Portside

With neoliberalism discredited and the political establishments of both parties defeated, we must offer real solutions on employment, economic inequality, and labor rights by organizing a grass roots, democratic rank-and-file movement, larger and more powerful than Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign. It’s time to build broader, unite stronger, and fight harder than we’ve ever done before.

Resentment won this election. It was a middle-finger, throw-caution-to-the-wind, damn-the-consequences vote - cast overwhelmingly by white people. Only white people had the luxury and the safety to ignore Trump's promises to restore law and order, to deport millions of immigrants and to endanger Americans who practice the world's second most popular religion. In their anger and their desire for change, Trump voters elected a racist and sexist president.

The working class - who are they, what are their interests, aspirations, fears. One little-known element of the 'class cultural gap' is that the white workers resent professionals but admire the rich. Class migrants (white-collar professionals born to blue-collar families) report that 'professional people were generally suspect' and that managers are college kids 'who don't know shit about how to do anything but are full of ideas about how I have to do my job.'

Outrage? AIPAC and the Conference of Presidents can summon it on behalf of Israel's government, on BDS, on the Iran Deal - but not for the American minorities targeted by Trump. Not even its Jews. Add your name to the Joint Petition from American Jews and Muslims on Stephen Bannon (see below).

Rising inequality is largely to blame for this electoral upset. Continuing with business as usual is not an option. People have lost their sense of security, status and even identity. This result is the scream of an America desperate for radical change. People have a right to be angry, and a powerful, intersectional left agenda can direct that anger where it belongs. Thomas Piketty and Naomi Klein offer up interesting analysis.

The battle lines are clear. Democracy is in peril and the left must take itself seriously electorally and politically. Ruth Potts speaks to Gary Younge, who was based in Muncie, Indiana, for the US election, about the implications of Donald Trump’s victory.

I am not suggesting that white racism alone explains Trump’s victory. Nor am I dismissing the white working class’s very real economic grievances. It is not a matter of disaffection versus racism or sexism versus fear. Rather, racism, class anxieties, and prevailing gender ideologies operate together, inseparably, or as Kimberlé Crenshaw would say, intersectionally.

We should resist the temptation to over-interpret Trump’s election as an American Eighteenth Brumaire or 1933. Progressives who think they’ve woken up in another country should calm down, take a stiff draught, and reflect on the actual election results from the swing states.

Race and racism in the U.S. context have long served as some of the most significant guarantors of democratic structures and institutions. In short, U.S. democracy itself is a racial project whose fulcrum hinges on policies of inclusion and exclusion.

Leaders in Seattle, San Francisco and other so-called "sanctuary cities" say they won't change their stance on immigration despite President-elect Donald Trump's vows to withhold potentially millions of dollars in taxpayer money if they don't cooperate.