If You Think We Can’t Beat Trump, Remember The 3.5% Rule

History shows autocrats are vulnerable to massive nonviolent resistance

Demonstrators hold various signs including "The Power of the People" and "No Kings No Royalty" at a pro-democracy rally. Photo by Erin Clark/The Boston Globe via Getty Images.

Saturday, June 14, is Donald Trump’s 79th birthday. It’s also the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army.

And this year, it will be marked by a military parade down the streets of Washington, D.C. at a cost to taxpayers of $45 million, including $16 million budgeted to fix the damaged roads caused by the 20+ Abrams tanks rolling down D.C.’s streets. But don’t be fooled. This parade is not to mark the Army’s birthday. The Army was all set to have a much more modest celebration before Trump got his mitts on it.

No, as Gulf War Army veteran Paul Sullivan told ABC News, “This Trump tank travesty is all about stroking Trump’s ego.”

But the good news is the military parade isn’t the only event taking place on Saturday. There will also be thousands of protests around the country smartly scheduled as counter-programming to Trump’s fascist-fest. These protests will feature millions of ordinary citizens peacefully marching and rallying to declare that here in America, “There is no King!”

As The No Kings website puts it:

“Donald Trump wants tanks in the street and a made-for-TV display of dominance for his birthday. A spectacle meant to look like strength. But real power isn't staged in Washington. It rises up everywhere else.”

Trump is a weak president desperately cosplaying as a strongman, precisely the sort of leader who needs to throw a military parade for himself to demonstrate his power, even as he reveals his deep insecurity about the lack thereof. And mass public displays of resistance are how we beat him.

Not only have we already seen Donald Trump blink in the face of popular pushback (remember, Trump Always Chickens Out…), but it’s also how citizens in other nations have defeated their autocratic leaders throughout history.

Political scientists Erica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan looked at a century’s worth of popular uprisings around the world. They not only found that nonviolent movements are far more effective than violent ones, but they’ve also formulated the “3.5% rule” when it comes to defeating autocratic leaders.

The Guardian sums it up this way:

Historical studies suggest that it takes 3.5% of a population engaged in sustained nonviolent resistance to topple brutal dictatorships.

So what can we glean from this theory about how to quash Trump’s rising authoritarianism as he tries to turn the United States into an autocratic police state? And what would that effort even look like? Also, what lessons has Trump himself taught us about how to push back on his desperate grabs for ever more power?

The 3.5% Rule

Despite what Trump and his MAGA media influencers would have us believe, the growing civil resistance to Trump is for the most part a nonviolent movement. Even in Los Angeles, where there have been isolated incidents of violence, the vast majority of actions there have been peaceful, regardless of the images Fox plays on repeat and that are spread on X.

That nonviolent ethos is by design.

As The No Kings website, which is organizing this weekend’s protests, specifically demands:

“A core principle behind all No Kings events is a commitment to nonviolent action. We expect all participants to seek to de-escalate any potential confrontation with those who disagree with our values and to act lawfully at these events. Weapons of any kind, including those legally permitted, should not be brought to events.”

Nonviolent action works, as Chenoweth and Stephan discovered in extensive research of political movements from 1900 to 2006. They documented this in their book Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic Of Nonviolent Conflict.

Per the BBC,

Looking at hundreds of campaigns over the last century, Chenoweth found that nonviolent campaigns are twice as likely to achieve their goals as violent campaigns. And although the exact dynamics will depend on many factors, she has shown it takes around 3.5% of the population actively participating in the protests to ensure serious political change.

Specifically, Chenoweth and Stephan found that nonviolent campaigns achieved their goals 53% of the time as compared to just 26% for violent protests. You can take a look at many such examples throughout history.

In 1986, millions of Filipinos took to the streets of Manila in peaceful protest and prayer in the People Power movement. The Marcos regime folded on the fourth day.

In 2003, the people of Georgia ousted Eduard Shevardnadze through the bloodless Rose Revolution, in which protestors stormed the parliament building holding the flowers in their hands. While in 2019, the presidents of Sudan and Algeria both announced they would step aside after decades in office, thanks to peaceful campaigns of resistance.

It makes sense, of course. For one thing, nonviolent actions have a very low barrier to entry, leading to the recruitment of a vast number of participants across demographics. Overall, they found that of the 25 largest campaigns they looked at, 20 were nonviolent (of those, 14 were successes.) And,

Overall, the nonviolent campaigns attracted around four times as many participants (200,000) as the average violent campaign (50,000).

Unlike violent actions, peaceful protests generally don’t require participants to be physically fit and are easier to publicize openly. They also only require easily accessible (and easy to carry) signs and bullhorns, not weaponry. And crucially,

By engaging broad support across the population, nonviolent campaigns are also more likely to win support among the police and the military – the very groups that the government should be leaning on to bring about order.

