The Resistance Gets Radical

“Welcome to the Resistance.”

During the first Trump administration, socialists loved to invoke this as a joke. The liberal resistance, socialists charged, was interested only in performative displays of opposition, blaming Russia for everything, and naively hoping Democratic Party adults in the room would take charge and turn back the clock to pre-2016 business as usual. Everything though has changed pretty dramatically since Donald Trump took office for a second time.

Again, much of the liberal base is in open revolt against a leadership that has so clearly failed to stop the inexorable march of far-right politics. But this time, liberals are voting for Zohran Mamdani, shifting left on Palestine, and becoming increasingly favorable to socialism as the solution to the problem of MAGA.

Daniel Denvir, host of the Jacobin Radio podcast The Dig, spoke to organizer and New York City Democratic Socialists of America (NYC-DSA) activist Eric Blanc, progressive political strategist Waleed Shahid, and co–executive director of the Indivisible Project Leah Greenberg about how and why liberals and “the Resistance” have radicalized. This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.