‘Arms Off’: Protesters ship a sweeping message to Trump and Musk at a DC rally

Surrounding the Washington Monument Saturday have been hundreds of indicators with messages spanning innumerable subjects. “Help Ukraine,” “Watch out for DOGE,” “Shield Trans Lives,” have been only a few of them. Others struck a word of exasperation: “The place do I begin…”

The nationwide Arms Off protests this weekend turned out thousands and thousands of protesters throughout 1,300 totally different occasions, organizers estimate, motivated by a big selection of causes however two individuals: President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk. Within the indicators they delivered to the DC rally, some protesters centered on a single situation. Others tried to suit as many as they might. The throughline was a message to the US authorities: shield democracy, and cease messing with packages and businesses that matter.

The gang in Washington, DC — greater than 100,000, per organizers’ estimates — was peaceable and orderly. On a stage behind the Washington Monument, lawmakers like Reps. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) and Maxwell Frost (D-FL) and organizers together with AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler spoke. Attendees round them quietly listened, save for the occasional call-and-response chant, cheers, or boos for the Trump administration. Farther away, a bunch of protesters marched across the Monument chanting, “Arms Off! Dump Trump!”

The various messages and actions converging in Washington principally appeared to coexist simply, with the occasional exception. As I stood on a road nook outdoors the Nationwide Mall, a handful of protesters urged individuals to hitch them for a pro-Palestine rally on the Capitol at 1 PM, an hour after the principle occasion programming started. A person holding a federal employee union signal interjected, telling one of many pro-Palestine protesters that whereas he supported their message, he frightened about diverting individuals from the central protest. “Don’t go away the principle rally,” he urged passersby. The professional-Palestine protester adjusted her message. “Be part of the Palestine rally at no matter time carries your spirit,” and “go to each rallies however don’t forget Palestine.”

In entrance of the Washington Monument, a girl named Susan was draped in blue pool noodles festooned with indicators that flapped within the wind: “DOGE is a SCAM,” stated one, “Stand with Ukraine,” one other. A 3rd bore an extended checklist of issues the federal government ought to preserve its “palms off”: legislation corporations, universities, and lots of federal businesses. “There are such a lot of issues that Trump has accomplished — and Musk and [Vice President JD] Vance — which can be outrageous,” she informed me. “Each single day, there are 4 or 5 issues. Whether or not it’s snatching individuals off the road, chopping businesses that carry out actually important capabilities — issues which will make sense to any person wielding a sledgehammer reasonably than a scalpel.” Susan, who declined to provide her final identify, says she selected the pool noodles to underscore the peacefulness of the occasion. “It is a non-violent motion, and in contrast to the January sixth insurrectionists who introduced flag poles and different issues to make use of as weapons, all people who’s right here is right here to peacefully protest.”

Some organizers arranged buses to assist individuals journey to the nation’s capital for the rally, although many individuals confirmed up nearer to house on the occasions unfold throughout the nation (and, because of protests in a number of main European cities, the world.) New York Metropolis reportedly had the same turnout to DC — which is a a lot smaller metropolis — and protests cropped up in stereotypically deep-red states like Idaho and West Virginia. However for a lot of who attended the DC rally, the occasion was deeply private. “Russell Vought stated that they needed to place us into trauma, and they’re delivering on that promise on daily basis,” says one one who recognized herself as a federal employee and declined to provide her identify, referring to the Challenge 2025 creator who leads the Workplace of Administration and Funds. “And it has been nothing however a nightmare since January twentieth for 3 million federal staff.”

Leonard Bailey, a retired Division of Justice employee, crafted an unlimited determine of a person in a Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) cap out of rooster wire and expandable foam. Talking to me whereas holding up his sculpture from the again, Bailey stated that it actually “pains” him to see how the colleagues he spent 33 years working with are being handled by Musk’s DOGE. “My expertise with the colleagues I’ve labored with over that point have been these have been individuals who labored effectively into the evening, via the weekend, via household holidays to maintain the American public protected,” he says. He began his pre-planned retirement in January, and whereas he says “individuals preserve telling me what nice timing, I’m nursing a case of survivor’s guilt.”

The one that recognized themselves as a federal employee stood within the crowd close to the stage handing out small American flags, providing to tape them to individuals’s indicators. “White supremacists have been marching with our flag for approach too lengthy,” she stated. “I simply assume it’s time to reclaim it. They’ve abused it. They’ve turned it into one thing that it was by no means meant to face for, and it’s alleged to be freedom for all, not for a choose fucking few.” (Some individuals appeared hesitant to take a flag, reconsidering solely when she informed them “we’re going to take it again from the far proper.”) Regardless of latest experiences that Elon Musk could also be on his approach out of the White Home, the employee is pessimistic that DOGE’s influence on the federal workforce will finish.

Being amongst different federal employees introduced some solace to Shopper Monetary Safety Bureau (CFPB) enforcement lawyer Doug Wilson, a member of the company’s union. The CFPB has had a rocky couple of months, with Performing Director Vought ordering staff to cease working, till a decide not too long ago ordered them to return whereas a broader case is pending.

For months now, federal employees in DC have been organizing protests in entrance of federal buildings, pushing again on the havoc Trump and Musk have wreaked on the federal workforce. Most of the early protests have been tiny, turning out one thing on the order of fifty attendees. The Arms Off protest in DC — and the day of motion at massive — operated on a completely totally different scale. However for some attendees, it served the same goal: letting them present as much as defend the work they’ve accomplished for years or many years. “It’s good to simply be collectively and expertise that solidarity,” Wilson stated Saturday, arriving on the protest. “I would like the nation to listen to that we do our jobs to guard them … I would like the American individuals to know that we simply need to work.”