Safeguarding the Progressive Movement in a Trump Presidency

"LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES!"  We are all familiar with this announcement from the Sergeant-at-Arms of the U.S. House of Representatives.  It is the last thing we hear before the leader of the free world enters the House chamber to give the State of the Union speech each January.  When we hear it in January of 2016, it will be the last time that the person who walks down the center aisle of the chamber will be Barack Obama.

Traditionally, a newly inaugurated President does address a joint session of Congress a few weeks after the inauguration, even though it is not considered an official State of the Union speech.  So when we hear those words again in 2017, who will be the person walking down the center aisle?

What if that person is Donald Trump?

There are no limits to the speculation of media pundits as to the possibility of this scenario.  "A ridiculous distraction" has morphed, in succession, into "another meaningless front-runner status"; "nothing more than the groundwork for a third party run"; "a lead in the polls that will soon evaporate"; and finally "a legitimate candidacy with a real chance at victory."  As I write, the most recent CNN/ORC poll shows Hillary Clinton leading Donald Trump among registered voters by only 6 percentage points, 51% to 45%.  And unfortunately for us Progressives, Secretary Clinton is facing a barrage of political attacks that are weakening her image and viability among "The Great Undecided" center-center-right and narrow issue voters: namely, Benghazi, emails, and an increasingly powerful grass-roots challenge from Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, who has given Progressives a legitimate alternative to Clinton.

Counterbalancing this precarious situation is the idea that Trump would stand no chance of becoming the Republican nominee, and that he would (as he, by his own admission during the Fox debate, would be more than happy to do) run as a third-party candidate, effectively handing the White House to the Democrats by splitting the Republican vote between the corporate shills and the whackadoodles.  But in the days since the Fox debate, poll after poll has indicated that Donald Trump's positions are, in fact, the shared views of the majority of the Republican Party, the rank-and-file of which is substantially more conservative than at least 15 of the current 17 candidates.  (Neither of the two exceptions, Mike Huckabee and Rick Santorum, will never be the Republican nominee, for reals.)   So the stage is set for an actual Trump matchup, be it with Clinton, Sanders, or even Vice President Joe Biden, who is still contemplating getting into the race.

And that lands us squarely inside the worst of all possible nightmares: that mental picture of President Trump, walking down the center aisle to deliver his first speech to a Joint Session, one hand on the nuclear button, the other signing deportation orders for 11 million undocumented immigrants.

So, what will we Progressives do for those four years?  What will be our priorities?  In a world where we can no longer count on a presidential veto to prevent regressive, damaging or bigoted legislation, we need to get as much accomplished as possible in these next few months.  These should be our priorities:

• LGBTI rights.  Marriage equality is not the end of our fight--it's the beginning. Our goal for 2016 should be the passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act.  This is the federal law that extends equal employment protection based on sexual orientation and gender identity.  We need to make sure that every candidate we support would be willing to vote in favor of this legislation, and write/call the Democratic leadership of both the House and the Senate to encourage bringing the law to the floor.  The nation currently has a hodge-podge of state and local ordinances, which means that LGBTI workers who change jobs and move may lose their protection.  Only a federal law can fix this.  

• Black Lives Matter.  The Black Lives Matter agenda, which includes important items such as sensitivity training for officers, deescalation of lethal force and new standards of engagement, should become the standard in every community.  Progressive voters need to make sure that every candidate we support for city councils and elected police department positions are aware of this agenda and support it.  Protests at campaign rallies are valuable, but they should be expanded to include the Republican candidates, who really need to hear the BLM message.  The recent disruption of a Jeb Bush rally was a good start.

• Immigration.  The 2016 House and Senate races will be crucial to this issue.  We must use every means at our disposal to get out the Progressive vote, not only for President, but for Congress as well.  "President Trump" has already made it clear that he fully intends to deport as many immigrants as possible, even children who are legal citizens of the United States under the 14th Amendment.  The only way to effectively oppose this is to have enough leverage in Congress to counteract any potential executive order that would lead to mass round ups and deportations.  This is perhaps the most serious threat of all.  Trump has decided to focus all of his self-loathing on this particular, vulnerable group, and he has persuaded his followers to do likewise.  

