Historical Movements Suggest a “Peak Event”
— Triple the Size of the 2017 Women’s March
MoveOn
(March 18, 2025) — Our democracy is slipping away—and faster than many political observers and historians thought possible. Every day brings more heinous developments: Over the weekend, with zero due process and in direct violation of a court order, Trump officials detained hundreds of people living in the United States and forcibly flew them to a concentration camp in El Salvador, where they will be held indefinitely.1
We do not know who was on the plane.2 As historian Timothy Snyder wrote yesterday, “There is no doubt that their rights were violated. But your rights have been violated as well. If you do not know the details about operations that forcibly remove human beings from the territory of the United States, you do not have a responsive government. And you are therefore at risk.”3
Trump officials detained Fabian Smidt, a German-born U.S. green card holder who was returning home from a trip to Luxembourg, at Logan Airport in Boston on Friday.4 According to his mother, the officials violently interrogated him, stripped him naked, and showered him with ice-cold water before sending him to an ICE facility.5 Fabian is an electrical engineer who lives in New Hampshire with his partner, a cardiologist, and their 8-year-old daughter—both U.S. citizens.6
Elon Musk’s DOGE team claimed an 82-year-old man in Seattle was dead, took more than $5,200 in past Social Security payments from his bank account, and ended both his Social Security and Medicare benefits.7 Despite being very much alive and lodging complaints with the Social Security Administration, he is still not receiving his benefits.8
The 3.5% Rule
While what is happening to us and our communities and all around us is horrific, research from Harvard University on historical movements shows that “no government has withstood a challenge of 3.5% of their population mobilized against it during a peak event.”9,10 It’s called the “3.5% rule.”11 It’s a relatively tiny percentage, really. We can get there.
The Women’s March in January 2017 is the largest single-day demonstration in U.S. history.12 Between 1% to 1.6% of the U.S. population participated in the Women’s March across hundreds of locations. Double or triple that scale would approach the 3.5% threshold.13
That’s our mission: doubling or tripling the size of the Women’s March and engaging 3.5% of the U.S. population in a massive protest to stop authoritarianism in America, which is here, at our doorstep, right now. That’s what we’re building to, because that’s what it’s going to take. Remember, tyranny cannot prevail over people who refuse to succumb to it.
As Robert Reich said earlier this month, “MoveOn can reach, train, support, organize, and communicate at a scale that is unparalleled in the progressive movement, and it does so with cutting-edge technology. We need MoveOn in this moment, now more than ever.”
That’s the work ahead of us, at MoveOn, 24/7 for as long as it takes, exposing the lies and corruption, fighting back with democratic values and moral authority, being in solidarity with people and communities most targeted, and organizing, organizing, organizing to bring more and more people to the streets.
Will you help us build toward 3.5% of the U.S. population, a relatively tiny percentage, engaging in active resistance, starting today so that MoveOn has and can sustain the financial resources to help lead the grassroots movement that will end Trump’s tyranny?
Forging a Potent Moral Force
Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a scholar on fascism and authoritarian leaders, wrote yesterday: “Each time we show solidarity with others, or support those who are protecting the rule of law, helping the targeted, or exposing the lies and the corruption, we are standing up for democratic values of justice, accountability, equality, and more.
In doing so, we model the behaviors the authoritarian state wants us to abandon. Joining with others, we transform our individual righteous indignation into a potent moral force for good.”14
MoveOn will be by your side every step of the way. Join us today and at every opportunity you have until we end the Trump-Musk-MAGA regime.
With hope, optimism, and immense gratitude for all you do.
–Emily, Olga, Kelly, Amy, and the rest of the team
Sources:
- “White House Denies Violating Judge’s Order in Deporting Venezuelans,”The New York Times, March 16, 2025
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/16/us/politics/trump-venezuelans-deportations-el-salvador.html - “The evil at your door,” Thinking about…, March 17, 2025
https://snyder.substack.com/p/the-evil-at-your-door - Ibid.
- “Green card holder from New Hampshire ‘interrogated’ at Logan Airport, detained,” WGBH, March 16, 2025
https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2025-03-14/green-card-holder-from-new-hampshire-interrogated-at-logan-airport-detained - Ibid.
- Ibid.
- “Here’s a ‘dead’ person on Social Security in Seattle, with plenty to say,”The Seattle Times, March 15, 2025
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/heres-a-dead-person-on-social-security-in-seattle-with-plenty-to-say/ - Ibid.
- “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 - “Questions, Answers, and Some Cautionary Updates Regarding the 3.5% Rule,” Harvard Kennedy School, Spring 2020
https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/2024-05/Erica Chenoweth_2020-005.pdf - Ibid.
- Ibid.
- Ibid.
- “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
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