Is America on the Brink of a Makeover?
PART 2: AHF’s Michael Weinstein on grassroots power and the pendulum swinging
Count on “the people” to determine how they wanted to celebrate the 250th birthday of the United States of America during the July 4th weekend. For those not fixated on FIFA World Cup matches or Taylor Swift’s wedding to Travis Kelce or CNN’s Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper getting drunk waiting for the ball to drop in Times Square marking the historic Independence Day, FOX News breathlessly covered poster-boy-for-pomposity Donald Trump as he took a massive South Dakota stage against the backdrop of Mount Rushmore where he hopes to mount his own visage.
Mount Rushmore is internationally famous as the backdrop used by director Alfred Hitchcock in his 1958 film “North by Northwest.” One Hitchcock scholar described the acclaimed movie in which villain James Mason chases Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint over recreations of the granite presidential faces as “a comic thriller about mistaken identity, political depravity, sexual blackmail, and ubiquitous role-playing.”
The weather also added drama for 4,800 fans who secured tickets through an online lottery. “A nearby lightning storm Friday afternoon pushed people indoors before the programming started, with hundreds cramming into the memorial’s cafeteria,” the South Dakota Searchlight reported. “Thunder, hail and heavy rain continued for over an hour,”
After Trump’s speech, California-based Pyro Spectaculars, with a $700,000 contract, produced a fireworks show to The Village People’s gay anthem “YMCA.”
Trump evoked a hell storm of his own, warning about “a resurgence of the communist menace in our land,” resurrecting his Red and Lavender Scare closeted gay McCarthy era mentor Roy Cohen.
“Communism is a mortal threat to American liberty,” Trump said, apparently alluding to the recent primary victories of Democratic socialist candidates. “It is the greatest threat to our country, including World War I, World War II, Pearl Harbor or even 9/11.”
AP fact check: linking Democrats to communism is “inaccurate.”
Trump’s penchant for an “alternative facts” Orwellian spin that demands loyal acceptance of a lie suggests this is his new gauntlet for the midterms. “Communism is the exact opposite of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” he declared. “It’s death, tyranny and the pursuit of evil.”
In his Mount Rushmore speech, Trump “was sharpening a line of attack that the White House has started to use to head off a newly insurgent progressive wing of the Democratic Party that appears to be resonating with liberal voters,” the New York Times reported. “He said the word ‘communism’ so many times, you might’ve thought the Cold War was still on.”
Trump also asserted that Republicans will “not lose an election for a hundred years” if they end the filibuster and pass the SAVE America Act, which would require anyone attempting to register to vote to prove U.S. citizenship and show identification at the polls. He wants to choose who votes, flipping the democratic principle of having voters choose their own leaders and representatives.
For America’s 250th birthday, Trump has shifted from talking about kings and dictators to comparing himself favorably to other American presidents, especially George Washington. As CNN noted in 2019, during an April 2018 tour of Washington’s home with French president Emmanuel Macron, Trump reportedly remarked of Mount Vernon and Washington: “If he was smart, he would’ve put his name on it. You’ve got to put your name on stuff or no one remembers you.”
This Washington comparison is also familiar. “I don’t know if you knew it, but he actually ran his business simultaneously when he was president,” Trump said during an October Cabinet meeting. “George Washington was actually considered a very rich man at the time. … George Washington, they say, had two desks. He had a presidential desk and a business desk.”
Trump cited Washington again in his March 2025 State of the Union speech. “In fact, it has been stated by many that the first month of our presidency — it’s our presidency — is the most successful in the history of our nation. And what makes it even more impressive is that, do you know who No. 2 is? George Washington. How about that? I don’t know about that list. But we’ll take it.”
Experts disagree. On Feb. 18, 2024, Justin Vaughn and Brandon Rottinghaus said their Presidential Greatness Project poll ranked Trump last.
