With Biden In Place, The ‘Resistance’ Tries To Pivot From Defense To Offense

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Members of Virginia’s Herndon-Reston Indivisible group take part in a protest in front of the White House on Aug. 6, 2018. With former President Donald Trump out of office, progressive groups are turning their focus.





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A defining characteristic of the Resistance was just how broad it was, in terms of what different groups cared about. March For Our Lives, for instance, brought together young Americans in favor of gun control.





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But not every group has the same priorities.

For their part, the Women’s March thinks that COVID-19 relief is immediately important, particularly for women of color. Carmona pointed to the fact that Black and Latina women accounted for all of the nation’s job losses in December.

«We have to be thinking about, what is the long-term effect of COVID on women and work, basically, in addition to women in health? she said. «So right off the bat, we know we are in a situation where we need to deal with the current conditions — first things first.

Meanwhile, Indivisible’s Levin mentioned pro-democratic reforms like Washington, D.C., statehood and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act as important priorities. And Black Lives Matter is pushing the BREATHE Act, which would shift funding from areas like incarceration to other areas like education.

It’s also not clear which of these policies Congress and President Biden might agree on. And while Biden is pursuing further COVID relief, it’s unknown what other policies he will choose to spend political capital on. (He just outlined a big immigration bill.)

One additional difficulty is just keeping up energy around a cause. Patrisse Cullors, co-founder of Black Lives Matter, says the group’s goals gained attention during last summer’s protests but then were swallowed up by other concerns.

«When something is not readily in the media, folks move towards apathy or get distracted, she said. «So this is not just a question for our electeds, but it’s a question for everybody who protested with us last summer — for the millions of people who showed up, keep showing up.

Cullors says she considers Black Lives Matter both part of the anti-Trump resistance but also more than a «Resistance group, as it existed well before the Trump administration.

BLM has also made its own political pivot in recent months, starting Black Lives Matter PAC in fall 2020. That gives it a more formal footprint in the political world, one where it and other groups may be fighting for oxygen in coming months.