how easily he can be manipulated and how gullible he is to believe that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, OH, are eating people’s pets. (He is either very gullible to believe these stories or as demonstrated on numerous occasions, facts hold no sway with him – or both.)

Is this who we want as the president of the most powerful nation on earth and the leader of the free world? Someone who is a convicted felon, who will lie to get what he wants, who often rants incoherently, who plans to seek retribution against his political enemies, and who seeks to divide us? A gullible, aspiring dictator who can be easily swayed by American extremists as well as by foreign dictators? Is this who we want to represent us on the world stage and in negotiations with other world leaders?

Or do we want a leader who is intelligent, articulate, energetic, and experienced as a prosecutor and a politician? One who has the nation’s interests at heart and not her own? One who wants to bring us together instead of divide us? One who has been a public servant her whole career? And someone who is well-respected on the global stage?

As we stand together at the edge of the precipice, may we choose candidates up and down the ballot that will strengthen and not destroy this democracy, who will defend our individual rights and freedoms, and who will allow the full participation of all in this multiracial democracy. Let us back away from the dangerous precipice of authoritarianism and choose to travel the path of true freedom – our lives, our liberties, and our individual pursuits of happiness depend upon it.



NOTE: The League of Women Voters*, a nonpartisan organization founded in 1920 by suffragist Carrie Chapmen Catt, sponsors a helpful website called VOTE411.org. On this website, voters can check to see if they are still registered to vote, to preview what is on their ballot, to find out info on the candidates, and much more. State and county election boards’ websites also offer key information for voters, such as voter registration deadlines, how to register, and more, including opportunities to volunteer as a poll worker.

* DISCLAIMER: I am a member of the League of Women Voters. Views expressed in this post are solely my own.

NOTE: Consider phone banking for the Democratic party at democrats.org to encourage registered Democrats, particularly in swing states, to get out and vote. Consider contributing to the Harris campaign as well as to the campaigns of vulnerable Democratic US Senators and House Representatives at ActBlue.org.

NOTE: If you have been a lifelong Republican, I understand how difficult it can be to cross the aisle. The fact is the Republican Party has moved so far to the right that they are no longer traditionally “conservative,” meaning they no longer follow the rule of law, or want decreased federal powers and increased national security. You do not owe the GOP anything. In the words of former Georgia Lt Governor Geoff Duncan (Republican) as he addressed the Democratic National Convention, “If you vote for Kamala Harris in 2024, you’re not a Democrat, you are a patriot.”

NOTE: To read more about Kamala Harris’ policies, click here.


NOTE: It is Hispanic Heritage Month through October 15. Learn more at:
https://www.hispanicheritagemonth.gov/
https://www.history.com/topics/hispanic-history/hispanic-heritage-month
https://www.state.gov/hispanic-heritage-month-2024/.



Text and photograph copyright © 2024 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of the Grand Canyon in Arizona at sunset.


Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe. Subscribers receive an email each month that includes the post with the lead photo as well as bonus photos not posted on the website. Email addresses are never sold or shared.



A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.

Towering over the beaches along the Alabaster Coast in France are the awe-inspiring Cliffs of Étretat. Impressionists, such as Claude Monet, captured the cliffs’ beauty and grandeur on canvas, prompting travelers, even today, to discover the cliffs for themselves.

Composed of chalk and flint, the cliffs stand at the edge of the town of Étretat in Normandy. Freshwater springs flowing underneath eroded the cliffs over time, creating three arches and a “needle” formation. The arches are particularly visible during low tide. Once a fishing village, today Étretat is primarily a quaint tourist town that caters to adventurers who wish to climb and hike the cliffs. One can spend a full day or more exploring the cliffs, tunnels, and caves. However, caution must be exercised and the tides must be taken into consideration. Despite signs warning of the dangers, often tourists become stranded along a tunnel when the tide rolls in. What if people just read and heeded the warning signs?

This election cycle has been full of adventure, too, with the last-minute changes in the Democratic ticket for president and vice president. With President Joe Biden’s selfless decision to step down as nominee, the new ticket of VP Kamala Harris and her running mate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz has energized the party.

