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women's march
Knitting the Anti-Trump Resistance—One Pink or Red Hat at a Time
The color of the hats might have changed over these years, but what has not changed is the core message: the symbolism of knitting as the slow work required to build a movement, and the need to take the time to plan before acting.
Feb 15, 2026
The pattern for a bright red melt the ICE hat popped up in my news feed the other day, and I immediately knew I had to knit one. That the pattern for the freshly renamed hat reproduces the pointed, tasseled hats Norwegians wore in the 1940s as a symbol of protest against Nazi occupation; that it comes from a small woman-owned yarn store in Minnesota at a time when it feels we are not far away from the catastrophe of Fascism and Nazism; that the proceeds from buying the pattern go to organizations that protect immigrant rights. All of this made it even more urgent that I get hold of some red yarn and start casting my stitches without delay.
I learned to knit as a young child from a woman who had herself learned from a woman who had herself learned from a woman. In Italy, where I was born and grew up, this was the norm for girls, though boys were never taught the craft.
As a teen, I enjoyed the meditative quality of the repetitive work of making something grow, one knot at a time. I marveled at the magic of my hands transforming linear yarn into a multidimensional artifact. I learned the patience needed to make and unmake and remake something until I could get it not perfect but good enough. I absorbed the anti-consumerist message of frogging, or unraveling, an old sweater that no longer fits and reusing the yarn to make a new one. I grasped the necessity to create plans before jumping into action.
Then life got in the way, and I let it all fall to the side while I concentrated on becoming a scientist and relocating to the United States to work in biomedical research. My hands turned to handling pipettes and tubes rather than yarn and needles.
But symbols are important. They speak through history, they tell us we are not alone, they let us say things that words often cannot express.
But without my consciously knowing it, it became clear that the same skills were needed in the lab as in putting together a knitting project. There it was, the need to slow down and plan ahead, to repeat the same gesture over and over again, to reuse old concepts for new discoveries, to build step by step until a complex theory emerges from the simplicity of a single experiment. During those years, my brain might have forgotten the practicalities of knitting, but the underlying lessons were all there.
In early 2016, after more than 20 years in the US, I applied for citizenship, hoping to contribute my vote against what would become President Donald Trump’s first term. Bureaucracy was too slow to allow me the privilege to cast my vote that year, but it did not stifle my willingness to protest what I saw as a dangerous development.
The pussyhat, which became a symbol of the protest movement against President Trump, brought me back to knitting. I got hold of some bright pink yarn and needles at my local women-owned yarn store and discovered that my hands still had the muscle memory of what I had learned decades earlier on the other side of the world. I knit a bunch of pussyhats for myself and my friends, which we sported at the Chicago’s women’s march on the gorgeous, hopeful day that was January 21, 2017.
It’s now almost 10 years later, and here we are again, knitting hats against the dangers to our democracy. The hat’s color has changed, from the pink that represented women’s rights to the red now pointing to the defense of immigrants’ rights. As a woman immigrant, I need both and I am sure I will need more in the future.
The color of the hats might have changed over these years, but what has not changed is the core message: the symbolism of knitting as the slow work required to build activism and resistance, and the need to take the time to plan before acting. Knitting as the symbol of the patience it takes to build something meaningful and complex, one knot at a time. As the symbol of the need to constantly make and remake, to reuse what we built in the past to create something that fits the moment. And of knitting, just like quilting, embroidery, and other textile crafts, as reclaiming the role of women in history.
Yes, I know, a handmade hat will not determine the success of our resistance. Just like the pussyhats did not prevent a second Trump term, the melt the ICE hats by themselves will not stop the violence perpetrated against immigrants and those who try to protect them. But symbols are important. They speak through history, they tell us we are not alone, they let us say things that words often cannot express.
When I went to get my skein of yarn the other day, a young man wearing the same bright red hat I was planning to make was at the store, chatting with the owner, who had set aside a basket of skeins of red yarn. The young man told me, matter-of-factly, that he had just finished knitting the hat he was wearing and was there to buy some yarn to make a few more hats for his friends.
And there it was, the symbolism personified. A male knitter, unthinkable when I was a young girl, who let me know, without needing to explain it, that women’s history should not only be reclaimed but also shared with those who can treasure it. A red hat and a basket of red yarn that signaled, “You have nothing to fear here.” That told me that the accent that inflects my English was welcome, not despised. That I did not need the copy of the US passport I have started to take with me wherever I go. That we can do this, together, one knot at a time.
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'Make Billionaires Pay': Coalition Opposed to Destructive Oligarchy Forges Mass Mobilization
"As the US braces for more extreme heat, wildfires, and hurricanes, the Trump administration has been systematically defunding our communities to give handouts to billionaires," said one organizer.
Aug 21, 2025
A broad coalition of progressive organizations on Thursday announced that they are uniting for a mass mobilization event aimed at taking on the billionaire class.
The upcoming Make Billionaires Pay marches, scheduled to occur nationwide on September 20, link together multiple crises—ranging from authoritarianism to the climate emergency to US President Donald Trump's mass deportations—by pointing the finger at the ultra-wealthy oligarchs who have been supporting them all.
Candice Fortin, US campaign manager for climate action organization 350.org, said that billionaires are the connective tissue that links together the major problems currently facing the United States and the world.
"This isn't a new story—billionaires have always prioritized profit over people," Fortin said. "This is a system working exactly as it was designed, but now without even the pretense of justice. As the US braces for more extreme heat, wildfires, and hurricanes, the Trump administration has been systematically defunding our communities to give handouts to billionaires. They're dismantling our democracy, attacking immigrants, and feeding the war profiteers."
