Free America! Protests Continue, More to Come
May Day Protests: Here Comes the Union Movement
The third weekend in April brought yet another round of protests against the Trump administration and its policies. This time the demonstrations were different in that they were more scattered, with many smaller protests focused on specific actions and policies of the current US regime, along with larger events in major cities.
Next up will be May Day, which won’t be on a weekend, although it’s likely there will be events through the following weekend. At the forefront of these actions will be labor unions, using the occasion to highlight specific entities refusing and blocking efforts for workplace/economic justice.
I’ll be sharing more specific news in the coming days. For now, here are three sites that may be helpful as plans are solidified: maydaystrong.org, UC Strike hub, Union del Barrio (Chicano Park
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BREAKING NEWS: Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency Director Lee Zeldin is coming to San Diego on (the official) Earth Day, Tuesday, April 22. He will hold a press conference at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot blame Mexico for everything and kiss up to Trump’s fossil fuel overlords.
San Diego 350 and allied groups will be holding a counter press conference/protest from 9 to 11:30am, to hold the line against Trump’s efforts to expand fossil fuels, and respond to executive orders that may be released on Earth Day targeting environmental activist groups.
Invited Speakers will include: Coronado Councilmember Amy Steward, Vista Councilmember Corinna Contreras
The coalition includes:
Change Begins With ME- Indivisible
Climate Action Campaign
Coastal Environmental Rights Foundation
Fallbrook Climate Action Team
Hammond Climate Solutions Foundation
In Good Company
SanDiego350
Swing Left/Take Action San Diego
The location for the counter press conference is currently listed at 2170 West Washington Street… however this may change so check in with SanDiego350 before heading out.
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The first weekend in April protests included an intention of size; millions of people protested, with San Diego downtown’s crowd size estimates ranging from 12,000 (police) to 40,000 (online observers using images to count individuals).
I’m not sure the size made much difference in legacy media coverage; most publications I reviewed used a wire service story, sometimes with a few paragraphs included on local turn out. In terms of fostering activism, my sense is that the April 5 actions made public denunciation of Trump/Project2025 policies real for an increasing number of people.
There was some confusion following April’s first round of protest activism about subsequent events. The decentralized nature of the organizing meant there was nothing concrete about the future path for protests; in the following days the 50501 group called April 19th as the next date where geographically centered demonstrations would take place.
“The disparate events ranged from a march through midtown Manhattan and a rally in front of the White House to a demonstration at a Massachusetts commemoration of ‘the shot heard ’round the world’ on April 19, 1775, marking the start of the Revolutionary War 250 years ago.”
April 19 protests were modified by a stated intention of spreading locations out, smaller city and even county activists were encouraged to set locations. In some areas those groups chose to organize around specific issues/causes. In my estimation this tactic mostly worked; there were ten announced protests in San Diego County, from downtown to Borrego Springs, even as competing events (Chicano Park Day & Earth Day Balboa Park) drew large crowds of their own.
One local shortcoming I noticed, and have observed in the past, it’s as if the activist population ends at the northern border of National City and southern county localities. The area is primarily Democratic when it comes to voter registration and generally speaking is more likely to be living with the economic stresses inherent in neoliberalism.
A cause that was included everywhere was the kidnapping of migrants to a notorious concentration camp in El Salvador, and the absence of due process in recent immigration enforcement actions.
If dissidents in the US were looking for a cause that the administration would engage with, critiques of the cruel and unusual enforcement of immigration laws and policy struck a chord at the White House, alerting the armies of MAGA trolls patrolling social media.
Gov. Gavin Newsom may view unrest and protests on immigration and human rights issues as a distraction, but these are issues that are tangible and personal for citizens and non-citizens alike. The common ‘bad-feeling-in-the-pit-of-my stomach’ condition is caused by things we can see, hear, or feel, something this week’s tariffs are only threatening at the moment.
It is clear the Trump administration has drawn a line in the sand on these questions, even as judicial decisions have mostly been damaging to the enactment of its policies. What amazes me is the level of sadism underlying White House/MAGA responses to political pressure.
