In the wake of President-elect Donald Trump’s victory, Democrats and those on the left are grappling with what comes next.
On The Intercept Briefing podcast this week, columnist Natasha Lennard critiques the Democratic Party. “You can’t be both at once: You can’t be the party of Wall Street, and you can’t be the party of the working class,” Lennard says. By acquiescing to Silicon Valley and Wall Street, the Democrats failed again “to offer a robust politics that serves the working class.”
Facing a second Trump term, Lennard says the way forward is a politics of everyday life and radical action that focuses on empowering grassroots movements and labor organizations. “When we look at what people can [do] — involving people at a local level, building community so that it is truly kind of a form of life to be in this politics, rather than just a donation, rather than just a vote, rather than just canvassing even.”
In conversation with Jessica Washington and Jordan Uhl, Lennard emphasizes the importance and resilience of the working class. “Nurses unions, food workers unions. Most of the working class in this country are women. And it is a profoundly multi-racial working class. And we have a working class of care workers. And a service economy. And an increasingly growing care economy,” she says. “That needs investing in. That needs support. That needs building.”
To hear more about the future of progressive politics, listen to this week’s episode of The Intercept Briefing.
IT’S EVEN WORSE THAN WE THOUGHT.
What we’re seeing right now from Donald Trump is a full-on authoritarian takeover of the U.S. government.
This is not hyperbole.
Court orders are being ignored. MAGA loyalists have been put in charge of the military and federal law enforcement agencies. The Department of Government Efficiency has stripped Congress of its power of the purse. News outlets that challenge Trump have been banished or put under investigation.
Yet far too many are still covering Trump’s assault on democracy like politics as usual, with flattering headlines describing Trump as “unconventional,” “testing the boundaries,” and “aggressively flexing power.”
The Intercept has long covered authoritarian governments, billionaire oligarchs, and backsliding democracies around the world. We understand the challenge we face in Trump and the vital importance of press freedom in defending democracy.
We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us?
IT’S BEEN A DEVASTATING year for journalism — the worst in modern U.S. history.
We have a president with utter contempt for truth aggressively using the government’s full powers to dismantle the free press. Corporate news outlets have cowered, becoming accessories in Trump’s project to create a post-truth America. Right-wing billionaires have pounced, buying up media organizations and rebuilding the information environment to their liking.
In this most perilous moment for democracy, The Intercept is fighting back. But to do so effectively, we need to grow.
That’s where you come in. Will you help us expand our reporting capacity in time to hit the ground running in 2026?
We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us?
I’M BEN MUESSIG, The Intercept’s editor-in-chief. It’s been a devastating year for journalism — the worst in modern U.S. history.
We have a president with utter contempt for truth aggressively using the government’s full powers to dismantle the free press. Corporate news outlets have cowered, becoming accessories in Trump’s project to create a post-truth America. Right-wing billionaires have pounced, buying up media organizations and rebuilding the information environment to their liking.
In this most perilous moment for democracy, The Intercept is fighting back. But to do so effectively, we need to grow.
That’s where you come in. Will you help us expand our reporting capacity in time to hit the ground running in 2026?
We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us?
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