Tamika Middleton, managing director for Women's March, also emphasized that today's crises are closely linked together.
"Women, migrants, queer and trans people, and communities of color have long been at the center of overlapping crises, from climate disaster to economic injustice to gender-based violence and forced displacement," she said. "These are not separate struggles; they stem from a global system designed by billionaires who exploit our struggles to maintain power."
Organizers said that these planned actions will focus on advocating for taxing extreme wealth, ending Trump's mass deportation program, and transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy.
The marches are being convened by Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM), Women's March, Climate Defenders, and 350.org, and more than 100 other organizations have endorsed them so far.
The flagship march is set to take place in New York City at the same time the 2025 United Nations General Assembly will be taking place. Other marches are set to occur simultaneously across the country.
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'Unite and Resist': Women's Day Rallies Against Trump Held From Coast to Coast
"This is our day to stand together, make our voices heard, and show the world that we are not backing down," said Women's March.
Mar 08, 2025
Women and their allies took to the streets of cities and towns from coast to coast Saturday for a "Unite and Resist" national day of action against the Trump administrationcoordinated by Women's March.
"Since taking office, the Trump administration has unleashed a war against women driven by the Project 2025 playbook, which is why, more than ever, we must continue to resist, persist, and demand change," Women's March said, referring to the Heritage Foundation-led blueprint for a far-right overhaul of the federal government that, according to the Guttmacher Institute, "seeks to obliterate sexual and reproductive health and rights."
"This is our day to stand together, make our voices heard, and show the world that we are not backing down," Women's March added. "Women's rights are under attack, but we refuse to go backward."
Women's March executive director Rachel O'Leary Carmona asserted that "the broligarchy that owns Trump is working to 'flood the zone' with hateful executive actions and rhetoric, trying to overwhelm us into submission."
"But we refuse to lose focus," she vowed. "We refuse to stand by."
In San Francisco, where more than 500 people rallied, 17-year-old San Ramon, California high school student Saya Kubo gave the San Francisco Chronicle reasons why she was marching.
"Abortion, Elon Musk, educational rights and trans rights, LGBTQ rights, climate change—all of these things, I am standing up for what I believe in," she said.
Her mother, 51-year-old Aliso Kubo, said that "we came out here specifically to support my daughter and women's rights."
Thousands rallied down the coast in Los Angeles, where protester Pamela Baez told Fox 11 that she was there to "support equality."
"I think I mostly want people to be aware that women are people. They have rights," Baez said. "We just want to show everybody that we care about them. People deserve healthcare. Women deserve rights."
Thousands of people rallied on Boston Common on a chilly but sunny Saturday.
"We are the ones who are going to stand up," participant Ashley Barys told WCVB. "There is a magic when women come together. We can really make change happen."
Boston protester Celeste Royce said that "it was really important for me to be here today, to stand up for human rights, for women's rights, to protect bodily autonomy, to just make myself and my presence known."
Sierra Night Tide told WLOS that seeing as how Asheville, North Carolina had no event scheduled for Saturday, she "decided to step up and create one."
At least hundreds turned out near Pack Square Park for the rally:
Today at the Women's March in Asheville, NC pic.twitter.com/BPAIZORSUd
— Senior Fellow Antifa 101st Chairborne Division (@jrh0) March 9, 2025
"As a woman who has faced toxic corporate environments, living with a physical disability, experienced homelessness, and felt the impact of Hurricane Helene, I know firsthand the urgent need for collective action," Night Tide said. "This event is about standing up for all marginalized communities and ensuring our voices are heard."
Michelle Barth, a rally organizer in Eugene, Oregon, told The Register Guard that "we need to fight and stop the outlandish discrimination in all sectors of government and restore the rights of the people."
"We need to protect women's rights. It's our bodies and our choice," Barth added. "Our bodies should not be regulated because there are no regulations for men's bodies. Women are powerful, they are strong, they're intelligent, they're passionate, they are angry, and we're ready to stand up against injustice."
In Grand Junction, Colorado, co-organizer Mallory Martin hailed the diverse group of women and allies in attendance.
"In times when things are so divisive, it can feel very lonely and isolating, and so the community that builds around movements like this has been so welcoming and so beautiful that it's heartwarming to see," Martin told KKCO.
In Portland, Oregon, protester Cait Lotspeich turned out in a "Bring On the Matriarchy" T-shirt.
"I'm here because I support women's rights," Lotspeich
said in an interview with KATU. "We have a right to speak our minds and we have a right to stand up for what is true and what is right, and you can see that women are powerful, and we are here to exert that power."
The United States was one of dozens of nations that saw International Women's Day protests on Saturday. In Germany, video footage emerged of police brutalizing women-led pro-Palestine protesters in Berlin.
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To Fight Trump 2.0, Everyone 'Needs to Become an Organizer'
"Just last week we had to cap a phonebank for the first time ever because of how many people RSVPed," said a spokesperson for the Working Families Party, which has seen a bump in the number of people interested in their work.
Feb 24, 2025
Grassroots protests organized nationwide. Federal workers finding community online and mobilizing through a new entity called the Federal Unionists Network. A bump in the number of people joining the Democratic Socialists of America and other groups. Rallies in front of federal agency buildings.
It might not look the same as "the resistance" of 2017, but these are just some of the examples of how communities are coming together to fight the second Trump administration's attacks.
Speaking on a podcast episode with Greg Sargent of The New Republic that aired Monday, Leah Greenberg—the co-founder of the grassroots progressive network Indivisible—said that "every month since November, we've broken the record for new Indivisible groups formed" and "we've had massive surges of people showing up locally all over the country."