Harris has stated that, if elected, her top priority on Day 1 of her term will be the middle class. She plans to address, among other issues, the rising costs of housing, groceries, and prescription drugs.

On the other side of the ballot, the Republican candidate, along with his running mate, embraces a burn-down-the-barn, white Christian nationalist agenda. He has stated that on Day 1, he will become a dictator.

Speaking at the Democratic National Convention of a possible second term for the GOP candidate, former President Barack Obama said, “We’ve seen that movie and we all know the sequel’s usually worse!”

On July 26 of this year, the Republican candidate told attendees at the Turning Point Action Believers’ Summit to “[g]et out, you’ve got to get out and vote. In four years, you don’t have to vote again, we’ll have it fixed so good you’re not going to have to vote.” Chillingly implicit in this statement is there will be no more elections if he wins in November. Earlier this week, he stated on Fox News that he had every right to interfere with the 2020 election. Furthermore, he has never said he will accept the results of this election if he loses.

In 2016, no one expected this candidate to win the presidency and he had no transition plan. Over the course of his term in office, his appointees often deterred him from his worse impulses (like shooting peaceful protesters below the knees). By the end of his presidency, he had eliminated all the “adults in the room.” If he wins a second term, the chaos and craziness of his first term will pale in comparison.

What are his plans if he becomes president again? There are two documents that help us see how disastrous a second term will be. The first is Agenda 47 and the second one, known as Project 2025, has been making a recent media splash. But what is in these two documents and why should we be concerned?

Agenda 47 is his own manifesto of policies for a new term as the 47th president of the United States. Most of these policies would be implemented by executive order without requiring the approval of Congress. The manifesto outlines increasing the powers of the president by reducing power in other parts of the executive branch of government. It has been described as fascist or authoritarian.

Under Agenda 47, presidential powers would be expanded by firing up to two million career civil servants and replacing them with loyalists. Independent regulatory agencies, such as the FCC, FTC, FDA, and EPA, would come under the president’s direct control. He plans to “clean house” in the Pentagon, the State Department, and in the intelligence agencies, including the CIA and FBI. Experts say this plan will upset the balance of powers between the branches of federal government, usurp the power of Congress, and violate the Constitution.

The policies detailed in Agenda 47 include implementing tariffs on imported goods which will create higher prices for US consumers and increase inflation. He would end US participation in the international treaty on climate change called the Paris Agreement and would roll back all the Biden-Harris administration’s regulations to fight climate change. The Department of Education would be abolished and states would be responsible instead. Federal funds would be terminated to any school that teaches critical race theory or gender ideology (meaning that transgender students will not be protected against discrimination). Diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives would be abolished. K-12 teachers would no longer have tenure and would be certified based on their patriotism. Children born of illegal immigrants on US soil would no longer have the right to US citizenship and related benefits.

Not included in Agenda 47 but stated by him repeatedly, is the round up by the military of 11 million illegal immigrants who would be placed into detention camps before being deported. This will become a humanitarian crisis: 80% of illegal immigrants have been in the US for more than a decade; over one million are married to US citizens and many have children who are US citizens. Separating families and destroying their livelihoods is unconscionable. The economy will suffer greatly without these workers and it would cost billions of dollars over more than 20 years to accomplish this horrific policy.

Agenda 47 specifies that journalists, federal agencies, and universities that have called him out for disinformation would be severely punished. Federal officials would be fired and lose their right to vote. Any federal funding would be eliminated. Individuals would be prosecuted. Taking away free speech and the free press is what authoritarian dictators do.

All types of gender-affirming care would be stopped for people of all ages. Hospitals, doctors, pharmaceutical companies, or other individuals who participate in gender-affirming care (even suggesting to a child they might be transgender) would be sued and any federal funding (including under Medicaid and Medicare) would be terminated. Agenda 47 recommends passing a federal law that says there are only two genders, male and female, and they are assigned at birth.

And those are just some of the details of Agenda 47!

