A group of Vote Yes on Question 1 campaigners stands in front of their farmers market booth in October. Photo by the author
As the Champaign-Urbana community considers how we’ll navigate a second Trump presidency, we can learn from the organizing that led to local ballot victories this past November. The massive effort that made these ballot wins possible holds part of the answer to the question many of us are asking: what do we do now?
In Cunningham Township, voters overwhelmingly passed advisory referendum Question One: “Shall the United States federal government and subordinate divisions stop giving military funding to Israel, which currently costs taxpayers $3.8 billion a year, given Israel’s global recognition as an apartheid regime with a track record of human rights violations?”
The vast majority of officials in Washington, D.C. have ignored Americans’ calls for an end to US military support for the Israeli regime that has committed numerous human rights violations and blocked humanitarian aid into Gaza. Many residents of Champaign-Urbana have joined a growing movement that voices its opposition to a siege that cost American taxpayers at least $17.9 billion in its first 12 months. This has been no easy feat, as major media outlets and government officials have downplayed the atrocities committed by the Israeli government in Palestine. The national trend of criminalizing protestors has further silenced dissent against our tax dollars funding the most well-documented genocide of our lifetime, making it harder to know who shares our humanitarian principles.
The local Palestine liberation movement grew rapidly after October 7, 2023. Organizers from groups like Prairie Liberation Center Alliance (PLCA), Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), Urbana-Champaign Jews for Ceasefire (UCJC), and Champaign-Urbana Muslim Action Committee (CUMAC) have mobilized area residents to join protests and boycotts, call elected officials, and speak at city council meetings to demand a ceasefire resolution and divestment from entities that fund genocide. The collective efforts of these organizations resulted in a resounding victory at the ballot box. The voters approved Question One with over 70 percent voting yes, to less than 30 percent voting no.
Question One originated from a campaign that demanded that Urbana City Council pass a ceasefire resolution in early 2024. For months, the above-listed organizations mobilized community members to pack Urbana City Hall and use public comment time to advocate for the resolution to be added to the council’s agenda. After two months, the council unanimously passed a ceasefire resolution including language that was bold at the time: the United States should stop sending weapons to Israel.
Building on this victory, a group of Urbana-based organizers with PSL researched the township’s strict requirements for getting a referendum on the November 5 ballot. The proposed referendum easily won a majority vote at a township meeting in the spring, launching the Vote Yes campaign to get the Cunningham Township Question One referendum passed by popular vote.
Bryan Maxwell, an Urbana resident and organizer with PLCA, is one of the organizers who campaigned for Cunningham Township Question One and also against the Champaign County Public Safety Sales Tax ballot measure. They “set up a table at the Urbana Farmers Market to talk to voters about both these referendums.” Maxwell named PLCA and IMC Community Wellness and Solidarity as two groups that organize around local issues like housing, alternatives to policing, and collective liberation. These groups were at the farmers market each week, educating voters about these referendums and “making sure people knew these referendums were on the ballot, and why they were important to the Urbana community.”
The Vote Yes on Question One campaign grew beyond educating voters at the farmers market. Volunteers distributed flyers at community events, raising awareness and answering questions about the campaign. Organizers welcomed difficult questions and hard conversations from voters, and they talked with any community member willing to have a conversation about Israel’s siege of Gaza. The campaign also completed an ambitious door-to-door canvassing effort. Through months of campaign work, the people in the movement developed stronger relationships with each other and the movement itself grew.
Canvassers visited thousands of doors in Cunningham Township, talking with residents and leaving literature about Cunningham Township Question One. Photo by the author
Local organizers invested hundreds of hours—and notably, very little money—and their efforts paid off with the landslide 70–30 victory.
So what lessons can we take from local organizers when it comes to surviving a second Trump administration? The key to building the world we want to live in, even when we’re living under growing fascism, is to organize with the local community.
“If we are to meet the challenges . . ., as a community we need to . . . grow our movement for justice and liberation,” explains Sam Froiland, a member of UCJC and organizer with PSL. “The people of the US are worse off than they were five years ago. Wages have not kept up with inflation and rents are soaring to record highs, while the Democrats and Republicans do nothing meaningful to address these issues. Trump’s planned tariffs and mass deportation campaign will only exacerbate these crises while unleashing campaigns of terror against our immigrant neighbors and making the world more dangerous by ratcheting up tensions with international powers.”
Maxwell also encourages local residents to plug into local groups and help build on their success. “I’d encourage anyone who’s feeling burnt out from national politics to get involved with groups like these and help make an impact in the local community.”
The power is with the people. By banding together to form networks of mutual aid and engaging in direct action, we can imagine what liberation can mean for all of us who live inside and beyond the imperial core. We can rebuild the communities that capitalism and white supremacy have destroyed. A second Trump presidency will bring more destruction to an already harmful system, but just as partisans and resistance organizations have fought fascism in the past, we can collectively build a liberated world that will replace the old one, right here in C-U.
Elizabeth Sotiropoulos (they/them) is a community organizer and activist who writes about the power of culture, community, and mutual aid in organizing against authoritarian government. They work with multiple liberation-focused organizations that organize for children’s rights, adoptee rights, queer and trans rights, education justice, and police accountability. Elizabeth lives with their nesting partner, kids, and beloved dog in Champaign. They love drawing, cooking, dancing, and imagining what our liberated world will be like.
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