While shock was the "dominant emotion in 2016," which translated into big mobilizing moments such as the 2017 Women's March, this time around "people weren't shocked anymore...[and] a lot of people understood instinctively that the way out of this was going to be the deeper forms of organizing," said Greenberg.
Ashik Siddique, a co-chair of the Democratic Socialists of America, echoed this sentiment. DSA is "really trying to find tangible, sustained ways to plug people in and not just be totally reactive," he told Common Dreams. Overall DSA membership has swelled 10% since November 2024, Siddique said, and the group has seen success channeling energies around targeted issues like protecting trans rights.
The Working Families Party, a progressive political party, has also seen a "significant bump" in the people interested in their work since the election, according to Ravi Mangla, WFP's national press secretary.
"Just last week we had to cap a phonebank for the first time ever because of how many people RSVPed," Mangla told Common Dreams.
But the focus on durable organizing does not mean that there hasn't been energy around galvanizing mass mobilization. On February 5, nationwide demonstrations that were a part of "Movement 50501,"—a decentralized rapid response to the "anti-democratic, destructive, and, in many cases, illegal actions" being undertaken by the Trump administration—took place in locations such as Philadelphia; Lansing, Michigan; Columbus, Ohio; Austin, Texas; Jefferson, Missouri, and elsewhere.
Other protests have take place in the streets of Los Angeles to protest the Trump administration's immigration crackdown, at Tesla stores, and in front of federal agency buildings that have been targeted by the Trump administration and Elon Musk's advisory body the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
On February 10, hundreds of protestors gathered outside the office of the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the federal agency dedicated to protecting consumers from unfair financial practices, following a directive from the Trump administration that all agency staff stay home. Indivisible, WFP, and a third progressive group, MoveOn, also organized a rally that drew over 1,000 people in front of the Treasury Department building in early February in response to DOGE efforts to infiltrate the agency.
Lawmakers in Republican districts have also been feeling some heat. At a recent town hall in Roswell, Georgia, Rep. Rich McCormick (R-Ga.) was booed and catcalled while he answered sharp questions about the Trump administration's actions. In one of the tensest exchanges, a speaker pressed McCormick on personnel cuts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The Trump administration's attacks on the federal workforce have made federal employee unions an important source of resistance to the White House and moves made by DOGE. A number of the administration's measures have been challenged in court by federal employee unions, and unions more generally.
Federal workers, many of whom have relied on the Reddit page for federal employees r/fednews to find solidarity and share information, also sounded the alarm at over 30 "Save Our Services" rallies around the country last week, including in New York, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Denver, Boston, Boise, Chattanooga, Chicago, and Washington, D.C., according to the publication Labor Notes. The protests were organized by the Federal Unionists Network (FUN), an informal association of unionists who are working to strengthen existing federal unions and build solidarity across the federal sector of the labor movement.
"Everybody right now and for the weeks or months or whatever it takes needs to become an organizer," Chris Dols, the president of IFTPE Local 98 at the Army Corps of Engineers and a leader in the Federal Unionists Network, told Labor Notes.
"If you're a federal employee and you don't know what your union is, get involved with FUN, we'll help you figure it out," Dols said. "If you don't have a union, we'll help you learn how to organize one."
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How Social Movements Can Respond to Trump 2.0
Our job will be to take advantage of the moments of opportunity that arise to hold the line against Trump’s authoritarianism—and also link them to a vision for creating the tranåsformative change we need in our world.
Nov 14, 2024
For many of us, the immediate aftermath of Donald Trump’s decisive electoral victory has been a time of deep despair and mourning. There has been plenty of commentary trying to make sense of Trump’s win and the factors that led to it. But no analysis changes the fact that the outcome represents a serious blow to our most vulnerable communities, a sharp setback for causes of economic and social justice, and a profound challenge to whatever semblance of democracy America has been able to secure. We have lived through it before, and it feels even worse the second time around. It is right that we take this as a moment to grieve.
But even amid our feelings of sorrow or hopelessness, we can recognize that political conditions are not static. As we step out of our grieving and look ahead, there are reasons to believe that a new social movement cycle to confront Trumpism can emerge. And in making this happen, we can draw on lessons from what has worked in the past and what we know can be effective in confronting autocrats. Our job will be to take advantage of the moments of opportunity that arise in coming months to hold the line against Trump’s authoritarianism—and also link them to a vision for creating the transformative change we need in our world.
Here’s why we can expect a new wave of movements to arise.
Trump Is a Trigger
We have often written about the importance of “trigger events” in sparking periods of mass protest. Social movement organizers can labor for years in relative quiet, carrying out the long-term “spadework”—as civil rights icon Ella Baker called it—of consciousness raising, leadership development, and building organizational structure. But there are also moments when issues of social and economic injustice are thrown into the spotlight by a dramatic or expected public event: A shocking scandal, a natural disaster, a geopolitical conflict, or an investigative report revealing gross misconduct stokes widespread outrage and sends people into the streets.
In these moments, activists who had previously faced a drought of public interest now find themselves in a torrent. The rules of ordinary politics seem to be suspended. And movements that can capitalize have unique opportunities to alter the political landscape, redefine the terms of debate around an issue and have impacts that ripple throughout the system.
In 2016, Trump’s election itself served as a trigger event. A wide range of groups, from the liberal ACLU to the more radical Democratic Socialists of America, saw membership and donations surge as concerned progressives braced for what was expected to come from his administration. New groups also emerged, such as Indivisible, which began as a viral Google Doc about how to confront elected officials and compel them to resist the Trump administration. It then quickly grew into an organization with more than 4,000 affiliated local groups by 2021.
