‘We Are the Frontline’ - An Afternoon with David Pepper
The Bette community got to spend time on Father’s Day with David Pepper, and here are some takeaways from that blessed ‘Speakeasy’ salon
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We got through an entire hour without mentioning Donald Trump.
We heard from friends in Tennessee, Missouri, Ohio, Florida, Oregon, California, and New York, each with unique questions for David Pepper — a democratic activist and former politician who wrote ‘Laboratories of Autocracy’ and ‘Saving Democracy’ — two of the most vital books of our time.
We got granular on what we can each do to save our democracy from authoritarian capture.
It was Father’s Day, so we also got to meet his two cute boys, Jack and Charlie, who had just gotten back from Washington D.C. on what appeared to be a fantastic family trip.
Whatever happens between now and 2024, we got to spend an hour with David Pepper on Father’s Day of 2023, and aren’t we so very lucky.
The David Pepper Challenge
When Pepper first joined our community in March, he issued a challenge — do we give enough of a sh*t to save our democracy? He was not convinced.
And each of us in this community revealed daily that yes, we do give enough of a sh*t to take the kind of action that makes a difference. We write postcards, we phone bank, we share intel, some of us work in the trenches of community politics, many of us donate to causes — heck, Bette Dangerous would not be flourishing without those who support my reporting and support me personally.🩵
So when Pepper returned for round two, many of us had read his latest book, ‘Saving Democracy’ and came armed with additional questions on where we could best be of service.
For me, the most important takeaway comes from the last question I asked him. As noted at the top of this missive, we got through the hour with nary a mention of Trump, but since the federal indictment had just come down, I thought it was important that we didn’t leave without having Pepper address the felony counts for espionage. Please pay attention to his response — you will find all of Pepper’s responses in block quotes throughout this report:
My main line is it's not going to save democracy if he's indicted or not.
If he's locked up tomorrow, they’re still going to gerrymander, they're still going to attack drop boxes, because they are disproportionately used by Black voters. So don't take any effort away from what you're doing every day to watch that stuff.
Let's all watch it. Let's hope there's accountability. But don't let that stop you from recruiting that great candidate in your area, because Trump’s prosecution is not going to solve our problems. It's a different lane.
On the flip side, Trump is an example of what happens when there's no accountability. People who see no accountability are inspired to do worse. He's a perfect example. So it's not going to save democracy, but do I want accountability for laws broken? Absolutely.
And I'm glad that we finally are seeing someone like Jack Smith say, ‘Sorry, buddy, you broke the damn law, and we are going to hold you accountable.’ So I think it's really important. It's important that we bring accountability to gerrymandered statehouses, especially when they break the law. So accountability is very important.
But I also worry we’re just gonna watch the Republican primary for six months, instead of doing what we have to do, and then we’re all gonna watch Jack Smith for a year.
Let's watch and let's hope for accountability. But you'll see in my book, there's so much you could be doing right now for democracy. Don't let watching that stuff stop us from doing that work.
Because if we do that work, we save democracy.
***Okay Bette community — your first action step is to share that block quote with everyone in your pro-democracy network.***
I am literally watching smart people focus on the kayfabe between Greene and Boebert, Musk and Zuck. Are those distractions going to save democracy? No, absolutely not. They are chaos agents chaosing.
Okay, back to our regularly scheduled recap.
Pepper talked about the “horrific, anti-democratic, illegal, attack on the Ohio constitution. To underscore the lawlessness of the great state of Ohio, the Supreme Court ruled that they are allowed to break the law,” he said.
Ohio is trying to enshrine minority rule — forcing the majority of Ohioans to live under the tyranny of unpopular rulings. He said they are operating as laboratories, and that they always learn from each other. If they get away with it in Ohio, it's coming elsewhere.
To read more about this, go here:
Going On Offense
One of the greatest lessons I learned from Pepper is we continually react to all of the plots and schemes by anti-democratic forces. So part of what we do in these conversations is figure out our offense. Pepper used the fall of Roe as an example, citing the statehouses that led that challenge.
Do you know that in Mississippi, Texas and Ohio, the authors of those abortion bans in those states, not one of them had an opponent the next year?
WTF?!
