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WAVE OF EARTH DAY PROTESTS AS AMERICANS MOBILIZE AGAINST TRUMP  
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Nina Lakhani
April 21, 2025
The Guardian
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_ Organizers team up with pro-democracy groups for flurry of actions
to demand right to free, healthy lives _

Anti Trump protesters in New York city on Saturday call out policies
on immigration, climate and other issues. , Andrea Renault/ZUMA Press
Wire/REX/Shutterstock

 

Hundreds of marches, pickets and cleanup events are taking place
across the US in the run-up to Earth Day on Tuesday, as environmental
and climate [[link removed]]
groups step up resistance to the Trump administration’s
authoritarianism and its “war on the planet”.

A fortnight after the “Hands Off” mobilization brought millions to
the streets, national and grassroots organizers are teaming up with
pro-democracy groups for “All Out on Earth Day” – a wave of
actions to demand the right to live free, healthy lives.

 
In New York, thousands of people gathered in lower Manhattan on
Saturday for the “Hands Off Migrants march” endorsed by dozens of
climate and migrant justice groups, calling for Immigration and
Customs Enforcement (Ice) to get out of New York – and New York to
get out of fossil fuels. The two movements converged amid Trump’s
crackdown on migrants and embrace of fossil fuels – which will drive
further climate collapse and forced migration.

Meanwhile in Milwaukee, a Stop the Cuts march organized by Indivisible
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called out Republican lawmakers backing the unprecedented cuts to
healthcare, education, environmental protections and climate funding.

“Trump is attacking migrants and the planet by aligning himself with
big oil and eroding hard won protections. Climate change is the
leading cause of global displacement, these are connected issues,”
said Renata Pumarol, the deputy director of the Climate Organizing
Hub, which coordinated the New York march. “As we fight the
authoritarianism of Trump, climate groups need to be part of the
resistance because we are all under threat.”

Trump and his billionaire mega-donor Elon Musk
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dismantling of federal offices that oversee clean air, drinking water,
national parks and forests, conservation, climate smart farming, and
environmental justice at dizzying speed, as well as pushing through
mass layoffs at core climate and environmental agencies including the
National Weather Service, Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema),
the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Forest Service.

 
Meanwhile, regulatory standards for fossil fuels, petrochemical
plants, mining and other polluting industries have been slashed –
along with an unprecedented crackdown on free speech, migrants and
universities.

Trump is also rumoured to be mulling an executive order that removes
tax-exempt status for some climate groups, which could prove
devastating for smaller grassroots organizations. Meanwhile the White
House is also pushing the Republican-controlled Congress to pass a
budget reconciliation bill that cancels billions of dollars of
Biden-era grants for clean energy and environmental protection
investments.

The response from the environmental and climate movement to the Trump
agenda has, until now, been mostly confined to the courts, with an
array of lawsuits challenging everything from mass layoffs, suspended
environmental justice funds and the erasure of climate change from
federal government websites.

 
According to some advocates, the resistance on the streets had been
somewhat underwhelming – in part down to shock at the scale and pace
of Trump’s attacks, as well as efforts by some green groups to stay
apolitical to appease funders and the administration. Protest
[[link removed]] fatigue, they say, may
also have played a role, given that the social uprisings in response
to the murder of George Floyd and Israel’s war on Gaza, which has
killed more than 50,000 Palestinians, has led to little sustained
political change.

[a group of people in streets hold signs such as ‘billionaires
profit from climate chaos’ and ‘stop pollution’]
Thousands of people fill Midtown in Manhattan to protest the Trump
administration on Saturday. Photograph: Andrea Renault/ZUMA Press
Wire/REX/Shutterstock

Now, three months into a Trump presidency and the capitulation of
Congress to his assault on the planet, many in the environmental and
climate justice movement will begin rallying behind three major
demands: to defend workers and democracy; lower costs for communities
and end handouts for corporations and billionaires; and make polluters
pay.

“The mobilizations … are the start of something: a wave from below
with winnable demands to meet and inspire people where they are,”
said Kaniela Ing, the national director of the Green New Deal Network,
a coalition of frontline communities, labor organizers, and climate
activists. “Rallies, protests, clean-ups … rising up takes many
forms, and it all helps, as we need consistent mass non-cooperation to
fight against authoritarianism and ensure a livable world.”

On Tuesday, the Planet over Profit and #teslatakedown coalition will
picket the New York home of billionaire James Murdoch, a Tesla board
member. The Trump mega-donor Elon Musk’s electric vehicle company
has faced allegations of air and water pollution around its factories
in the US, “and because there’s no greater threat to our ability
to live rich, dignified lives on a safe, stable planet than the
Trump/Musk regime,” according to organisers.

 
In Michigan, Jewish organizers are running a phone bank to turn out
climate and environmental voters ahead of the 6 May municipal
elections. In Duluth, Minnesota, traditional Ojibwe blessings for
Mother Earth will open an event featuring students spearheading
efforts to install solar energy in local schools and environmental
scientists on the need to protect the local EPA water lab.

This year’s Earth Day, [[link removed]]
which includes climate education in schools and universities,
beach-clean ups, and tree planting in the US and globally, is the
55th, but thanks to Trump, it is like no other.

The first Earth Day took place on 22 April 1970, when 20 million
Americans participated in nationwide events, protests and teach-ins
about pollution, the loss of wildlife and pillaging of natural
resources – bringing together disparate issues under the broad
banner of what then became the US environmental movement.

This was followed with a campaign to oust 12 members of Congress with
terrible environmental voting records in the midterms, with seven of
the so-called dirty dozen incumbents losing their seats – including
the powerful chair of the public works committee.

The success sent shockwaves across Washington, and a month later,
Congress passed the clean air act by an overwhelming majority,
followed by slew of laws that formed the bedrock of environmental
protections including the clean water, endangered species, and
national marine sanctuaries acts – and Richard Nixon created the
EPA.

“For about six years the environmental movement was unstoppable, as
we pushed to make the world a healthy place for humans and all
diversity of life. There’s always been a pendulum in American
politics but nothing like the assault on the environment – and
social security, education, health and economy – we see today,”
said Denis Hayes, the organizer of the first Earth Day.

“In 2026 we will need to organize aggressively for the election, but
this Earth Day is about people with shared values coming together
looking for local solutions, some introspection on what we did wrong
that allowed Trump to get elected, and finding strategies on how to
overcome him.”

A new review of 50 recent studies
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found that protests tend to sway media coverage and public opinion
toward the climate cause – even when disruptive tactics are used.
The Yale Program on Climate Change Communication researchers found
that collective action can also shift people’s voting behavior. In
one study in Germany, the Green Party received proportionally more
votes in areas where climate protests took place, Grist reported
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The GNDN and the Sunrise Movement, a youth-led climate justice group,
were among those that campaigned to secure the Inflation Reduction and
Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act in 2021 and 2022 - now under
threat by Trump’s pro-fossil fuel, anti-climate action agenda.

“Just three months into the Trump presidency, the damage has already
been catastrophic,” said Aru Shiney-Ajay, the executive director of
the Sunrise Movement. “This Earth Day, we stand united in defiance
of their greed and fight for a future that prioritizes people and the
planet over profits.”

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* Earth Day; The 89% Movement; Environmental Activism; Trump; Musk;
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