{"id":617386,"date":"2026-05-01T14:34:06","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T14:34:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/617386\/"},"modified":"2026-05-01T14:34:06","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T14:34:06","slug":"thousands-in-us-to-join-no-school-no-work-no-shopping-may-day-protest-in-economic-blackout-protest-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/617386\/","title":{"rendered":"Thousands in US to join \u2018no school, no work, no shopping\u2019 May Day protest in economic blackout | Protest (US)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thousands are set to join an economic blackout for International Workers\u2019 Day on Friday, as part of 3,500 \u201cMay Day Strong<\/a>\u201d events across the country. Organizers are calling for \u201cno school, no work, no shopping\u201d with walkouts, marches, block parties<\/a> and other gatherings planned into the evening.<\/p>\n

May Day has long been an annual day of protest for the labor movement, and this year, many active movements are converging to fight for \u201ca nation that puts workers over billionaires\u201d. Demanding no ICE, no war, and taxing the rich<\/a>, the May Day Strong coalition includes labor unions, immigrants rights groups, political organizations such as the Democratic Socialists of America, and the organizers behind the No Kings protests. Friday\u2019s economic disruption builds on a similar coordinated effort out of Minnesota in January, when tens of thousands of Twin Cities residents took off<\/a> from school and work to flood the streets in protest of federal immigration agents storming the city.<\/p>\n

Neidi Dominguez, founding executive director of Organized Power in Numbers and an executive team member of May Day Strong, said that they expect more than twice<\/a> the number of May Day events than last year.<\/p>\n

Leah Greenberg of Indivisible, one of the main organizations behind No Kings, described the May Day<\/a> economic blackout as a \u201cstructure test\u201d for the movement.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are asking people to take a step into further exerting their power in all aspects of their lives \u2013 as workers, as students, as members of local organizing hubs,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s important as it builds muscles towards greater non-cooperation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Teachers\u2019 unions and students are an active part of the fight, a continuation of their months of organizing against ICE<\/a>. At least 15 school districts in North Carolina<\/a> have given teachers the day off to join a statewide May Day \u201cKids Over Corporations\u201d rally for public education funding. In Chicago, Illinois, the Chicago Teachers Union fought and won to have May Day made a \u201cday of civic action\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs educators, we feel a very real accountability to the young people in the families that we serve,\u201d Stacy Davis Gates, president of the Chicago Teachers Union and Illinois Federation of Teachers, said earlier this week<\/a>. \u201cWe want to connect people not just to the affordability crisis but the crisis of our institutions being marginalized in this moment and the impact on our young people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sanshray Kukutla, a student at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, and organizer with the campus\u2019s Sunrise Movement chapter, is helping coordinate a local walkout for students, teachers, workers and residents. \u201cWe\u2019re taking collective action to send a message to the billionaire class: it\u2019s our labor, our spending, and our participation that keeps the whole system running, and if we don\u2019t work, they don\u2019t have profits,\u201d said Kukutla.<\/p>\n

Organizers say the day of action is an effort to build toward a general strike, which was essentially outlawed through the 1946 Taft-Hartley Act and hasn\u2019t happened in the US since. As a workaround, Shawn Fain, president of the United Auto Workers (UAW), has called for unions to work toward a general strike on 1 May 2028, by having existing union contracts expire in unison.<\/p>\n