Hi there! Welcome to Easy A–Your go-to source for quick and easy actions you can take in five minutes or less about the issues you care about.
Are you a busy mom? Or maybe your work is so hectic you can’t think about anything else during the day? A lot of us are also taking care of parents or other loved ones too, leaving little time for anything else.
The good news is that these are things you can do while you’re waiting in the school pick up line, on your lunch break, or even at your kid’s soccer practice – anywhere you happen to be! And you can easily share Easy A with your friends so they can be in the know, too! We’ll send you a new action to take every week–just one, we promise –and it will always be something you can do in five minutes or less. Ready to get started? Let’s go!
Read This: Supporting the Transgender Community
June is Pride Month, a time to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community and advocate for their rights.*
This year, supporting the transgender community and advocating for their rights is especially urgent. That’s because the Trump administration has launched a series of executive orders and other actions that take away trans people’s rights and try to erase their very existence.
Here’s how:
- One of the very first executive orders Trump announced — on his inauguration day! — orders the federal government to only recognize two sexes, “biological males” and “biological females.” It also removes all previous federal guidance that recognized and supported non-binary and transgender people. This means that government-issued IDs like U.S. passports and records like tax and social security forms won’t recognize all genders. And federal prisons will have to house prisoners based on only two sexes, putting non-binary and transgender prisoners at risk of physical harassment and assault.
- A similar executive order restricts what schools can teach about the LGBTQ+ community and requires public schools to only recognize two sexes. It bans schools from recognizing transgender students by their preferred names or pronouns and actually threatens to withhold public funding from schools that support students in this way. It also threatens the prosecution of teachers and school administrators who don’t comply.
- Also impacting schools, a separate executive order bans transgender athletes from playing on girls’ and women’s sports teams, rather than leaving this decision up to state and local organizations. This order goes beyond schools, seeking to pressure independent national and international athletic organizations — including the Olympics — into adopting the same policy. Not only does this take away opportunities for trans girls, but it subjects all girls and women to the possibility of unnecessary and invasive physical examinations.
- Another executive order bans transgender people from serving in the U.S. military. After it was announced, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth directed the military to stop providing healthcare for transgender service members. Both actions are being challenged in federal courts, but for now, the military can ban the enlistment of transgender people and discharge thousands of active service members.
- A separate executive order restricts access to healthcare for transgender children and teens, even in states where it is specifically protected by state law. It misrepresents the guidelines and standards of gender-affirming care recognized by the medical community and takes away the freedom of kids and families to make their own healthcare decisions. The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on a case, U.S. v. Skrmetti, which will decide if the U.S. Constitution protects healthcare for transgender kids.
- The U.S. Supreme Court has also agreed to hear Chiles v. Salazar, which could overturn a ban on “conversion therapy” in Colorado. This discredited practice tries to force LGBTQ+ people into being straight. All major medical and psychological associations have proven that it does nothing but cause serious harm. If the court overturns the ban and allows “conversion therapy” in Colorado, it would set the precedent to overturn similar bans that exist in 20 other states.
The bottom line is that these policies are trying to push trans people out of our communities and deny their existence.
To make matters worse, these political attacks have led to an increase in suicide risk among LGBTQ+ kids and teens, and Trump has proposed to cut federal funding for the life-saving 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. This hotline helps thousands of kids a month — more than 1.2 million since it started in 2022.
It’s up to all of us to stand up in support of the transgender community. As less than 1% of the U.S. population, they cannot fight this fight alone, but they are 1.6 million people whose health, safety, and happiness matters. Pride Month is a great time to take action, and in the coming weeks, we’ll show you how!
*If you have more time this week, you can read last year’s Easy A posts that dig deeper into the history of Pride Month.
Do This: Sacred Politics and the Threat of Christian Nationalism
Well that didn’t take long! We’re already seeing the influence that Christian Nationalism has on President Donald Trump now that he is back in office. Two of his first actions were to begin the mass deportation of immigrants and to issue an executive order that denies the existence of transgender people. These are both priorities of white Christian Nationalists.
Thankfully, people are raising their voices and bravely calling out these hateful actions. One of those voices we have heard is The Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington. In her sermon at Trump’s inaugural prayer service, she asked him to show mercy to those who are scared right now due to his policies — especially immigrants and LGBTQ+ children.
Bishop Budde joins historical religious leaders like The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Mother Teresa who were inspired by their faith to speak up for the vulnerable among us. Now, Trump has called her “nasty” and demanded an apology. U.S. Representative Josh Brecheen of Oklahoma has even introduced a House Resolution to censure her!
