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Democracy Dies in Darkness – It’s Time for a Reckoning

By Maria Perez, Co-founder and Co-Executive Director of Democracy Rising,

and Muthoni Wambu Kraal, co-founder and Executive Director of Women’s Democracy Lab

All we have is each other.

This is not the first time large segments of the population—we the people—have faced state-sanctioned dehumanization and violence. We’ve seen it in the genocide of Indigenous peoples, centuries of slavery, decades of Jim Crow. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 made it easier, after Pearl Harbor, to justify the internment of Japanese Americans. Throughout our history, we’ve seen police forces act as systemic agents of racial control. Today, we face the stripping of reproductive rights, the promise to round up millions of immigrant and mixed-status families, and more.

For some time now, we’ve known that we’ve been teetering on the edge of a new era of state-sanctioned racism and misogyny, and the 2024 election has shown us that we failed to prevent it. We are no longer standing on the edge—we have fallen off the cliff into dark and dangerous times. But like every time before this, only we can keep each other safe and protected. And like every time before this, we will rise again.

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For Black women—who have been at the forefront of protecting democracy—the stakes have never been more personal. We watched as the margins of voters of color, alongside white women, tipped the scales between electing a highly qualified woman of color president and ushering in a government of tyrannical white nationalists. 

In response, Black women have drawn a line in the sand. We are done weaving a collective quilt of safety for all—only to see it unraveled by those who fail to act in the interest of the most vulnerable. For women of color, the message is painfully clear: the incoming regime’s plan is to fully relegate us as a collective underclass, the hell with our rights. We are all rightfully shocked; feeling betrayed, fearful, irate, ashamed of this country’s choices, and deeply exhausted.  

It is almost inconceivable that a blatantly racist, sexist, and authoritarian wannabe dictator was elected by a popular vote—including more Black and brown votes than ever before. Authoritarian figures have been elected democratically in other countries for decades, but we often tell ourselves this happens only in countries with weaker democracies or more homogeneous populations. History provides some insight.

In 2018, Brazil—a country where whites are the minority—elected its own white supremacist autocrat, Jair Bolsonaro. At the time, there was a narrative suggesting that non-white voters had somehow been entranced by him, even as he denigrated and dehumanized them. The truth is, there have always been Black and brown people in Brazil who supported racism and sexism. The same holds true with voters of color here.

Voters make decisions based on a wide range of factors, including deeply ingrained family values, religious beliefs, societal pressures, trauma, and individual disposition. Propaganda is a powerful tool, and social media is an unmatched accelerant. So yes, some of our Black, Latino, AAPI, and Indigenous people voted for this, but a larger story is likely to emerge about the coalition of voters of color who “stayed home.” All of these dynamics should be turned from blame into questions— Why and where do we go from here? If we fail to diagnose the underlying political choices of those who fought to protect the nation from autocracy—and those who didn’t, we will also miss the answers we seek. 

We have a role to play to address the threat to the decades of coalitions and trust we’ve worked hard to build across communities. We will need to create broader input and ownership over agendas that benefit the many, while practicing engagement and communication that navigates racism, sexism, and fears of replacement that also exist across communities of color.

We cannot afford to abandon any segment of our people because of the choices made by some, and rejecting the blame narrative is a crucial first step

The second step is to go small and build our democracy at the grassroots level. The road ahead is tough, it will require all of us—whether we voted for a different outcome, the outcome we got, or didn’t vote. We know what the incoming federal government has promised. They intend to stay in power, ruling by any means necessary. We have a very short time to prepare.

When Indigenous Zapatista leaders in Chiapas responded to the grave economic threat to communities following the 1994 launch of NAFTA, Subcomandante Marcos made their mission clear: “we are here to ensure that the inclusive, tolerant, and plural tomorrow—which is, incidentally, the only tomorrow possible—will arrive.” 1

This is our assignment now.

Policy fights must continue, and they must be fought wherever and whenever we can—at the local and state levels. But much of our work now is also cultural. Culture is shaped by action, art, dialogue, and creating spaces for people to come together. It cultivates democratic values and practices.

Focusing on cultural renewal will give us concrete evidence that what we do now matters—and bring joy in doing it together. We’ve seen movements like Black Lives Matter and Standing Rock spring up, fueled by solidarity. We’ve seen neighbors in urban and rural communities respond to COVID-19 and help one another through climate disasters. We are capable of organizing mutual aid and solidarity structures across political and racial divides.

We have leaders who have done this, and new ones will bring fresh energy. Our priority must be to keep as many people as safe as possible until this regime ends. But make no mistake: we must rebuild our coalition so we can fortify our shared democratic future on the other side.

1 “Fourth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, “A new lie is being sold to us as history,” quoted in Gustavo Esteva and Madhu Suri Prakash, Grassroots Postmodernism: Remaking the Soil of Cultures (New York: Zed Books, 1998), 43.”

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