Five Signs Our Country Isn’t Lost

One the hand, there’s no sugarcoating how progressives feel at the close of 2024: rough.

Donald Trump won back White House with a campaign that was openly bigoted and fascist. And from Joe Biden’s backing of Israel’s ghastly war in Gaza to his ill fated decision to seek reelection, progressives aren’t exactly celebrating his tenure either.

The next few years will see an onslaught of challenges. But if you look closely, you’ll see signs people aren’t just going to roll over and accept it. Here are five that caught my eye

• Populist anger is boiling over. 

The American public has had it with economic elites. Union activity has been on an upswing for a few years running now, with union petition filings in 2024 significantly up over 2023. 

After a successful national strike in 2023, the United Auto Workers won an election in Tennessee this year, a major breakthrough in the traditionally anti-union South. And more Amazon warehouse workers and drivers are pushing to join unions as well, breaking open one of America’s most anti-union corporations.

Meanwhile, local communities in places like Wisconsin fought back against a private equity takeover of nursing care. And nationally, popular anger positively exploded over the greed of health insurance companies.

Trump likes to play a populist on TV. But if he moves to slash workers rights, cut taxes for CEOs, and erode health care access, he’ll have a fight on his hands.

• The peace movement is back.

The movement for a ceasefire in Gaza drew support from a vast, diverse coalition of young people — with additional support from different faith communities, unions, environmentalists, and many others who’d previously stayed “in their lane.”

They haven’t succeeded yet. But they’ve won broad, bipartisan public support for a ceasefire, arms embargo on Israel, and more generally a foreign policy informed by human rights. 

Democratic politicians in particular won’t be able to avoid this issue anytime soon.

• Climate wins are slowly adding up.

Temperatures continue to rise, natural disasters are getting worse, and our leaders continue to fail us on climate. But the Biden administration’s signature climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act, is unleashing record investments in green jobs, fueling unprecedented growth in renewable power across the United States.

Meanwhile, Indigenous-led efforts are quietly reintroducing species to their natural habitats. In Oregon’s Klamath River basin, salmon recently appeared for the first time in 100 years after a dam was removed.

The more local support initiatives like these win, the harder they’ll be to reverse.

• Some people showed up for their immigrant neighbors.

One of the worst moments of the 2024 campaign was the ridiculous slander of Haitian Americans in Springfield, Ohio by Donald Trump, JD Vance, and other right-wing figures.

But Springfield natives turned out to support their Haitian neighbors. Locals flocked to Haitian restaurants, churches, and community centers to show their solidarity, prompting even state and local Republicans to speak out against these dangerous lies.

There’s a lesson here. While hardline immigration measures can attract support in the abstract, people feel much differently when they realize members of their own communities could be affected. 

Progressives should defend their immigrant neighbors without apology, not peddle the “Republican-lite” policies favored by national Democrats in recent years. If they stand up for what’s right, they may win some unlikely allies.

• Even where Democrats lost at the polls, progressive issues won.

Forget “red states” and “blue states” — there’s support for progressive ideas in all 50 states. 

Just look at the last election. Several “red states” passed ballot measures to raise the minimum wage, guarantee paid leave, protect abortion access, and liberalize their marijuana laws. This latest election was no exception — it’s a trend that’s been building for years.

Once you filter out the noise around candidates and just ask people about progressive policies directly, even “red state” voters tend to say yes. The key is to make candidates themselves run on those policies — without watering them down.

In short, our politics are a mess right now. But our country isn’t “lost” — only our leaders are. When Americans organize around our common decency, it’s going to get a lot harder for bullies like Trump to walk over us.