{"id":21059,"date":"2025-10-24T08:15:21","date_gmt":"2025-10-24T08:15:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/21059\/"},"modified":"2025-10-24T08:15:21","modified_gmt":"2025-10-24T08:15:21","slug":"oaklanders-gather-by-the-lake-to-say-no-kings-peoples-world-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/21059\/","title":{"rendered":"Oaklanders gather by the lake to say No Kings! \u2013 People’s World"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Oaklanders\t<\/p>\n

No Kings Day march in Oakland, Calif., October 18, 2025. | Marilyn Bechtel\/ People’s World<\/p>\n

OAKLAND, Calif.\u2014Streets around Chinatown\u2019s Wilma Chan Park were packed on Oct. 18, No Kings Day, as thousands of people bearing signs with messages like \u201cDemocracy Needs Your Courage\u201d and \u201cStop the ICE Age,\u201d and wearing costumes both fanciful and political, marched to the Lake Merritt Amphitheater, led by youth from Destiny Arts Center. Organizers said more than 10,000 joined in the action\u2014one among some 50 in the San Francisco Bay Area.<\/p>\n

At the lake, they responded with cheers and applause as U.S. Rep. Lateefah Simon, who represents Oakland, Berkeley, Alameda, and neighboring communities in Congress, challenged them: \u201cAs we gather here today, feel your strength, feel your power!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Protestor holds sign at No Kings Day demo in Oakland, Calif., October 18, 2025. | Marilyn Bechtel\/ People\u2019s World<\/p>\n

Calling the government shutdown \u201cthe work of a Republican Party that has mistaken greed for governance and chaos for courage,\u201d Simon said Republican legislators \u201care punishing people for their own failure,\u201d and \u201cwe will continue to organize against their savagery.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

While \u201cwe are in fact living in the midnight of our democracy,\u201d she said, \u201cmidnight doesn\u2019t last forever \u2026 and dawn is coming,\u201d because the people gathered for No Kings actions here and throughout the country \u201care telling this administration we will never bow down, never be on our knees!\u201d<\/p>\n

Oakland Mayor and former Congresswoman Barbara Lee galvanized the crowd as she declared, \u201cDonald Trump wants to be a king. He wants to be a dictator; he wants to tear down the guardrails of government\u2014the courts, our Constitution, the checks and balances that protect us from tyranny.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, not on our watch! When they try to roll back our voting rights, when they try to silence our voices, when they rig our maps, they rewrite the rules. We stand up, fight back, and speak louder than ever before. We are free people and we intend to stay that way!\u201d<\/p>\n

Addressing the crowd in Spanish, Teresa, a member of Trabajadores Unidos\/Workers United, said that while ICE tactics in the Bay Area have been different from those in Los Angeles and other cities, they are still creating terror and fear because no one is immune to an ICE raid.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere in the Bay Area, we are organizing,\u201d she said, as allies meet \u201cto coordinate a line of defense\u201d and directly impacted communities make emergency plans \u201cbecause we know we keep each other safe.\u201d<\/p>\n

Teresa led the crowd in chanting, \u201cEl pueblo unido jam\u00e1s ser\u00e1 vencido! The people united will never be defeated!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Sign at No Kings Day march in Oakland, Calif., October 18, 2025. | Marilyn Bechtel\/ People\u2019s World<\/p>\n

Thousands of federal workers have been furloughed or are working without pay, said MT Snyder, an organizer with the Federal Unionists Network, while thousands more have been fired by an administration that is not interested in programs that help the American people.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you believe that our government should work for us, not rule over us, then I want you to do one thing right now: take out your phone and go to savepublicservices.com,\u201d Snyder told the crowd. \u201cThat\u2019s where you can stand up for federal workers, public servants, everyday people, to protect the programs and rights that make this country worth serving.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gaza was also on the minds of rally-goers. Oakland School Board Vice President Valarie Bachelor, who MC\u2019d the program, reminded the crowd that in August, the Palestinian Youth Movement released a report<\/a> revealing that the Oakland Airport had been used to send 280 shipments of military cargo to Israel in the previous six months.<\/p>\n

\"\"Baby Trump inflatable at No Kings Day march in Oakland, Calif., October 18, 2025. | Marilyn Bechtel\/ People\u2019s World<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd now,\u201d Bachelor said, \u201cweapons contractors want to make Northern California their new hub for this deadly trade. We\u2019re saying Hell, No! We refuse to let our city be complicit in genocide. That\u2019s why dozens of organizations have come together to demand an arms embargo<\/a> now, to stop those killer shipments and to end our city\u2019s role in oppression.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

To cheers and applause from the crowd, Bachelor said marchers were calling for a \u201cpeople-first agenda\u201d \u2013 free speech; freedom to assemble; strengthening immigrant rights, trans rights, and rights of all people, full funding for education and healthcare, stronger labor laws, and environmental protections.<\/p>\n

Earlier in the day, as marchers were preparing to leave Wilma Chan Park for the lakeside rally, Dr. Stewart Chen, a leader in Oakland\u2019s Chinatown, told them No Kings Day \u201cis a reminder that the power belongs to the people, belongs to everyone who believes in democracy. From Chinatown and Little Saigon and every street in Oakland to every corner of this nation, our message is clear: We stand united against tyranny and dictatorship!\u201d<\/p>\n

We hope you appreciated this article. At\u00a0People\u2019s World, we believe news and information should be free and accessible to all, but we need your help. Our journalism is free of corporate influence and paywalls because we are totally reader-supported. Only you, our readers and supporters, make this possible. If you enjoy reading\u00a0People\u2019s World\u00a0and the stories we bring you, please\u00a0support our work by donating or becoming a monthly sustainer today<\/a>. Thank you!<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCONTRIBUTOR<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Marilyn<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"No Kings Day march in Oakland, Calif., October 18, 2025. | Marilyn Bechtel\/ People’s World OAKLAND, Calif.\u2014Streets around…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21060,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[7,7733,7152,143,145,144,16600,16601,13,2281],"class_list":{"0":"post-21059","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oakland","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-no-kings","10":"tag-no-kings-day","11":"tag-oakland","12":"tag-oakland-headlines","13":"tag-oakland-news","14":"tag-political-action","15":"tag-political-activism","16":"tag-politics","17":"tag-u-s"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21059"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21059\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}