Looking back at 2024, building community
Introduction
Inauguration Day already feels like a lifetime ago. Team MAGA is implementing Project 2025 at lightning speed to disorient and overwhelm us. Trump and his cronies want us to believe that speed and coercion demonstrate strength and that resistance is futile. But if we take a deep breath and another look at the executive actions, reversals, miscommunication, purges, threats, locked government offices, and so on, the blizzard of activity the Trump administration hopes conveys strength actually looks more like disunity and weakness. They are delivering the flood they promised, and it is overwhelming. But resistance is far from futile — in fact, it’s rising.
Authoritarian overreach generates backlash, and backlash can be organized. With 55+ years of experience behind us, Community Change knows that now is the moment to go all in. We also know this is not the time for business as usual, so we are using a rapidly evolving landscape to rapidly test new models and tools to organize and mobilize. We will keep experimenting, listening, and learning in the weeks and months ahead.
At the same time, we are keeping our focus on the positive vision of what our country can be: A society where families can live with joy and dignity, where we have access to the care we need, send our children to safe, affordable centers while we go to work, where we can put food on the table, cover our bills, and save for the future. In short, a people’s economy.
Community Change’s North Star — what keeps our strategy grounded in the midst of chaos — is to build a grassroots movement to abolish poverty. With this goal in mind, we are meeting this moment with determination. We continue to listen to and talk with people who may not feel heard or seen, building community and solidarity with our neighbors to secure economic freedom and rebuild our democracy. Read on to learn about how we’re meeting this moment.
Program Updates
Communication — to fight disinformation, educate the public, and share stories that connect us — is essential in this moment. We are cutting through the noise with information and analysis to help people navigate the first 100 days of Trump 2.0 and block MAGA kleptocracy.
“Full Chaos Mode”
To make sense of the barrage of measures since January 20, we’re breaking things down to help folks understand what Trump’s executive orders mean for their states, communities, and families and to shine a spotlight on MAGA’s agenda: to transfer more wealth from working people to the ultra-rich.
We shared a memo with hundreds of grassroots partners across the country laying out the potential impact of the administration’s illegal attempt to freeze federal funds on our communities and our economy, describing ways the opposition is pushing back, and inviting people to take action and make their voices heard.
In the second half of January, thousands of people took digital action with us, including sending 4,630 messages to legislators. We are also sharing information and analysis in digital spaces to reach a broader audience. For example, in Trump’s Executive Orders and What They Mean For You, Community Change/Action Digital Media Specialist Alondra Trevizo breaks down the impact of executive orders on immigration, healthcare, DEI, and more.
Changing Hearts and Minds to Protect the Safety Net
For decades, the right has used racism and shame to undermine support for safety net programs, even among those who most rely on them. It’s time to end the stigma, so in January, we invited people to share their stories of how safety net programs helped them weather tough times, and to imagine how having universal access to food and healthcare could change the way people live, work, and interact with each other. In the first week after we launched this project, we had hundreds of responses from people who are telling their own stories and more than 2,000 people raised their hands to join in defending key programs — and imagining how our economy could work for everyone. This is just one of the ways we are building a bigger, stronger movement and connecting people to the fight for our country. We will share folks’ stories on ChangeWire and other platforms in the coming months, so stay tuned.
Taking Steps Together Towards a More Just and Equitable Society
It’s important to remember that underdogs in our country have taken on entrenched and well-resourced interests in the past, and won through the power of solidarity. The women’s suffrage, labor, and civil rights movements prevailed in the face of violence and intimidation, winning rights we now take for granted. In this video, we remind viewers that we are not alone, that our shared interests are greater than our differences, and that together we can build an economy and society that works for everyone.
Before You Go
- In A Prescription For Disaster, Alondra Trevizo shares an all-too-common story about rising prescription medication costs. If Trump gets his way, things could get a lot worse.
- Read Community Change board member Sherece West-Scantlebury’s take in Nonprofit Quarterly on the intersection of economic inequality, systemic racism, and the persistence of harmful narratives, co-authored with Keecha Harris.
- Connecting people through storytelling, fighting disinformation, doing public education, and amplifying grassroots organizing is going to be key into 2025. Fortunately, we have our very own in-house media platform to help do some of this work – ChangeWire.org. Check out our 2025 ChangeWire Fellows cohort nd subscribe!
