Anger on the Trump administration bubbled over throughout the Bay Space as a whole lot gathered for “Not My President’s Day” to protest alleged anti-democratic actions by the Trump administration and Elon Musk’s Division of Authorities Effectivity.
The Monday protests — with massive teams in San Jose, Oakland and San Francisco — had been a part of a collection of demonstrations meant to antagonize President Donald Trump, presidential adviser and Tesla CEO Elon Musk and different members of the administration who’ve challenged democratic norms, curtailed protections for the LGBT group and ended fairness and variety initiatives throughout the US.
“Even in defeat we stand together,” stated Berkeley’s first poet laureate, Rafael Jesus Gonzalez, on the Oakland Pergola beside Lake Merritt to a crowd that surrounded him. “We cannot let fascism rule in America. We must come together.”
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Democrats and progressives throughout the US had been largely stagnant since President Trump returned to workplace on Jan. 20 and sweeping adjustments to public companies, protections for trans folks and immigration enforcement. The few protests there have been had been sparsely attended and sometimes lacked the vitality of these from Trump’s first time period.
That modified this previous weekend within the Bay Space the place residents gathered outdoors of Tesla showrooms to denounce Musk and harm the world’s richest man the place it counts: his pockets. Protest indicators from the march referred to as to “send Musk to Mars” whereas different indicators tied him to Nazism after he gave a Nazi salute at President Trump’s inauguration.
In San Jose, a whole lot of demonstrators converged on the Circle of Palms downtown, the place they hoisted indicators saying “Remove the Muskovites,” “Elon is a Terrible President” and “Wake Up America.” Audio system included Assemblymember Ash Kalra and former Santa Clara County Supervisor Rod Diridon Sr.
After the group had grown to an estimated 1,500 demonstrators they marched across the block into Plaza de Cesar Chavez Park, chanting “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Elon Musk has got to go.”
Jessie Heminway, a protester in Oakland with a member of the family within the federal authorities, stated Musk’s cuts to companies are unauthorized and unconstitutional.
“It’s a nuthouse there. They’re firing qualified people. It’s retribution,” Heminway stated. “Letting Elon run free in the government without even confirming him is entirely inappropriate.”
She stated she had questioned the aim of protest as a political motion after the ladies’s march and Black Lives Matter rallies that occurred throughout Trump’s first time period had little impact on public coverage. She discovered a solution throughout the march alongside Lake Merritt, nevertheless, saying, “People need to meet each other and have community.”
Members of the protests diversified from long-time organizers from the Sixties to newly activated contributors like 14-year-old Iris Baker.
Baker, who’s nonbinary, joined the protests as a result of the federal authorities had suspended purposes for folks searching for so as to add “X” as a gender label on passports. “In the eyes of the law, it says people like me aren’t valid.”
Initially Revealed: February 17, 2025 at 4:06 PM PST
