freelansing in Seattle

As the abuses spewing forth from the White House become more widespread, serious, and unavoidable, let’s keep one question in mind: How much abuse from a national tyrant are we willing to endure before we walk away from this dysfunctional relationship? This question is especially relevant to Pacific states (Washington, Oregon, California, & Hawaii).

California has borne the worst of it so far, and we can be thankful that Gavin Newsom and other California Democrats have chosen to fight back rather than simply roll over against federal bullying and abuse. But we know that the Tangerine Tyrant is coming for Washington and Oregon as well. (Looking at you, Portland! Remember last time?)

Most people are assuming we need to defeat the fascist wave by winning back at least one house of Congress in 2026 and the White House in 2028. But what if MAGApublicans succeed in preventing such victory through gerrymandering, voter suppression, and other rigging of the electoral system? Are blue states willing to continue to endure fascist rule that their voters want no part of? Is it time to consider other options? In a relationship with an abusive partner, when is it time to stop trying to reconcile irreconcilable differences and simply walk away?

Some states are already engaging in what some have called “soft secession” by creating regional compacts that work around federal dysfunction. One example is the recently formed West Coast Health Alliance (plus a similar effort formed in the Northeast) to bypass RFK, Jr.’s anti-vax policies and keep state citizens healthy based on actual science. There is a similar regional compact around climate science in the face of an administration that irrationally hates windmills, supports “Drill, baby, drill,” and wants to make coal great again.

We are seeing more abuses emanating from this regime every day. It may be time for contiguous regions of blue states (like Pacific states and north Atlantic states) to find ways to create more separation from the mad king and his tyrannical rule. “States rights” used to be a Republican rallying cry to preserve racist and other regressive policies, but maybe it’s time for progressives to embrace the concept.

As more soft secession efforts develop, we may also need to start considering what hard secession might look like. It’s hard to know how things will develop over the coming months and years, but secession needs to be on the menu. These United States have not realistically been united for many years. Time to acknowledge that reality and begin to consider alternatives.

It’s too early to know exactly what that might look like or exactly how it might come about. What extreme authoritarian action will be the final straw to precipitate an extreme response? We don’t know, but we should be ready.

Postscript: The accompanying graphic here says “U.S. out of Cascadia!” If you don’t know, Cascadia is a hydrologically defined region of watersheds that flow into the Pacific Ocean from southeast Alaska to northern California. It includes most of British Columbia and Idaho, as well as western Montana. In some ideal future, it would be best if political jurisdictions matched watersheds and bioregions, but that’s probably a question for the distant future.

For the near future, the question is how we survive the immediate assault on humanity and our ecosystems where we are. And while it can be argued that such a thing as a “blue state” is ultimately an arbitrary fiction—with plenty of red areas—it is still a political reality. For now, it makes more sense to envision a Pacific alliance of existing blue states than an altogether new formation based on watershed boundaries. Pacifica rather than Cascadia. Some of the details will be addressed in future posts.