100 Angry Protesters at Trump Tower With Plans to Return
New York, May 10 On a few hours notice, about 100 people turned out at Trump Tower in NYC on Wednesday, May 10 to express their outrage at the illegitimate firing by Trump of FBI Director James Comey. The crowd was angry, diverse, and involved an important breadth of professionals, activists from different movements, students and youth, and parents with their kids.
Sunsara Taylor started things off by calling out the illegitimacy and danger of Trump’s firing of Comey, how this is not only an obstruction of justice and a violation of established norms, but also a major escalation in the consolidation of fascism in this country. She insisted that it was up to the masses of people, everyone who had done the right thing to show up at this protest, as well as millions more that we have to reach out to and mobilize, to drive out the fascist Trump/Pence Regime and she called on people to get organized with Refuse Fascism on the spot.
Others from the crowd voiced their deepest fears, their visceral outrage, and their heartfelt determination to do everything they can to stop the Trump/Pence Regime. One man described being just seven years old when Richard Nixon was forced to resign and spoke of believing that things had gotten better. That today his son is seven years old, and things are even worse than during Nixon. He said Trump stands as an embodiment against every single belief and value he has ever held dear – against truthfulness and integrity, against concern for the planet and for other people.
A young man stepped forward with his 4 ½ year old daughter. In a small but beautifully earnest voice she led the crowd in two verses of “We Shall Overcome.” Another man got up and said, “I’m not very good at standing in front of a crowd, so I’ll just list what I am against.” The crowd cheered more and more loudly as he went through his list: racism, bigotry, sexism, lying, imperialism, ignorance, and more. A woman from the organization Rise and Resist at one point led the crowd to repeat after her, “Twitter and Facebook are NOT a protest! Take to the streets!” Someone else warned the crowd that Trump would be looking for any kind of “terrorist incident” in order to seize even greater power, drawing the analogy to the Reichstag Fire (the burning of the parliament building) during Nazi Germany that Hitler seized on as the pretext to undermine the rule of law and vastly consolidate his power.
About midway through the protest, an organizer asked who thought everyone should come back on Saturday to protest again and with bigger numbers. Someone from the crowd shouted out, “What about tomorrow?” Someone else answered, “Every day until he’s gone!” Within moments, the whole crowd was chanting it, “Every day until he’s gone! Every day until he’s gone!”
The main sign being held among the crowd was the Refuse Fascism NO! sign, calling out the fascist Trump/Pence Regime, but there was also a spattering of very creative handmade signs. One teenager stood next to her mother with a sign created to look like an email demanding that congress impeach Trump, with an alert added on that “This is NOT SPAM.” Another cited legal codes and definitions of obstruction of justice. Others depicted connections between Trump and Russia.
At the high point of the protest, and as part of leading people to get organized to go forward, two young organizers with Refuse Fascism addressed the crowd. Both emphasized the fascist nature of the regime and the limited window in which to act to drive out the regime, and called on people to get organized and come to the mass organizing meeting after the rally. One did powerful exposure on the vicious assaults on women, Muslims, immigrants, environment, people around the world, science, LGBTQ people and more. The other built on this while also emphasizing that the Trump/Pence Regime is illegitimate not mainly because of potential ties to Russia, but because they are fascist.
After a bit more than an hour, everyone was invited to come down to the Refuse Fascism mass meeting to make plans for going forward. A core of freshly energized new people accompanied the veteran organizers of Refuse Fascism down town for their meeting and together they made plans to step things up and push hard to make good on the mood and desire expressed in, “Every day until he’s gone.” After making plans to be back at Trump Tower the next several days in growing protests – reaching out to many other organized forces to join – the bulk of the people at the meeting took off in a march through the village in downtown NYC.