These progressive groups left X for Bluesky. Was it a mistake?

In the 24 hours surrounding President Trump’s first inauguration in 2017, MoveOn.org blasted out a flurry of 57 tweets to its hundreds of thousands of followers, urging them to #ResistTrump.  

The longtime progressive online organizing group petitioned members of Congress to boycott Trump’s inauguration ceremony, loudly opposed his cabinet nominees, created content with celebrities, and promoted events across the country. At that political moment, the organization and others like it were all hands on deck, and Twitter was one key tool they used for organizing and communications. 

During this year’s inauguration, MoveOn didn’t post on X once — no campaigns, petitions, or guidance for its 300,000 followers to oppose Trump’s radical cabinet nominees. Instead, the group left a pinned post at the top of its account, directing users to follow them on Bluesky. So, I went to the group’s Bluesky account, and it appears they only posted just one message on Inauguration Day this year: “Don’t despair. Organize.” 🤷‍♂️

MoveOn was one of many leading progressive organizations that fled the platform formerly known as Twitter in the wake of Trump’s November election win. Upset with the platform’s right-wing ownership and tolerance of hate speech, these groups moved to Bluesky, an X-copycat platform boasting a superior commitment to content moderation and generally fewer Nazi vibes.

Those organizations included: The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Indivisible, Ultraviolet, Human Rights Campaign (HRC), Earthjustice, 350.org, and Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). A few noteworthy others, like Planned Parenthood and Women’s March, have only posted once or twice on X in the past month, effectively leaving the platform. 

For most, the switch to Bluesky has not really been a resounding success. Every group in the above list has struggled to build serious audiences there, and none have passed even 100,000 followers. Bluesky’s defenders will note that the engagement rate on posts on that site is much higher than on X, where political account growth no longer really happens and is essentially a ghost town for progressives.

That’s a fair point, but then why aren’t these organizations posting on both platforms?

Bluesky is still in its infancy and seems to be a promising platform where many journalists, researchers, and progressive activists genuinely enjoy reading and engaging with news and politics. While it still only maintains a tiny fraction of the users that X does, organizations should engage their audiences on that platform and on other emerging sites that allow them to expand their reach. 

At the same time, should organizations just stop communicating with hundreds of thousands of their dedicated followers in order to claim a moral victory and stick it to Elon Musk? In these incredibly bleak political times, why are groups tasked with taking on the Trump administration not using every tool at their disposal to do so?

Politics is about addition, not subtraction, and these organizations are paid to reach audiences “where they are.” It should take a staffer less than one minute to copy and paste a post from Bluesky onto X, and it doesn’t make anyone any less progressive for doing so. If a post brings in one additional donation, one more volunteer, or one more event attendee in the Trump era, wouldn’t it be worth it?

MAGA merch advertising on Facebook is on the rise

In the past month, ten pro-Trump merch vendors have spent a combined $3.3 million on Facebook ads selling everything from pens and bobbleheads to sneakers, stamps and calendars. They’re even pushing “Gulf of America” t-shirts. These companies are generally structured as opaque LLCs and have long found a niche hawking their wares to Trump supporters on Facebook.

The top spending merch advertiser in the above chart, “I Love My Freedom” is tied to a dizzying pro-Trump content farm on Facebook that I first identified two years ago. Through a variety of related entities, the group and others like it run over 90 pro-Trump Facebook pages with more than 45 million followers.

The TikTok ban is here. Sort of.

In case you haven’t noticed, you can no longer download TikTok in the Apple Store in the U.S., which means it’s effectively “banned” at the moment for people who didn’t already have it on their phone. This also means the app won’t be able to push updates to users in the U.S. via the App Store until the company figures out a permanent solution with the government. These changes also apply to other Bytedance-affiliated apps like CapCut and Lemon8.

As a result, internet weirdos are selling new “TikTok-loaded” phones online for thousands of dollars on eBay, according to CBS News. Because of course they are.

More things you should read

• Last week, The Atlantic ran an interesting profile of Jubilee Media, the ultra-viral debate video startup you probably started noticing last year.

• In one of his latest issues of the Message Box newsletter, Dan Pfeiffer asks the question many of have been wondering: Why are Democrats voting for Trump’s nominees?

• The Washington Post published a nice long look “inside Mark Zuckerberg’s Trump pivot.” According to Rolling Stone, Zuckerberg may have more “ass kissing” to do, though.

• As Donald Trump begins mass deportations, starts trade wars with allies, and pushes through the most extreme cabinet in American history, the Democrats’ leader in Congress, Hakeem Jeffries, is reminding us all that “Presidents come and Presidents go.” That’s the fighting spirit we need right now.

• The Trump White House set up a snitch line for federal employees to report on anyone in the government secretly doing any unsanctioned DEI-related activities, lol. Sam Stein at The Bulwark reports that the admin’s “DEIA Truth” email account is now being flooded by spammers.

• Did Americans shift rightward or couchward in 2024? As Democrats continue to discuss and debate what happened in November, you should listen to this conversation with Mike Podhorzer on Way to Win’s latest Charting the Way Forward podcast.

One last thing: Not the White House

That’s it for today - thanks for reading! If you enjoyed today’s issue, I hope you’ll share it on Twitter, Threads, or Bluesky, or consider upgrading your subscription! If you have questions, feedback, tips, or ideas for a future newsletter, just send me an email: [email protected]