Stay Off the Roads: Join Us on Zoom Tonight

IMV Vigil & Action Virtual Gathering
Sunday, January 25
7 pm-8 pm

It's been a terrible 24 hours. The hopeful inspiration of seeing tens of thousands of Minnesotans march in solidarity with neighbors and stand up to resist occupation by Trump's paramilitary on Friday was shattered yesterday in the midst of the brutal murder of VA ICU nurse Alex Pretti.  

And yet, we are in the midst of a snow storm and travel advisory that limits our ability to gather physically as a political action community to comfort one another, express outrage, and share ideas for response.  

Please join us for a virtual vigil in memory of Alex Pretti, and in solidarity with directly impacted people in Minnesota, Portland, and every city targeted by ICE and by the cruelty and lies of this regime's state terror.   

We will have time for processing our horror and grief, but also for brainstorming creative ideas for using our voices, resisting authoritarianism, and helping neighbors in the Mohawk Valley in the days and weeks ahead. 

Take Action in Solidarity with Minnesota Today

Today Minnesotans are stopping work, school, shopping, and other activities to engage in a day of Truth & Freedom.  The people of Minnesota have been inspiring us all and we need to support them.  We are not holding a solidarity event today, as we have regular rallies on Thursdays and Saturdays --and the weather is especially tough for gathering outside today and tomorrow.  

So, what can we do to be in solidarity with the Minnesotans who have been on the front lines of the ICE invasion in their communities? Read on for suggestions.

(Photo from Minnesota Indivisible Alliance.)

Call Your Members of Congress NOW!

This week we are responding to calls to action from Indivisible that urge our elected representatives in Washington to stand up to the Trump administration on several issues.  Here are the calls you should make today, and emails to send as well.

Tell your Senators: Rein in ICE NOW. The coalition behind ICE Out For Good is following our historic weekend of action by flooding Congress with calls demanding that they use the upcoming Homeland Security funding bill to rein in ICE. After calling your Senators, call your Representative.

Call, Email, & Take Action

We hope many of you joined the National Mass Call on Wednesday evening, "Healthcare not Warfare," and the Rapid Response Call: ICE Killing and Lawlessness in Minneapolis that was held last night on Zoom.  Both events were scheduled in response to unfolding Trump regime actions that occurred after our last weekly email.  

Take action NOW!

What's your 2026 Activism Resolution?  

We need to hear from you!  2026 is going to be (arguably) the most important election year of our lives to date.  It's going to be a year when solidarity and political activism form a bulwark to defend against authoritarianism. Trump and his supporters in Congress and in the state governments may act like wounded animals lashing out at the most defenseless people and institutions in a last ditch effort to keep power. And those people and institutions will need backup. 

What do you plan to do?

This is the final IMV email newsletter of 2025.  We want to start off 2026 with a newsletter that doesn't just detail Trump Republican horrors but instead, catalogs your commitments to defend against them, defeat them at the polls, and make a better world.

Rally With Us This Week

Even if you can only come for 20 or 30 minutes, put on your boots and coat and join a rally. If rallies are cancelled by the organizers because of weather conditions, it will be posted at least an hour or two prior on our Indivisible Mohawk Valley Facebook page.  

Our rallies build connection and community by showing up together regularly, and we let the public know that there is strong opposition to Trump, MAGA, and Project 2025 authoritarian policies.

And, review the tips for talking politics discussed at our recent Zoom meeting.

IMV's December Meeting: Tuesday, Dec. 9th

Please join Indivisible Mohawk Valley for an engaging and educational virtual meeting focused onMessaging & Communication.  

Since the season can get busy, and the weather is unpredictable, we will gather on Zoom for our December meeting.

IMV's December 2025 Meeting on Zoom

We hope you had a fun and relaxing Thanksgiving holiday with family and friends.  If you had any difficult conversations about politics, or you spent a little too much energy trying to avoid such interactions, we have a way to make the coming weeks of family gatherings and social events just a little bit easier...

Please join Indivisible Mohawk Valley for an engaging and educational virtual meeting focused onMessaging & Communication. Since the season can get busy and the weather unpredictable, we will gather on Zoom.

LGBTQ Rights Rally in Rome Saturday

Please join the weekly Saturday Rally in Rome, NY, with a special focus: LGBTQ Rights and Solidarity. 
The rally is in honor of Transgender and Intersex Day of Remembrance.

Bring signs supporting LGBTQ+ rights.
As always, signs in support of democracy, affordability of health care, and human rights (and against authoritarianism and fascism) are welcome. 

BRING: Your favorite signs and noisemakers, bells etc.
Any non-perishable food and hygiene items collected will be donated to community food pantries and nonprofit agencies serving those in need. 

Join a Targeted Boycott: "We Ain't Buying It" 

Many of you have been advocating for more economic boycott campaigns to build on the successes of the campaigns against Disney/ABC in reaction to the Jimmy Kimmel firing, Tesla (because of Musk's DOGE), and Avelo Airlines, a commercial airline that took Trump regime contracts to disappear immigrants on their planes. 

Here is a targeted campaign that relies on all of us to not only boycott specific companies on specific days (very measurable in terms of impact) but also to share the campaign, get our friends and family members to sign, and spread the details on our personal social media accounts.  

