O.C.’s Women’s Marches: What’s next?
“Build bridges not walls.” “Women stand together.”
These were among the tamer messages displayed on signs as thousands of people assembled in Santa Ana on Jan. 21 as part of a global event sparked by the Women’s March on Washington, D.C. An additional 1,000 people rallied in Laguna Beach.
In Santa Ana, the participants — men, women and children — chanted “Women united will never be defeated” and “This is what democracy looks like” as the demonstration rolled down Fourth Street during the four-hour event. Many wore pink “pussyhats,” a symbol of solidarity among protesters.
While a statement for women’s rights, the event allowed people to express their views on a range of related concerns, like protection of the environment, respect for minorities and access to healthcare, whose progress they believe could be undermined by the new Trump administration.
Join the conversation on Facebook >>
Take Diane Cushman Neal, 47, who was at the event with her daughter Ashley, 17.
Neal has cystic fibrosis. On that day, she was hooked up to an oxygen port and an IV.
“I don’t want my healthcare taken away,” she said, referring to newly inaugurated President Donald Trump’s vow to repeal the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.
Ashley said she is marching for her mother, “so she has the healthcare she deserves.”
And then there was Kymberly Wilborn, 52, of Dana Point, who said she took part in the Rodney King protests in Los Angeles in 1992 and recently participated in Black Lives Matter protests. In 1991, videotape captured King, who was black, being beaten by Los Angeles police after a high-speed chase, but the officers were acquitted at trial the next year, sparking violent protests.
At the recent march, Wilborn held a sign that listed the names of prominent activists including Rosa Parks and Harriet Tubman.
“This march is fabulous. All races, all creeds,” said Wilborn, who is black. “People that are zero months old to 90 years old. Although we didn’t win the election, we made our point today.”
But if the moment promised power in numbers — with more than a million participants joining in “sister” protests across the U.S. and around the world — what does the future look like? Is this shaping up to be a movement akin to U.S. women’s push for the right to vote from the mid-1800s to the early 1900s or like the second-wave struggle for equality in the workplace and elsewhere in the 1960s and ’70s?
Some marchers, having had a few days to reflect on the protest, said last week that they were ready for further action.
With a renewed sense of spirit from the historic event, Cushman Neal said days afterward that she is ready to get fully involved — whether there is an organized movement or not.
She’s been phoning her congressional representatives and plans on taking part in any marches or protests that arise.
Various groups, including the Orange County Labor Federation and Arab American Civic Council, an Orange County-based grassroots organization dedicated to empowering the Arab American community, vow to maintain the momentum after assisting with the Santa Ana event.
And organizers of the Women’s March on Washington released details last week regarding a new national campaign called 10 Actions 100 Days.
According to the website, during the first 100 days of Trump’s presidency the group will release every 10 days a new way for people to be politically active. The first action asks people to let their senator know about an issue that matters to them using the postcards offered on the campaign’s website
Protests have long been a means of communicating deeply held beliefs, whether in support of jobs and racial equality or in opposition to an unpopular war and the use of nuclear weapons.
Last week, USA Today reported that American scientists worried about climate change and Trump’s characterization of it as a hoax are planning a protest march in Washington, D.C., though as of Friday no date had been announced.
And abortion foes met Friday for their 44th annual march in Washington.
How it all started
The road to organizing the Santa Ana march began with just a few people getting together. Concerns about the election of Trump was the glue that bound them, said Nichole Ramirez, an event coordinator.
Eventually a coalition of 20 groups was formed. It included the Orange County Labor Federation, the Arab American Chamber of California, Women in Leadership and Progressive Interfaith Alliance, among others.
They would meet weekly.
Out of those meetings came the idea of a march to coincide with the Washington event so that Orange County residents could play an active role in the demonstration without having to travel across the country.
To notify the public, they used the usual social media channels: Facebook, Snapchat and Twitter. Ramirez said people seemed to flock almost immediately to the sites, signing up for the event on the Facebook page.
Ramirez said organizers expected about 4,000 participants. She said she was pleased to report that the number was closer to 20,000. Santa Ana police have offered a more conservative range of 6,000 to 8,000 marchers.
In Laguna Beach, crunch time was more the theme. Residents Cindy Obrand and Sally Rapuano organized their rally about a week before Jan. 21.
Obrand said she felt emboldened by an apparent hate incident involving the tossing of a watermelon onto the frontyard of a black teenager’s home in Laguna Beach.
“It was a horrible, ugly incident,” she said. “It touched me deeply.”
Obrand works as a volunteer disc jockey at the local KX 93.5 radio station and was hoping to get the audience to support the march.
The work seems to have paid off.
In the tiny coastal community, an estimated 1,000 people jammed into the area around Main Beach in support of the widespread demonstration.
Demonstrators — men and women of all ages — stood shoulder to shoulder as they carried signs reading “Don’t gut the EPA,” “Love trumps hate” and “Nasty women unite,” a reference to Republican Trump’s “such a nasty woman” comment during the presidential debates with his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton.