Factually challenged assertions concerning Kilmar Abrego Garcia have been served up to whatever media that would accept them. In some instances legacy media has bought into the right wing framing as they attempt to fact check the administration’s excrement laden outflow.
The White House thinks it’s “winning” the debate over Garcia’s (and others) imprisonment. Although some traditionally conservative media (National Review, for instance) have expressed concern about violations of constitutional constraints on executive power, Breitbart News is playing up attacks on politicians and activists who have opposed the administration’s actions.
The biggest and most fascist-sounding blowhards at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue are getting lots of media facetime, with Stephen Miller making comments that make Garcia seem to be less-than-human and Sebastion Gorka suggesting that those supporting due process should be prosecuted.
White House social media accounts would have been suspended in a time where decency was the norm. So-called evidence has been fabricated and apples are being compared to oranges.
Cases before the Supreme Court will be heard in the coming weeks and the thing to watch will be how much grace will be afforded the Trump administration, which has all-but-waved their middle finger at lower courts. Lately, the now totally bastardized Justice Department has been unable to sustain substantive legal arguments, resorting to deceit and trickery to bolster their cases.
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I spent the morning and early afternoon on April 19th attending the Progressive Labor Summit at the San Diego Convention Center. For the last eight years this gathering has sought to build bridges between labor unions and community activists.
It was the usual mix of plenary addresses, a few panels for the crowd and then workshops on issues facing organized labor and society in general. There was a lot of expertise going around both with the summit and the hallways outside. Sometimes this amounted to oversharing on the details of everyday union operations, and in other instances there were moments of brilliant analysis, stuff that even a politics junkie like myself had never been exposed to.
There was a lively discussion on economics with data and opinions I know I’d never heard before. Usually these sorts of panels where my mind wanders off onto checklists for uncompleted tasks or –sans coffee– a major effort to look attentive while catching a few winks. Not this one; we’re talking points of view off the path beaten by the bi-partisan do-nothings who tell us change is impossible, or that the time isn’t right.
The excellent panel on the cost of living featured Brigette Browning (San Diego & Imperial Counties Labor Council), Kyra Greene (Center on Policy Initiatives), Sean Elo-Rivera (San Diego City Council) and Terra Lawson-Remer (San Diego County Supervisor), and was moderated by Rudy Gonzalez (San Francisco Building and Construction Trades Council).
Kyra Greene set the stage by declaring a progressive should be convinced that there are enough resources in the world to take care of everybody’s needs and more. It is a statement that makes excuses impossible.
I’d attended the State of the County address earlier in the week, and heard Lawson-Remer’s wish list for an era where the orange ogre threatens the very foundations of governance. On this panel there were times where she took off her Supes hat and presented as an economics expert willing to express bold policy ideas.
Elo-Rivera also revealed himself as a deep thinker, and an agile politician willing to tackle small ball issues as a way of getting at the bigger picture. Everybody on the panel rose to the occasion, making an otherwise mundane topic something to get excited about.
The several hundred people in attendance were light on non-labor related activists (who were otherwise occupied and likely unaware of the conference), but the crowd was younger than I remember from past years. About half the room raised their hands when asked if this was their first time attending.
From my years as an activist, I can tell readers that cause-related activism and organized labor activism are different. For one, there’s a baked-in element with unions, who (usually) have to consider the organization’s dues paying members and the services they expect. Yes, organized labor can walk and chew gum at the same time, that doesn’t change the fact that unions are providing a vital part of the nation’s social safety net.
Unions possess the communications and social support necessary to sustain and win in political crisis situations. The 50501 movement, Indivisible, and others like it are more informal, often without the kinds of ties to their constituencies needed to get through to the desired conclusion of a social movement.
It’s appropriate that the next big event on the opposition calendar is scheduled for May Day. Donald Trump has already been the worst thing ever to organized labor, and he’s just getting started.