The action is specifically for Nov. 27-Dec. 1st, so it includes Black Friday and Cyber Monday. 

Don't Just Get Mad, Take Action

What happened on Sunday? 
First, we had a great turnout for our big Fall Fiesta on Sunday!  We collected food donations and volunteers brought that food and monetary donations to the Utica Food Bank.  Leftover fajita food went to Cornerstone Church's Morrow Warming Center.  Thank you to everyone who contributed.

Then on Sunday night, eight Senate Democrats defected and capitulated to Republicans in return for almost nothing.All that pain for nothing. Even after Democrats soared to election and ballot initiative victories on a wave of affirmation for holding strong on the fight against Trump.  Even after an increasing majority of the public was blaming Republicans and not Democrats for the shutdown and the harm to working people.  Eight Democrats caved.   It was crushing.

Read Indivisible's response and plan for action.

Congratulations & Thank You, Local Candidates!

Congratulations to our local candidates who ran for office and won!  It was a great day for our judicial candidates--they worked so hard to cover a vast territory of counties for months, and Democrats won three of the four seats in our district of the NY Supreme Court.

We thank everyone who ran and everyone who volunteered to help them.  Democracy is not a spectator sport, but it is a team sport.  Great job, team!

(Photo from Rally to thank Representative John Mannion.)

Vote. Get Your Friends to Vote Too

We are asking you to vote early.  There are three days left--today, tomorrow, and Sunday. 

Please also text or call FIVE (5) of your friends and ask them to vote early.  Do that immediately.  Ask friends, family, and co-workers: "What is your voting plan?"  or "When are you planning to vote?"  Drive them to the polls if you have to!  Make sure they know how important it is to vote for Democratic candidates in this election, because many of the Republicans on the ballot are MAGA or MAGA complicit.  

We are asking you to vote early starting tomorrow, Oct. 25, and thru Nov. 2.  Please also text or call FIVE (5) of your friends and ask them to vote early.  Do that immediately.  Ask friends, family, and co-workers: "What is your voting plan?" or "When are you planning to vote?"  Just get them to the polls!  Make sure they know how important it is to vote for Democratic candidates in this election, because many of the Republicans on the ballot are MAGA or MAGA complicit.  

After No Kings: What's Next?

Thank you to everyone who showed up in the Mohawk Valley or anywhere for #NoKingsDay! 

From our official counters, we had nearly 5,000 attendees at the three events co-sponsored by IMV, plus another thousand at Hamilton. Our movement is growing!  And contrary to the Republican talking points, every single event across the country was joyful and peaceful.
 
Protests serve many purposes -- they change the narrative, they grow our movement, they show people reeling under the weight of the regime’s atrocities that they are not alone. But a single day of protest -- even the largest single-day protest we’ve seen in our lifetimes -- will not overcome the fascist onslaught we face.  It’s going to take ongoing, strategic organizing -- exactly the kind of organizing Indivisible was created to foster -- to deliver us from tyranny. Now it’s up to each of us to channel this incredible energy into the organizing power it will take to defeat autocracy and win.

#NoKingsDay Tomorrow!

"If your First Amendment rights are under attack, and you decline to show up because of those threats, then you don't have First Amendment rights."
--Ezra Levin, Indivisible

Now is the time to join together and stand up to a wanna be dictator, his corrupt administration, and his complicit allies in Congress and the Supreme Court.  Time to make our voices and our presence--in huge numbers--loud and clear for everyone to see. 

"The Largest Single Day Protest in American History" 

With almost 2500 events registered so far across the globe, the total number of events has already far outpaced June’s No Kings Day, and more are being added every day.
Indivisible leaders are confident that October 18th No Kings will be the largest single day protest ever in American history. Do not let your friends, family, and co-workers miss out on this event.  Someday, after we end this nightmare, and democracy flourishes again, our grandchildren and great-grandchildren will ask us whether we showed up on the side of justice, truth, and multicultural democracy on this day.  We need to be able to say, "Yes, I was there." 

Demand #CareNotCuts & End the #TrumpShutdown

After an explanation of the government shutdown, we list some specific actions we can take today and on October 18.

"We are not without fear. But we walk through it in courage. The kind of courage that topples kings."  -Greisa Martinez Rosas of United We Dream Action

 No Kings Oct.18:
We Need YOU to Start Recruiting Your Friends

Have you seen the #NoKings.org map explode? Our Utica, Rome and Herkimer rallies are now on the map!

Our only path out of this autocratic freefall is to bring millions more people--a very big, wide coalition--into the public, open, transparent movement against authoritarianism.

Action on Every Front: How IMV Will Help Defeat Autocracy

If you were at IMV's September meeting on Wednesday, you probably caught the wave of excitement as many new groups formed to focus on creative ways of throwing a wrench in the works of accelerating MAGA authoritarianism,

People joined around tables and brainstormed and shared ideas, raised questions and concerns, and then exchanged contact information so they could set up their next meeting to start turning their ideas into actions. 

What's next?
Next week in this newsletter we'll share out the projects that are underway and the contact email for how YOU can join in any effort that fits your interest, skill, or passion.  

As Colt Brumm said as he charged the groups, "You keep hearing that SOMEBODY should do something. But every person in this room is SOMEBODY."