As a volunteer with Refuse Fascism, I’ve spent the last months organizing in DC, where I’ve had a few short but intense conversations recently with people who are newly involved. They got me thinking about what we’re actually facing—and about how moments like this have unfolded in history.
My background is Jewish. I’m not religious, but my family history is something I carry with me. Last year, my sister shared something she recently learned that hit hard: part of our family was corralled into a castle court yard where most were shot or hung and children were forced to shoot at their own parents under threat of having all present killed. My aunt was sent to Aushwitz as a child where she watched as her parents were marched off to the gas chambers.
I have a cousin who was driven underground and joined the resistance. Another cousin, who I knew, had a concentration camp tattoo on his arm. To see that mark, to know what it meant, is something that never leaves you.
Hitler’s first attempt was not mass murder—it was expulsion. He tried to drive Jews out of Germany. But country after country—including the United States and England—refused to take them in. When that failed, the regime escalated. The Final Solution came last.
And now. Trump and the MAGA movement are openly pursuing mass deportation and ethnic cleansing. The cruelty is not accidental—it is strategic. Terror is meant to make people live in and leave out of fear. History shows where fascist logic leads next.
One truth has become painfully clear to me as I’ve learned more about this period of history: the people did not have what we have now. They did not have an organization whose mission was to mobilize millions of people into the streets to stop a fascist regime before it couldconsolidate power and drive people into hiding, into ghettos, into death camps.
Yes, there were courageous individuals. Students who resisted and were executed. Military officers who tried to assassinate Hitler and were publicly hanged. Courage existed—but what was missing was mass, sustained resistance on a scale large enough to make fascism impossible to govern.
That is what makes today different: we have Refuse Fascism.
If you’re able, I’m asking you to contribute what you can to help sustain and grow Refuse Fascism. Help promote The People’s Indictment of Donald Trump. *
Whether it’s $10, $25, $200, or more, your donation helps build the kind of mass resistance that history shows is necessary—and still possible.
The more I understand this moment, the more convinced I become: there are many good organizations doing important work, but there is no other organization organizing around the understanding of what we now live under and has the strategy to drive fascism out. Millions in the streets. Sustained, nonviolent protest. Refusing to comply. Driving a fascist regime from power before it is too late.
This is a moment that will be judged by whether or not people stepped forward before it was too late.
Thank you for reading, for caring, and for acting.
With urgency and hope,
Jeremy B.
Jeremy has used his skill to produce many artworks for the movement.
If you’re interested in the original paintings, contact us.