Forty percent of union members nationally voted for the President, which is a higher percentage as a group than registered (as opposed to actual) voters in general. So union leaders, who see an existential threat, have to be smart in not alienating those who have recently lost their faith in Dear Leader. Reluctant Republican members who are otherwise sane are one of a very few constituencies worth building bridges for at this time.
The other reality about the union movement as a whole, is they’ve been more often on the right side of history when it comes to the dirtiest words of MAGA-land: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. So they bring constituents who otherwise might sit out mass political actions.
The two union-led events I’m aware of involve picketing at UCSD’s Hillcrest hospital and at the university’s La Jolla campus supporting unions trying to keep their members above water in California’s economy. I’m sure there will be more.
At some point down the road there will need to be discourse on re-establishing governance, making expertise essential again, and making sure the plague of economic inequality gets cured. In addition to efforts to neutralize the worst effects of the Trump gutting of the federal government, a commitment to building a better overall society needs to make its way up the list of activist priorities. Unions need to play a leading role in crafting systems that work for everybody.
Otherwise, the incrementalist notions of intellectually corrupt ‘leaders’ will triumph over the real reforms that are necessary, i.e. we don’t need to just expand social security, we need to invest as a nation in a national pension and disability support system.
Let May Day ring the bell for freeing us from the psychological, economic, and cultural boundaries imposed by the extreme concentration of wealth extant.
Monopoly Round-Up: Monopolies and Fascism by Matt Stoller at BIG
… I do think it’s worth remembering that you cannot separate economics and politics. There is no world in which Google flourishes as a monopoly and America flourishes as a political democracy. We must choose. Since the 1970s, we have chosen poorly, and Americans have become more tolerant of authoritarianism in politics, as it just doesn’t seem that different than what they see in commerce. I mean, when I note how petty it is to fire government employees and not even let them collect their desk belongings, one response I hear is a smug variant of “well that’s how it happens in the private sector.”
What’s upsetting about this comment isn’t the callousness of it, it is that it’s correct. When we allow authoritarian behavior in commerce, we are inviting it into politics. When we consolidate economic power, we invite our enemies to use it against us. And I don’t care who you support in politics, that should scare you.
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RFK Jr. is wrong about autism by Noah Berlatsky at Public Notice
Instead of trying to cure autism or make autistic people “normal,” autistic people now advocate for providing accommodations — like remote work options — that can help make it easier for them in the workforce. And they also advocate for recognizing that human beings are valuable no matter who they are or what they can do. All life is worthy of life.
The idea that people are different and that society should accommodate and even celebrate those differences is, of course, anathema to the Trump administration. Trump is attempting to undermine civil rights gains in what Adam Serwer has referred to as “the Great resegregation.” He’s mounting a withering, unrelenting attack on trans rights and trans people. The massive cuts to USAID programs — which could kill millions every year — is also an assault on foreign, non-white people who the current administration sees as worthless.
Kennedy’s disgust with and devaluation of autistic people fits neatly into this eugenic logic that views health as virtue, and sees illness, or difference, as a kind of moral lapse which should be subject to punishment or censure.
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California draws ire as out-of-state factory farms turn pig poop into cash by Evan Halper and Samuel Oakford at The Washington Post
The expected return on investment in systems that turn animal poop into natural gas is in the double digits over the decades-long life of the projects, according to public statements by Dominion Energy, a major Smithfield partner, oil giant Chevron and Midwest power company DTE Energy. Smithfield and its partners say they have invested at least $650 million in such technology so far, meaning a potential profit of tens of millions of dollars.
To receive carbon credits under California’s “Low Carbon Fuel Standard” program, companies convert methane from animal waste into natural gas and pipe it into California’s fuel supply. It is usable only in the tiny fraction of vehicles powered by natural gas. But big oil companies buy the carbon credits generated to cancel out — on paper — the emissions from the fossil fuels used by most cars and trucks.
The oil companies are passing the extra costs of purchasing those carbon credits on to California consumers, according to the state’s own Energy Commission data. A University of Pennsylvania study, based on the state’s data forecasts that the added expense — last year 10-cents-per-gallon on average — could soar to as much as 85 cents within the next five years.