We want Bishop Budde to know that we support her, and we want you to join us. Earn your Easy A this week by signing our Thank You card below. You can even add a personal message if you’d like! We’ll be finalizing the card this week and delivering it to her in D.C. soon, so scroll down and add your name today!
It’s so important that we keep calling out Christian Nationalism for what it is — a political movement with an agenda that hurts all of us. And as Shane Claiborne said in our Sacred Politics podcast, a great way to counter something we don’t agree with is to live our lives showing a better way. Like Bishop Budde, we can all be shining examples in our community of how to treat others, regardless of our faith.
Watch This: Sacred Politics and the Threat of Christian Nationalism
Christian Nationalists, who are mostly white evangelicals, are a shrinking minority in our population.1 They are desperate to maintain the political power that white Christian men have historically had in American society. They resent the social progress that has moved America closer to our ideal of equal rights for all — progress like same-sex marriage rights, gender equality, and diversity and inclusion initiatives.
Christian Nationalism is not a religion itself, it’s a political movement made up of a small subset of conservative white evangelical Christians. Watch this short, one minute video about the goals of the Christian Nationalist movement, how they’ve been successful, and the threat they pose:
Christian Nationalists support politicians like Donald Trump — even if he doesn’t live by Christian values himself — because he delivers policies and laws that uphold white Christian male privilege. Now that he is back in office — largely due to Christian Nationalist support — they will continue to have a significant influence on his administration’s policies. To protect equal rights for all, we must keep pushing back on their efforts.
Read This: Sacred Politics and the Threat of Christian Nationalism
One of the biggest threats to American democracy, especially as Donald Trump returns to the presidency, is the influence of Christian Nationalism. We took a deep dive into the movement with our limited series podcast, Sacred Politics, so let’s take a look at what we learned.
What is Christian Nationalism?
To be clear, Christian Nationalism is not Christianity. It is not even a religion — it is a political ideology and movement on the extreme right that has weaponized their religion to further their agenda. Christian Nationalists believe that America was founded by Christians for Christians. They believe that our government should give them privilege and power, and base our laws on their beliefs. They are against reproductive rights and same-sex marriage, and want to infuse religion into public education. They are often behind book bans, challenges to public school curriculum, and regressive policies on marriage and family planning.
Where did Christian Nationalism come from?
The movement grew in the 1960s and 1970s in response to the Civil Rights movement, feminism, the sexual revolution, and secularism. This new faction of the conservative right was largely White Christians who saw social progress as evidence of moral decline. They felt their values and power were under attack. They’ve been trying to return our country to what they consider a time of greatness — the time before the 1960s — ever since.
They want us to forget that pre-1960s America lacked equality for almost anyone who wasn’t a white, straight male. Their version of our history ignores slavery and segregation to make the past seem more idyllic. But knowing that this goal wouldn’t be palatable to the general public, they united around the issue of abortion instead.
The movement started by using the existing, organized communities of Christian churches, getting tens of thousands of pastors and televangelists to mobilize their congregations. This is still how they organize today. They use fear and anger to energize their base. They tell them they are being persecuted by progressive movements. They call opposing political “enemies” the “anti-Christ”. This perception of being under attack fuels their righteousness and solidarity.
How do Christian Nationalists Justify Supporting Immoral Leaders?
It’s really hard to understand why and how anyone who considers themselves a Christian can support politicians like Donald Trump, who does not seem to be religious or to live by religious values. But they don’t see him as a betrayal of their values. They just consider him “God’s flawed vessel” and they forgive him for those flaws because the ends justify the means. They don’t care if he embodies Christian values as long as he has the power to give them the political outcomes they want. And that’s exactly what he’s done for them so far.
What are Christian Nationalists’ Goals?
During Trump’s first term, he gave religious leaders insider access and appointed many Federalist Society judges, three of whom helped the U.S. Supreme Court overturn Roe v. Wade — a decades-long goal of Christian Nationalists. That’s why they worked so hard to get him elected again — to accomplish more of their agenda.
It’s all spelled out in Project 2025, the far-right extremist plan created for Donald Trump’s second term by the Heritage Foundation and other allies. They want to take away more of our reproductive rights, they’re targeting the rights of LGBTQ+ people, immigrants and women, and they want to teach their biblical worldview in our public schools. The plan gives them a detailed roadmap for how to do it. This damage could take generations to reverse.