Clearly, this is the most important election of the century so far.  We Progressives lost the opportunity to steer the country in the right direction in 2000--we cannot afford to lose that opportunity this time.  The stakes are too high.  A nation can recover from the dithering of a George W. Bush, but the vindictiveness, the cruelty of a Trump presidency could ruin the United States forever.  We cannot let that happen.

Getting HERO Wrong

When it comes to LGBTQ equality, things have certainly been going our way recently on the national front.  The focus on national marriage equality, as well as various prospective approaches to national employment equality, has been all-consuming for LGBTQ activists across the nation and here in Houston.

However, to use an unfortunate analogy, while we here in Houston were celebrating the beautiful, panoramic view of the national landscape, a very large tree standing right next to us fell directly on our heads.  

And the resulting "ouchie" is pretty significant.

In May of 2014, the Houston City Council passed the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance by a significant majority.  Almost immediately, a well-organized and well-funded petition drive was organized by several anti-GLBTQ rights activists, in association with a coalition of conservative black ministers, aimed at overturning the ordinance.  On April 17 of this year, State District Judge Robert Schaffer ruled that many of the signatures on the petition were invalid, and that the ordinance should remain in effect.  End of story, right?

Well, apparently, that's what the Houston LGBTQ activist community thought, and I think the best way to explain how wrong the activist community got this is to use my own personal experience.  I am a member of several activist organizations here in Houston.  I am a grass-roots member of these groups: I give what monies I can, but I cannot afford $500 a plate gala tickets; I volunteer as much time as I can given my other obligations to HIV/AIDS activism, children's health, and two chambers of commerce; I show up for meetings and always maintain my credentialing, although I often feel as though my voice is not heard.  I sometimes have to remind myself that our activist groups are, by definition, GAY groups.  That means they are like those "measuring sticks" for children in front of rides at amusement parks:  you must be THIS (physically attractive...wealthy...politically connected) for us to acknowledge you.  

So how does my experience tie into the HERO debacle?  Well, while the Houston activist community was sleeping, a group called the NO UNequal Rights Coalition, lead by anti-GLBTQ activist Dave Welch and anti-GLBTQ attorney Andy Taylor, were busy filing not one, not two, but THREE court appeals on the petition issue, including an appeal to the Texas Supreme Court.  In spite of those filings, for the last four months the leadership of the activist community has been placidly telling the rank-and-file, "Celebrate!  The HERO fight is over!  Don't worry about HERO!  Yeah, sure, there are some appeals, but they're not going anywhere.  We can focus on other things now.  Hooray!"  And instead of questioning leadership, the rank-and-file went blissfully along with this party line, and those of us who WERE aware that these appeals might in fact "go somewhere" were told not to mention the emperor's lack of clothing.

Of course, last week the chickens came home to roost.  The Texas Supreme Court ruled the petitions valid and told the Houston City Council that they had 30 days to repeal HERO or place it on the November ballot.  Now the activist community, instead of being proactive, is forced to play defense, making impassioned pleas at last week's City Council meeting, and trying desperately to organize a get-out-the-vote movement.  Lurking over all of these efforts is the political reality that at best, the vote on HERO will be close, and the awful truth that the ordinance will in all likelihood fail in November.  So far, I have heard no explanations from activist leaders about why they were so negligent about staying on top of the court appeals, or how they managed to get all of this so wrong.

The problem is this:  there are scores, perhaps hundreds, of rank-and-file, grass roots folks just like me who, if leadership would quit marginalizing us, would have been happy to have been organizing, marching, protesting, carrying signs, posting on social media, and generally making a ruckus, both in Houston AND in Austin, to make sure that the court appeals of HERO stayed firmly in both the local and national spotlights.  But too often, we are told by our organizations that "your help is not needed on this" or "we're focusing on this thing over here right now."  Grass roots doesn't work with a single square foot of sod--it requires acres of people fighting EVERY potential equal rights outcome and, unlike our leadership, staying on the horse until it's safely across the finish line.  I absolutely hope that HERO passes in November.  What I don't understand is why the leadership of the Houston GLBTQ activist community helped put us in the position we are in through their complacency, especially when there are so many people, people who constitute an untapped resource, going unused.