One woman held a sign bearing the image of Vladimir Putin holding a baby, and the baby’s face was that of Trump, suggesting the new president is too quick to side with the Russian leader.
Newport Beach resident Irene Montoya, 33, printed out an image she saw on Pinterest showing Trump grabbing the Statue of Liberty between the legs.
Referring to the leaked “Access Hollywood” video of Trump boasting about being able to grab women by the genitals because of his star power, Montoya said she felt “disgust.”
“Words mean something, especially when you’re president,” Montoya said.
At the rally, Laguna Beach residents and former teachers Linda Simpson, 75, and Ceil Sharman, 77, said kids should not have to see hatred and bigotry during Trump’s presidency.
“If there’s anything Trump has done, it’s making people realize that they need to stand up for themselves,” Simpson said.
The future
Dana Emerson, one of the organizers of the Santa Ana event, said Tuesday that she was “blown away” by the march and sees a need for a robust movement going forward.
“I see that marginalized communities are coming together to the understanding that there is greater power when they fight together than to separate and fight their battles of injustice independently,” Emerson said. “I do see a lot of changes on the horizon with that kind of unity. Now the voices can’t be ignored and the communities are no longer invisible.”
Some women who had been in Washington reported being chastized at the demonstration because of their anti-abortion leanings, despite the common goal of fighting for women’s rights.
But Emerson said if the movement is to be successful, it needs to be inclusive, to have “multiple voices for a single cause.”
As far as what the movement will look like over the next four years, she said people are going to be more inclined to contact their congressional representatives and join more rallies and demonstrations.
Emerson, the dean at Coastline Community College — which has campuses in Westminster, Garden Grove and Newport Beach — said she will be working with local organizations to bring people together so that events like the Jan. 21 march keep happening.
In echoing Emerson, Ramirez, a coordinator of the Santa Ana gathering, said days later that she believes the march will lead to a national movement. Locally, she said, the same groups that worked together on the Santa Ana march will be meeting to discuss “phase two,” although details weren’t yet clear.
Rashad al-Dabbagh, director of the Arab American Civic Council, said Wednesday that the group is launching a new local program called The Beautiful Resistance, which will advocate for unity among the people of Orange County.
Al-Dabbagh said he was concerned with Trump’s recent executive orders to build a border wall and crack down on sanctuary cities. As the leader of a group that defends the rights of Arab Americans, al-Dabbagh was especially concerned about Trump’s talk of banning refugees from various Middle Eastern countries. He hopes that the group can work locally to counteract the divisiveness that he said will be caused by such presidential orders.
The Orange County Labor Federation, which represents more than 90 local unions, is also looking to the future of the movement. Branch director Carlos Camacho said the group is planning a May Day march in support of human rights. Specifics about the march were not immediately available.
Leland Sisk, 69, of Garden Grove said days after attending the Santa Ana march that he believes the national event “sent a message to Trump [that] we are here and we aren’t going away.”
Sisk, a Vietnam veteran, said he is making a habit of calling his congressional representatives and will attend local city council meetings.
And he said he and his wife will surely be taking to the streets again.
“Democracy is not easy,” he said. “You have to get involved.”
Obrand said Wednesday that the Laguna Beach rally was something “beyond her wildest dreams.” She said that if the movement is going to be successful, people need to mobilize locally as well as nationally.
Obrand, who is 69, believes her role is in mentoring people so they learn to organize. She said she plans on working with a new community group that sprouted in the days following the Jan. 21 demonstrations.
About the new group, resident Lauren Segal said six people who each have a background in community organizing met Tuesday night to discuss joining forces in the name of activism. Segal previously founded Give a Beat, a nonprofit that works on behalf of criminal justice in Los Angeles.
Segal said the new Laguna group is planning to meet every week and eventually invite others to attend. She said the meetings will act as a support system for individuals in the community who feel persecuted.
Segal also said she wants the group to mobilize the community in support of national efforts like writing to congressmen or raising money for activists working in other states.
On Jan. 15, around 100 demonstrators assembled outside the office of U.S. Rep. Mimi Walters (R- Irvine) to oppose her efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act and then marched 2 1/2 miles to UC Irvine for a rally with state Treasurer John Chiang, who was speaking there. Later, they made signs at the Duck Club in preparation for the upcoming march.
The march and rally on Jan. 15 was organized by Indivisible O.C., a grassroots group that opposes the policies of Trump and the Republican Party.
Kathleen Treseder, a member of Indivisible O.C. and a participant in the Irvine events, said last week that she had flown to Washington, D.C., in time for the Women’s March.
During her layover in Salt Lake City, she noticed other women, waiting for the same flight, making their signs for the march.
Later on, she and the other passengers on the plane learned from a flight attendant that the pilot, also a woman, requested that flight in order to attend the march.
Treseder, 44, said that what is next for her is putting together a rapid action group that will remain engaged in and vocal about political issues.
“If there’s something that happens like a bill being voted on, then we’ll have the email addresses to send messages right away to members of Congress,” Treseder said. “I plan on being very active, and the march is just the start of it.”
Twitter: @benbrazilpilot
Twitter: @AlexandraChan10