What is Project 2025 and how does it fit with Agenda 47? Project 2025 is a 900+-page authoritarian handbook crafted by a group of his conservative Christian nationalist allies led by the Heritage Foundation (see footnote 1) that will serve as his transition plan for the first 180 days in office, if he is elected. Although his “official” plan is Agenda 47, his campaign has said it and Project 2025 are aligned.

Like Agenda 47, Project 2025 is essentially the plan for him to take over the entire executive branch of the federal government by consolidating power into the office of the president, dismantling federal agencies, undoing popular policies, and implementing various draconian measures. After details of Project 2025 leaked, he realized these actions and policies are grossly unpopular and has tried to distance himself from Project 2025. However, numerous allies and former staffers have worked on this document and his name is threaded throughout it. It is not possible for him to disavow Project 2025.

Project 2025 contains numerous plans and policies based on four promises found in its foreword:
 
1 – “Restore the family as the centerpiece of American life and protect our children”
2 – “Dismantle the administrative state and return self-governance to the American people”
3 – “Defend our nation’s sovereignty, borders, and bounty against global threats”
4 - “Secure our God-given individual rights to live freely – what our Constitution calls ‘the Blessings of Liberty’.”

According to Project 2025, “restore the family” defines a family as “a married mother, father, and their children” (presumably heterosexual and cisgendered) who are the “ideal” family. “Protect our children” is a dog whistle for banning transgenderism. Project 2025 seeks to eliminate protections and rights of LGBTQIA+ families, including criminally punishing transgenderism as pornography. It stops short of calling for a ban on same-sex marriage. Neither does Project 2025 specify a national abortion ban, but it does severely restrict abortion (and miscarriage care) and contraception access and funding (see footnote 2). The Heritage Foundation opposes in vitro fertilization (IVF) and while Project 2025 does not specifically mention IVF, it does include language that supports fetal personhood, leaving open the possibility of a ban on IVF with simply an executive order. Other provisions include eliminating the federal Head Start program, reducing Medicare benefits by eliminating the new $2,000 cap on out-of-pocket annual prescription drug costs and eliminating government negotiations of drug prices.

Similar to language in Agenda 47, “dismantle the administrative state” means to consolidate the president’s powers from within the executive branch by placing all agencies, even those currently independent, under the president’s direct control. By controlling the US Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI, he can carry out his vow to seek retribution from his political enemies with impunity. He would force the DOJ to drop his criminal trials. Both prospects are chilling.

As in Agenda 47, as many as two million government workers could be fired and replaced with allies whose sole qualification would be loyalty to him, not job competency or experience. Project 2025 provides a data base of loyalists who would replace current workers. As under Agenda 47, the Department of Education would be completely abolished.

“Defend our nation’s sovereignty” means to promote US isolationism by gutting American involvement in NATO and no longer supporting our allies around the world. Project 2025 also includes funding the construction of the US southern border wall, eliminating visas for victims of crime and human trafficking, and allowing the use of the military against immigrants at the southern border and peaceful protesters anywhere in the US.

The fourth promise of Project 2025 redefines the pursuit of happiness as “blessedness.” It states: "an individual must be free to live as his Creator ordained – to flourish. Our Constitution grants each of us the liberty to do not what we want, but what we ought. This pursuit of the good life is found primarily in family - marriage, children, Thanksgiving dinners, and the like.” This may sound as idyllic as a Normal Rockwell painting, but it is a way to control people in this country and to exclude those who are not white, conservative, Christian, cisgendered, heterosexual, and married with children. Project 2025 includes striking any language related to sexual orientation, gender identity, reproductive rights, diversity, equity, and inclusion out of all government rules, regulations, documents, contracts, and laws. Protections regarding discrimination against LGBTQIA+ would be eliminated.

The word “order” appears numerous times in Project 2025. Under these policies, the government would have the power to control what we do, how we worship, who we love, and when we have children while taking away our rights to free speech and peaceful protest. À la The Handmaid’s Tale.

While it is not possible to delineate all the provisions of Project 2025 here, other key provisions include eliminating federal funds for climate change research as well as eliminating the underpinnings of the US central banking system known as the Federal Reserve System.

