Appeasement Is Failing: Why Fighting Back Against Trump Is The Only Option

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., capitulated to President Donald Trump and the GOP over the budget this week, sacrificing one of Democrats’ last pieces of leverage as Trump bulldozes the federal government and jails activists. Schumer defended voting yes on the GOP budget that would neuter the legislative branch, arguing that he had no choice but to give in or face a government shutdown. He’s not the first to make that kind of decision.

Leaders of businesses, universities, and nations across the globe face the same question: Should they fight Trump, or hope that by giving him what he wants he’ll somehow do less harm?

Far too often, these leaders have chosen appeasement over resistance — and, in return, gotten nothing.

At Columbia University, leadership has remained largely silent over the Trump administration’s arrest of recent graduate Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian activist with legal permanent residency in the United States. The Trump administration has not charged Khalil with a crime, arguing instead that his pro-Palestinian campus activism made him a national security threat. Rather than publicly defending its students, Columbia on Thursday expelled, suspended, or revoked degrees of students protesting Israel’s war on Gaza, sending a clear signal of where the university stands in regard to academic speech rights. The fact that the university opted to crack down on its students even after the Trump administration cut $400 million of federal funding is a sign the school is still trying to appease Trump rather than resist him. In a letter responding to the cuts, interim university president Katrina Armstrong wrote that Columbia was committed to “working with the federal government” and said that combating antisemitism is its “number one priority.”

The university had a similar response to the Department of Homeland Security raiding two students’ rooms earlier this week. In a campuswide email, Armstrong refused to condemn the raids, writing that “Columbia is committed to upholding the law.” Now it appears that another student has been detained by immigration officials.

Yet despite these conciliatory efforts to placate an increasingly powerful president, the Trump administration continues to target Columbia and its students. On Thursday, the Department of Education threatened the school in a letter, demanding further crackdowns on student activism, a mask ban, increased authority for campus police, and that the university place its departments of Middle East, South Asian, and African Studies on receivership, which could cede control of those departments to an external authority.

If there’s any lesson from the early months of the second Trump term, it’s that playing nice with Trump isn’t just bad optics — it’s a losing strategy. Resistance to Trump has netted some early victories, particularly in the courts, where some cuts by Trump and Elon Musk have been put on ice, and in foreign trade, where some countries that responded in kind to the threat of U.S. tariffs have seen those fees delayed.

“Conceding to the authoritarian agenda won’t save us. The more we willingly give bullies, the more they forcibly take,” said Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., in a statement to The Intercept.

Ramirez argued that these capitulations go far deeper than giving into Trump on the budget; it’s about Democrats ceding ideological ground on a range of issues without so much as a fight.

“Some of my colleagues have willingly conceded ground on immigration, cancer research, the rights to due process and free speech, Social Security, veteran benefits, environmental sustainability, and labor rights in the hope of gaining future protection or appeasing Musk and Trump,” she said. “Their mistake. Musk and Trump will continue taking more of our civil rights, programs, and resources unless we find the courage to stand our ground and fight back.”

“Democrats cannot continue to move in a way that signals to the American people that they will not fight for them.”

Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa., agreed with Ramirez. “The ultra-rich are buying off our democracy and moving us towards oligarchy and authoritarianism,” said Lee, in a statement. “Democrats cannot continue to move in a way that signals to the American people that they will not fight for them.”

Aimee Allison, founder of She the People, an organization working to elevate the political power of women of color, argued that Democrats who have tried to placate Trump haven’t gotten the scrutiny they deserve. “We need to pay more attention to the cowardly capitulation of Democratic leadership and institutions to pave the way for Trump’s misdeeds; Senate minority leader Schumer is exhibit one of failing the moment,” she wrote to The Intercept. “While the majority of democratic Senators pledge a no vote on cloture and refuse to cooperate with Republicans, he bends the knee. His weakness in the face of the bald-faced dismantling of our democratic institutions and the federal government is a liability.”

Allison said what happened with Columbia University was a perfect example of why appeasement failed.

“If the Columbia example teaches us anything, it’s that capitulation does not gain time and doesn’t gain power, and it certainly does not protect vulnerable people or our deeply held values,” she said.

Justin Hansford, a Howard Law professor and founder of the Thurgood Marshall Civil Rights Center, argued that capitulation had only emboldened Trump. 

“The more that they cave in, the more damage that gets done,” said Hansford. “Not only has the caving not changed Trump’s approach, he keeps ratcheting it up.”

Business leaders have also largely capitulated to Trump, rolling back diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives and remaining silent about his ongoing trade war, even as tariffs threaten their bottom line.

“We get to determine the limits of presidential power by how much we push back.”

Resistance is the only thing that’s been effective thus far, argued Hansford. “Thinking about situations in which people fought back. I mean, look at the lawsuits that froze attacks on DEI,” said Hansford, pointing toward a lawsuit brought by Democracy Forward that led to a preliminary injunction of Trump’s anti-DEI executive orders. Federal workers have also fought back and won, noted Hansford. Earlier this month, a federal judge ordered the Trump administration to rehire thousands of federal probationary workers.

“The secret here is understanding how power works,” said Hansford. “If you do it, then he has the power to make you do it. If you take it to court, then he has to prove the limits of presidential power. In a real way, we get to determine the limits of presidential power by how much we push back.”

The post Appeasement Is Failing: Why Fighting Back Against Trump Is The Only Option appeared first on The Intercept.