So when I say go on offense, we're often not even on defense. We literally are letting them turn the country upside down with completely toxic laws that are not supported by the majority in these states. And often they're not even opposed. There is zero accountability. There's not even someone knocking on doors, saying, ‘Oh, you didn't know that your state rep is the one who led to that 10-year-old who was forced out of state to get an abortion?
After Dobbs, we start running everywhere, Mississippi, everywhere, and you'll start bringing accountability back to places that are downward spirals of extremism, because there's no accountability whatsoever.
Another key point he brought up was we are doing absolutely nothing about voter purges. So another way to go on offense is to go out and register people to vote. He said that every mayor in every city should be using their entire footprint of City Hall — “rec centers, libraries, public transportation, to register the people that are being purged by the statehouse that's going on offense for the people who are being victimized by awful voter suppression.”
He also said to know the deadlines in all our states so we don’t miss an opportunity to vote out extremists.
If you're in a district that hasn't had an opponent to the local extremists for some time, you may not run yourself, not everyone should run, but you and all those you know, should make it a collective goal that someone's running for that seat.
Take on the Book Banners
He said to get out of the ‘business as usual mindset’ and take on the book banners.
Business as usual is a disaster. So go to that school board meeting and take on the book banners. It's really unpopular banning books. Why would I allow a parent telling me and my two sons what they're allowed to read in schools? Hell no. This is 70 - 30 issue in most places. If you show up to the school board meeting and make that clear, they all run away... When people do that, the pro-freedom-of-education-people, which is what I am, we don't want some angry parent down the street, telling my kids what to read — well, you will win that fight if you show up.
When people show up to protest at statehouses, it has an impact. When big crowds show up, or personal phone calls are made, or postcards are sent, people send a message to politicians that they shouldn’t have done something unpopular and when politicians know their future is on the line, some acquiesce to popular opinion. Most of the unpopular moves are done in cover of darkness.
Pepper encouraged us to get out of the ‘all or nothing’ mindset. Taking our eye off the statehouses led to the overturn of Roe, and too often we focus on federal runs to the peril of state and community politics.
We just have to see that the battle for democracy is broader. It's deeper.—David Pepper
He said the anti-democractic forces are taking every shot they have, so we need to do the same.
One of the most important reports I have done with Pepper is this report on how Jim Crow-era voter suppression strategies are being deployed again today:
I had him respond to the recent SCOTUS ruling that backed a landmark voting rights law — the 5-4 decision tossed out Republican-drawn congressional districts in Alabama that a lower court said discriminated against Black voters.
It really is a huge win. There's speculation Roberts was getting scared of all the bad press… my optimistic side says the argument Alabama was making to get rid of this Voting Rights Act was rogue, it was a lawless… this was a major league victory for representation of minority communities. And overall, this would have been a really poisonous tool that could have made gerrymandering even worse than today. And they did stop it, which was a great result.
I brought up the Alabama decision because as we fight against a dystopian fascist future, it is important to acknowledge the wins along the way. We cannot depend on the kindness of extremist judges, but both Roberts and Kavanaugh were in the majority — a departure for both.
Pepper reminded us that this case revealed an important lesson:
You never know when you might win. This was a case that most people thought was going the other way. And so thank goodness they didn't let that stop them from bringing it forward… Even if it feels like an uphill battle — legally, politically, you name it — always keep fighting. You never know when you will have a surprise win.
As he answered questions from Bette members on how they can help Ohio and their own states — phone bank, write postcards, get involved in voter registration, talk to neighbors — he noted that one way to get messaging across was to talk about the outcomes of bad policies. It’s indefensible to have bad roads, it’s indefensible schools aren’t funded.
Focus on the consequences of bad Republican policies. And here's my guarantee, you will find them everywhere. It's like Russia's army, it's corrupted. So it's not a good army, these states are corrupted. And so the public outcomes in these places are falling apart as a bunch of for-profit grabbers use the public money to profit themselves. And the politicians are literally the ones pushing that money their way. Republicans have been better at messaging, using fear to activate their base about immigrant caravans at the border, etc… We don't have to make stuff up for our base. We just need to be pretty fired up about it.
