On March 28, 2026—two months after Trump’s gestapo forces murdered Alex Pretti and Renée Good—nearly 9 million people took to the streets to declare “No Kings” for the third time. The progressive organization behind the protest, Indivisible, declared it the largest single-day demonstration in American history.

But six months later, with November midterms fast approaching, ICE continues to kidnap immigrants from their homes and Trump is not an inch closer to being convicted and removed from office. A fourth No Kings event is just days away and some organizers have begun to question what exactly the group is demanding.

Indivisible was founded in the wake of Trump’s first election by husband and wife Ezra Levin and Leah Greenberg, both former congressional staffers. In December 2016, alongside a group of colleagues, the couple published a 26-page digital guide to resistance on Google Docs (the Indivisible Guide). The handbook quickly went viral and thousands of local Indivisible chapters began to spring up across the country, demanding Trump’s impeachment and removal from office. Democratic leadership was not amused, citing the need to stay focused on policy rather than accountability. Nancy Pelosi said the party should cultivate the image of being the “‘no drama’ Democrats.”

Ten years later, the Democrats are still reluctant to impeach Donald Trump and hold him accountable for his crimes and unconstitutional actions. Indivisible, known for its most-prominent visual, a logo of a crossed-out crown above the words “NO KINGS,” seems to have joined them in this.

Despite its origins as a movement dedicated to helping citizens pressure elected officials into resisting the Trump agenda, Indivisible National has not endorsed Trump's impeachment, telling a local chapter via email that it is “not an endorsed priority” for the No Kings! Coalition. In Montana, the organization went further, requesting that the same chapter not use the “No Kings!” logo or branding for their impeachment-focused event—and threatening to remove them from statewide communications after they didn't comply. That dispute followed another undemocratic intervention in the state's politics: a campaign by Indivisible National to convince Alani Bankhead, the Montana Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, to withdraw from the race. (Levin and Greenberg did not respond to Current Affairs’ request for comment, or an interview.)

These incidents raise questions about the direction of one of the country's largest anti-Trump organizing networks. Is the country’s leading resistance group still focused on “resistance,” or has its strategy become increasingly concerned with preserving the Democratic Party's electoral prospects?

In the streets and away from the halls of Congress

The unfortunate truth is that while local Indivisible chapters are made up of committed individuals laser-focused on opposing fascism, at the national level, it seems that Indivisible serves to insulate Congress from the honest rage of the American people.

Back in 2016, Indivisible provided information and tactics that taught Americans how to make things uncomfortable for elected officials. The Indivisible Guide taught constituents to hold onto the microphone at town halls until they got an answer, and explained exactly how to get a staffer to go off-script during a phone call. It urged Americans to disrupt congressmembers’ ribbon-cutting ceremonies (“Don’t let them get photo-ops without questions about racism, authoritarianism, and corruption”), and to “barrage” them with demands until they answered.

Today, the group’s website explicitly writes that one of their core principles is “no civil disobedience.” An updated version of Indivisible’s viral 2016 handbook now simply tells Americans “while some of the original Indivisible Guide is applicable, not all of it is.”

The 2026 guide is almost exclusively focused on electoral politics, assuring the reader that a resounding win in the midterms will puncture Trump’s aura of omnipotence, create federal checks on MAGA power, and protect the democratic transfer of power in 2028.

There is nothing inherently wrong with organizing for electoral victories. But at a time when the administration is flagrantly defying the Constitution while deploying unaccountable paramilitary forces to detain children, kidnap people off the streets, and even raid the homes of elected officials, this strategy is far from enough.

Some local organizers wanted to change that—and in Montana, they were punished by the national organization.

A comfortable status quo.

As Indivisible has gained resources and membership, they appear to have transformed from an agent of effective change to a part of the establishment. The Democratic establishment routinely chooses “safe” candidates over unabashedly progressive ones. In this cycle, those candidates have lost. Repeatedly. In multiple states. Again and again. That did not deter Indivisible National from becoming involved in a contentious effort to persuade Montana's Democratic Senate nominee, Alani Bankhead, to withdraw from her race in August 2026.