When dictators seek to quash such an uprising, they will inevitably rely on the local police force or military as their personal enforcement mechanism. But nonviolent action can largely serve as a sort of kryptonite to such crackdowns:

During a peaceful street protest of millions of people, the members of the security forces may also be more likely to fear that their family members or friends are in the crowd – meaning that they fail to crack down on the movement. “Or when they’re looking at the [sheer] numbers of people involved, they may just come to the conclusion the ship has sailed, and they don’t want to go down with the ship,” Chenoweth says.

The lesson Chenoweth and Stephan took away from their research was clear:

“Numbers really matter for building power in ways that can really pose a serious challenge or threat to entrenched authorities or occupations,” Chenoweth says – and nonviolent protest seems to be the best way to get that widespread support.

Once around 3.5% of the whole population has begun to participate actively, success appears to be inevitable.

This raises the next logical question: Will we achieve that 3.5%, and could we even hit it by this weekend?

The approximate total population of the United States is 343 million people. 3.5% of American residents would amount to 12 million people.

No Kings estimates more than 1500 rallies will be held this weekend across the country (notably, they have purposely not organized one in Washington, D.C.) which are likely to attract millions of Americans, including 250,000 in Los Angeles alone. Even the April 5 Hands Off mobilization attracted at least 3.5 million according to Ezra Levin of Indivisible. That makes 12 million at least theoretically achievable for this weekend’s protests, but more work may yet be required.

But beyond turning out huge numbers to protest, what does success actually look like?

What Does “Defeating Trump” Mean?

So what does success against Trump mean here in the U.S.?

We’ve seen that impeachment is unlikely to lead to Trump’s removal thanks to the pliant GOP Senate, and even if he were to be removed, that would mean President J.D. Vance, who would have incumbency to run on in 2028.

The next opportunity therefore to change political power in Washington will be the 2026 midterms, where Democrats have the opportunity to take back Congress.

As even Mike Johnson conceded in a recent interview with Jonathan Karl of ABC News, if Democrats win back the House in 2026, that essentially cuts Trump’s presidency from 4 years to 2.

But there are some important fights before then, including defeating Trump’s signature legislation, which he calls the “Big Beautiful Bill.” As Johnson made clear in his interview with Karl, Trump and Republicans see passage of their budget bill as the path toward a House majority, so defeating the bill, or ensuring it is severely defanged, would by their logic significantly weaken the GOP politically.

But also on people’s minds on Saturday will be rolling back Trump’s ICE raids and his militarization of Democratic-led cities, as we have seen Trump test run in Los Angeles this past week. But as American Prospect executive editor David Dayen argues, defeating the former can actually hamstring Trump’s ability to accomplish the latter.

The massive budget bill Republicans hope to pass through reconciliation (i.e., with just 50 votes in the Senate) is not just about massive tax cuts for the wealthy at the expense of healthcare for poor and disabled Americans.

As Dayen elaborates at The Prospect:

…not much attention has been given to the surge of money that will go to immigration enforcement from this bill. The House version provided $151.3 billion in additional resources for immigration agencies, and while the Senate Judiciary Committee has not yet released its text, the targets in their budget resolution would raise that number even higher.

The $45 billion earmarked for building new detention centers would represent a 364 percent annual increase to the construction budget, supercharging the detention beds available to at least 125,000. The entire federal prison system only holds a little bit more than that. Then, another $27 billion is plowed into enforcement and deportation, enough to hire 10,000 more ICE officers over the next five years.

So, if you want to end the ICE raids, defeating the “Big Beautiful Bill” is a good place to start. Because, as Dayen reminds us, if the bill does pass in its current form…

The enforcement apparatus being directed by White House “border czar” Tom Homan and Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller will have much more resources to carry out operations across the country.

But can public mobilization actually be effective when the ruling party appears immune to public pressure (or at the very least, sees pressure from Donald Trump as far more compelling)? After all, despite town hall after town hall where Republicans’ constituents shouted down their representatives over Trump’s authoritarian maneuvers and the devastating cuts in the budget bill, the absolute worst version of the bill still passed the House by 1 vote, only losing two Republican defectors. A meeting with Trump and, no doubt, his personal phone calls to wavering members were all that was needed to overcome public protests.

But two things to remember. First, the bill still has to pass the Senate, which is already eyeing significant changes from the House version. Second, when confronted with public disapproval, Trump, despite what he would have us believe, often caves under enough pressure.

Trump Always Chickens Out

When it comes to weakening Trump and the GOP’s handle on power by defeating, or at the very least, significantly weakening the GOP budget bill, the protests this weekend are very well timed.

