Story highlights The young administration has been ferocious in seeking to weed out dissent from the ranks

The rogue resistance has not been confined to the halls of Washington power

(CNN) The pitched resistance to the Trump administration's early onslaught of executive actions and controversial Cabinet nominations has increasingly come to be defined and inspired by a coalition of the unassuming -- bureaucrats and mostly anonymous civil servants.

For the first time in more than a decade, Democrats in Washington are the minority party in both chambers of Congress with no White House to push back on or reject the Republican agenda. Nearly powerless as President Donald Trump seeks to impose his will on the machinery of government, opponents and conflicted nonpartisan civil servants have been forced to seek out new and unusual means of resistance.

The administration's actions are not entirely outside the realm of the recognizable -- new presidents have the prerogative to highlight their priorities and downgrade others. But Trump and his inner circle's delight in attacking political norms -- the strategic underpinning of his winning candidacy -- and their decision to author and implement a shock and awe series of orders in such rapid succession has inspired its own brand of asymmetrical blowback.

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The administration's travel ban order appeared, for its lack of specificity, designed to sow chaos and resistance. The simple fact of it would have provoked anger around the country -- and that's even if it had been delivered with caution and more careful legal vetting. But its haphazard and chaotic implementation created crises inside the government while mobilizing mass protests outside Washington, in cities around the country.