The Dictatorship
Nearly 77M people voted against Trump. That should give us hope.
To find hope in the aftermath of this month’s electionI don’t have to look any further than the notes I took for the two novels I’ve published since 2019. My debut novel, “We Cast a Shadow,” follows a Black man in a futuristic America trying to protect his son from those who want to destroy his Black body. “The American Daughters,” published this year, is the story of an enslaved girl who joins a spy ring to fight the Confederates.
For everyone who denied the humanity of others, there was someone else who stepped up to defend them.
I spent two decades doing research for those novels, including interviewing elders and digging through archives in New Orleans’ French Quarter. After the last page was turned in, I learned one simple truth I believe speaks to this moment when an incoming president is promising to inflict pain upon our neighbors: For much of our dark past, for everyone who denied the humanity of others, there was someone else who stepped up to defend them. For that reason, frightening changes that initially seemed permanent were anything but.
A bill stripping away rights might be passed one year only to be struck down by a court the following year. Or, in the reverse, a negative ruling by a court might be superseded by a legislative act. Politics, history and culture are like a pendulum, held by a woman on a seesaw, which is itself perched on the back of a whale swimming across the sea. There’s too much motion to fully understand, but two things are certain: One, you’re moving toward something, and two, change is inevitable.
The people in my novels resist authoritarianism in the way that one group or another of Americans always has. Most Black Americans were treated as the property of the wealthy during the time when “The American Daughters” is set, but the characters vigorously fight for their freedoms despite the immense personal risk. In creating these fictional characters, I was inspired by a score of real-life freedom fighters: from Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth to more obscure figures like Juan San Maló (Jean St. Malo) who established a village for those who escaped slavery deep in the swamps east of New Orleans.
The narrator of “We Cast a Shadow” is a loving father who uses cunning to shield his son in a world where Black Americans are forced into fenced-in ghettos or deported altogether. The narrator’s wife, Penny, is white, but she is an even fiercer protester of inequality. And several other characters also defend the marginalized. These characters represent a variety of approaches to resistance, just as real-world figures such as Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm XPatty Hearst and Ida B. Wells had different ways of fighting back against oppressive systems.
Both novels, then, are informed by the many ways that people living in an oppressive police state resisted and fought back and didn’t give up hope but made plans for a brighter future.
But we don’t have to go back to previous centuries for a reminder that bad times don’t always last as long as it looks like they might last. The day after the 2004 election, my best work friend sat in her office crying. President George W. Bush had just won re-election after he’d launched an illegitimate and brutal war in Iraq and after his party had strategically placed anti-marriage-equality measures on ballots across the country to help the party win that year. My friend was crying in part because at the time, the Bush coalition seemed permanent. On that day in 2004, we couldn’t have even conceived of a President Barack Obama or imagined that during his time in the White House the Supreme Court would make marriage equality the law of the land.
In “We Cast a Shadow,” African Americans are forced to live in a neighborhood surrounded by a wire fence. They can leave only with special permission, not unlike the Japanese Americans who were trapped inside internment camps during World War II. I’m unusual in that I always hope for the best. But I also believe people when they announce what terrors they plan to unleash. I’m disgusted that the new administration is promising to round up countless people and corral them into places that will most likely look very similar to those camps. If President-elect Donald Trump’s menacing promise is enacted, then children will lose their parents. People will die.
There were almost 77 million people who voted against the president-elect’s agenda, a fertile ground of opposition and defiance.
The characters in “The American Daughters” are trapped by patriarchal and racist forces that have plans for their bodies. The women in particular are motivated to fight their oppressors at every turn. We’re at such a place again. Given the Supreme Court justices he appointed (and is likely to support) and the anti-abortion foes in his orbitwe can expect Trump’s new administration to continue to eat away at women’s rights to control their own bodies. That can only result in deaths as doctors unwilling to risk their medical licenses refuse to provide treatment to women who need it. We can also expect that the new administration will do all that it can to end protections for trans and nonbinary people, which will cause incalculable pain and devastation.
But, according to the latest numbers, there were almost 77 million people who voted against the president-elect’s agendaa fertile ground of opposition and defiance.
At some point the new administration will lose its momentum. Allies will use the courts to divert, delay and defeat the worst decisions of this president. The midterm elections will be here before you know it. And in 2028, despite some people’s worries, there will be an election.
The writer James Baldwin, speaking about how he dealt with bullies who threatened him when he was a child, said he’d say, “‘OK … but you gonna have to do it every day.’ You’d have to beat me up every single day. So, then the question becomes which one of us would get tired first. And I knew it wouldn’t be me.”
A friend from Asia told me after the results of the Nov. 5 presidential election that she felt like the U.S. the world loves had just died. But America is what it is in part because we’ve always had people like Baldwin, people who despite being battered refused to ever get tired and quit. To those who think the fight has been lost, I say not so fast. The real-life stories of America show us that we’ve been here before.
Maurice Carlos Ruffin
Maurice Carlos Ruffin is the author of the national bestseller “The American Daughters,”as well as a short story collection, “The Ones Who Don’t Say They Love You.” His debut novel, “We Cast a Shadow,” was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the PEN America Open Book Prize. All three books were New York Times Editor’s Choice selections. He is the winner of the Iowa Review Award in fiction and the Louisiana Writer Award. Ruffin is an associate professor of creative writing at Louisiana State University.