A new Quinnipiac poll found the bill with very little popular support, with opposition at 53%-27% with just 67% of Republicans in support of it. As for Medicaid cuts, only 10% support cutting the program while 47% feel Medicaid funding should increase.

At the same time, Trump’s July 4th deadline for Senate passage of the bill appears in jeopardy with Politico reporting that Republicans are openly “scoffing” at the deadline. Senator Ted Cruz admitted it could take weeks to reconcile the Senate bill with the House bill, because “the Senate is going to do what it damn well wants to do.”

A massive show of force in the streets against the president’s tactics and policies, along with a new poll showing him with just 38% approval, will only embolden Senate critics of the budget bill and potentially extend the negotiations well into the summer, something the White House had hoped to avoid.

But it’s also important to remember all the times that Trump, when faced with pressure, has caved.

Trump, of course, famously backed off his “Liberation Day” tariff regime, earning the nickname TACO (Trump Always Chickens Out) with a “pause” on the majority of tariffs. This is just as Rep. Eric Swalwell had predicted back in April that Trump would do under pressure from the American people.

Last month, Trump blinked in his negotiations with China, and now Trump’s Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, has signaled that the tariff pause is likely to continue. Yeah, no kidding.

Trump has even backtracked on a lot of his tough talk on his extra-judicial detentions and deportations, with the administration forced to release Tufts student Rümeysa Öztürk and Columbia student Mohsen Mahdawi. They even returned Kilmar Abrego García to the U.S. after claiming he’d never set foot in the country again. More recently, after ICE detained Massachusetts high school student Marcelo Gomes Da Silva on his way to volleyball practice, his community revolted, and he has since been released on bond.

Trump had another TACO moment just today, acknowledging he has gone too far with his crackdown against migrants, saying:

Our farmers are being hurt badly — you know, they have very good workers, they’ve worked for them for 20 years. They’re not citizens, but they’ve turned out to be great. And we’re going to have to do something about that.

The common thread is clear. Trump backs off in the face of public pressure after he inevitably overreaches. And overreach is precisely what he has done by deploying the National Guard and even 700 Marines to Los Angeles. Now today, in an even more extreme show of force, DHS agents tackled and detained U.S. Senator Alex Padilla at a Homeland Security press conference.

Trump keeps giving the people more reasons to rise up against his policies, and this weekend we have the perfect opportunity to register our disapproval. If past is prologue, this will result in further backtracking. But we’ve got to show up.

Find A No Kings Protest Near You

It’s perfectly understandable that people remain cynical about the theory of change that can stop Trump.

But on his show last night, Chris Hayes made a simple point, saying

“It feels odd to have to say this but protests are good, actually. Protests against cruelty and tyranny and for our shared values are a good thing and never more so than in the face of an authoritarian threat to our most cherished liberties.

People should be peacefully protesting against the ongoing attempt to end American democracy we’ve been witnessing…Protest is how ordinary Americans make change in this country. It is the most powerful tool we have.”

The hard truth of it is, we must. As former Obama aide Ben Rhodes expressed to Hayes during the same segment:

“It’s the last guardrail and all the other guardrails are gone, Chris. We’re much further along in terms of the consolidation of power in this country than people like to think. And popular mobilizations, street protest, the will of the people being expressed like that is the absolute backstop.”

In the end:

“…the only way to really break the grip of an authoritarian regime is to essentially show that there’s popular mobilization.”

Yes, Donald Trump wants to turn us into an autocracy. He made very clear what he envisions during his recent speech at Fort Bragg. And as authoritarian expert Timothy Snyder starkly puts it on Substack today:

Earlier this week Donald Trump called for a second civil war at a U.S. military base. This scenario can be resisted and prevented, if we have the courage to listen, interpret, and act. And this Saturday we will have the occasion to act.

Snyder goes on:

It is clear what Trump is trying to do. He wants to turn everything around. He wants an army that is not a legal institution but a personal paramilitary. He wants it not to defend Americans but to oppress them. He wishes the shame of our national history to become our pride. He wants to transform a republic into a fascist regime by transforming a history of courage into a future of cowardice.

This can only succeed if it goes unchallenged.

And challenging Trump is precisely what this weekend is about. And it’s going to be massive as this No Kings protest map makes clear.

As Snyder concludes:

This weekend Trump plans a celebration of American military power as a celebration of himself on his birthday -- military dictatorship nonsense. This is a further step towards a different kind of regime. It can be called out, and it can be overwhelmed.

Thousands of Americans across the land, many veterans among them, have worked hard to organize protests this Saturday — against tyranny, for freedom, for government of the people, by the people, for the people. Join them if you can. No Kings Day is June 14th.

Be part of the 3.5% that ends Trump’s march toward autocracy. We’ll see you in the streets this Saturday.