Sunrise Movement is recruiting activists to travel into four midterm battleground states for an operation it calls Operation: Stop a Coup, promising to cover travel and lodging for those who cannot pay their own way, according to recruitment materials reviewed in a report published this week. The operation’s FAQ, promoted publicly by Indivisible Albany on October 5, describes buses, lodging with community hosts or in churches, and financial help for volunteers. It names Michigan, Arizona, Georgia and Texas as destinations.

Sunrise membership is not required and neither is prior experience. The document invites partner organizations, says placement will depend on availability and local connections, and excludes minors. The deployment it advertises runs October 30 through November 5, past Election Day, though the document mislabels November 5 as a Friday when it falls on Thursday. Sunrise published separate materials calling for mass noncooperation against those it labels fascists and billionaires.

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From Natalie Winters on Substack:

The left-wing group backing Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed used that language in a fundraising appeal for activist training, describing mass noncooperation aimed at those it labels fascists and billionaires.

It also says Sunrise intends to observe polling places, support voters, and “pressure local officials” to refuse orders it characterizes as illegal. If Trump denies election results, the group plans to use protest to influence the narrative.

The reviewed records do not establish that El-Sayed directs the election-defense operation.

An October 28 fundraising email from an unnamed Sunrise sender said the writer was already flying to Michigan for six days of voter outreach, describing ten-hour days and thousands of doors knocked. The Michigan organizing push extends from registering young voters to pressuring local officials, and the group frames the whole effort as preparation against potential election interference. Public recruitment material casts volunteers as doing turnout work and poll watching while preparing for nonviolent direct action afterward if needed. The budget for the operation and any records of actual travel payments were not disclosed in the materials reviewed.

El-Sayed’s connection runs through the boardroom. Sunrise’s 2020 tax filing lists Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed as a director, and a July 24, 2026 endorsement email confirms he served on the board for two years. That same email asked supporters to come to Michigan and campaign for El-Sayed and for Sunrise co-founder Will Lawrence, who is running for Congress. The invitation coincided with a July 24–27 national training in Michigan; the Sunrise Orange County chapter’s archive says five of its members attended the gathering, which it describes as a camp on stopping a coup, and then canvassed for both candidates. The endorsement email carries a disclaimer that it was not authorized by any candidate or committee. The fall recruitment FAQ identifies the ability of those same candidates to claim victories as a central stake of the operation.

The group’s training program has openly emphasized disruption. A May 2 appeal credited an in-person Strike Camp and ongoing online instruction for coordinated May Day actions, claiming activists blocked New York Stock Exchange entrances, disrupted transportation and occupied a hotel. By September, Sunrise said it had trained organizers from more than 100 schools over the summer, and a September 3 email described campaigns meant to turn higher-education institutions against Trump, arguing that university opposition would weaken the administration’s legitimacy and connecting campus preparation to possible midterm interference. Sunrise’s financial backing includes direct grants from George Soros’s Open Society network, whose filings record $1.5 million: $1 million in 2020, then $250,000 in 2022 and $250,000 in 2023. The 2020 grant year coincides with El-Sayed’s board service.

Isaiah 5:20 pronounces woe on those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, and this is precisely the inversion on display: a movement that brands lawful election outcomes a coup while calling its own disruption righteous, funded by men who have spent decades buying influence in American institutions. Christians should be clear-eyed about what is being built here. Money is moving young people across state lines to camp outside polling places, and churches are being offered up as lodging for the effort, which means pastors in Michigan, Arizona, Georgia and Texas may soon be asked to host people whose stated purpose is to disrupt the integrity of our elections. So let’s pray that election officials in those four states would be alert and impartial; that the young people being recruited would think for themselves rather than be used; that pastors would weigh carefully what they lend their buildings and their names to; and that Americans would refuse the counsel of those who are seeking to disrupt our elections.

How are you praying about this issue? Share your prayers and scriptures in the comments below.

(Excerpt from Natalie Winters on Substack. Photo Credit: Karola G from Pexels via Canva).