Trump will trigger outrage. But outrage alone is not enough.
At the same time, outrage among women about Trump being able to take office in spite of his overt misogyny led them to mobilize in record-breaking numbers. A call to action went out immediately after the election, and on January 21, 2017, the day after Trump’s inauguration, upwards of 4 million people rallied in Women’s March events, spread across every state in the nation. Scholars tracking participation identified this as “likely the largest single-day demonstration in recorded U.S. history.”
This time around, the mood is different. The shock of “how could this ever happen” that many experienced eight years ago feels distinct from the gut-churning sense of “it is happening again” that is sinking in this time around. As The New York Times described it, there is a “stunned, quiet, and somber feeling,” sometimes accompanied by resignation, rather than an immediate impulse to rise up in resistance. That said, established progressive groups that have created space for members to gather to make sense of the electoral outcome and plan a response have seen a strong response. Most notably, a mass call two days after the election organized by a coalition of 200 groups—including the Working Families Party, MoveOn, United We Dream, and Movement for Black Lives Action—drew well in excess of 100,000 people, with thousands signing up for follow-up community gatherings.
There will be more opportunities to come. It is highly likely that future trigger events will arise as Trump begins implementing his agenda. Although he won a commanding electoral victory, a significant portion of his gains can be attributed to rejection of the status quo and a desire on the part of voters to sweep out a broken political establishment. On a policy level, Trump is often incoherent. Although he presents himself as a champion of those left behind, he cannot deliver for working people. Instead, many of the things that he will attempt may prove to be deeply unpopular, from tax cuts for the wealthy and attacks on women’s rights, to unconstitutional power grabs and cuts to social services or public benefits.
Should Trump begin to carry out the program of mass deportations that he has promised, resulting in separated families and shattered communities, conservatives could quickly find that their overreach has sparked backlash and defiance—not only from defenders of human rights but even from business people alarmed at the economic disruption.
In late 2005, when the Republican majority in the House pushed through a piece of anti-immigrant legislation known as the Sensenbrenner Bill—a measure which, among other impacts, would have created penalties for providing humanitarian services to undocumented immigrants—it gave rise to a series of massive immigrant rights protests in the months that followed. Hundreds of thousands marched in 2006, not only filling the downtowns of major cities like Chicago, Dallas, and Los Angeles, but also flooding public squares in places such as Fresno, Omaha, and Garden City, Kansas. These actions galvanized the Latino vote and had lasting impacts in multiple election cycles that followed.
Likewise, in the early days of Trump’s first term, his administration’s “Muslim ban” prompted rallies and civil disobedience at airports around the country. While the ban was being challenged in court, the actions served as major public flashpoints, both bolstering local groups and giving rise to national formations such as #NeverAgainAction, while also prompting cities to make vows to protect migrants.
Public revolt can cut both ways: The rise of the Tea Party in 2009 became a significant hindrance to former President Barack Obama’s ability to pursue a progressive economic agenda. But whether such mobilizations come from the left or right, it is important to recognize that they can have significant consequences.
Activism during Trump’s first term was able to create a sense of an administration that was embattled and mired in controversy, rather than one carrying out a popular mandate. While most presidents can expect to enjoy a bump in popularity following their inaugurations, Trump instead faced record-low approval ratings. And while conservatives passed a major tax law that favored the rich, they were unable to realize other top goals such as the repeal of Obamacare. With the 2018 midterms, movements played a significant role in creating one of the most dramatic swings in recent electoral history, propelling a wave that both swept Democrats into power in many states and deprived Republicans of control of the U.S. Congress, closing their window of maximum legislative power.
Looking forward, Trump will trigger outrage. But outrage alone is not enough. It needs to be translated into action. Movements must be ready to capitalize on and extend the opportunities that Trump’s policies create. Here, preparation is helpful: By anticipating and planning for trigger events, movements can position themselves to take maximum advantage.
Different Strategies for Change Can Work Together
When we track the impacts of mass protests, one of the most consistent things that we witness is that critics are eager to denounce activist tactics and preemptively declare new movements as ineffectual, even when they have scarcely just appeared. When mass protests erupted in Trump’s first term, there were a plethora of voices condemning them as pointless and even counterproductive.
In The New York Times, David Brooks conceded that the Women’s March was an “important cultural moment,” but argued that “Marching is a seductive substitute for action,” and that it ultimately amounted to little more than “mass therapy” for participants. “Change happens when people run for office, amass coalitions of interest groups, engage in the messy practice of politics,” Brooks wrote, contending that “these marches can never be an effective opposition to Donald Trump.” Such pessimism was sometimes echoed by left-wing commentators as well, who devoted more energy to dissecting the political limitations of the Women’s March than capitalizing on the opportunities it created to draw new people into long-term organizing campaigns.
In fact, people newly activated by the march became part of many subsequent efforts, and the following year the mobilization fed directly into the #MeToo movement, which erupted after another trigger event—namely, publicity that shed light on the sexual abuses perpetrated by Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein. Not only did #MeToo have far-reaching implications for policy, in the legal system, and in other arenas of public life, it also significantly affected voting patterns, with The Washington Post reporting on a “women-led army” that was “repulsed by Trump and determined to do something about it” driving abnormally high turnout in 2018 and 2020.
As social movements respond to outrage over Trump’s policies and tie their actions to a real agenda for transformative change, they puncture the pretense that he offers any sort of real alternative to a democracy ruled by elites and an economy designed to serve the wealthy.
