To: Senate Democrats
It's time for Senate Democrats to catch up to the resistance
Do everything in your power to stop all Senate business and to refuse all Cabinet and Supreme Court nominees.
Why is this important?
The peaceful, inspiring, broad-based resistance to Trump and his shocking, unconstitutional, and immoral agenda will continue to stand up, fight, and lead. The people are in the streets. We're doing our job.
But now we need Senate Democrats to step up and do their job. Senators need to do everything in their power to stop all Senate business and to refuse all Cabinet and Supreme Court nominees—until we stop Trump's un-American, unconstitutional agenda, including his Muslim ban.
The public—the majority of which voted decisively against Trump—is demanding clear, principled, and total opposition to the Trump Administration's extreme, unconstitutional, and unprecedented agenda and executive orders.
We need Senate Democrats to get the message to take extraordinary steps— and quickly.
To their credit, some Senate Democrats, including Elizabeth Warren, Jeff Merkley, Chuck Schumer, Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Kirsten Gillibrand, and Bob Casey (among others) attended airport and other protest rallies this weekend. That they went to where grassroots energy was surging is an important step, and they should be commended for it.
More recently, a number of senators gave impassioned floor speeches, keeping the Senate open late into the evening. And, Sen. Merkley has declared he will filibuster any Trump nominee to the Supreme Court.
These are positive steps. But they are not nearly enough.
Just voting against Trump's policies and nominees is not enough; Senate Democrats must use every procedural tool available to them to shut down the Senate. That means demanding roll call votes, denying unanimous consent, and challenging even "normal" Senate procedures to stop "business as usual." As Adam Jentleson, former deputy chief of staff to Sen. Harry Reid, pointed out recently, Senate Democrats can effectively grind business in the Senate to a halt — if they're willing to.
But now we need Senate Democrats to step up and do their job. Senators need to do everything in their power to stop all Senate business and to refuse all Cabinet and Supreme Court nominees—until we stop Trump's un-American, unconstitutional agenda, including his Muslim ban.
The public—the majority of which voted decisively against Trump—is demanding clear, principled, and total opposition to the Trump Administration's extreme, unconstitutional, and unprecedented agenda and executive orders.
We need Senate Democrats to get the message to take extraordinary steps— and quickly.
To their credit, some Senate Democrats, including Elizabeth Warren, Jeff Merkley, Chuck Schumer, Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Kirsten Gillibrand, and Bob Casey (among others) attended airport and other protest rallies this weekend. That they went to where grassroots energy was surging is an important step, and they should be commended for it.
More recently, a number of senators gave impassioned floor speeches, keeping the Senate open late into the evening. And, Sen. Merkley has declared he will filibuster any Trump nominee to the Supreme Court.
These are positive steps. But they are not nearly enough.
Just voting against Trump's policies and nominees is not enough; Senate Democrats must use every procedural tool available to them to shut down the Senate. That means demanding roll call votes, denying unanimous consent, and challenging even "normal" Senate procedures to stop "business as usual." As Adam Jentleson, former deputy chief of staff to Sen. Harry Reid, pointed out recently, Senate Democrats can effectively grind business in the Senate to a halt — if they're willing to.