Project 2025 reaches into every aspect of American life. Legal experts believe that Project 2025 will undermine the rule of law, blur the lines between church and state, and destroy our civil liberties. Even implementation of just a few of Project 2025’s ideas could have far-reaching and disastrous consequences.

Can this candidate, if elected, legally implement any of Agenda 47 or Project 2025? Most of the changes would be implemented by executive order which does not require congressional approval. Any executive order could be challenged in the courts, but with a conservative majority on the US Supreme Court, it is unlikely they would strike down many of his orders. Congress could possibly serve as a check on the president. (See footnote 3).

The bottom line is both Agenda 47 and Project 2025 lay out plans to consolidate power into his hands and replace the rule of law by making him an authoritarian dictator, just like his idols Viktor Orbán, Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong Un. Both documents call for firing federal employees and replacing them with loyalists. Both documents attack our civil liberties and individual freedoms.

There is a lot riding on this election. While I have previously stated that democracy is on the ballot this year, our rights and freedoms are being threatened by a political party that wants to control us – at the ballot box, in our jobs, in our relationships, and in our doctors’ offices, all in the name of power. Theirs.

A second term will be significantly worse than his first term and inherently dangerous to our country, our democracy, and our individual freedoms. If he wins, Agenda 47 and Project 2025 are what he will do. Fortunately for us, he and the Heritage Foundation have written down their policies in plain sight. I just wonder if we can heed the warning signs.



FOOTNOTES:
1-The Heritage Foundation is a conservative think tank that opposes “abortion and reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights, immigrants’ rights, and racial equity” (per the ACLU). The Heritage Foundation published Project 2025 with assistance from other far-right organizations, including Alliance Defending Freedom and Family Research Council. As an aside, Republican vice-presidential candidate JD Vance wrote the forward to the book entitled Dawn’s Early Light: Taking Back Washington to Save America, written by Kevin Roberts who is CEO of the Heritage Foundation and a major architect of Project 2025. This book calls for a second American Revolution. It is interesting that suddenly this book’s debut has been delayed until after the election. On an episode of Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast, Kevin Roberts stated, “we are in the process of a second American Revolution which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.” Roberts has also aligned the Heritage Foundation with the Danube Institute, a front for Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s far-right policies, which has funded members of the American far right. Roberts has called the Hungarian “democracy” THE model of conservatism as Orbán has rejected immigration and a diverse society and redefined “family” only to mean a heterosexual, cisgendered, married mother, father, and their children. Orbán is also in this candidate's orbit and someone he admires as a dictator in a government that is democratic in name only.

2- Some of Project 2025’s reproductive health policies call for:
-    Banning the drug mifepristone (which is also used in miscarriage care)
-    Eliminating funding of Planned Parenthood (see footnote 4)
-    Surveillance of all miscarriages and abortions by the federal government
-    Enforcing the 1873 Comstock Act that prohibits mailing abortion medications and imprisons violators, including health care providers
-    Eliminating contraception from Medicaid and allowing employers to remove coverage from their health plans.

3- The US Supreme Court’s July 1, 2024 decision giving him immunity from criminal conviction for “official” acts is obviously very concerning. However, that judicial decision would not need to be invoked since issuing executive orders is not typically a criminal offense.

4- Planned Parenthood is the largest reproductive health provider in the US. Eliminating it would mean that many lower-income women will not be able to get health exams, mammograms, and contraception at no cost. Currently, Planned Parenthood provides contraception to 2 million people every year, including vasectomies.


NOTE: If you are interested in reading books on democracy and how easily a democracy can fail, I highly recommend: How Democracies Die and Tyranny of the Minority, both by Harvard professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, and Democracy Awakening by Heather Cox Richardson. I also recommend Heather Cox Richardson's daily email on Substack.com called Letters from an American.


Text and photograph copyright © 2024 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of L’Aiguille (“Needle”) as seen through La Manneporte arch at Étretat, France.



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A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.

Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).

Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice.  Click here to learn more.