The Senate voted Tuesday to install Jay Clayton, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, as director of national intelligence despite a tense confirmation hearing that eroded the once broad bipartisan support for his nomination.
Clayton was confirmed 51-47 along party lines, with all of the chamber’s Republicans and none of its Democrats voting to hand him the reins of the nation’s sprawling intelligence apparatus.
The final vote came after a combative July 16 confirmation hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee, during which Clayton said under oath that he is not an “election denier” but refused to directly state that President Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential election to former President Joe Biden.
That unnerved Democratic lawmakers on the panel, some of whom had expressed support for Clayton’s nomination amid their enthusiasm to replace acting Director Bill Pulte, the Federal Housing Finance Agency head and a Trump loyalist. Since taking over for former National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard, who resigned from her Cabinet-level position after a tumultuous tenure in May, Pulte has overseen multiple rounds of layoffs across the agency.
In Clayton, who served as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission during Trump’s first term, some Senate Democrats had seen an experienced public servant who could be entrusted to lead the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies after more than a year of clashes with Gabbard, who they accused of making false election fraud claims and furthering Trump’s political agenda.
But his refusal to answer questions about who won the 2020 election and his stumble during a series of questions about Trump instructing Gabbard to attend an FBI raid of the election office in Fulton CountyGeorgia, earlier this year swiftly shattered that support.
During a heated exchange with Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., Clayton said he had only been made aware of Gabbard’s presence at the raid during a private conversation with the Georgia senator the day before the hearing.
“The first time you learned that Director Gabbard was present at that raid was in my office yesterday?” Ossoff asked, visibly stunned.
“It was the first time that, in my recollection, I’ve thought about it recently,” Clayton answered.
Democrats and election experts have repeatedly warned that Trump is launching an unprecedented effortto discredit and potentially steal the midterm elections. They have expressed fears that Trump will ask Clayton to attend another FBI raid in November involving the seizure of ballots and election records, as Gabbard did. Clayton’s performance in the confirmation hearing, which took place hours before Trump delivered a primetime address to the nation in which he said with no evidence that the country’s elections are being “rigged and stolen,” did not assuage those fears.
“I’m bitterly disappointed,” Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the intelligence committee, told Clayton of his refusal to say who won the 2020 election and his answer regarding Gabbard’s role in the Fulton County raid as the hearing wrapped. The committee narrowly referred Clayton’s nomination to the full Senate in a 9-8 vote the following week.
“You’re going to be in a room with [the president] many times, and at times you should have a difference of opinion. And if you can’t disagree with him when he’s not in the room, are you going to be able to disagree with him when you’re sitting across from him in the Oval Office or Situation Room?” Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., asked Clayton at one point, reflecting the growing tension in the hearing room.
After Clayton’s confirmation, Warner called on the new director of intelligence to resist pressure from Trump to manipulate intelligence for political gain or use it to cast doubt about U.S. election results or interfere in U.S. elections.
“Having known and worked with Jay for years,” Warner said. “I came away from his confirmation process with serious reservations about whether he would be willing to stand up to political pressure when it matters most. Now that he has been confirmed, I sincerely hope he proves those concerns unfounded.”
“Clayton now has an opportunity – and the responsibility – to demonstrate that intelligence will never be shaped to fit a political narrative, that analysts will be free to deliver their best independent judgments, and that the extraordinary authorities entrusted to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence will never be used to manufacture doubt about the integrity of our elections or justify interference in their administration.”
David Rohde contributed to this report.
Sydney Carruth is a breaking news reporter covering national politics and policy for MS NOW. You can send her tips from a non-work device on Signal at SydneyCarruth.46 or follow her work on X and Bluesky.
Happy Tuesday! Here’s your Tuesday Tech Drop, some of the past week’s top stories from the intersection of politics and technology.
Texas’ censorship law still partially blocked
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit upheld an injunction partially blocking a Texas law aimed at preventing minors from being exposed to harmful content. The portion of the SCOPE Act that requires some digital service providers to adopt monitor-and-filter strategies had already been hit with an injunction, which the 5th Circuit upheld after Texas appealed.
Read more at Bloomberg Law.
House Speaker Mike Johnson claimed ignorance when questioned about plans by President Donald Trump’s social media company to sell premium access to market-moving posts. On Monday, the Louisiana Republican told BLN’s Manu Raju that it was the first time he had heard the news, which was reported last week.
Watch Johnson’s response below.
GOP lawmakers largely silent amid Trump making $2B in his first year of second term — and of potential conflicts.
“First I’ve heard of it,” Johnson said of Truth Social selling quicker access to market-moving posts.
Others won’t comment, some shrug it off.
$2B raise any red… pic.twitter.com/I6ph3RgDy5
— Manu Raju (@mkraju)”https://x.com/mkraju/status/2081708925758382111?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>July 27, 2026
Administration sued over alleged database
Privacy and civil liberties advocates have sued the Trump administration, accusing it of adopting “a secret policy of collecting, maintaining, and using personally identifying information of protestors and observers.” The lawsuit centers on claims — some of which have been made by federal immigration agents — that the government is maintaining a database to spy on critics of the president’s racist anti-immigrant crackdown.