Amidst a flurry of dark money spending, Democratic Senate candidate Alani Bankhead told Montana repeatedly that her Senate campaign was not a trial run: she would not be dropping out if she won her primary. In May of 2026, her opponent Seth Bodnar declared his candidacy as an independent, despite the best efforts of the Montana Democratic Party leadership and former Democratic Montana governors Brian Schweitzer and Steve Bullock to convince him to run as a Democrat. As a result, Bodnar sat out the primary election and on June 2, Bankhead won the Democratic nomination for Senate with 43.6 percent of the vote.

Facing a three-way split due to Bodnar’s independent Senate run, unknown political operatives decided to get serious about their campaign to convince Bankhead to drop out. A now-deleted Google doc titled “Project Montana Dem Dropout” (provided to Current Affairs via email) coordinated efforts to push Bankhead out.

Indivisible spearheaded one of those efforts.

On August 4—one week before the deadline for Montana Senate candidates to drop out of the race—a senior organizer with Indivisible National sent a frantic email to all of the group's leaders in Montana, under the subject line: “URGENT!! RAPID RESPONSE CALL WITH LEAH/EZRA!!” The last-minute meeting had a clear, and seemingly critical agenda: “We will discuss the Montana Senate race, and how you all can take direct action to influence the future outcome of this race. I know this is short notice, but this is very urgent! I am asking EVERY group to please be in attendance.”

During the meeting, local organizers were asked to sign a pre-written letter to Bankhead and her staff asking the candidate to drop out of the race. Tensions rose immediately. While some members of local chapters agreed, others were appalled by the demand: “WTF? Where did Indivisible get the idea that we wanted the DULY ELECTED DEMOCRAT to drop out?” one organizer wrote in a subsequent email thread. “If you, as a national group, are not advocating for our state's interests, please stay out of our business.”

Following pushback from local organizers, Indivisible National ultimately abandoned the plan, writing in an email addressed to “Indivisible Leaders of Montana” that “after taking into account all of the responses we have received to the draft of the letter to Alani Bankhead and her staff, we have decided not to move forward” with submitting it.

The effort to push Bankhead out of the race was a resounding failure. True to her word, the Democrat did not step aside, saying it would be a “cold day in hell” before she dropped out. In an op-ed for the Washington Post, Bankhead said that succumbing to the pressure would overturn the expressed preference of Democratic primary voters, meaning party elites were deciding which choices voters should have. A member of the local Montana Indivisible group, Flathead Democracy, responded to Indivisible’s attempt to undermine democratic process by writing in an email thread: “If National didn’t actually intentionally design this whole fiasco… they are negligently terrible at predicting outcomes and shouldn’t be advising us in the first place.”

Indivisible’s intervention in the Montana race for Senate raises fundamental questions about the role of a national political organization in local elections. The group may have believed that persuading Bankhead to withdraw would improve the chances of defeating the Republican candidate, but Bankhead had won the Democratic nomination, while Bodnar chose not to compete in the primary. Local organizers, and voters, had their own views about the race, and Democrats are by no means united around Bankhead. But by attempting to persuade her to step aside, the national organization put its own assessment of electoral strategy ahead of the outcome of the primary, based on an assumption that they alone knew what was best for constituents.

It was not the last time Indivisible National would clash with its Montana chapters.

No Kings. No Demands. No Teeth.

Despite Indivisible National’s attempt to push Bankhead out of Montana’s senate race, the organization remained the established leader of the resistance movement. A few weeks later, local Montana Indivisible groups began planning for Indivisible’s next day of action.

On August 27, Flathead Democracy brought an idea to the national organizers: focus the early vote efforts on impeachment to pressure congressional candidates to take a stance on holding the Trump administration accountable. The plan was simple: inspire voters to go to the polls with a concrete demand—vote for candidates who will pursue the impeachment, conviction, and removal of Trump and his enablers.

Indivisible National was not interested. The national organization instead ratcheted up pressure on Montana Indivisible groups to fall in line. On September 4, Indivisible emailed Flathead Democracy to request that they not use the No Kings label or branding for their event, saying impeachment was “not an endorsed priority of the coalition.” (Indivisible’s 2025 attempt to trademark the “No Kings!” logo failed, meaning their branding is legally open for anyone to use.)