And I worry, when we milquetoast everything, because we're trying to find a few swing voters, that we really don’t explain what's at stake to our voters. And make it clear that ‘this is what happened with Dobbs and why.’ When we milquetoast too much, we get rid of messages that actually motivate people to show up, and we can't do that.
Gretchen Whitmer’s ‘Fix the damn roads’ is one of the best examples. It's simple. It's meaningful to everybody, and it was very winning.
One of our members from Tennessee voiced her concerns about the growing authoritarianism in her state — which she likened to living ‘The Handmaid's Tale.’
Pepper said Tennessee is a perfect example of a state where there’s been no no accountability.
In Tennessee, I hate to say, you're one of the clearest examples: 50% of those extremist people did not have an opponent. They don't care what the governor says. They're essentially reappointed to these offices. Every incentive in their world without accountability is to be an extremist.
But my free advice would be if you really want to change it — run D’s in every part of Tennessee. No more years with 50% unchallenged. No way! Get that number down to zero or as close as you can. Even if you don't win, if you knock on 10,000 doors to explain how crazy these laws are that aren't supported by most parts of this country, or most parts of any of these states, people will hear you.
When we're not running against these extremists, they literally have no incentive but to do what they're doing. And they actually have an incentive to always go further. And if the craziest person proposes a law, even if they know it's a bad one, they basically are put in a position of ‘Well, I don't have an opponent in the general so I'm not gonna be punished for doing something crazy. But if I don't go along with the crazy guy and I vote with the two Justins and Gloria Johnson on something, I'm going to lose.’ And so we have to get into that space and start bringing accountability back, or even the moderate better known governor will get run over every time. If we don't start doing this, it will never change.
We have a massive problem with lawlessness run amok with no accountability.
He said start working with every nonprofit we can find to go into those school board meetings and take on censorship.
I need people to see they're on the frontline. Wherever you live, if you’re doing this work, you are the frontline.—David Pepper
Complacency and despair are our enemies, but so is thinking it’s happening somewhere else.
The Koch cadre and the folks attacking democracy love it when we all sit around and think that somewhere else is determining the outcome.
Because the true force that will win democracy is all of us figuring this out and going to work. That is literally the thing. That's the majority.
The whole point of the ‘Saving Democracy’ book is to literally say to people, create your own plan to lift democracy where you live. And I literally create worksheets and templates… If everyone does this, we can win. If we all continue to be lulled into thinking that this battle is somewhere far away from us, they win.
And so much of the reason we're not doing it is because we just aren't seeing the battle correctly. So we're on the frontline, we are the frontline, there's so much to be done.
Those who were in attendance know that each time we meet with David Pepper I bring my red and blue pom poms, and cheer as he gives us our marching orders.
Now, let’s take the David Pepper challenge:
We will not be lulled into thinking that somewhere else determines the outcome
We will each in our communities commit to doing the labor of democracy
postcards, phone banking, campaigning, canvassing, whatever is necessary
We will make sure we run democrats in every race — no longer will extremists go unchallenged
We will cheer on accountability for the lawless, but we will not be cheated into believing Trump’s conviction will save us
We will go on offense and stay on offense
We will sharpen our messaging
Focus messaging on the consequences of bad Republican policies
Even if you think you’ll lose, try anyway
We will take on the book banners
We will work with nonprofits to show up at our school board meetings
We will not be bullied
We will get fired up
We will save our democracy
Get to work.
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Our next Bette Dangerous ‘Speakeasy’ Zoom for paid members is Sunday, July 2, 4 pm PT with the return of Martin Sheil! Marty will update us on Trump’s various legal entanglements and his likely path to unfreedom; Paid members also receive invites to our weekly Bette’s Happy Hour, a wellness checkin every Tuesday, which often features surprise guests. This Tuesday, our checkin is at 5 pm PT.
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“I say a silent prayer of thanksgiving as I walk upon the earth.”-Audrey Peterman.
“May the viral hope for truth and humanity wash away the chaos of these years.”-S.C., Bette community member
“Something Sacred never dies in almost all of us, who can hear the invitation of Truth…”-words from a Bette Dangerous community member
“Nothing but blue skies from now on…”-Irving Berlin
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(The symphony outside my window as I worked today 🦜)
