What The Hell America!

Attacks on the most vulnerable are just the beginning, as Trump’s escalating campaign against immigrants, women and the poor threatens the rights and freedoms of all Americans.

Originally published in the Daily Hampshire Gazette.

After World War II, German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller famously said, “First they came for the socialists and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out for me.”

We are watching this happen in real time with the Trump administration.

Donald Trump has targeted immigrants, such as Kilmar Abrego Garcia, with illegal deportation; then he came after workers’ rights, with cuts to overtime pay and rolling back rights to unionize; then he came for the hungry, with cuts to food programs and Medicaid; then he came for the low-income children, with the elimination of Head Start childcare; then he came for the sick, with cuts to funding for medical research; then he came for women, with cuts to reproductive healthcare and funding for domestic violence shelters and rape crisis hotlines; then he came for disabled and elderly people, with cuts to Social Security and Medicare—and so much more.

This strategy of targeting the most vulnerable, then expanding outward to eliminate the rights of everyone, is a longstanding right wing strategy in the United States.

Take abortion rights. Shortly after the Supreme Court established constitutional abortion rights in Roe v. Wade (1973), conservative states targeted young women’s access to abortion by passing parental consent laws, which the Supreme Court upheld in Bellotti v. Baird (1976). Then in 1977, Congress targeted low-income women’s access to abortion with the Hyde Amendment, banning Medicaid coverage for abortion, which the Supreme Court upheld in Harris v. McRae (1980). Building on these two cases and using similar reasoning, the Supreme Court restricted abortion access for all people in Casey v. Planned Parenthood (1992), leading to a precipitous decline in abortion access. Then in 2022, the Supreme Court overturned constitutional abortion rights entirely in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. Today, 18 states ban first-trimester abortions.

As with abortion, so with contraception: The far right first targeted the most vulnerable—the young—then expanded to the poor, and is now attacking everyone’s access to contraception.

Not satisfied with abortion bans, right wing extremists are now coming after contraception. Again, they started with the most vulnerable: young women.

In March of 2024, in the case of Deanda v. Bacerra, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned decades of precedent by ruling that states may require young women to have parental permission to obtain contraception. Earlier this month, Trump began cutting off federal family planning funds for reproductive health clinics that provide contraceptives to low-income women. In a recent report, Birth Control Under Threat, the National Women’s Law Center details myriad further attacks on contraceptives, including the University of Idaho refusing to provide students with birth control information and a Missouri hospital refusing to provide rape survivors emergency contraception. Legislators in several states have now introduced bills to ban contraception entirely. In his concurrence in Dobbs, Clarence Thomas suggested the Supreme Court should overturn the 1965 Griswold v. Connecticut decision that established the constitutional right to access contraception without government interference.

As with abortion, so with contraception: The far right first targeted the most vulnerable—the young—then expanded to the poor, and is now attacking everyone’s access to contraception.

We see these same tactics used with violence. Two thirds of mass shooters have histories of domestic violence. These men first target the women in their lives—wives, girlfriends and mothers—often with few repercussions. Having learned they can get away with it, they escalate their violence. We saw this with the Jan. 6 insurrectionists, who for years used violent tactics against abortion clinics.

“The same violent brew of paramilitary warriors, white supremacists, and Christian militants that we saw descending on the Capitol building merged to oppose abortion with lethal force decades ago,” said University of Kentucky historian Carol Mason, author of the book Killing for Life.

The lack of consequences for the fury and violence anti-abortion extremists directed toward women entering reproductive health clinics has emboldened the far right. They learned that if they could claim their cause was righteous, they could get away with violence.

Donald Trump first abused and gaslit the women in his life. Now, he’s abusing and gaslighting America. He is bullying law firms, universities, corporations, mayors, governors and anyone who won’t do what he demands. When society enables bullies, they get worse.

We must fight for everyone, not only because it is the right thing to do, but to stop the expansion of the violation of rights. Trump is boundary testing. If you give him an inch, he will take it all, until he has obliterated all resistance—and our democracy.

Speaking out for those who are targeted, no matter who they are, is speaking out for everyone. Please act now while you still can.