Mariana Mcdonald – Hands Off! Georgia

A scorching sun and clear blue skies accompanied some 30,000 protestors in Atlanta at the Hands Off! demonstration April 5. Participants at the energetic, intergenerational, and multiracial protest carried  signs voicing concerns on issues from Medicaid to creeping fascism to reproductive rights. The Hands Off! slogan was a fitting unifying call for the demo, urging participants to bring homemade signs about their pressing concerns. It was stunning to see thousands gathered at Atlanta’s capitol, united to protest what’s happening in the country right now.  

Rally speakers hailed from a wide range of organizations, including  the NAACP, community groups, local government, and immigrant rights groups, among others. One speaker, Nora Burcea Pullen, of Romanian heritage, told the gathering “I’m here because I’ve lived what we’re here to prevent—a dictatorship. I grew up in the brutal regime of Ceausescu.”  People came from a range of racial and ethnic groups, the largest of which was white people. While this is not without concern for a demonstration in a city that’s 48% Black, it was heartening to see so many white people take action for all people’s rights—not just their own. And as one young Puerto Rican attendee remarked, “It’s good. White people have got to step up and get involved.”

Atlanta Hands Off! organizers estimated the crowd at 30,000; local mainstream media offered a much lower number, unsurprisingly. Throughout Georgia, at least 16 towns held demonstrations in addition to Atlanta, in cities and towns from Rome to Savannah and Gainesville to Macon, with participant numbers ranging from 100 to 2,000. 

The turnout in Atlanta and throughout the state was unlike anything this observer has seen in twenty-plus years in Georgia. People are angry and upset and ready to fight. Hopefully the Hands Off! Initiative can build on this massive outcry in Georgia and throughout the country to broaden and strengthen the national resistance movement this historical moment urgently requires.

Eileen Hirst – San Francisco, California

I’m new to this whole protest thing. Walking down Larkin Street to join the Hands Off demonstration at Civic Center, I encountered three women carrying signs.They were dressed in layers, wore sunhats and sneakers, and sported water bottles in holders. Clearly experienced. “I don’t know if it will do any good,” I said. “Of course it does good,” said one. “It shows them we won’t let them destroy our country.” And it beats sitting home, doomscrolling. At Civic Center, there were thousands of people, so many that you couldn’t see the stage or hear the speakers. As it wound down, a woman with a bullhorn directed us up Van Ness Avenue to the Tesla dealership to join a few dozen people already there. Does it matter that a few thousand people in our San Francisco bubble are protesting? Maybe not, but what about Hands Off demonstrations in every state, red and blue. What about conservative-leaning cities like Ocala, Boise, Cheyenne, and Oklahoma City. Even Colorado Springs, That has to do some good, right?

Jay Schaffner, New York City

Estimates in New York City are 100,000. It took over two-and-half-hours to go from 42nd Street to 26th Street down Fifth Avenue, which is wide. After we started on 42nd, people were still coming in on 41st and 40th. There were no permits, it was negotiated on the spot, from what I understand.

People were going to Bryant Park from the subways, but the park was full, there was no place to go, people were lined up on Fifth and Sixth Avenues, on 40^th and 42^nd Streets. It was cold, it was raining. On 40^th, people filled the street, nobody was moving – people waiting, talking with one another, people whom they just met, for half-hour, in the wet and cold. Home made signs getting rained on.

Then word gets passed, go up to 42^nd and over to Fifth and march down to Madison Park, at 26^th Street.

We were on 42nd Street for more than half-hour, getting to the middle of the block. Thousands upon thousands of people; people just joining – Haven’t really been in a march like this, no real contingents, just people joining in.

My estimate from anti-Vietnam war demonstrations, an avenue block is about 5,000. 42nd was full, 41st was full, both between 6th and 5th. There were people on Fifth and Sixth Avenues, and other side streets. Just saying.

There were a number of union contingents that joined as we marched down Fifth – huge ones from the UFT (United Federation of Teachers) and NYSNA (NY State Nurses Association), the Laborers, CWA, SAG-AFTRA, Musicians. The Central Labor Council endorsed the march. Attached is a poster for the event, put out by the New York Hands Off Committee.

Bottom line people were there, some were able to assemble with their unions, with community groups, but people came out.

Since there were no permits, there were also no speakers.

Anyone could bring whatever signs they wanted.

Here is what one of my neighbors posted on Facebook, which is a damn good summary of the mood of the country:

“This felt to me much more deeply serious and intentional than the typical protest I’ve been to over the years. All two hours were pretty much consumed by gathering and marching–not the usual long-winded, repetitive speechifying (that so often feels like work to listen to) from leaders, would-be leaders, and politicians, that so often consume most of the time, but rather homemade signs, spontaneous chants, our steps, steps, steps, and more steps–and a sense of community with our fellow protestors all across the country.

This was not a one-time thing to make us feel good. This was a promise to keep it up, to do everything we can to save our country.”

Kurt Stand – “#42 was not a DEI hire”, April 5 at the Lincoln Memorial

We knew it would be a good crowd when we got to the Metro – long lines of people buying fare cards – which translated into people coming from outer suburbs to go downtown and  attend the rally in D.C.

Between looking at handmade signs, watching people look at their phones to figure out which stop they should get off, it was clear that for many, if not most, going to protests is not something they ordinarily do.

Once we arrived at the Lincoln Memorial, we saw lines of animated people of all ages assembling talking, listening, looking all around (we hooked up with a group from DSA – young, militant, engaged – and happily too seeing old comrades and friends as in days of old).  At the Memorial we would go from an open space to a crowded space, with the open space behind us filling up.  With people behind us, to the side of us, all around us, it was impossible to estimate the crowd size. Numbers were perhaps not as high compared to some major demonstrations, but that was because this was not a national march; rather it drew from the “DMV” — Washington DC, suburban Maryland, Northern Virginia.

Thus the issues that resonated most were those that are impacting our communities.  Federal workers, contractors, grantees were omnipresent as was evident by the signs – including many by scientists.  Trans rights, public education, the needs of special needs kids was also a theme for they are the ones being hurt the most by the attempted destruction of the Department of Education.  And anger at the attack on democracy has a particular meaning in D.C. as city residents lack (even in good times) basic rights that people in the 50 states take for granted.  Speaking of democracy or the lack thereof, another focus was on migrant rights; the illegal deportation to El Salvador of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a sheet metal worker apprentice and unionist, is a case in point – we had attended a solidarity action at the federal courthouse in Greenbelt the day before.  And after the rally on Saturday there was a march to ICE Headquarters that was met by many attending the adjacent Palestinian solidarity demonstration.

Best moment: a guy in a kilt and a bagpipe playing “Foggy Dew” – which fit nicely with the best poster we saw bit later: The answer to Germany 1933 is France 1789.

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Tomorrow more reports from a few of the 1300 Hands Off! demonstrations around the country