At this juncture of encroaching authoritarianism, where the rule of law buckles under the burden of executive overreach and civil liberties deteriorate in silence, this is our position. We address this not to the officials in Washington but to the people they have betrayed—to the millions weary of empty promises, fear, and witnessing the erosion of democracy from within. We acknowledge your presence, and we have reached our limit in patience. We compose this not as radicals but as steadfast witnesses.
We founded The Civic Front on the belief that democracy demands structure, discipline, and coordinated resistance for its defense. We are a framework for survival and a blueprint for reclaiming power. What follows is not a wish list; it is a mandate for action:
We are not isolated now; we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us. The Civic Front emerges from the lineage of American resistance. When tyranny manifested as an empire, ordinary citizens protested by dumping tea into the harbor. When slavery was the law, abolitionists defied it with moral fortitude and direct action. The exclusion of women from democracy pushed suffragists to shatter windows and societal expectations. When segregation gripped the South, freedom riders and civil rights organizers did not await permission to participate in society; they actively built their own.
We are also part of the American story, comprised not of passive acceptance but of individuals who refuse to yield. Each Chapter of progress was born from confrontation, organization, and sacrifice. The Civic Front reclaims this history. We are not a departure from American values; we are their fulfillment. Demanding housing, healthcare, education, and bodily autonomy is not radical; it is revolutionary only because of this prolonged denial of necessities.
We invoke this history not to idealize it but to remind ourselves that change does not emanate from permission; it arises from pressure, which must be organized and sustained.
The current administration, backed by billionaires and bolstered by a culture of apathy and propaganda, has crossed a line. What follows shows how far this government has strayed from the values it once promised to protect.
The clearest sign of a move toward authoritarianism is the deliberate attack on civil liberties, which are fundamental freedoms citizens have valued for generations. The most apparent example is mundane disregard and the upturning of the nose at Habeas Corpus, a sacred right to protection from arbitrary detainment and holding, set in place to prevent citizens from being detained indefinitely without trial. This move is a weakening of a crucial protection for civil freedoms. The actions and statements made by the current administration showcase their willingness to disregard civil liberties and empower law enforcement to function as an American Gestapo, opening the possibility for citizens to be forcibly removed from public spaces by an unchecked authority, potentially sent to a government-run detention facility or foreign prison.
However, civil liberties are not the only casualty. While the rights of the people are under assault, so are the institutions meant to serve them. The very machinery of government is being gutted and rebuilt in the image of loyalty, not competence. This gutting is no accident; it is a calculated effort to consolidate power, suppress dissent from within, and eliminate resistance before it can arise. Dissident suppression began with the revival of the executive order Schedule F, stripping thousands of career officials involved in policy work and reclassifying them as at-will employees, allowing the administration to begin mass firings based on political alignment and following the implementation of Schedule F, a sweeping purge across federal agencies, with over 275,000 civil servants forced into retirement or removed by coercive tactics and budgetary dismantling. Critical oversight bodies have also been targeted, with at least 17 Inspectors General responsible for independent accountability abruptly dismissed. At the center of this is Project 2025, a formal plan to boot and replace non-partisan experts with pre-vetted loyalist ideologues, which will form the federal bureaucracy into an extension of executive will.
The politicization of the Department of Justice, previously formed by non-partisan career prosecutors and investigators, has been replaced with administrative loyalists, threatening the department's neutrality. The erosion of this institutional independence undermined public trust. It endangered the fair enforcement of laws, turning the Justice Department into a tool for political retaliation, starkly contrasting the intended purpose of impartial governance. Together, these actions represent administrative reshuffling and an authoritarian restructuring of governance designed to consolidate control and eliminate the safeguards of a professional, independent public service.
Replacing public servants with loyalists is not simply about control over bureaucracy but about who gets protected and punished. This current administration has repeatedly used the full weight of state and federal power to crush dissent, silence opposition, and target those who challenge its authority. Pro-Palestinian activists and students have been surveilled, blacklisted, and deported en masse, with visa revocations linked to social media posts and political speech. The ability to enroll international students was revoked from Harvard University, not due to administrative failure but as a punishment for "ideological noncompliance." Abandoned investigations into abusive policing practices in cities like Minneapolis and Louisville by federal investigators showed a sudden retreat from civil rights enforcement in favor of shielding state violence. Moreover, the president openly used tools of government for ideological retribution, launching investigations against journalists, political opponents, and even academic institutions. Using government for retribution reveals the disdain for dissent and weaponization of the state itself; criticism has become a threat, and punishment has become policy. However, this does not stop here, reaching into the hands of law enforcement, with national security and public safety used to target groups based on political beliefs rather than criminal activity. For instance, the FBI issued internal memos identifying specific religious communities as potential threats, proposing infiltration strategies that raise serious constitutional concerns.
As the use of state power to crush dissent continues, the effects ripple into every corner of public life, particularly the erosion of human dignity. Executive power has been weaponized to gut reproductive freedoms, reinstating the global gag rule and dismantling protections for abortion access at home and abroad. Parallel to this, a targeted crusade against LGBTQ+ communities has taken root through executive orders that revoke federal recognition of trans individuals, defund gender-affirming care, and ban their service in the military. The same authoritarian impulse drives efforts to sanitize education by banning books on civil rights, gender, and race, erasing marginalized voices under the guise of protecting children. Authorities criminalize even compassion: they use ideological enforcement and wartime-era laws like the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to detain and deport people based on nationality or political affiliation. These actions are not isolated; they are part of a coordinated rollback of rights, rewriting the boundaries of who can exist safely, speak freely, or receive care.