USPTO rejection of trademark for official No Kings! logo as filed by Indivisible on December 12, 2025.

In fact, Flathead Democracy was using its own crossed out crown logo, the one they had developed for their March 2025 No Kings event, held three months before the first nationwide “No Kings.” Citing disillusioned voters that needed a concrete reason to vote, Flathead Democracy decided to move forward with its impeachment-focused event anyway, using the group’s version of the logo, and informed Indivisible National of their decision.

In response, the national group requested a meeting with the chapter’s members to discuss items “that have caused concern regarding your behavior and working relationship with Indivisible.” One of the agenda items was the chapter’s “use of the NK branding in a way that is harmful to the movement.” In emails shared with Current Affairs, Indivisible then informed Flathead Democracy that they would be removed from statewide communications. (Because those communication networks were maintained by Flathead Democracy, however, not Indivisible, that threat was never executed.)

March 2025 Flathead Democracy Facebook post advertising an alternative state of the (dis)union address.

Flathead Democracy “No Kings: Impeach Convict Remove” logo and language.

It remains remarkable that a group committed to “No Kings!” not only refuses to endorse impeachment but actively discourages other members from doing so. When it comes to accountability, Indivisible National seems to have fallen prey to the same malaise that has infected the 119th Congress. Like Congress, Indivisible discusses the anti-constitutional and illegal actions of the administration at length. Like Congress, its leaders fundraise heavily off of those abuses of power. And like Congress, Indivisible has simply refused to take any further action. To critics, the organization has transformed into a hollow shell of its former self, hoping no one pushes too hard on the facade.

From Confronting Congress to Electing Democrats

Indivisible’s 2025 guide explicitly states that the best case outcome is to “fight Trump to a draw and sometimes score a win.” They are clear that this plan is time-limited, “to make it to 2026."

The thing is, no one is fighting this administration to a draw. No one really seems to be fighting at all. Barely two years into the term, academics have catalogued more than 4,000 anti-democratic and anti-constitutional actions by Trump and his administration. Democracy, and Democrats, have entirely failed to constrain rising authoritarianism and voters know it.

What Democratic voters (and Dem-leaning independents!) want is an end to Trump’s corruption and abuse. And they want it by huge margins: In a September 2026 poll, 81 percent of respondents selected “ending Trump’s corruption and abuse of power” as their preferred priority for the Democratic party. For 37 percent of respondents, ending Trump’s corruption and abuse was the only thing they wanted the party to focus on.

The American people want Trump gone. Another September 2026 poll indicated that more than 70 percent of Democrats want to see Trump out of office by almost any means necessary: impeachment, 25th amendment, military coup, or death by natural causes. (Only the “assassination” option did not see a majority of respondents feeling positive.) Respondents were also asked whether they were “more likely to support a candidate in a Democratic party primary that regularly criticizes the Democratic Party establishment.” Nearly half of respondents agreed with that statement, with just 27 percent disagreeing—and these are dyed-in-the-wool Democrats, with 70 percent holding a positive view of the party.

In its most recent guide, Indivisible asks its members to consider whether actions they are taking “strengthen future Democratic candidates, weaken future Republican opponents, and build the base of involved, active people who will stay involved next year.” These polling results suggest that what engages voters, while strengthening both Democratic candidates and the Democratic party, is more than just a robust critique of the status quo. It’s a full-throated demand for accountability and a willingness to fight for it.

It’s not news that Congress doesn’t listen to the American people. Congressional approval ratings have fallen even further than Trump’s, sliding from 25 percent to 15 percent over the last year. In order to hold the Trump administration accountable, Congress has to be willing to use the powers granted to it by the Constitution to withhold funding, end wars, and yes, impeach, convict, and remove.

If Congress refuses to do that, the American people must hold them accountable too.

The process of holding Congress accountable hasn’t actually changed over the last decade. House members—Republican or Democrat—must all seek election every two years. They are up for re-election right now, and the mid-term elections are less than a month away. Campaigns know that they have to answer voter questions if they want those votes, and so right now, they are uniquely vulnerable to constituent pressure. In 2016, Indivisible National could focus their membership exclusively on pressuring MAGA Republicans. But to be effective in 2026, they would have to encourage their membership of millions to hold the feet of both Democrats and Republicans to the fire for their failure to reign in the Trump administration.

