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Joining a nationwide movement, hundreds of protesters convened in Mountain View on Saturday morning to show their support for progressive causes, just ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.
The People’s March on Jan. 18, a rebranding of the Women’s March, drew crowds to Gateway Park where demonstrators rallied under a wide banner of issues – from reproductive health to immigration, climate change, racial justice and LGBTQ+ rights.
“Resist, persist, rise up,” protesters chanted as vehicles honked their support along El Camino Real. Signs boldly expressed opposition to Trump and heavily focused on the theme of unity, despite people’s different reasons for attending the rally.
“A lot of us are really against Trump,” said IdaRose Sylvester, a community advocate and one of the event organizers. “But we all are extremely positive and pro our community,” she added, noting that the demonstration was a call for positive action to resist oppressive policies.
Many of the protesters at the Mountain View rally heard about it through “Together We Will,” an activist network that held demonstrations during the first Trump administration. On Nov. 5, Sylvester put out a call to revive the group after it became clear that Trump would win the presidential election again. About 3,000 members strong, hundreds more joined overnight, mostly from the Mountain View area, Sylvester said.
When the People’s March came up, Sylvester saw it as an opportunity to get boots back on the ground and reaffirm the community’s support for progressive causes.
Other advocacy groups also had a big presence at the rally. Representatives from Sister District South Bay, a grassroots organization that supports Democratic candidates, spoke out against attacks on voter’s rights, while Dianna Zamora of Planned Parenthood Mar Monte denounced the erosion of women’s health care after the overturn of Roe v. Wade.
Still, messages of hope and unity took center stage, with local activists urging the community to not give up and to continue fighting for the future.
Raymond Goins of the NAACP and Silicon Valley De-Bug, a community-based justice organization, noted that racial justice went hand-in-hand with women’s rights. “We’re stronger as a fist than divided as a finger,” he said to cheers and applause.
“America’s greatness doesn’t come from walls or divisions,” said María Marroquín, executive director of the Day Worker Center in Mountain View. “It comes from opening doors, from welcoming new ideas, new people and new perspectives,” she said.
The messages were well received by the demonstrators. Shreyas Nayak, a 12-year-old Mountain View resident, held up a sign stating, “The future is not up there” that had an arrow pointing to an image of Trump Tower. Next to him, a family friend held up a pro-immigration sign.
Showing community solidarity was a big reason for holding the march, said Lenny Siegel, a former Mountain View mayor who has been organizing demonstrations at Gateway Park since the 1990s.
“There’s been a lot in the national press about how Silicon Valley is teaming up with Trump, and that’s just not accurate,” Siegel said, noting that while there were a few billionaires in support of his policies, it did not reflect the majority.
“Mountain View is basically the birthplace of Silicon Valley. So, I think it’s important to show that Silicon Valley has not gone over to Trump, that people here are concerned about climate change, reproductive rights, immigration issues,” he said.
