Rep. Raskin: ‘Popular Protest Is Going to Become Very Important’ in Resisting Trump Agenda

EXCERPT:

RASKIN: “But popular protest is going to become very important here, and it’s going to look very different from the first Trump Administration. Everybody remembers, you know, a million people gathering for the Women’s March, and I have no doubt we could get at least that many, if not 5 million. But we also know that Donald Trump has just pardoned 1500 Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, violent insurrectionists, cop assaulters, and so we don’t want a huge protest like that to become a magnet for right-wing provocateurs and violence. Donald Trump would love nothing more than to send in the police and to, you know, stage some kind of — you know, declare martial law or something in a situation like that. But I think the decentralized local protests around particular departments, particular agencies, in particular towns and cities, are going to proliferate. And I gotta tell you, it was thrilling and exhilarating to see hundreds of people show up on just a couple hours’ notice that we were going to have a press conference outside of AID today. So there’s tremendous popular fervor here, and that’s giving everybody a lot of confidence and showing that we’re not afraid of these people. They might be attempting a coup against America, but we’re going to stop them and we're going to use every means available to us."