Thousands of protesters attended the ‘People’s March’ on January 18, just two days before Inauguration Day, to remind America why President Donald Trump was elected to office and reassure them that the country made the right decision. Those protesting the incoming Trump administration promised to keep the division going by reminding Americans of what divides us rather than what unites us while failing to realize that they had nothing to actually protest.
According to USA Today, some of the protestors appeared to still be haunted by the overturning of Roe v. Wade in the U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Dobbs case. One protester, Brittany Martinez who traveled to D.C. from Florida, held a sign saying, “Public cervix announcement. My body, my choice.” Some even wore accessories with the Planned Parenthood logo.
USA Today reports, other attendees included “a little girl sitting on her father’s shoulders [who] carried a sign that said ‘pizza rolls not gender rolls.’ Others held handmade signs that said ‘new year, same fight,’ ‘I’m pissed,’ ‘feminists Trump fascists’ and ‘Trust Black women.’”
Suffragette-style protesters also joined the march donning sashes that said “equal rights,” a phrase which they did not explain the exact meaning of other than that the sashes are “just as relevant now as they were four years ago,” according to USA Today.
Another protester, Jackie Greto, tried to clarify the purpose of the march saying, “You think about your mom, your grandmother’s, they all had to fight for the same stuff, and you just going back again. And we shouldn’t. We have young nieces and daughters and stuff. What if something happens to them and they don’t have a choice?”
Deb Caldwell spoke with USA Today about her reason for being there, echoing the “women’s rights” movement the protesters felt that they had going for them, saying, “We have to keep resisting and speaking up because silence is deadly. I’ve become a radical feminist as I’ve gotten older, just because I see that women are truly one of the oppressed groups, probably possibly the most oppressed group in the world. And it becomes really troubling to me. I have three granddaughters, and people just need to keep speaking up.”
Sarah Wood reflected on her purpose for being there saying, “I think the last time I was sort of angry, but in disbelief and thought, maybe naively, that it might not be as bad as I imagined it could be, and it was worse. I can only imagine how bad this new administration’s going to be.”
Protesters convened at the Lincoln Memorial to hear speeches and to find resources that met their needs ranging from those focusing on immigration to abortion to climate change.
Although the sad and sorrowful march was reminiscent of the Women’s March of 2017, during which Madonna famously said, “Yes, I am angry. Yes, I am outraged. Yes, I have thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House,” the People’s March was not meant to replicate it, according to Tamika Middleton, managing director of the Women’s March. However, the Women’s March was part of organizing the People’s March.
Middleton said that the “unique energy of that moment,” referring to the Women’s March, would be a “misstep” to try to recreate, and that this new march was meant to “move with a different kind of intention around not just how many people we can get in the streets in that day, but how many people we can move into the movement for the long term.”
