More than a thousand protesters convened in Boston Common Feb. 14 for the “Stop the Coup: Our Love is Resistance” rally to oppose President Donald Trump and tech billionaire Elon Musk.
The event was co-sponsored and attended by 100 different organizations which advocate for a variety of issues ranging from environmental action to LGBTQ+ rights. A series of speakers addressed the crowd at the Parkman Bandstand starting at noon before leading attendees in a march up Tremont Street toward the JFK Federal Building at 1 p.m.
Naia Tenerowicz, an organizer with the Springfield Climate Justice Coalition and Climate Action Now of Western Massachusetts, spoke at the rally. Tenerowicz addressed recent federal actions against disabled Americans that have put legislation meant to provide equal opportunity at risk and executive orders reversing environmental justice policies from the Biden administration. In an interview with The Huntington News after her speech, she said unifying people and organizations on diverse issues is critical at this time.
“It’s extremely important to have events like this because we are reaching across all of these different issues, across all of these different communities,” Tenerowicz said. “We’re all in this fight together and we all need to show up and support each other. Climate injustice folks need to show up for trans and queer folks, for people fighting racism, fighting colonization, fighting for Palestine. All of us are here together to fight for the justice that we all need.”
Tenerowicz said that while recent actions by the Trump administration affect a wide range of people and groups, these actions target historically disadvantaged Americans.
“We’re all here together to fight back against this coup that will hurt all of us and to fight back against this increasingly fascist government that is targeting all of the most vulnerable people here,” Tenerowicz said. “We’re not going to stand for that — we’re gonna stand up to them and not let them hurt the most vulnerable.”
Chief Kenny Black Elk, an indigenous activist with Action for Equity Heritage Circle and Greater Four Corners Action Coalition, has attended the National Day of Mourning for Native Americans demonstration in Massachusetts for over 50 years. Black Elk spoke about indigenous people in America’s vulnerability in the current political climate.
“I feel the United States needs to be free. We’re held under siege right now, and freedom is a terrible thing to waste,” Black Elk said. “[To make change] we need to free the United States.”
Black Elk has been fighting to change the Massachusetts state flag, which shows a white hand holding a sword over the head of an Indigenous person. He said that while some things have changed in that time, there is still plenty of work to be done.
“I’m proud to say that some things have changed, but many things are all the same,” Black Elk said. “I don’t want my grandchildren or my children growing up under a racist flag of Massachusetts.”
Another marginalized group present at the rally was the LGBTQ+ community, which has been targeted by Trump and the Republican party, in particular transgender and gender-non-conforming Americans. Many LGBTQ+ rights groups were represented at the rally, including the Boston chapter of The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, an activist and charity group centering LGBTQ+ issues which is organized similarly to and acts as an order of religious nuns. The sisters use humor and hold events to raise funds and bring awareness to issues afflicting the queer and trans community.
Sister Brother Freddie Anne Willing, an abbess of the order, represented the Sisters in the distinctive nun-inspired drag, a trademark of the organization.
“It’s very important to come out and stand in numbers to show people that we are aware of what’s going on and that it is simply horrendous,” Willing said.
Willing said that the rights of transgender people are a major issue for him and his organization, particularly after the events of a recent court case targeting some transgender members of the U.S. military. During the court session, the judge challenged the Trump-backed prosecution to answer if the case was a malicious, directed attack rather than an issue of policy. As Willing described, this event was just one in countless instances that have brought activists of various issues together.
“The number of things that have gone wrong in the past few weeks are just overwhelmingly numerous,” Willing said. “I stand with trans people, I stand with queer people, I stand with immigrants, I stand with the disabled. I stand with literally everyone because the attacks at this point are so numerous that they really are an attack on everyone.”
The numerous and wide-ranging nature of the Trump administration’s attacks was also discussed by Jennifer Riley, an activist of 350 Mass, an environmentalist group.
“Trump and Musk are flamethrowers to all issues. They’re making everything worse,” Riley said. “They want to make everything worse because everything is subservient to their profits and their corporate friends.”
Riley expressed that the climate crisis was especially relevant at the time of the rally, following the devastating wildfires in Southern California and storms in Southeastern states. The name of her organization refers to 350 parts per million — the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere considered safe by many climate scientists. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere on Feb. 14 was 427.44 parts per million. Riley said Trump and his allies perpetuate environmental disasters and the larger issue of global warming.
“[Rising carbon dioxide levels are] what’s causing the heating, the droughts, the wildfires, the huge storms that we’re facing now. Our planet is becoming uninhabitable,” Riley said. “You must fight back to save yourself and to save all of us. No one is safe from climate disaster and these thugs [Trump and Musk] are exacerbating it. They’re making it worse.”
Riley carried the banner bearing her organization’s name through the rally and marched alongside other organizations and individuals from diverse movements and philosophies. Attendees were united under the common goal of resisting the Trump administration’s attacks on everything from marginalized communities to the environment to Palestinians under siege in Gaza.
The event is one of many other past and upcoming demonstrations opposing Trump in Boston and across the country. Many demonstrators, like Willing, say that each event is an opportunity to stand with a community of similarly minded people to fight back against a common oppressor.
“When there is any opportunity to stand shoulder to shoulder with those I trust in my community, with those who I fight with and for, I will take that opportunity,” Willing said.