But the even bigger problem for the argument of those who dismiss mass protest is the assumption that different approaches to creating change are mutually exclusive. To the contrary, key to both defeating Trumpism and winning what we actually want in the future is cultivating a healthy social movement ecosystem in which multiple approaches to change complement and play off one another. There is strong evidence from past mobilizations that mass protest in fact feeds such an ecology in many different ways. Following peak periods of unrest, which we describe as “moments of the whirlwind,” those who have been laboring for years in the trenches often remark on how the surge of interest and support significantly expands their horizon of possibility.
Social movements alone have the potential to produce a response to Trump that both invites mass participation and that is connected to a broader vision for change. The alternative—relying on legal cases or other insider challenges to the administration’s policies, hoping that politicians will save us, or relying on Democrats, by themselves, to not cave or conciliate themselves to Trumpism—is a recipe for defeat and demobilization.
The bright spots of the first Trump era came as movements not only rallied large numbers of people in defensive battles against the White House, but also carried forward popular energy by organizing around a positive vision for change. Here, the model offered by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) was very important. Sanders achieved far greater success in his 2016 primary challenge to Hillary Clinton than anyone in the Washington establishment could have imagined by running on a resolute platform of Medicare for All, free higher education, and confronting the power of corporations and the rich. Whether or not “Bernie would’ve won” in 2016 had he been in the general election, as many of his supporters believe, the senator was nevertheless vital in pointing to a model of how Trumpism could be combatted with a progressive populist vision, rather than a retreat to the center and the adoption of “Republican-lite” versions of policy.
Groups motivated to build active support for such a vision—which included progressive unions, community organizations investing in electoral work in a more concerted way than ever before, and new or re-energized formations such as the Democratic Socialists of America, Justice Democrats, Our Revolution, the Working Families Party, and the Poor People’s Campaign—entered into contests that gave rise to the Squad at the federal level, as well as an unprecedented number of movement champions taking office locally.
The Sunrise Movement, another group that contributed to this push, exploded onto the scene in 2018, playing a key role in putting the Green New Deal at the center of policy debate and, along with Fridays for Future, revitalizing climate activism. Trigger events around police violence ignited a new round of Black Lives Matter protests and a national reckoning on race that has helped secure important gains around criminal justice reform—strides toward which have continued in spite of backlash.
This time around, we must be more clear than ever that our goal is to win over a majority of Americans. Movements should not be afraid to engage in polarizing protest, but they should be mindful of the challenge of producing positive polarization that reaches out to include more people in the fight for justice, while minimizing negative polarization that pushes away potential supporters. Crucial to this is always seeking to expand the coalition of allies, engage in political education to bring in newcomers, and not accept the myth of the righteous few, or the idea that the path to victory is through demanding ever-greater levels of moral purity among those we associate with, even if that means ever-greater insularity.
The day after the election, Sunrise tweeted: “Trump loves corporations even more than Democrats do, but he ran an anti-establishment campaign that gave an answer to people’s desire for change.” As social movements respond to outrage over Trump’s policies and tie their actions to a real agenda for transformative change, they puncture the pretense that he offers any sort of real alternative to a democracy ruled by elites and an economy designed to serve the wealthy. “We can stop him, and we must,” Sunrise added. “But it’s going to take many thousands of people taking to the streets and preparing to strike. And it’s going to take mass movements putting out a better vision for our country than Trumpism and proving that we can make it happen.”
If ever there was a time to allow ourselves a space for mourning as we contemplate the fate of our country, it is now. But ultimately, only we can save ourselves from despair. David Brooks intended to be dismissive in characterizing collective protest as “mass therapy,” but in one respect he is onto something: There is no better antidote to hopelessness than action in community.
Our past experience tells us that coming months and years will offer moments that trigger public revulsion. Social movements provide a unique mechanism for responding; creating common identity and purpose between strangers; and allowing genuine, collective participation in building a better democracy. If we are to make it together through Trump’s second presidency and emerge in its aftermath to create the world we need, this may be our greatest hope. Indeed, it may be our only one.
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All-Male Commission Passes Abortion Travel Ban in Lubbock County, Texas
"We're going to make sure that there are political and electoral consequences for this," said one abortion rights campaigner.
Oct 24, 2023
Seeking to create a "sanctuary for the unborn," commissioners in Lubbock County, Texas voted Monday to empower citizens to sue individuals assisting pregnant people who travel in unincorporated areas of the county for the purpose of having an abortion.
The Lubbock Avalanche-Journal reported Commissioners Terence Kovar, Jason Corley, and Jordan Rackler all voted in favor of the ordinance, with the body's two other members—County Judge Curtis Parrish and Commissioner Gilbert Flores—abstaining.
The legislation allows citizens to sue anyone who assists a pregnant person in getting an abortion in Lubbock County or who helps them travel through unincorporated areas of the county en route to abortion care. The law does not apply to pregnant people seeking the procedure, and is not applicable in incorporated areas like the city of Lubbock—where 265,000 of the county's 318,000 residents live.
In 2021, Lubbock became the largest U.S. municipality to ban abortions within city limits. It is now the fourth and largest in Texas—and sixth overall jurisdiction in the state—to allow civil lawsuits against those who assist people traveling for abortions.
In June 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court's right-wing supermajority ended half a century of federally enshrined reproductive rights in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization. Texas already had a so-called "trigger law" in place to automatically ban all abortions in the state, as well as an early 20th-century law banning the distribution of "obscene" materials including contraception. The 1925 law took effect that July, while the trigger law—which made performing an abortion a felony punishable by up to life in prison, except in cases when a pregnant person's life is endangered—kicked in the following month.
