The system has been steadily redesigned by authoritarians to remove accountability. I don't call my lawmakers since they all regard me as an enemy - calling any GOP lawmakers is pointless, they aren't accountable to their constituents, they do the party's business not the people's business. Protests are limited to "free speech zones" and almost entirely ignored by mass media, even mass protests are invisible to most. And elections are so heavily manipulated with intimidation at the polling places and large scale disenfranchisement that they don't reflect anything like any popular interest. It's bad, we're working on leaving the country.
I am extremely demanding but my representatives are totally ignored when this party holds the house and senate. We can’t keep quietly chanting “be reasonable” forever.
Representatives can put their physical bodies where the problem is and organize loudly to bring additional bodies along. If the police or military has to break them up, so be it; the media coverage will be iconic.
DOGE will find it hard to function effectively if they have to squirm through an angry picket line every day.
Vote in your State election, and make sure your State representative knows you're voting against gerrymandering and for some sort of citizens'-accountable districting policy. It'd be even better to run in any State-level election that is (otherwise) unopposed. A large number of State-level seats went unopposed in 2024.
And, yes, I do know that our current predicament is 30 years in the making, and will take years to fix. I've been working with these groups since 2015, banging the drums, trying to explain to Ds & Rs that our govt(s) (at all levels!) are weak, and easily targeted by foreign & domestic actors due to widespread gerrymandering, high incumbency rates, low primary engagement, and first-past-the-post voting. Our naysayers are — as always — far-right groups interested in autocracy and oligarchy.