“Trump,” the scholars wrote in the Los Angeles Times, “maintains the position he held six years ago: dead last, trailing such historically calamitous chief executives as James Buchanan and Andrew Johnson. In that and other respects, Trump’s radical departure from political, institutional and legal norms….puts him behind not only Buchanan and Johnson but also such lowlights as Franklin Pierce, Warren Harding and William Henry Harrison, who died a mere 31 days after taking office.”
Given Trump’s tantrums over aerial photos showing low attendance for his big 250 State Fair address, one wonders if splashing his name and image on buildings, money and other “beautification” projects, currently projected by Forbes to be roughly $162.5+ million - plus the “vanity” $1.4+ billion ballroom – might be his middle finger to critics. Might his ultimate goal be replacing Washington DC’s name with his own?
Trump raked in a $2 billion haul last year, according to a 927-page financial disclosure report showing how he and his family “reaped huge financial rewards in 2025 through his money-losing Trump Media venture and a separate cryptocurrency firm called World Liberty Financial, even as routine investors suffered vast losses,” the New York Times reported July 1. “He also amassed hundreds of millions through deals that involved foreign governments or corporations with agenda items pending before the Trump administration.”
Meanwhile, the federal government debt as of July 5 is $39.46 trillion or $115,625 per American, according to the Peter G. Peterson Foundation.
Washington warned about potential despots like Trump. Sarah Pruitt’s 2020 analysis of Washington’s Farewell Address, the first version of which was written by his friend and protégé Alexander Hamilton, concludes that the retiring president focused on three themes: 1) the Importance of unity; 2) The ‘Worst Enemy’ of Government: Loyalty to Party Over Nation: 3) Danger of Foreign Entanglements.
Shirking the nation’s common interest could engender a “spirit of revenge” and prompt the rise of “cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men” who would “usurp for themselves the reins of government; destroying afterward the very engines, which have lifted them to unjust dominion,” Washington cautioned.
The Constitution’s system of checks and balances and separation of powers prevented despots or groups from taking control of the government. And the system also allowed for change through laws or constitutional amendments rather than by force.
Washington urged unity above all. “The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appellation derived from local discriminations,” he wrote. “You have in a common cause fought and triumphed together; the independence and liberty you possess are the work of joint counsels, and joint efforts of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.”
In their survey, the presidential scholars said their assessments “are driven not only by traditional notions of greatness but also by the evolving values of our time.”
That emphasis on common interests and shared values was represented on July 3 by New York City Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani, an inspirational Democratic Socialist, who delivered remarks commemorating America’s 250th Fourth of July birthday while sitting at George Washington’s desk, surrounded by recently naturalized America citizens.
“Two hundred and fifty years presents a rare opportunity for more than 340 million people to turn together — both towards one another and towards ourselves, to take measure of who we are as a nation. When we look at America, what do we see?” he asked.
“The truth, my friends, is that America is exceptional because here, nothing is fixed into place. The frontier may be closed, we may have walked on the moon, but the work of fulfilling the values first enshrined in the Declaration of Independence — that work endures, my friends, and it belongs to us all. It belongs, too, to our newest Americans, those standing here with me today,” Mamdani said.
“Patriotism has never been about pretending our nation is without flaws,” he said. “Patriotism is every act of righteous dissent, it is every march led under the heavy sun, it is every protest held a decade before its time. It is precisely because we love this nation that we will not leave it. After all, who loves America more than those who have sacrificed so much to make it free?”
The real celebrations of America’s 250 anniversary came from regular grassroots folks like the thousands organized by AIDS Healthcare Foundation and representatives from 50 coalitions for their “We the People March for Freedom” in Fort Lauderdale, Florida on July 3. Gov. Ron DeSantis missed the patriotism. He was at Mount Rushmore with Trump.
The marchers were encouraged to bring signs with messages about issues that matter to them such as about the war in Iran, affordability, which Trump called a “hoax” and housing, which he calls “a yawn”.