How do we stop the Christian Nationalist Movement?
Don’t be discouraged. We can push back. Only 14% of Americans are White evangelicals, the group most closely associated with the movement. They are far from the majority. In the coming weeks, we’ll talk about what we can do to stop them from making any more progress.
Want to dig deeper into this topic? Read more from these guests of our Sacred Politics limited series podcast:
- April Ajoy, “Star-Spangled Jesus”
- Shane Claiborne, shaneclaiborne.com and redletterchristians.org
- Kristin Du Mez, “Jesus and John Wayne”
- Karla Kamstra, aka Rev Karla, revkarla.com
- Talia Lavin, “Wild Faith”
- Jess McIntosh, jessmcintosh.org
- Katherine Stewart, “The Power Worshippers”
- Jemar Tisby, “The Spirit of Justice”
We want to hear from you!
Happy New Year! Or, maybe you’re feeling something other than happy about 2025?
We get it. We’re all still feeling and thinking a lot of things about what lies ahead this year, so we really want to hear from you. It’s time for our annual Community Survey!
Everything we do is in service to building, supporting, and strengthening our community so that together, we can fight extremism and protect our democracy. You are our North Star, so we need your input to make sure that what we’re doing — and the way we’re doing it — is valuable to you.
Your Easy A assignment this week is to take our quick 2024 Community Survey. Help us reflect on the work we did in 2024 so that we can be sure our energy and resources are focused on the right things in 2025. We promise to dig deep into your responses and use them to map our path forward. Just click on the link here or the image below to get started.
We’re grateful you’re here and are honored to take on 2025 together!
Do This: We Got This! Because We’ve Got Each Other.
Historians like Heather Cox Richardson and Timothy Snyder agree, one of the ways we protect democracy is to maintain a strong community of people that stand up to the threats of extremism together. That’s exactly what Red Wine & Blue does.
We help suburban women across the country find their people and organize against book bans, attacks on public education, threats to our reproductive rights, and hate in all its forms. We are so proud of our community. And we’re lifting it up with our year-end celebration, We Got This!
We shared about our We Got This! campaign before, but we’re excited to add that:
- One lucky donor will receive an awesome gift basket filled with exclusive RWB goodies!
- All donations are currently being matched dollar for dollar by a generous RWB member, doubling their impact!
So our final Easy A action of the year is simple — please give to Red Wine & Blue today. You can use the form below. Everything we raise in this annual campaign will support our fight against extremism in 2025. Help us confidently say, “We Got This!” because we have your support. Thank you!
Watch This: We Got This! Because We’ve Got Each Other
We wish you could see the messages we get every day from our community members. We hear from so many of you — literally daily — either by email, DMs on social media, or in direct conversations with our regional organizers, about how important the Red Wine & Blue community is to you. Watch this short video to see what we’re talking about:
We wanted you to see for yourself that you are not alone! Our community is 600,000+ women strong and still growing, and that’s something to celebrate! So we’re lifting up our community with our year-end celebration, We Got This!
You give us the hope and the motivation to keep going in our work to fight extremism. We hope this video has done the same for you!
Read This: We Got This! Because We’ve Got Each Other.
As we reflect on 2024, a year filled with emotional highs and lows, one thing stands out to us the most — the passion and the commitment of the women of Red Wine & Blue.
Our community came together — and grew — with a level of energy and a desire to take action like we’ve never seen before. We worked hard, and we had fun, too! The joy we found in our connection and shared purpose was undeniable, and while we didn’t get every victory we wanted, what we’ve built together can’t be taken away.
It’s a beautiful thing to know that we’re not going away and that no matter what we face in 2025, we’re not facing it alone. We got this, because we’ve got each other.
That’s why we are holding our annual, year-end celebration of community and giving campaign! We’re:
- Celebrating friendships that have been created through Red Wine & Blue.
- Highlighting successful advocacy efforts in your communities.
- Holding a friendly We’ve Got This: Coast-to-Coast state contest and a raffle for Red Wine & Blue swag.
- Hosting a Friend-a-Thon: RWB Girls Night Out event for you to meet other community members in your area.
- Giving you a carefully curated digital care package to treat yourself and your besties this holiday season.
- Asking for your support to power our work in 2025.
Our community is more than 600,000 women strong with more than 500 local groups across the country. In 2025 we plan on fighting harder than ever against extremism. Whether it’s more book bans, attacks on trans kids, bans on our reproductive rights, or any other threats to our freedoms that extremists cook up, we got this.
