Boycotts, Resilience, and Power — The Call for Collective Action
On Feb. 15, at the Carson Community Center, nearly two dozen people showed up to learn what they can do to stop the dismantling of our democracy. Looking around, the median age was over 70 years.
Robert Leslie, an 83-year-old Vietnam War veteran and civil rights activist, a retired police officer (from four different LA County agencies), and most recently one of the founders of Carson Coalition, thought he was retired from it all. But Trump’s election for the second time and the nonstop crazy executive orders since Jan. 20 changed his mind.
Leslie handed out a 17-page agenda covering Trump’s executive orders attacking the civil service, democratic norms, publicly supported news such as PBS and NPR, and birthright citizenship.
But when Rep. Nanette Barragán (D-44th) arrived, most of those two dozen people wanted to know what Democrats were doing about it.
Many still believed Democrats aren’t fighting hard enough without recognizing that the Party’s ability to fight was clipped this past election cycle and that there’s a compliant Republican party across the aisle.
Rep. Nanette Barragán was there to give an update and send the message… get up and fight. Don’t back down.
“There’s so much going on. These are very dark times in our country right now,” Barragán prefaced her comments.
“If you turn on the television you see a whole bunch of things happening from one day to the next and on to the next thing … they are trying to flood the zone,” she said.
Barragán reported that Republicans have released their budget that aims to pay for tax cuts for the 1% by cutting programs that help low-income and middle-class families.
“It’s Trump 2.0. We saw this happen during the first Administration,” she said.
“They’re purging federal employees. They are dismissing the inspector generals who are in charge of finding waste, corruption, and fraud.”
Barragán noted that Democrats and their allies are fighting back through litigation but ultimately, it’s the public’s outrage, not just from the Los Angeles Harbor Area but across America, that’s going to push back the tide as low-income and middle-class communities across the nation are impacted by the moves of this administration and the Republican Party.
Barragán highlighted the actions of a Republican freshman in Congress, who at least had the temerity to say, “I’m not going to just let you cut programs that are impacting my constituents.”
The programs Republicans are cutting include SNAP (food benefits) and the Department of Housing and Urban Development, will impact the building of affordable housing, and they are coming for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
Rents are not getting any cheaper and the cost of housing is not going to get cheaper, Barragán said. “This is not going to help this situation.”
Barragán pointed to the most galling part of what is happening, and that is the fact that everything is happening with the consent of the Republican Party.
“They’re completely okay with it,” Barragán said. “They’re okay with Elon Musk going into the federal payment system and getting your social security number and your bank account numbers, your home address, all your personal, private information.”
“They’re even calling DHS officers on members of Congress who are going to the Department of Education to say, we want to see what’s happening,” Barragán said. “We want to go in. Our job is to do oversight, but it’s a lot harder when you’re in the minority. Republicans control the House and they get to set the hearings.”
“This is the time we need to stand up. We need to speak out. We need to join the protest,” Barragán said.
Citing the Muslim ban and the separation of children from their families at the border crisis during the first Trump term, Barragán went on.
“It is really going to be public sentiment that causes the shift,” she said. “We saw that In the first administration where they were separating women and their children. And there was an outrage and they stopped it. Now, they’re doubling down.”
Barragán argued that the first step the resistance needs to take is to change the language they use.
“The Republicans are saying they are in charge. ‘We don’t need you,’ they say. So the question is not whether the Democrats are going to shut down the government, but rather, ‘Are the Republicans going to shut down the government?’ This is their government. This is what they’re doing. This is them tearing the country apart. The way we talk, matters. The words we use matter. Don’t let them fool you,” Barragán said.
She reminded her constituents what happened in December 2024 when Trump and Musk attempted to force a government shutdown over the debt ceiling.
Trump and Musk wanted to spend everything and not worry about the deficit and pay for it. Guess what? Donald Trump and Elon Musk lost that fight and they retreated.
The bottom line is that Democrats can’t even find three Republicans to save democracy right now.
Community activist and civic leader Diane Thomas gave voice to the steely determination expected of elders, exhorting everyone to not dismiss family and friends who chose to stay home this past election or worse, voted for the orange felon.
“We have to talk to our people. We’re on the ground and we have to make sure that people are getting the right information,” Thomas said.
She noted that as the Republican overreach starts to affect them, their children and grandchildren, getting them good information will be critical.
“We cannot grow weary … It’s going to turn. You have to be ready. You have to be that voice,” Thomas said.
It was not lost on anyone in that room that Republicans were staging an all-out assault on the civil rights gains that African Americans fought and died for going back to the ratification of the 14th Amendment.
Thomas noted that communities of color and other marginalized communities of every persuasion have benefited from the sacrifices made by African Americans going back generations.
The resolve of the attendees was also reflected in their attitude about the Feb. 28 boycott, which the mainstream press says is organized by the Peoples Union USA, founded by John Schwarz, while there are mass forwarded text messages calling for the same boycotts but calling on participants to follow the leadership of activist and political pundit Rev. Al Sharpton.
Thomas said, “You don’t have to turn the TV on to tell me to boycott anyone. If we are supposed to boycott Target, Walmart, or whatever don’t tell me to only boycott them for one day.”
She said she had already started her boycott.
“Don’t go in there. Show them our money is green and we got some,” Thomas said.
“We need to regroup and understand where we came from. If we can overcome without social media, they can buy up all the social media they want, they can’t control what we do. That is our power,” Thomas said.
Thomas was making the point that billionaires can and will purchase news media and social media platforms, but people will find a way to communicate with each other and keep each other informed.
In a message to other marginalized communities who happily voted against their self-interest, Thomas reminded us to go on Google and look up the holidays that won’t be recognized. They’re not doing Black history or Juneteenth. They’re not doing Hispanic Heritage Month, or Cesar Chavez Day.
“Get you a bag of popcorn, and watch what happens. But when you get on the phone, call your people. ‘Are you watching this?’ Make sure they know what’s going on but don’t you get all frazzled about it,” Thomas said.
By the end of the meeting, the overall mood was that of resolve. And the message delivered and received was “Be still” and “Stay ready.”