Anyone who "aids or abets" an unlawful abortion in Texas can be sued for wrongful death. In March, a Galveston man filed suit against three women for helping his ex-wife obtain abortion pills, which she used to terminate her unwanted pregnancy.
"Texans already live under some of the most restrictive and dangerous abortion bans in the country, yet anti-abortion extremists continue to push additional unnecessary, confusing, and fear-inducing barriers to essential healthcare," Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas spokesperson Autumn Keiser said in a statement Monday.
Proponents of the Lubbock ordinance included a New Mexico state senator and other residents of the nearby state who said it has become a haven for Texans and others seeking abortions after their home states banned the care. Some supporters said they believed the law is sanctioned by their Judeo-Christian deity figure. One pastor compared outlawing abortion to the abolition of slavery.
Explaining his Monday abstention vote, Flores said he opposes abortion but cited the state's history—which includes genocide, rampant dispossession of Indigenous and Latino Texans, and 20th-century anti-Mexican pogroms—as a reason for caution.
"I am 77 years old. I go back to the '50s and '60s... when my rights were violated at school, at restaurants, anywhere I went," the Latino commissioner explained. "What's in front of me right now is, do I have the right, do I have the power, do I want the authority to tell women what to do, to violate their rights?"
"When I took this job 24 years ago to obey the Constitution of the United States, I wasn't put here to tell you what to do with your life, your body, and your rights," he added.
Legal experts have questioned whether laws like Lubbock's are actually enforceable. In a concurring opinion in Dobbs, Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote: "May a state bar a resident of that state from traveling to another state to obtain an abortion? In my view, the answer is no based on the constitutional right to interstate travel."
Reproductive rights advocates have vowed to fight what they call "unconstitutional" abortion travel bans. They also expect such laws to backfire at the ballot box in elections across the country next month and, critically, in 2024.
"We're going to make sure that there are political and electoral consequences for this," said Rachel O'Leary Carmona, executive director of the Women's March.
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Appeals Court Upholds Restrictions on Mifepristone—But Abortion Pill Remains Available for Now
"Today's decision is a likely first step toward a massive blow to reproductive rights in the United States—and a stark reminder that our courts have been hijacked by Republican extremists," said one abortion rights advocate.
Aug 16, 2023
A federal appellate court on Wednesday upheld portions of a ruling restricting access to the abortion pill mifepristone, although the drug will remain available pending the outcome of ongoing litigation.
A three-judge panel of the right-wing 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that mifepristone can remain on the market, while finding that the Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) 2016 move to allow the pill to be taken later in pregnancy, mailed directly to patients, and prescribed by healthcare professionals other than doctors was likely illegal.
The ruling—which the Department of Justice (DOJ) said it will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court—was condemned by abortion rights advocates.
"Ignoring the facts and the expert scientific judgment of the country's top doctors is judicial activism of the highest order."
"This entirely illegitimate decision could cost lives all across the country," Rachel O'Leary Carmona, executive director of Women's March, said in a statement. "The conservative three-judge panel that is the 5th Circuit Court is just another agent in extremist Republicans' plan to enact a full nationwide abortion ban and to cut back access to critical reproductive healthcare."
"To be clear: Mifepristone is an FDA-approved medication that has been proven safe and effective for women in all walks of life for over two decades," she added. "It has a safety record of over 99%—more than that of Tylenol or Viagra."
Following the Supreme Court's cancellation last year of half a century of constitutional abortion rights in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk in Texas ruled this April in Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. FDA that the agency's approval of mifepristone in 2000 was illegal.
The DOJ subsequently appealed Kacsmaryk's decision to the 5th Circuit. Later in April, the Supreme Court granted a request by the Biden administration to continue allowing widespread access to mifepristone pending the outcome of the 5th Circuit case.
"Today's decision by the 5th Circuit to partially reaffirm Judge Kacsmaryk's ruling attempting to yank mifepristone off the shelves is an outrageous attack on the reproductive freedom and bodily autonomy of women and pregnant people in the United States," Catholics for Choice president Jamie Manson said in a statement.
"A mountain of scientific evidence demonstrates that mifepristone—which, when taken in combination with misoprostol, accounts for most of the abortions in the United States—is a safe and highly effective method of terminating an early pregnancy," Manson added. "Ignoring the facts and the expert scientific judgment of the country's top doctors is judicial activism of the highest order."
Nicole Regalado, vice president of campaigns at UltraViolet, warned that "if the Supreme Court refuses to take this case, or affirms the 5th Circuit's decision, it will severely restrict access to mifepristone nationwide."
"Today's decision is a likely first step toward a massive blow to reproductive rights in the United States—and a stark reminder that our courts have been hijacked by Republican extremists who will stop at nothing to advance their sexist agenda," she continued.
"In times like these, every single one of us must make a choice: Will we stand by and let extremist judges impose their sexist agendas on millions of people, or step up to protect the rights of women and pregnant people to make decisions about their bodies?" Regalado added. "History will remember which side we choose."
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Advocates Warn Abortion Pill Access Still at 'Severe Risk' Despite Supreme Court Reprieve
"This stay is the bare minimum," said one reproductive rights campaigner. "The imminent threat to access to mifepristone and abortion care remains."
Apr 14, 2023
"Mifepristone remains safe, effective, and AVAILABLE."
However, access to medication abortion remains at "severe risk." That was the message Friday from reproductive rights advocates after the United States Supreme Court temporarily blocked a ruling by a Texas federal judge that would effectively end access to abortion pills.
