Welcome to the show, everybody.

I spent a bunch of time this weekend thinking about the concept of resistance and whether

that concept is really enough for the next four years. After Donald Trump kind of squeaked through the

2016 election, we saw the resistance kind of emerge. And it was the bumper stickers, I resist,

and the whole thing. And basically, it was thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, millions of Americans getting

off the sidelines, pushing back against an agenda that felt extreme and chaotic and dangerous.

And the thinking sort of was for Trump's first term, if we can hold Trump's worst impulses

at bay for four years, we'll restore some kind of normalcy,

let's endure this bizarre and dangerous chapter, then the country will come to its senses.

And it sort of did happen in the sense that Donald Trump was defeated in 2020 by Joe Biden.

Now, Mark Elias, who's been a guest on this show, has a great piece called Building the Opposition,

where he writes that some people today are starting to say the resistance was a failure,

and therefore it's inappropriate for the second Trump term.

And they call it these naive protests. They say it's sign waving that didn't really do anything

during Trump's first four years. And whether or not a resistance is the right thing for the next

four years, I completely disagree that the resistance to Trump's first term

didn't work.

It prevented the Affordable Care Act from being gutted.

It helped build the legal and civic infrastructure that took Trump to court and won some

important battles.

It energized the wave of fresh candidates who transformed the 2018 midterms. And at the end of the day,

that resistance led to Trump being deposed after just one term, Joe Biden coming in,

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