“No Kings”? Absolutely. But Also “No Oligarchy”

Ben Burgis has an important article over at Jacobin, a piece that reflects the message on the sign I made for last Saturday’s “No Kings” march and rally in St. Paul (above).

“Last weekend’s massive ‘No Kings’ rallies proved Donald Trump’s deep unpopularity,” writes Burgis. “But Trump should be opposed as a symptom of America’s vast warmongering, oligarchic elite, not a simply a grotesque anomaly.”

Following is more of what Burgis says about this important issue.

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Trumpism came into existence precisely because we live in a wildly unequal and increasingly economically precarious and unequal society, and this made the neoliberal centrism of the dominant wing of the Democratic Party increasingly unappealing. Trump was able to scapegoat immigrants (accused of stealing jobs or smuggling fentanyl) or foreign nations screwing over the United States in bad trade deals for problems actually caused by our own domestic oligarchs.

Democrats and liberals largely responded to the rise of Trump with an empty defense of procedural democracy per se without tying this defense to any real sense of how democracy can be used to improve the lives of ordinary people. Hence, we had years of relitigating every detail of the January 6 riots even as Democrats pretended to be powerless to even overrule the Senate parliamentarian to raise the national minimum wage. That strategy failed so catastrophically that now Trump is back in office.

Trump’s right-wing authoritarian demagoguery is a particularly dangerous symptom of a much deeper rot. Those early “Fighting Oligarchy” rallies had the virtue of identifying that rot, and putting forward an alternative message about the same underlying social problems that bred Trumpism in the first place.

It’s very good that so many people are outraged at the administration’s authoritarianism. The turnout at the rallies was inspiring, and I hope that we see much more of the same going forward. . . . Our message needs to be clear. No Kings? Absolutely. But also No Oligarchy.

To read Ben Burgis’s article “Don’t Lose Sight of the Oligarchy” in its entirety, click here.


Related Off-site Links:
Making “No Kings” a Turning Point – Christopher D. Cook (Common Dreams, June 19, 2025).
The New American Oligarchy: Creating a Country of the Rich, by the Rich, and for the Rich – Andy Kroll (The Indypendent, December 3, 2010).
Why You Should Hate the Rich Even More: An Interview With Rob Larson – The Chris Hedges Report (June 18, 2025).
The Right Wing’s Goal of Repealing the 20th Century Is Now Within Reach. Who Will Stop Them? – John Tarleton (The Indypendent, February 13, 2025).
“End the Oligarchy”: Sunrise Movement Launches Campaign to Confront Trump and Fossil Fuel Barons – Stephen Prager (Common Dreams, April 26, 2025).
“This Is What Oligarchy Is About”: Republicans Plans to Slash Medicaid to Offer More Tax Cuts to the Rich – Democracy Now! (May 12, 2025).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• “Protesting Is What Patriotism Looks Like in Public”: The “No Kings” Protests of June 14, 2025
• Norman Solomon: Quote of the Day – June 16, 2025
• Peter Bloom: Quote of the Day – June 10, 2025
• Ted Rall on What It Means to Be a Leftist in 2025
• Butch Ware on His Run for California Governor and the Wider Goal of Disrupting the Duopoly
• Eric Fernández: Quote of the Day – May 14, 2025
• Progressive Perspectives on Bernie Sanders’ “Fighting Oligarchy” Tour
• Why the Democratic Party Is Not Going to Save Us From Fascism
• An Opportunity for Organizing Against Duopoly
• Building Solidarity on the Left
• “It Is Our Responsibility to Make a Third Party Viable”
• “The Moment Is Ripe”: Butch Ware on Building a “True Oppositional Alternative” to the Duopoly
• Democrat Talk on the Eve of Trump’s Return
• Breaking the Mold: Why Progressives Should Push for Marianne Williamson to Lead the DNC
• Inauguration Day Thoughts
• The Green Party’s Jill Stein and Butch Ware Give Their First Post-Election Interview
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in the 2024 Election
• “A New Chapter of the Democratic Party Needs to Begin”
• What the Republican Party Now Stands For
• The Lamentable Legacy of the Biden Administration
• Jill Stein: “We Give Reasons for People to Come Out and Vote”
• We’re Witnessing a Liberal Meltdown Over Jill Stein
• Butch Ware: “You Can Actually Vote Your Conscience”
• Peter Bloom on the Unmasking of the “Democratic Charade”
• The “Green Smoothie” Option
• Green Party Vice Presidential Candidate Butch Ware in Minneapolis
• When Democrats Undermine Democracy
• Elise Labott on How Third Parties Can Revitalize Democracy
• Something to Think About – August 15, 2024
• Centrist/Corporatist Democrats Have Just Launched “Left Punching” Season
• “Americans Deserve Choices”: Jill Stein on Breaking Points – 4/30/24
• AOC Falls in Line
• The Cassandra of U.S. Politics on the “True State of the Union”
• Will Democrats Never Learn?
• “The Next Step Is a Green Step”: Cornel West Endorses Jill Stein (2016)
• Hope Over Fear: Voting Green

Image: Michael J. Bayly.