Justice Samuel Alitoissued a short order on the high court's "shadow docket" staying until next Wednesday last week's decision by U.S. 5th Circuit Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, an appointee of former President Donald Trump who ruled that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's 2000 approval of mifepristone—one of two drugs typically used in tandem to induce abortion—was illegal.
Alito, who wrote the majority opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization—the ruling that canceled half a century of federal abortion rights—is assigned to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
"While medication abortion remains accessible for now, this case should never have been heard in the first place," NARAL Pro-Choice America president Minni Timmaraju said in a statement. "Nothing about the rulings from the lower courts' Trump-appointed judges had any basis in medical science–both are steeped in reckless disinformation and total disregard for the law. As this case continues, safe and effective medication abortion in all 50 states is at severe risk."
Jenny Ma, senior counsel at the Center for Reproductive Rights, said Friday that "mifepristone will remain available as it has for the last 23 years, for at least five more days."
"This week has created whiplash for healthcare providers and patients—and this order provides cold comfort for a brief few days," Ma added. "But this case is far from over. The Supreme Court must take action next week to stop the chaos unleashed by these extreme decisions."
On Wednesday, a three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit Court temporarily blocked the part of Kacsmaryk's ruling that would have invalidated the FDA's approval of mifepristone. Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, called Wednesday's ruling "a wolf in sheep's clothing."
"The court rightly found that some claims were filed too late," Northup added, "but that should not distract from the radical assault on the FDA's decision-making authority and the fact that it will wreak havoc on the provision of medication abortion if it stands."
The full Supreme Court next week is expected to consider granting a longer stay of Kacsmaryk's decision.
According to the Center for Reproductive Rights, healthcare providers "have been thrown into chaos repeatedly this week, with the accessibility of mifepristone volleying between two federal district courts and a circuit court."
After Friday's stay, NARAL Pro-Choice America asserted:
The people hurt most by these bans and restrictions are those who already face barriers to accessing abortion care—including women; Black, Latina/x, Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, and Indigenous people; those working to make ends meet; the LGBTQ+ community; immigrants; young people; those living in rural communities; people with disabilities, and other historically oppressed communities.
Rachel O'Leary Carmona, executive director at Women's March, said in a statement that "had the Supreme Court refused to act today, the restrictions imposed by the 5th Circuit would have taken effect across the nation. This stay is the bare minimum. The imminent threat to access to mifepristone and abortion care remains."
"Mifepristone has been safe and effective and proven that way for more than 20 years," O'Leary Carmona continued. "There is no doubt about the FDA's authority to regulate it, or that the drug helps save lives."
"This case should be a clarion call to defenders of democracy to take action," she asserted. "If we don't act now, our courts and democracy itself will be eroded beyond repair."
"That's why Women's March is turning out in D.C. and cities across the country this weekend," she added, referring to nationwide protests planned for Saturday. "Together, we can protect the right to safe, legal abortion care and ensure that everyone has the freedom to make decisions about their own bodies and lives."
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Women-Led Marches and Rallies in US Cities Nationwide Call for Trump's Ouster and GOP Defeat
"His presidency began with women marching and now it's going to end with women voting," said head of the Women's March.
Oct 18, 2020
Thousands of people--mostly young women, some in costumes, many donning signs, and all wearing masks--marched and rallied Saturday in Washington, D.C. and in cities around the U.S. to voice opposition to President Donald Trump as well as his latest Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett, and to urge voters to soundly defeat the Republican Party's congressional candidates at the ballot box.
This weekend's nationwide protest was the latest in a series of women's marches that began the day after Trump's inauguration in 2017.
Rachel O'Leary Carmona, executive director of the Women's March, told the crowd in the nation's capitol: "His presidency began with women marching and now it's going to end with women voting. Period."
"From Denver to Durham to D.C., women sent an unmistakable message," the Women's March Twitter account noted on Saturday night. "We've had enough. We reject Trump's agenda that doesn't include all of us, and we will unite across our differences to vote him out."
In a video shared by the New York Times, women described their motives for attending the protest. Natalie Gates told reporters that she wanted to use her voice to oppose the appointment of Barrett to the high court, since Trump's nominee "will affect my children and the future."
Chants of "Vote him out!" and "Donald Trump has got to go!" can be heard throughout.
Another recording shared by the Washington Post shows evidence of clashes between women's rights advocates and a small group of right-wing counterprotesters.
There were far more opponents of the reactionary agenda of Trump, Barrett, and the GOP than supporters. "I will NOT go quietly back to the 1950s!" read one protester's sign.
A young woman from West Virginia named Taylor told a reporter that "I am marching because access to reproductive healthcare is a human right."
"Women showed up in force on day one of Trump's presidency for the first Women's March," Carmona said at the D.C. rally, "and now we're mobilizing to finish what we started."
"People need to get out and vote," Tamika Palmer, the mother of Breonna Taylor, told attendees. "Protesting is good but if we don't take it to the polls we're really not going to make the change we want and need."
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Nevertheless, She Persisted - By the Millions
It's women of every race and creed working to bring the country back toward the ideal of a compassionate democracy
Jan 26, 2018
Back in 2007, just a month and a half after I was first elected president of the Writers Guild of America East, we and our friends and colleagues at the Writers Guild West were plunged into a strike against the networks and studios. For me, it was one hell of an initiation.
The strike would last a grueling hundred days and the asymmetric warfare we waged was a success, but early on the first morning I arrived at Rockefeller Center concerned that no one would show up for the picket line.
