Opinion: With the growing threat to democracy, it’s time for Gen Z to step up

Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes a mix of guest commentaries online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

•••

There are moments when history speeds up, when the gap between the ideals a nation proclaims and the reality its people experience becomes painfully clear. We are living through such a moment now.

On Tuesday night, California Gov. Gavin Newsom addressed the growing threat to democracy posed by President Donald Trump’s use of state power for political gain. In his remarks, Newsom quoted former Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, who once said, “What I have desired to do is to make the people of Boston realize that the most important office, and the one which all of us can and should fill, is that of private citizen. The duties of the office of private citizen cannot under a republican form of government be neglected without serious injury to the public.”

Brandeis wrote those words in 1903. In 2025, they may be more urgent than ever.

President Trump has now federalized the California National Guard, overriding Newsom. He has deployed 700 U.S. Marines to patrol an American city. His administration has authorized masked and heavily armed federal agents to conduct raids in immigrant neighborhoods. These are not headlines from a distant past or a foreign regime. This is happening here, now. And it demands a response, not just from politicians or pundits, but from all of us who occupy that most important office: private citizen.

This is the same president who stood by while lawlessness ruled the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. He watched as an attempted coup unfolded in real time, directed at the very constitutional order he now claims to defend. That contradiction should not be lost on anyone, especially my generation. Gen Z understands the stakes because we have grown up in a time when truth is twisted and power is abused in plain sight. We have recited the Pledge of Allegiance, and we have studied the Preamble to the Constitution, only to find that the ideals of liberty and justice for all are still too often honored in speech but denied in practice. Our generation has seen the gap between promise and performance, and we are being called to decide whether we will close it.

So what does it mean to be a private citizen in Gen Z’s America? It means reckoning with the contradictions we have inherited. We were taught that all are created equal, even as we saw how inequality is protected by policy. We pledged allegiance to a republic “with liberty and justice for all,” while watching the very systems that govern us fall short of that promise. We came of age in an era of school lockdowns, mass protests and digital disinformation. We are not detached from history. We are its next chapter.

As a Gen Z American and an attorney, I see this moment through both the lens of lived experience and the responsibilities of the law. The Constitution, which I have sworn to uphold, begins with a promise: “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union … .” It does not promise perfection, but it demands a pursuit of it. When those tasked with enforcing our laws wear masks to conceal their identities, when federal agents act without transparency or accountability, and when military power is turned inward against our own people, we are not forming a more perfect union. We are unraveling it.

The current justification for this show of force is the presence of immigrants, human beings who are seeking safety, dignity and opportunity. That justification is not new. Throughout our history, fear has been weaponized against marginalized communities to consolidate power. But we should know better by now. My family’s story, like that of so many Minnesotans, reflects the full complexity of this nation. I am the descendant of Black Americans who endured the American nightmare of slavery, and of European immigrants who came through Ellis Island in search of the American dream. These legacies are not opposites. They are intertwined. And they form the foundation of my belief that America must be a nation where liberty and justice truly are for all.

And now, the Marines have landed. National Guard troops in California are under federal command. The secretary of defense is threatening further deployments into American cities. This is no longer theory. It is our lived reality. For those of us in Gen Z, especially here in Minnesota, we must resist the temptation to scroll past this moment. We cannot afford to be hypnotized by memes or distracted by performative outrage. Our generation came of age in a time of protest and pain, but also possibility. The question now is whether we will be remembered for our activism or for our apathy. Democracy does not survive on vibes and retweets. It survives when private citizens step forward and act.

We are approaching Juneteenth, the day when the last enslaved people in America were told they were free, years after the Emancipation Proclamation had already declared it. It is a reminder that freedom delayed is freedom denied. And today, the stakes are rising again. Will we meet this moment? Will we protect the promise of liberty not just for ourselves, but for those whose rights are most at risk?

The levers of democracy still exist, but they do not move themselves. Gen Z has the numbers, the perspective and the urgency to shape the outcome. But action requires awareness. The erosion of rights is not always announced with fanfare; often it is hidden behind official statements, sealed court orders and televised distractions. In this moment, our civic strength will be measured not by what we post, but by what we do.

Justice Brandeis was right. The most important political office is that of the private citizen. The question now is: Will we do the job?

Haley Taylor Schlitz is an attorney, writer and former public school teacher based in St. Paul.