Longtime AHF friend, labor leader and activist Dolores Huerta, Haitian American activist Santra Denis, Healthcare advocate Alecia Tramel-McIntyre, Gen Z activist Maxx Fenning, and AHF President/CEO Michael Weinstein all participated in a rally, and march through downtown Fort Lauderdale, culminating in another event with a powerful musical performance by award-winning gospel artist Erica Campbell.
Florida is of particular importance to AHF and other HIV/AIDS activists. Recently, AHF and coalition members won a strong pressure campaign against the state, requiring DeSantis to restore ADAP funding to his state budget, though other serious issues remain.
“This victory belongs to our whole coalition, the clinicians, providers, and people living with HIV who told their stories at real personal cost,” Esteban Wood, Director of Advocacy and Legislative Affairs at AHF, said in a press release. “We led this fight together. For months, it was a promise. Today it is the law, and people can finally breathe.”
In a recent hour-long Zoom conversation, Michael Weinstein and I talked about Trump’s obsession with communism; Michael’s long association with Democratic Socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders; how the issue of income equality crosses all lines; opposition to corporate politics expressed by young Democratic Socialists; and comparing the possibility of their influence and pull to the pull the Tea Party had on the Republican Party.
Michael also gives his take on the political scene and disapproval of Trump – in Part 1, along with strong comments on Gaza, immigration, race and Texas political star James Talarico.
In Part 2 of our interview here, Michael and I talked more politics, HIV/AIDS and AHF. I’ve been covering AHF since the late 1980s when the nonprofit was AIDS Hospice Foundation While AHF is now a global $3 billion healthcare organization with 10,000 employees (for which they won a Forbes Award as one of America’s Best Large Employers (#98), Michael’s through-line from the Lavender Left until now is his deep commitment to helping those in need. At the end of our conversation/interview on the cusp of this historic moment, I asked him what freedom and independence meant to him.
MW: “Well, on a personal level, it means being able to be all of who I am – a senior, a gay man who’s married to another man, a history thinker. I’m an activist on a societal level.
I still get goosebumps when I drive by the Capitol, when I see the Lincoln Memorial. When I reflect on so many American heroes.
We are very imperfect, right? But that’s humanity. We have a choice between the angels of our nature and the sub-basement of our nature. It’s up to us individually and collectively to bring out the best in us.
And I have found the individual protests - which I usually go to in my neighborhood. I don’t go to the one downtown. I go to the one in Hollywood - and seeing that mix of people with their homemade signs and seeing the people honking and all that - it’s a tonic.
Sometimes I argue with my family members who are… I describe them as: left, very left, and extremely left - more or less. It’s my extended family, too, [with] a couple of conservatives thrown in there, but not much. We don’t have to worry about arguing at family gatherings. But sometimes I have to say to them, ‘I like living in the California bubble’….
So, it’s all about keeping the promise, right? The promise isn’t fulfilled. But it’s about aspiring to keep the promise.
And if I just reflect on LGBTQ and AIDS issues -America stepped up to bring treatment to the world. Nobody else did that, besides us.
When I think about the movement for LGBTQ rights - we were the spearhead of that.
I think about the Women’s Movement. I think about the Civil Rights Movement - we’ve both lagged behind but also been the tip of the spear.
And so, I’m American, through and through. And I’m an Angeleno. This is my fate, for better or worse. I’m gonna make the best of it….
Sometimes when I’m talking to progressive people, I have to say, ‘I have a simple definition of being a progressive: I want to help the most people in need with the things they need the most.’
I think part of my evolution from being a far lefty to where I am now is - it was a point at which I gave up on ideology. I said - that is not the answer. The answer is how to help….
This is so extreme [now]. I mean, this makes the Pharaohs and the Gilded Age look like child’s play. It’s not sustainable. It’s not going to continue this way. It can’t continue. You can’t have this many people so disenfranchised. It will change. The pendulum does swing.
And it will.”
Watch the full interview with Michael Weinstein below:
Karen is THE BEST!