I needn't have worried; within an hour or two, hundreds of us were marching, but as I was fretting and staring at piles of unused placards, a policeman came up to me.
"You guy are the writers?" he asked. I nodded. He pointed to the piles. "Then how come your signs aren't more clever?"
He had a point, and as time went on, we got much better at it. By comparison, originality and adroit wordplay have never been an issue at the women's marches, either last weekend or at the mass demonstrations a year before, held the day after Donald Trump's inauguration and believed to be the biggest single day protest in American history.
This January, at more than 300 events in every one of the fifty states, everyone who gathered to shake a fist in protest of the first year of the Trump White House - by some estimates, more than two million in America and worldwide - knew why they were there and they expressed it loudly and well with their chants, cheers and splendid signage: from the simple yet eloquent "Dump Trump" and "Banish the Bully" to "Grab 'em by the midterms" and "I would hate to be the guy who keeps pissing off all these women."
Those women and men hit the pavement everywhere from Chicago and Los Angeles to Denton, Texas, and Fayetteville, North Carolina. Here in Manhattan, by 10 am last Saturday, a bright and sunny, temperate day, the streets already were filling up. We talked our way through a police line at 72nd Street, got over to Central Park West and moved downtown toward the rally site at Columbus Circle.
But after ninety minutes of being penned in with thousands of others and nothing to do but mill around and wait, we exited near where Gays Against Guns were handing out song sheets and belting out, to the tune of The Battle Hymn of the Republic, "He's the cherry on the sundae of the racist and the rich/So afraid to pay their taxes, they will scratch a fascist itch."
We worked our way west over to Lincoln Center and were thrilled to witness crowds surging up Columbus Avenue and Broadway working their way north and then east and south to join the march. They were angry at what's happening but still in high spirits, still able to rally and voice their concern for all that's misbegotten and misogynistic about our benighted White House.
Lamely, Trump tried to coopt Saturday's events, tweeting that women had a perfect day to "celebrate the historic milestones and unprecedented economic success and wealth creation that has taken place over the last 12 months." This was mansplaining at its lowest and just to make it worse, on Monday night there was presidential amanuensis Kellyanne Conway parroting the same disingenuous boasts of her boss. Shame on her. Again.
But more important and constructive, the creativity and commitment typical of the women who marched Saturday and Sunday translate into votes.
This week's Washington Post/ABC News poll showed Democrats leading among female voters 57-31 percent, "double the size of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton's margin in the 2016 election," the Post reported. "Nonwhite women favor Democrats by a 53-point margin, somewhat smaller than Clinton's 63-point advantage over Trump in 2016. But white women have moved sharply in Democrats' direction, favoring them over Republicans by 12 points after supporting Trump by nine points in 2016..."
And don't dare discount the depth of women's dissatisfaction with Trump - six in ten female registered voters "strongly disapprove" of Trump - a feeling, if it holds, that will get them to the voting booth for sure. (According the Post/ABC News poll, on a generic ballot, Democrats are ahead of the GOP by fifteen points among those "absolutely certain" they'll vote.)
Columnist EJ Dionne notes "a condescending habit in the nation's capital of seeing voters as detached and indifferent to the day-to-day workings of government....
"But news from across the country should shatter these illusions. A large majority of voters, including many erstwhile Trump supporters, is rebelling. The evidence is overwhelming that the president's foes are as determined and motivated as any opposition in recent memory."
And yet coverage of the weekend's marches was lacking. "After the initial flurry of media attention - crickets," Helaine Olen at The Washington Post wrote, citing a Media Matters analysis that the Sunday morning news shows "were nearly silent on the historic protests."
Olen added, "While it's common sense to observe that the government shutdown is taking up some of our oxygen, the lack of attention also demonstrates how even with the #MeToo movement, it is ingrained to treat the concerns of women as secondary to, well, bigger things that are deemed more serious. And when opposition to the Trump administration and the Republican Party is framed as a women's issue, it receives less attention than it should."
She also quoted pollster Matt McDermott who told her that part of the problem is that the media has chosen to "course correct" because of the belief that they had failed to pick up on the extent of Trump's enraged white male support. "There is not coverage of the actual movement building on the left," McDermott said, "which is arguably by any measure the greatest political movement we've seen in decades in this country."
Contributing to that movement, "an unprecedented surge of first-time female candidates," Charlotte Alter at TIME magazine reports, "overwhelmingly Democratic, running for offices big and small, from the U.S. Senate and state legislatures to local school boards.
"At least 79 women are exploring runs for governor in 2018, potentially doubling a record for female candidates set in 1994, according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. The number of Democratic women likely challenging incumbents in the U.S. House of Representatives is up nearly 350% from 41 women in 2016. Roughly 900 women contacted Emily's List, which recruits and trains pro-choice Democratic women, about running for office from 2015 to 2016; since President Trump's election, more than 26,000 women have reached out about launching a campaign."
In 1968, when insurgent Democratic candidate Gene McCarthy won more delegates than President Lyndon Johnson in the New Hampshire primary, he thanked the college kids who had fueled his campaign. "People have remarked that this campaign has brought young people back into the system," he said, "but it's the other way 'round. The young people have brought the country back into the system."
Fifty years later, it's women of every race and creed working to bring the country back toward the ideal of a compassionate democracy. The media and establishment politicians, especially those who support and encourage our current kleptocracy of lies and inexcusable policy, ignore that power at their peril.
"Who do you think has been organizing things in America?" Harvard a professor of government and sociology Theda Skocpol asks. "It's women."
How does that grab you, Mr. President?
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