Mattie
Armstrong-Price
The coming year
promises to be a dangerous time for progressive groups. Last month the House
passed resolution 9495, which would grant the executive branch extraordinary
powers to designate nonprofit organizations as terrorist supporting and thereby
to revoke these organizations’ 501(c)3 status unilaterally and without due
process.
Hundreds of activists gather for an
encampment on the University of Michigan's campus calling for an
immediate cease-fire in Gaza, on April 24, 2024 in Ann Arbor, Michigan,
United States.(Photo: Adam J. Dewey/Anadolu via Getty Images)
The significance
of this development is chillingly clear now that we have evidence of a
right-wing plan to use the pretext of fighting terrorism to shut down more than
100 progressive organizations, including Jewish Voice for Peace, Black Lives
Matter, Students for Justice in Palestine, and the Democratic Socialists of
America.
As reported on
the progressive news site Truthout, in November a right-wing think tank with
ties to the Heritage Foundation published a glossy report that purports to show
how these and other progressive organizations are “pro-terrorism.” The report
outlines a series of steps that the think tank, the Capital Research Center,
believes should be taken to shut these 159 groups down, ranging from the
revocation of their 501(c)3 or 501(c)4 statuses to the prosecution and
deportation of their leaders. Such moves, if made by the Trump administration,
could effectively shutter progressive civil society.
The “evidence”
provided for progressive groups’ supposed support for terrorism is highly
suspect. In many cases, the Capital Research Center simply highlights
statements made by these groups that are taken to be insufficiently
condemnatory of Hamas. Groups’ use of language like “armed resistance” to
describe Hamas’ actions is taken, in and of itself, to constitute active
support for this Palestinian militia. We are in the realm here of “thought
crimes.”
As a historian
of modern Europe, I am alarmed by this call to shut down progressive
organizations and parties en masse: The current push to do so resonates with
the history of 20th-century fascism.
In April 1919,
just weeks after the official formation of the Italian fascist movement, Benito
Mussolini’s supporters violently attacked the offices of Avanti, a socialist
newspaper. The Italian Blackshirts then carried out a campaign of violence
against trade unionists and socialists.
More than a
decade later, when Adolf Hitler was granted dictatorial powers through the
March 1933 Enabling Act, among his government’s first actions was the outlawing
of opposition parties, including the Social Democratic Party. Leaders of the
Social Democratic Party were targeted for arrest, faced torture, and were
detained in prisons. As had already happened to the Communist Party and would
subsequently happen to other opposition parties, the German Social Democratic
Party in May and June of 1933 was rendered inoperative. The Party was shut down
by the new regime.
Today in the
United States, the Capital Research Center is promoting a plan to shut down
progressive opposition parties like the Democratic Socialists of America and to
bring down a wide range of progressive organizations including the Center for
Constitutional Rights, the Council on Islamic American Relations, the Movement
for Black Lives, the National Lawyers Guild, Black Lives Matter, Students for
Justice in Palestine, and Jewish Voice for Peace. These and other progressive
organizations, while not nearly as powerful as the left in early 1930s Germany,
nevertheless have the capacity to lead mass movements and to effectively resist
regressive political transformations. This is why they are being targeted.
In the closing
weeks of the 2024 presidential campaign, Vice President Kamala Harris indicated
that she believes that now President-elect Donald Trump is a fascist and that
he wants to rule as a dictator. To say that Trump is a fascist is to put
forward a hypothesis, informed by historical comparison, about how he intends
to govern. But would-be strongmen can only carry out their plans with the
acquiescence of wider layers of the state and of civil society.
Donald Trump may
want to forcibly repress progressive dissent—he has effectively said as
much—but how much support will his efforts receive? Will the incoming
Republican-led Senate follow the House in granting the executive branch
extraordinary powers both to designate nonprofit organizations as
“terrorist-supporting” and to revoke their 501(c)3 statuses without due
process?
Will
conservative commentators who have kept their distance from the MAGA movement
nevertheless amplify and endorse the Capital Research Center’s report calling
for the aggressive dismantling of Black Lives Matter, Students for Justice in
Palestine, Jewish Voice for Peace, and the Democratic Socialists of America,
among more than 100 other organizations?
Will centrist
politicians, media outlets, and commentators stay silent about attacks on the
left, or will they speak out in defense of the right of progressive parties and
organizations to exist?
When considering
possible executive branch moves to shut down progressive organizations, those
from different parts of the political spectrum might feel conflicted. Perhaps
there have been statements made or actions taken over the last year by
progressive organizations—including organizations that have protested in favor
of a cease-fire in Israel and Palestine—that you have found objectionable.
Perhaps you believe that the progressive movement has in some way taken the
wrong tack.
Nevertheless,
now is the time to think carefully about political principles concerning
assembly, expression, and protest. Now is the time to consider the precedent
that widespread attacks on progressive organizations would establish, and about
the powers that should or should not be invested in a would-be authoritarian
president.
History tells us
that right-wing authoritarian movements and governments begin by attacking
leftist and progressive parties and organizations, and then proceed to target
other opposition parties and civil society organizations.
Defending
progressive organizations in this moment will help ensure the protection of
civil liberties and democratic institutions over the coming months and years.
We are living through a historically dangerous moment. It is also a moment for
clarity and courage.
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