Can the “mixed middle" end the current politics of destruction?
Q&A with veteran organizer Michael Gecan on the power of deep, disciplined, relentless relational organizing.
Last week, organizer Michael Gecan wrote a piece in the New York Daily News titled, “For Trump, power is just breaking things.” What caught my attention was his… optimism.
Gecan is one of the people whose op-eds and emails I always read because they help me see things differently — and often more clearly.
I first discovered his work because his name kept coming up over and over while I was doing research on faith-based community organizing for my first book.
During Gecan’s long career in Chicago and New York City, he has has held various top positions within the Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF). His book, Going Public: An Organizer's Guide to Citizen Action, became foundational to my understanding of contemporary community organizing.
Community organizing has long been a way for ordinary Americans to “do democracy,” following a set of principles and practices that can yield tangible solutions to shared problems. Gecan has spent his career putting those principles to work.
In the following Q&A, I asked him to share more about what he was seeing on the ground, and why it is making him cautiously optimistic about Americans’ chances of “put[ting] the brakes on these breakers.”
I hope his words help you to see things in a different light too.
Q&A with Michael Gecan
Ruth Braunstein: You wrote in a recent editorial, “If the Trump administration is about anything, it’s about using its power to break things.”
You point out a problem with this being their “core and sole mission”: “They don’t know what they are for. It’s only a matter of time before increasing numbers of Americans … begin to weary of this program of breaking all things.”
Are you seeing evidence that Americans are wearying of the chaos, and if so, where?
Michael Gecan: We see this on a number of levels and in very different settings. Recently, I was meeting with leaders in a very depressed section of Harrisburg. One of the leaders, a Hispanic man whose father ran a Pentecostal church, said that he had voted for Trump in 2024, thinking that Trump, as a businessman, would be better for the economy. But he said that things had worsened for him and his friends and that the fear generated by the immigration crackdown had created new and deeper stress in the community.
The owner of a barber shop made the same point. He said, “People don’t want to come out, not even for a haircut, because they are scared.”
A few weeks later, I had two meetings with Midwestern business leaders —lawyers, finance people, owners of manufacturing companies, about half Democrats and half Republicans, although they didn’t identify by party. All of them were deeply troubled by the instability and unpredictability in the country.
At a local level, you could view the election of the mayor of San Francisco, [Daniel] Lurie, as a reaction to local chaos. And I do believe I see this playing out in New York City right now. Several of the candidates strike people as worrisome due to past behavior, sketchy associates, or eccentric patterns. The one who seems stable and calm is, counterintuitively, the person who identifies as a socialist.
Ruth Braunstein: In the op-ed, you talk about a group of Americans called the “mixed middle.” Who is this, and why should we focus on them?
Michael Gecan: It’s the 34% that the Gallup people identify as independent, even in these polarized times. Republican pollster Kristen Soltis-Anderson goes even further. She, like Gallup, says that one third of the electorate is moderate. But another 21% say that they are ‘somewhat conservative,’ while 15% say they are ‘somewhat liberal.’ That adds up to 70% of the country.
We see this all the time locally. People with a mix of views — some in inner city neighborhoods more liberal on economic and other issues, but socially conservative; others in suburban or gentrified areas more conservative on economic matters, but liberal socially.
All elections are won or lost in the middle, not at the extremes.
So acting as if everyone is sharply polarized means that you miss those in the 33% or 70% who are thoughtful, mixed, and open to being engaged if approached relationally and respectfully.
Ruth Braunstein: You argue that “people, if organized, still have the power to put the brakes on these breakers,” meaning Trump and his associates who are using their power to break things rather than build things.
Where do you see this kind of organizing happening? Can you share any success stories?
Michael Gecan: We have spent our lives in communities that people had declared beyond repair, perhaps not worthy of repair, and certainly not able to revive themselves. Through our organizing, in places like East Brooklyn or the west and south sides of Chicago, we find talented leaders and deeply rooted institutions that combine to build enough power to halt the decline and reverse the negative trends.
“Nothing is written,” to quote Lawrence of Arabia, that can’t be rewritten with deep, disciplined, relentless relational organizing. I don’t mean to minimize how hard this is. It’s very hard. But we have done it in quite-large local settings. And it can be done nationally now.
Ruth Braunstein: Finally, much of the talk about 2026 focuses on the candidates running for office, and often when we hear about “organizing” these days it is in relation to building a base for a candidate.
Do you view the goal of organizing in this moment to influence the 2026 election, or are there other goals or methods of influence people should be focusing on?
Michael Gecan: There are two dimensions to this. On the local and non-partisan level, we in the IAF [Industrial Areas Foundation] will continue to address major local issues through our organizations. So much gets addressed and improved that really is not affected greatly by the antics on the national level.
But on the partisan level, candidates are needed, but they are not the key. The key there, for those who do that work, is to build the deep networks of local leaders, like that fellow in Harrisburg and those business leaders in the Midwest, and demand a saner, more balanced set of Congress-people and a House that can be the first check on the unchecked and unbalanced situation we see now.
Note: If you’d like to go deeper, Gecan wrote about these themes at greater length in three essays for the Australian Broadcasting Company's Religion and Ethics, which were then published in the U.S. as “Freedom From and Freedom For” by the Acta Publications Group in Chicago.
Something Light
Why King George III in the Broadway production of Hamilton should be played by… Weird Al.
Readers of this newsletter may recall that I am a big fan of the musical Hamilton (this is not exactly shocking).
I am also a parent of small kids who attempts to share my interests with them in age-appropriate ways. This means that I have spent an inordinate amount of time during the past year listening to the singular masterpiece, The Hamilton Polka, by “Weird Al” Yankovic.
In a tight five minutes, Yankovic musically summarizes the entire play, which he arranges as… a polka. I know, I know. But it somehow works?
And it has led me to the following undeniable conclusion: “Weird Al” should be cast as King George III in the Broadway production of Hamilton.
Take a listen — and then let me know if you want to join me in starting an online petition.
This could be how we the people make our voices heard.