Read more at Common Dreams.
SpaceX’s stock collapse
SpaceX’s stock price fell again Monday amid ongoing concerns in the market about spending on artificial intelligence. The stock’s overall collapse since its peak after its initial public offering in June has reportedly played a role in erasing owner Elon Musk’s trillionaire status.
Watch Bloomberg Tech’s report below.
Trump administration exempts SpaceX
Speaking of SpaceX, the Trump administration — perhaps, in keeping with the president’s campaign vow to “make life good” for people like Musk — agreed to exempt the company’s Starlink routers from the Federal Communications Commission’s ban on foreign-made routers. Starlink makes some of its routers in Vietnam.
Read more at Ars Technica.
High-tech voter suppression
AlterNet published a report on the high-tech tools enabling conservatives to challenge voters’ eligibility en masse, posing potential threats to voter participation in the upcoming midterms.
Read more at AlterNet.
Senate crypto bill in danger
A Senate bill regulating cryptocurrencies — and banning federal officials, including presidents, from issuing digital assets like Trump’s crypto coins — is at risk of languishing as Democrats raise concerns that the bill’s ethics provisions aren’t strong enough.
Read more at CNBC.
The Justice Department is prosecuting a critic of Atlanta’s massive “Cop City” compound over an allegation that the activist gave authorities planning to looking through his phone a so-called duress password that triggered the deletion of his data.
Read more at Tech Crunch.
Kalshi’s midterm moves
Kalshi, the glorified betting platform that has financial ties to Donald Trump Jr. and which has been used to promote baseless election conspiracy theories, unveiled its “midterms hub” ahead of this fall’s elections. What could go wrong? Plenty, it seems. A Kalshi board member joined MS NOW’s “The Weekend” to discuss the scrutiny the company is facing.
Watch the interview here.
MAHA misinformation
“Make America Healthy Again” influencers are spreading misinformation about women’s menstrual cycles, and The Guardian spotlighted how the influencers are spreading falsehoods about women’s luteal phases — claims that seem designed to malign birth control and fuel pronatalist talking points that have gained steam in the MAGA movement.
Read more at The Guardian.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.
Today’s edition of quick hits.
* The latest on the Japanese earthquake: “A 7.1-magnitude earthquake hit Japan’s southern Kumamoto prefecture on Tuesday, knocking out power to thousands of homes, rupturing roads and leaving some trapped and others presumed dead inside a partially collapsed shopping mall. Speaking to reporters from her office in Tokyo, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said authorities were still assessing the full extent of the damage in the area, which was devastated by a deadly quake a decade ago.”
* Tehran contradicts Trump: “Iran’s skies have been free of the sound of explosions and airstrikes for the past several days, after a bout of renewed fighting with the United States. But Iranian officials say they have not agreed to a cease-fire and are in no hurry to hold direct talks with American negotiators. Instead, Iranian officials insist that they are in a position of strength, military leaders boast of battlefield successes, and diplomats dismiss U.S. claims that they are eager to return to negotiations.”
* The six-month mark: “Soon after the war began on Feb. 28, President Trump declared that Iran was ‘totally defeated and wants a deal.’ Then in March, Mr. Trump said the U.S. military would wrap up its campaign against Iran in two to three weeks. ‘We will be leaving very soon,’ he said. Now the conflict is entering its sixth month and a period of deep uncertainty. After nearly two weeks of attacks and counterattacks, Mr. Trump has held off a major escalation. But major issues between the two sides remain unsettled.”
* Putin’s latest offensive against dissent: “The Kremlin has initiated a new crackdown on anti-war voices ahead of Russia’s parliamentary elections in September, barring candidates from running if they show any sign of opposing the bloody, expensive and increasingly unpopular military operation in Ukraine.”
* The latest ethics probe: “The House Ethics Committee said in a statement Monday it is investigating Rep. Lance Gooden, a four-term Texas Republican. It’s unclear what the committee is probing, but the Office of Congressional Conduct, an independent investigative branch of the House, sent over findings regarding Gooden to the committee June 10.”
* A striking report out of Louisiana about how state and local officials agreed to give a tech giant everything it wanted as part of a secret deal: “The New York Times’s examination shows for the first time how Meta used secrecy and speed to pave the way for its giant project, which it calls Hyperion. At a pivotal moment for the A.I. boom, Hyperion could be a blueprint for other companies intent on avoiding local opposition in order to get massive data centers built fast.”
* Evidence of a toxic political climate: “Last week, former Justice Department lawyer Liz Oyer testified in the Senate against the confirmation of Todd Blanche as attorney general. Then came the death threats.”
* The pressure on McConnell persists: “Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear has asked Sen. Mitch McConnell to ‘directly and verbally address’ their constituents or resign, the Democratic governor’s latest demand for transparency regarding the 84-year-old Republican lawmaker’s condition as he recovers from a fall and pneumonia.”
See you tomorrow.
Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”
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