In early 2025, Levin and Greenberg landed on a brilliant strategy to do just this. They asked Senators to deny unanimous consent in order to slow down the confirmation of Trump’s appointees and obstruct his legislative priorities. The Senate is full of arcane rules, but they can unanimously agree to bypass a rule, and often do, to streamline Senate business. However, if a single Senator objects to this unanimous consent, they can torpedo the plan. Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) did this for nine months in 2023 and singlehandedly held up hundreds of military appointments.

There are approximately 20 requests for unanimous consent during each day in the Senate. By week seven of the 119th Congress, there had been 461 requests for unanimous consent and only ten objections—eight by Republicans and two by Democrats. Only one of those objections resulted in a delayed nomination: Russell Vought, as director of the Office of Management and Budget. The rapid pace of confirmations was notable even to Republicans. On February 5, 2025, Senator Lankford (R-OK) said: “We have confirmed more people now in the Senate than were confirmed in the first three weeks of the Biden administration and in the first three weeks of the first Trump administration combined.”

Nothing required the 119th Congress to speed-run Trump appointees and agendas. Any Democratic senator could have objected to unanimous consent at any time. Indivisible was, at one point, urging members to demand their Senators take this specific action to constrain the Trump administration. And then they stopped.

Indivisible’s 2025 guide to the new democratic Congress includes a section describing the effectiveness of denying unanimous consent in the Senate. But the link provided to readers to “read more” is no longer active. (Indivisible National did not reply to a request for comment as to why they retired this demand.)

Excerpt from the Indivisible's 2025 document "Indivisible on Offense: A Practical Guide to the New, Democratic House"advocating for the denial of unanimous consent in the Senate.

Resistance is more than opposition.

There is a resistance movement in the United States. It has been actively pursuing impeachment, conviction, and removal, the constitutional remedy for Trump’s treasonous tyranny for more than a year and a half. FLARE USA has held a continuous protest in Washington D.C. since May 2025 and walks citizen declarations of support for impeachment into congressional offices every Monday. Remove the Regime, the coalition led by Jessica Denson, demanded impeachment on the National Mall last November and regularly works with Free Speech for People to bring impeachment articles to the floor of the House for a vote. Ralph Nader’s organization is working behind the scenes to get articles of impeachment written and filed.

Congress is slowly getting into the act as well. Rule IX of the House of Representatives allows any member to raise impeachment as a question of privilege and force a vote within two legislative days. Representative Al Green (D-TX) has already forced three votes on Trump’s impeachment. There are now ten active impeachment resolutions for members of the administration (four for President Trump, three for Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and one each for Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, Secretary of Human Health and Services Robert F. Kennedy, and Chief Justice John Roberts, and Director of the Office of Budget and Management Russell Vought). Former Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and Former Attorney General Pam Bondi were both forced out under threat of impeachment. And in September, Representative Thomas Massie (R-KY) became the first Republican to force a vote on impeachment using Rule IX. To avoid the required vote, Johnson sent the House into an early recess. Congress will now vote whether to take up the question of impeaching Hegseth on Nov 9.

I lead Citizens’ Impeachment, a grassroots nonpartisan movement that helps people directly pressure their members of Congress to impeach Trump and his administration since April 2025. We are a project of Courage for Democracy PAC, and Alani Bankhead is one of 25 Courage Candidates on the ballot who have pledged to impeach Donald Trump. In January 2026, 10,000 people signed up to lobby for impeachment, meeting their members of Congress at district offices. In February, those same groups turned down our invitation to repeat the exercise, saying that they had to prepare for No Kings. In some cases, these groups refused to pursue impeachment simply because Indivisible National had not endorsed it.

To anyone not riddled with the brainworms endemic to D.C. political life, the impeachment, conviction, and removal of President Trump is the obvious and immediate demand for a rally titled No Kings. The impeachment process is the Constitution’s own remedy for addressing an unfit government official, especially a wannabe dictator like Donald Trump. It was added to the Constitution as an explicit remedy for tyranny because Benjamin Franklin knew that war and assassinations waited if we had no other way to remove a mad king. 

