WASHINGTON ― When Donald Trump took the presidential oath of office in 2017, he was met by angry protests of more than 4 million people across the country, a sustained movement that dedicated itself to resisting his administration in the name of women’s rights and civil rights.
When he’s sworn in for his second term on Monday, Trump will find no such mass demonstrations or vocal opposition on the streets of the nation’s capital or elsewhere. The huge Women’s March protest of 2017, which has now been rebranded as the People’s March, is still expected to draw thousands to downtown Washington on Saturday, but the number of protesters is unlikely to match the historic turnout eight years ago.
The lack of a new Trump resistance movement is a reflection of the fatigue many on the left feel in the wake of his 2024 presidential election victory, as well as a new strategy from Democrats and activists that ditches knee-jerk hostility and outrage toward Trump for a more toned-down approach that aims to home in on the effects of his policies on working-class people.
“People in 2017 were deeply uncertain about what a Trump presidency would mean and wanted to raise their voices to try to influence them,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) explained to HuffPost. “This time, Trump and his tight band of billionaires have made pretty clear what the fights will be, and that’s less about protests in the streets and more about the hard, inch-by-inch fighting over tax policy and environmental regulations and building permits.”
Already Democrats are warning the public about Trump’s plans to cut social safety net programs in order to pay for another round of tax cuts, his proposed across-the-board tariffs that could severely hit pocketbooks, and the many conflicts of interest in his billionaire Cabinet and among wealthy allies like Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
They see calling attention to bread-and-butter issues that directly affect voters as a more effective way to go about handling Trump’s second term rather than, say, screaming about his proposal to acquire Greenland or his latest outburst online.
“It’s like, mid-December, and I’m getting ready to get on the elevator, and, oh, Donald Trump just said he wants to, you know, he might invade Greenland,” Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.) recalled of learning about the president-elect’s idea last month to buy the Arctic territory from Denmark. “And I could feel myself like starting to spin again, like, OK, what do I need to respond to? What do I need to say about this?”
“I think that outrage machine is something that he drives, hoping that we’re all going to get on it, and we’re just not going to get on that machine anymore,” she added. “We’re still actively fighting them when they are doing things that we think are going to hurt people, [but] we’re not going to get pulled into that machine anymore. We need to be focused on what they are doing that is going to hurt people.”
Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.), shown her at a Senate hearing in September 2019, predicts people will become more engaged as they see what actions come from the White House. Susan Walsh/Associated Press
The Minnesota Democrat said that “people are exhausted” by the daily Trump news cycle, but she predicted that they would tune back in once Trump begins executing his agenda.
The president-elect is reportedly planning to issue about 100 executive orders on Day 1 of his presidency, including a flood of immigration policy changes, such as mass deportations. He’s also expected to soon pardon hundreds of people convicted of participating in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, including possibly violent Trump supporters who assaulted police officers that day.
“I think when they start to do the things that we’re fearful that they’re going to do, you’re going to see us fighting,” Smith said.
In a sign of the Democrats’ changed posture toward Trump, the Senate on Friday advanced a major immigration bill aiming to crack down on immigrants lacking permanent legal status who commit crimes, clearing the way for Trump to sign it into law as early as next week. Ten Senate Democrats supported the measure, helping to hand Trump what is expected to be his first legislative victory.
But Democrats aren’t planning to help Trump on every issue. And they’re hoping that the public will eventually reengage and turn against Republicans’ agenda, starting with their grilling of his Cabinet nominees. (A nonprofit affiliated with House Democrats has already begun running ads attacking health secretary nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for “raising the cost of meat and produce.”)
“It’s just going to take a little bit of time for all of their positions to be completely understood,” Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) said of Trump’s top administrative picks. “The [confirmation] hearings are the education that the American people get, which will then lead to the activation.”
“Each of those actions that are about to unfold are going to be what then draws people’s attention to become active, to do something politically,” Markey added. “The more it becomes clear how it impacts ordinary people, the more activation you’re going to see.”