While executive power has consolidated and human dignity has worn away, the current administration has subordinated policy to spectacle, replacing democratic values with branding. Rather than proposing substantive solutions for healthcare, education, and housing crises, the administration has leaned heavily on personality-driven politics. Public appearances, slogans, and emotionally charged media performances replace structured policy debate or democratic deliberation. Healthcare faces federal efforts to dismantle the Affordable Care Act, which continue under the radar, primarily through judicial appointments and regulatory sabotage. Public health organizations are becoming increasingly politicized, with no viable national replacement proposed, only promises of a "better" system. Basing appointments in leadership on loyalty rather than expertise undermines pandemic preparedness and protections for reproductive health. Education, specifically the Department of Education, is used as a battlefield rather than a steward of equitable access. Efforts to defund public education, whitewash history curricula, and intimidate teachers have intensified. At the same time, student debt relief is stalled or reversed through legal and bureaucratic entanglement. Instead of investing in future generations, politicians spend their capital attacking "woke indoctrination" and targeting trans youth. At the same time, they allow federal housing programs to stagnate or go underfunded while evictions rise and rent soars. Instead of expanding affordable housing or tenant protections, the administration promotes "law and order" narratives that criminalize homelessness and funnel resources to militarized policing, treating poverty as a threat rather than a symptom of policy failure. All the while, personality-driven governance distracts from systematic neglect. Rallies, merchandise, social media spectacle, and scapegoating of marginalized communities become the substance of administration strategy. The transformation of state machinery into a cult of personality leaves people without shelter, care, or opportunity.
We do not consent; we reject your vision of America, ruled by executive decree, corporate oligarchy, and dominionism masked as law. We will not sit idle as you erase our rights, redefine truth through media monopolies, and criminalize the poor while bailing out the rich. We will not wait for permission to resist; we, the people, are the shield of democracy. When the courts fall, when the elections are rigged through voter suppression and gerrymandering when speech becomes suspect, we return to our most sacred truth: power belongs to the people, not through hashtags or ballots, but through direct action, collective care, and mass resistance. We demand a different future rooted in freedom, including bodily autonomy, housing, and healthcare. Daily lived democracy is not marketed every four years. Justice that repairs, not punishes. If you do not deliver it, we will build it ourselves. To those in power, you are on notice. You will not surveil your way out of resistance, jail your way out of accountability, bury the truth, silence every voice, or kill every dream. History will remember you, and so will we. We are The Civic Front; we are the workers, the students, the veterans, the organizers, the mothers, the queer, the dispossessed. You cannot stop what has already begun.
The Civic Front affirms that preserving democracy requires the active participation of the people. To that end, all citizens who answer the call to engage in lawful, strategic resistance do so through the following means:
Economic disruption, including but not limited to coordinated sick-outs, rent strikes, targeted boycotts, and labor walkouts focused on infrastructure chokepoints;
Mass mobilization, including visibility blitzes, peaceful protests, civil disobedience, and solidarity actions synchronized with legislative or judicial flashpoints;
Parallel institution building, such as mutual aid networks, grassroots education hubs, community health systems, and independent citizen media;
Legal resistance through filing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, public record inquiries, strategic lawsuits, and localized electoral campaigns to reclaim municipal and regional power.
Each Civic Front chapter shall operate autonomously but remain accountable to the democratic framework that binds our shared vision:
All chapters shall adopt a
Lawful arming of citizens is not a call to violence but a constitutional safeguard against tyranny:
We advocate for federal preemption of discriminatory gun laws that target marginalized groups or political dissenters;
We call for the Firearm Access Equity Act to provide financial support for legal firearms, ammunition, and training;
We support the establishment of Community Defense Training Networks (CDTNs) within chapters, grounded in de-escalation, legal education, and collective accountability;
A Legal Defense Fund to protect citizens lawfully exercising their right to defense from targeted prosecution.
To protect democratic infrastructure and expose betrayal of public trust:
We will investigate individuals or institutions that meet criteria including abuse of power, financial entanglement with fascist-aligned entities, dissemination of disinformation, or direct participation in unconstitutional acts;
Our Investigative Exposure Campaigns will rely on verifiable evidence gathered via OSINT, whistleblower accounts, and FOIA records;
A nonviolent, non-doxxing digital archive shall be maintained to educate the public and document systemic enablers of authoritarian policy.
We declare that this moment is not without precedent and reclaim the American lineage of organized resistance—from abolitionists, suffragists, and civil rights workers to whistleblowers and modern freedom movements.
Civil liberties have historically been upheld through collective struggle and challenged by unchecked power, as seen in history with the Alien and Sedition Acts, COINTELPRO, Japanese internment, and the Patriot Act, all of which serve as evidence that liberties erode without resistance.
If unresisted, the current administration's consolidation of power may result in:
The collapse of institutional independence, judicial neutrality, and public accountability;
The redefinition of dissent as criminality and compassion as contraband;
The erosion of bodily autonomy, reproductive rights, trans existence, and racial justice;
The collapse of public health, education, and housing in favor of spectacle, loyalty, and private profit.