Impeachment is, very literally, how the Constitution says “No Kings!” There are no other options. Application of the 25th amendment would require the President to have a cabinet that was at least half composed of something other than ghouls and loyalists committed to speedrunning the end of democracy. Attempts to deny Trump via the 14th amendment have been rejected by the Supreme Court and the question returned to Congress. If Trump were truly a danger to democracy, the Court presumes, Congress would impeach, convict, and remove him from office.

In light of the Trump administration’s ongoing and egregious efforts to sabotage this election (some of them impeachable offenses in and of themselves), Indivisible National’s focus on voting is insufficient to protect a failing democracy. The Founders rejected the idea that in a true crisis, the country could wait for the next election. James Madison argued that the limited duration of a president’s term was “not a sufficient security” against a president who might become corrupt, oppressive, or betray the public trust. By perverting his administration into oppression, Trump’s own conduct demands impeachment, conviction, and removal.

Indivisible has spent nearly a decade warning its millions of members about the danger posed by the Trump administrations. The president’s second term has seen repeated violations of the 1st, 4th, and 5th amendments, aggressive efforts to undermine the 14th, ongoing violations of civil liberties, criminal wars of aggression abroad, efforts to erode election integrity and “just-a-joke” suggestions that Trump will run for a third term. Despite the clear and present danger to this democracy, Indivisible National has asked its members to consider impeachment only once, and it wasn’t even of Trump. It was of Kristi Noem.

Five minutes after Trump fired Kristi Noem as head of the Department of Homeland Security, Indivisible national sent out an email asking their membership to call Congress and demand Noem’s impeachment. And 40 minutes after that, they sent another email saying: "OK, obviously this was a coincidence, but a win is a win. No need to call and email your Members of Congress about impeaching Noem now." Wow, what great timing. Never mind. Don’t bother calling your member of Congress. She’s already gone.

Read that again. The premier “resistance” organizing group told their membership that impeachment was possible only after it was no longer necessary. And to ensure that Congress was not bothered by constituent pressure, they walked back that ask less than an hour later. Apparently there were no other officials to impeach, no other impeachable offenses to discuss with Congress at that time. No reason for folks to call their representative, not really. 

It was just a few weeks after this false start on impeachment that the American people showed up on the streets for No Kings 3. Indivisible National still has not endorsed impeachment. Congress is still refusing to act. Trump is still in power. And Trump continues to abuse the American people.

No one is coming to save us. We have to save ourselves.

In the six months since No Kings 3, the leaders of the national Indivisible organization have subverted democratic outcomes and diverted the righteous anger of the American people away from Congress. In doing so, they are signaling that they are comfortable allowing this autocratic regime to remain in power. The establishment they support says it outright, with House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries stating that impeachment is not a priority and Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) saying that she wants to “move on” and help Trump “save face.”

They are out of touch. The American people want accountability. 55 percent of Americans, to include 80-plus percent of Democrats and 60-plus percent of independents, support impeachment. In fact, a majority of Americans have wanted impeachment since April of 2025.

Congress refuses to listen, and Indivisible seems content to let Congress pat constituents on the head and tell them to let the adults handle this. Our leaders are not leading, and so citizens must pave the way.

To the local Indivisible groups reading this: the power you wield has always been yours and yours alone. Indivisible uses your labor and your energy to fundraise, and Congress needs Indivisible to keep you trusting that there is a plan. But Democratic leadership has now come right out and said it—there is no plan. Representative Jeffries has not ruled anything in or anything out. Instead, he is meeting secretly with the unelected nepo-baby responsible for failed negotiations with Iran.

You have the power to hold every single member of Congress accountable, Democrat or Republican. Show up directly at your congressional office, talk with your staffers, and insist that your member of Congress uphold their oath of office.

When you do, use 2016 Indivisible’s own tools. Ask your member of Congress what the plan is to hold this administration accountable. If they tell you about lawsuits they have filed and legislation they have passed, ask how that holds this lawless administration accountable, now, in the moment that they are violating the Constitution and harming the American people. And if you are speaking to your House representative—or to Indivisible national—-ask them specifically whether they will commit to pursuing impeachment.

Wait for their response. Don’t give up the mic until they answer you.