Hands Off!
Resistance to the administration is widespread and strong
A flood of people that organizers claim numbered in the millions gathered Saturday at over 1,400 “Hands Off!” events held in every state and around the globe in a collective act of peaceful pushback against the Trump administration’s assault on democracy, government services, civil rights, and our overall wellbeing.
Sponsored by a coalition of pro-democracy, labor, civil rights, veterans, LGBTQ, and women’s rights organizations, it was the largest day of collective action since the start of the Trump presidency.
From state capitols to city halls, from federal buildings to local parks, events large and small reverberated through a country that is increasingly mobilized to reclaim what Trump and Elon Musk are stealing from it.
The large events generated a lot of attention. Over 100,000 gathered at the National Mall. Tens of thousands converged on Boston Common. So many people lined the mile-long stretch between Madison Square and Bryant Park on New York’s Fifth Avenue that Trump dared not try shooting anyone there on Saturday.
But it was the smaller events—especially events in red states and cities—that were perhaps the most meaningful. It was the 300 people in rural Batavia, New York and the 125 people who represented over 12% of the population of Skagway, Alaska whose participation said this is not a partisan protest or an ideological uprising.
They chanted. They listened to speakers. They carried protest signs.
And they saw they are not alone. They demonstrated that we are not alone.
The presence of Republican protesters and protests in Republican jurisdictions makes it hard to categorize Saturday’s events as Blue America protesting Red America. It would be more accurate to say that Saturday marked an outcry by America against a regime that is anti-American.
At its core, the fundamental message of the demonstrations is a conservative one. Trump is the radical who is taking things that law and tradition rest in our hands. By telling him “hands off” these things, the demonstrators are insisting on the preservation of a centuries-old constitutional order.
By saying “no” to Trump on multiple grounds, the protesters are demanding the conservation of what is rightfully ours. The conservation of our rights. The conservation of our government benefits. The conservation of our liberties.
There was a time not long ago when the Republican party made a lot of noise about being the party of individualism and personal freedom.
To rise up and demand civil rights is an act that dates back as far as the Revolution and reverberates through the abolition and suffrage and civil rights movements. It resides deep in the DNA of our political culture.
The centuries-long struggle to expand civil rights has been propelled in part by a fundamental belief in popular sovereignty. That is, Americans by and large buy into the Enlightenment idea that governments are derived by the people to serve the people. While our history has been defined by the struggle over which people get to be included in the represented group, there has been little patience for the idea that an elite few should get to decide who sits at the table.
People expect to have rights, and to have the liberty to fight for their rights. The idea of a strongman taking away our rights and our democratic processes aligns with the reasons why the Revolution was fought in the first place. It’s alien to the American experience.
So when we see people across the country band together to say “hands off,” it is an expression of the Jeffersonian ideal that the unalienable rights we possess are to be preserved by governments “deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
Like those earlier movements, the fight against American authoritarianism will neither begin nor end on one day. Also like those movements, there will be days that are galvanizing. Saturday was one of those days, and it marked the culmination of a week in which the pro-democracy movement began to find its voice and make genuine strides.
It was a week that saw a courageous senator fill a leadership vacuum.
It was a week that saw the fragility of the Trump coalition at the polls.
It was a week that saw the would-be authoritarian light his administration on fire.
There is momentum now. There is growing recognition that individuals can have enormous influence by banding together. Large protests will become larger protests as images from Saturday’s event go viral and participants talk to friends and relatives who may not have participated this week but will consider doing so next time.
It has always been the case that we have the power to stop the madness. It has always been the case that only we have the power to stop the madness. It has always been the case that we can only stop the madness through collective action.
The events of last week showed us how to do it, and should give us reason to believe we will.
In the small Hawaii town of Waimea, where it’s not uncommon to see more cattle than people, over 800 lined the main road with signs reclaiming rights of every description. Passing drivers overwhelmingly honked approval and flashed the “shaka” gesture, 🤙which can never be mistaken for a fascist salute. The message was clear: Trump’s small grasping hands have overreached. This was a ruler across the knuckles.
We counted 127 participants in Morristown, TN, a great turnout for us in very red East TN. Later, on the local Dem. Party FB page, a couple of Trump supporters tried to spoil our good moods by heckling us with the usual Republican, FoxNews BS. I interjected that right now, in TN, we have counties that are experiencing catastrophic flooding at a time when this Administration and DOGE have dismantled FEMA. We also have right now, in TN, a measles outbreak that has already killed two unvaccinated children, at a time with medical and research agencies that work to educate people about vaccines have been shuttered by this Administration and DOGE. And that doesn't even count all of our neighbors, our friends and family members, who are now or will be hurting soon because of the higher prices of everything and the economic recession which are the direct consequence of this Administration's tariffs. I said, let's not waste time heckling each other with partisan crap when we need to work together to help people in our community survive.