RESISTANCE: PEOPLE’S PROMISE LETTER, USPS, NIH, ETC.
The Trump administration is taking so many illegal (many are unconstitutional), cruel, and objectionable actions that it’s hard to know what to focus on. Most important is to regularly raise your voice and take actions to resist, protest, and push back, regardless of the issue or specific action you’re focused on.
(Note: If you find a post too long to read, please just skim the bolded portions. Thanks for reading my blog!)
Contact your members of Congress regularly so they know you’re paying attention, watching them, and that you care; that you want them to take strong actions to resist, protest, and push back. Thank them when they do good things; they need to hear this and feel supported. Criticize them when they do wrong things and urge them to do the right things, vigorously.
Ask them to take visible and powerful actions as Senator Booker (D-NJ) and Representative Jeffries (D-NY) did on Sunday with their 12-hour teach-in on the steps of the Capitol. [1] They highlighted the values and moral principles of Democrats, drawing from their religious faith.
While this post focuses on some perhaps less dramatic, but nonetheless very important issues – the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the U.S. Postal Service (USPS), as well as the People’s Promise letter – we shouldn’t lose sight of critical, on-going targets of protest including:
The return of Abrego Garcia and others who have been illegally shipped to prison in El Salvador,
The release of Ozturk, Khalil, and others who have been illegally detained,
The cessation of foreign aid by USAID that will cause millions of avoidable deaths worldwide and here in the U.S. (see this previous post for more detail),
The SAVE Act in the Senate, which would dramatically increase voter suppression (see this previous post for more detail), and
The slashing of staff and funding, as well as disruption, at multiple government agencies and programs including the Veterans’ Administration, Social Security, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Head Start, the Labor Department, the Department of Education, the Department of Health and Human Services, the IRS, and other government agencies. These actions will jeopardize the health, safety, and well-being of tens of millions of Americans in the short-term and all three hundred million Americans in the long-term.
Feel free to mention any of these when you contact your members of Congress – or contact them multiple times and mention all of them!
ACTION #1: Please contact your US Representative and Senators and ask them to do everything they can to stop the sabotage of research supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is the largest sponsor of biomedical research in the world. The firing of thousands of workers and the blocking of funding for hundreds (probably thousands) of on-going research projects endangers our short-term and long-term health. For example, research on detection and treatment of diseases such as Alzheimer’s and cancer are being brought to a screeching halt. Drug research and development are similarly being blocked. The impact of all of this cannot be overstated. For example, from 2010 – 2019, 99.4% of new drugs approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) were developed with NIH funding support.
You can find contact information for your US Representative at http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/ and for your US Senators at http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm. (Note: Many offices only accept messages on a voice mail system. In most cases, you can call outside of regular business hours and leave a message.)
ACTION #2: Contact your US Representative and Senators and ask them to oppose the privatization of the U.S. Postal Service (USPS). The USPS is a vital public service. It delivers mail to everyone, any place in the U.S. It is not profitable to deliver mail to isolated, small, and/or rural communities, so with privatization these places would lose mail service. This is exactly what happened when the airlines and railroads were deregulated – service to small, unprofitable communities ended or became prohibitively expensive for most people.
Ask your Representative and Senators to support the bipartisan resolutions opposing Trump’s USPS privatization scheme: Resolution 70 in the House and Resolution 147 in the Senate.
You can find contact information for your US Representative at http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/ and for your US Senators at http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm.
ACTION #3: Please sign the People’s Promise Letter sponsored by Common Cause and others. It’s a response to Trump’s first 100 days in office. It calls for an alternative course of action that delivers:
An economy that works for everyone including livable wages, the right to unionize, affordable housing, quality healthcare, and quality early education and child care.
A government for the people including quality education for all, a strong safety net, and the wealthy paying their fair share in taxes.
Equal rights and opportunity for all including legal due process for all; voting for all that is easy, protected, and accurately counted; and freedom from hate and discrimination for all.
Click on “Sign The Letter” in the upper right of the People’s Promise website to sign. Scroll down to read about the harm that the Trump administration has done in its first 100 days.
[1] Rubin, J., 5/2/25, “Undaunted,” The Contrarian (https://contrarian.substack.com/p/undaunted-57a)