Dear MoveOn member,
Authoritarians benefit from an under-informed population—which is precisely why Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and the Republican Party are carrying out the most sweeping assault on the American mind in modern history.1
Trump has effectively dismantled the U.S. Department of Education—gutting its staff and attempting to close the department altogether. American children be damned.
He’s cutting funding to public libraries and museums—invaluable places that provide internet access, literacy programs, and homework help to millions.2
He’s going after scientific research. Silencing dissent. Threatening universities, researchers, and students and their free speech and academic freedom. Detaining immigrants—including lawful permanent residents with green cards—for speaking out. 3
These efforts aren’t about policy, efficiency, or saving taxpayer money. They’re about control. It’s about creating a culture of fear and complacency. It’s about tearing down the means and institutions that allow people to think critically, challenge authority, and participate in democracy.
Our country is in enormous danger right now. That’s the terrifying worry that keeps me up at night. But we can prevent our democracy’s downfall, together.
I believe the Trump-Musk regime will ultimately fail, because the backlash to their authoritarianism is growing every day. In the past few weeks, tens of thousands of people across the country showed up to see Senator Bernie Sanders, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and other progressive champions who have been rallying around the country to urge people to fight against oligarchy.4
I believe a reckoning is coming. But to succeed, we need a massive movement.
MoveOn has a plan—using cutting-edge technology—to reach, train, support, organize, and communicate at a scale that is unparalleled in the progressive movement. It won’t be easy, but for the sake of our country’s future, it must happen. Will you help?
Please: Will you start a $5 monthly donation and help MoveOn create a movement so powerful that Trump will face a reckoning he can’t ignore?
No, I’m sorry, I can’t make a monthly donation.
Research on other authoritarian regimes gives us the playbook we need to fight back.
According to researchers, “no government has withstood a challenge of 3.5% of their population mobilized against it during a peak event.”5,6
3.5 percent of the population is 11 million Americans. If we mobilize at this scale, the research shows we’ll win.
And I believe that mobilizing people at this scale is absolutely achievable. But it won’t be easy: It means even more people than attended the Women’s March. Even more than Martin Luther King’s March on Washington.
Getting to that scale will require significant resources. Which is why I’m asking you, Kendall:
Please help MoveOn build the movement we need to engage 3.5% of the U.S. population in a massive protest movement to stop authoritarianism in America by starting a $5 monthly donation.
I’m sorry, I can’t make a monthly donation.
Throughout history, tyrants have understood that their major enemy is an educated citizenry. That’s why they want an undereducated and complacent population.
Slaveholders prohibited enslaved people from learning to read. Nazis burned books. Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping censor the media. Trump and his MAGA allies are undermining the institutions—from public schools to libraries—that nourish free thought and informed debate and hoping people will give up hope and be afraid to speak out.
MoveOn is working day and night to mobilize the MASSIVE grassroots reckoning that we need to stop this nightmare. That’s why your $5 monthly donation is so critical.
I’m sorry, I can’t make a monthly donation.
Authoritarians want us to feel powerless. But we are not powerless.
We’ve faced darkness before. And we’ve come through it by joining together, organizing boldly, and refusing to give in.
Thanks for all you do.
–Robert Reich
P.S. The 3.5% rule teaches us that we don’t need a majorityto defeat tyranny. We just need enough. Enough people with courage. Enough people with clarity. Enough people to say: No more, this ends here.
Will you start a $5 monthly donation to help MoveOn’s efforts to help mobilize 3.5% or more of the population?
No, I’m sorry, I can’t make a monthly donation.
1. “Trump’s attack on the American mind,” Post by Robert Reich on Substack, March 20, 2025
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/trumps-attack-on-the-american-mind
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. “Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez rally tens of thousands in Denver to ‘fight oligarchy,'” Colorado Politics, March 24, 2025
https://www.coloradopolitics.com/elections/2026/bernie-sanders-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-rally-tens-of-thousands-in-denver-to-fight-oligarchy/article_b58a784b-e2f7-4127-bda7-9a6e6b07bfcc.html
5. “Questions, Answers, and Some Cautionary Updates Regarding the 3.5% Rule,” Harvard Kennedy School Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, April 2020
https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/2024-05/Erica Chenoweth_2020-005.pdf
6. “We Are Living Through Moral Collapse. How Democrats Can Strike Back,” Lucid, March 16, 2025
https://lucid.substack.com/p/we-are-living-through-moral-collapse
Want to support MoveOn’s work? Donald Trump and his MAGA allies expect us to give up. But we will not give them what they want. We will never stop working to defend our fundamental freedoms and protect our democracy. MoveOn has been leading the movement against right-wing extremism for 26 years, and we promise you that we will still be here every step of the way forward.
Will you donate to power MoveOn’s work to protect our freedoms and democracy under Trump’s administration?
No, I’m sorry, I can’t make a monthly donation.
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