We got this because we’ve got the support of our community. Everything we do is possible because your donations give us the funding we need. That’s why it’s so important that our community knows about our year-end giving campaign.
While we take the end of the year to celebrate our community, rest, recover, and prepare for 2025, we hope you will join us with your support! Thank you!
Do This: Immigration, The American Fabric
Immigration was a deciding issue for a lot of voters in the 2024 election. We saw politicians use misinformation and partisan talking points to dehumanize immigrants and scare voters, but we know the facts.
We can stand up to these extremists and counter their harmful misinformation by having conversations about immigration with people who know and trust us, and by sharing the truth on social media. We’re making it easy for you!
Use our tool below to share this ready-made post on your favorite social media platform(s). The post includes the text and image you need, and a link to our shareable pdf with facts about immigration. We also have real stories about immigrants who are a vital part of the American fabric. All you have to do is a few clicks to share! Earn your Easy A by sharing today.
Watch This: Immigration, The American Fabric
The incoming Trump administration is doubling down on their campaign promises to curb immigration and conduct mass deportations, possibly even targeting naturalized citizens.
Amidst the hateful rhetoric, it’s important to remember that, while Americans disagree on how to improve our increasingly stressed immigration system, the majority of us support humane immigration policies and legal pathways to citizenship.
Watch this quick video as a reminder of how extremists are using immigration as a topic to scare and divide us, and how we can — and must — rise to this challenge and reject their hate and division.
We’ll be taking a break from our >Easy A next week to celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday, but we’ll be back the following week to talk about what we can do to support immigrants and immigration in the face of oncoming threats.
Read This: Immigration, The American Fabric
Many extremists made immigration and the fear of immigrants a central issue in their 2024 election campaigns, and it worked. A lot of them got elected, including Donald Trump with his promise to conduct mass deportations. So let’s talk about immigration.
Who Are Immigrants?
The United States is largely a nation of immigrants from all over the world. We are each diverse threads that weave together to create the beautiful American fabric.
Immigrants are not a monolith. They come from many different countries for many different reasons. Everyone is an individual with their own unique story. Whether they are fleeing war, violence, corruption, economic instability, climate disasters, or looking for opportunity, they share a desire for safety and a future for themselves and their families.
Immigrants come to the U.S. through work, student, or family visas, as asylum-seeking refugees, or meet the legal requirements for naturalization. They contribute to our communities and economy by starting businesses, serving in the military, or working in areas like healthcare, childcare, agriculture, construction, government, and service, to name a few.
Truths About Immigrants
Extremists want us to fear immigrants, so they spread dangerous myths and disinformation. But immigrants are not the problem. The problem is the partisan politicians who are dehumanizing and othering immigrants to divide us and gain political power. The scarier and more negative the lies are, the more quickly they spread and take hold. Let’s look at some facts instead.
- TRUTH: Immigrants are less likely to be criminals. US Census data shows that immigrants have never committed more crimes than native-born citizens.
- TRUTH: Most fentanyl is brought into our country by American citizens, not by immigrants.
- TRUTH: According to economists, as immigration goes up, more jobs are created — including jobs for native-born citizens. Many of the industries listed in the section above rely heavily on immigrants for their workforce.
- TRUTH: The health and stability of our economy depends on immigrants. They reduce labor shortages and contribute billions of dollars a year — yes, billions — to Social Security, Medicare, and state and local services.
- TRUTH: Only citizens can vote and have their vote counted in federal and state-wide elections.
It’s also true that our current immigration system is not equipped to handle the increase in people seeking citizenship. We can debate how to fix it, but most Americans agree, we want to solve our immigration challenges with humane policies and legal pathways to citizenship. We want our politicians to find solutions, not scapegoats.
Keeping the American Fabric Strong
So what can we do? It may feel difficult in light of the recent election results, but we don’t have to lose our values or our hope for the future.
We can have conversations with the people we know. We can stand up to partisan talking points and myth-bust their disinformation by sharing facts and real immigrant stories — starting with our own family histories. We can reject the othering of immigrants and seek to find similarities and honor our differences. We can support immigrant-owned businesses in our communities and immigrant families in our local schools. And it’s never too soon to look for like-minded politicians to support in the next election cycle.
The strength of our American fabric comes from the tight weave of our diverse threads. Let’s not let hateful politicians tear that fabric apart.