We're Not Moving To Canada. We're Staying Right Here.

The “I’m going to move to Canada” line is no longer funny. “President Trump? I’m outta here,” seems to be the thinking. But you know what? You, the people who are joking about moving to Canada, the people who are worried about a Trump presidency: You’re not the people who will suffer.

Reminder: Donald J. Trump doesn’t believe in climate change. He says he’s going to build a wall with Mexico on his first day. He says he will nominate a pro-life Supreme Court justice his first day, and the GOP Congress will usher them in. Infrastructure bills? How can we? We’re cutting taxes. Obamacare? Gone. You’re on your own. Minimum wage? Forget it. Black Lives? Forget it. All Lives Matter. Blue Lives Matter. Muslims? Deport them. Who cares if they were born here? Ship them somewhere sandy and hot.

You know who’s going to suffer? The guys who pick our organic strawberries and potatoes and their families. They can’t follow politics on their smartphone. They can’t vote. And they can’t move to Canada. They’re too busy trying to figure out how to keep their families together, and in the U.S., with the damned wall that Trump wants to build.

You know who else will suffer? The thousands of black people who have spent the last two years working on Black Lives Matter and who are finally getting out the word that perhaps things aren’t as equal as we all thought, and that perhaps, just maybe, we need to come together and work on it, and work on police brutality, and have every cop wear a camera. And they have finally woken up a huge section of America to support them, just in time for Trump to pretend he doesn’t know who David Duke is.

You think the people in Flint, Michigan can afford to move to Canada? They can’t afford to move out of Flint — where the water is literally killing their children.

You know who else can’t move to Canada? The 46 million Americans who rely on SNAP to meet their basic food needs. Are we really just going to abandon them all while we go eat gravy on our fries and learn how to root for hockey teams? We’re going to let them starve while a pompous billionaire takes over OUR country?

Gay teenagers, coming bravely forward instead of cowering in the background, because for the first time, our country feels safe for them. Do you think President Donald J. Trump is going to welcome them to his rallies, from what you’ve seen? Are they still going to feel safe? Still want to leave them here with the immigrants, the poor and the Trump supporters?

What about the most vulnerable among us? Screw moving to Canada. I’m not in one of the groups that’s vulnerable. I’m not an immigrant, black, Muslim, disabled or poor. But I am an American.

My grandfather was a coal miner, and my great-grandmother came over from Poland with nothing. I have a great-great-grandfather that came over from Ireland on a famine boat alone with an uncle, at age seven, when everyone in his family had died because the British starved them. And I will be DAMNED if I’m going to leave this country and let Trump undo all of the work my immigrant ancestors did.

My grandfather didn’t work in a coal mine so that Trump could brag about the size of his dick on television while I left the country and watched on the sidelines until things got easier. I’m going to stay right here. In my country. And I’m going to do what I can to mitigate the damage.

President Trump? You’re on notice. There are millions of us. And we’re going to be here, standing up, and using our voices, and our bodies if we need to, and we’re going to stand between Trump and immigration camps. We’re going to stand between him and taking away Muslims. We’re going stand between him and pulling immigrants back to Mexico. We’re going to stand up every time we hear a racist remark. And we’re going to fight like hell to protect our rights.

We are not going anywhere. This is our country, and we’re not leaving. Someone’s got to stay and protect the ones who don’t have that option.