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DEMONSTRATIONS AND DEMOGRAPHICS  
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Bill Fletcher, Jr
April 3, 2026
ZNetwork
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_ In the aftermath of the “No Kings Day” demonstrations of March
28th, there has been renewed interest—and concern—that in many
cities the participation of people of color generally, and Black
people specifically, has been limited. _

, Cris Crass via Meta | "NoKings for multiracial feminist democracy
against the authoritarian nightmare" | NYC, March 28, 2026

 

In the aftermath of the “No Kings Day” demonstrations of March
28th, there has been renewed interest—and concern—that in many
cities the participation of people of color generally, and Black
people specifically, has been limited.  To my knowledge, no one has
done any study on this, so we are forced to rely on a combination of
anecdotal information and historical analysis and patterns.

What is completely obvious to anyone who looks at our situation is
that the victories won by progressive social movements in the
‘1960s’ have been set back over a more than forty-year period of
relentless attacks.  Focusing on the Black Freedom Movement for a
moment, these setbacks have been resisted over time and taking many
forms.  The Black-led electoral upsurge that began in the late 1970s
and lasted through the end of the 1988 Jesse Jackson Presidential
campaign is a case in point of that resistance.  That said, the
combination of repression (including assassinations of leaders and
activists), strategic confusion and disagreements, and the decline in
active mass democratic organizations among African Americans,
contributed to a growing malaise, tending towards despair.  Not
altogether different from the twenty-year aftermath of the defeat of
Reconstruction, there started to be a noticeable though not
overwhelming turn inward, with parallels in the direction of the
politics and philosophy of Booker T. Washington.

In our era, the 1995 Million Man March was an example of this turn
inward in the aftermath of defeat.  The march had two significant
downsides.  First, it was all-men.  To paraphrase the late Amiri
Baraka, one does not go to war and leave half the army at home. 
Second, there were no demands on the state or corporate America.  The
march was very much focused inwardly on Black America and,
specifically, on Black men.  Though mass activism certainly did not
disappear in the 1990s, the fact that more than a million people would
converge on Washington, DC and not place demands on the state given
what was happening—and continued to happen—to Black America was
phenomenal.

Over time and with the exception of the trade union movement,
non-profit advocacy rose to largely replace mass organizing and the
building of member-controlled mass democratic organizations.  While
those engaged in the advocacy work are overwhelmingly dedicated and
very much committed to justice and democracy, the large-scale turn
away from building personal connections with the grassroots along with
challenges associated with the growth of social media, the increased
environment of isolation has had a noticeable impact on the
willingness of many people to engage in struggle, at least over the
longer term.

2020, and the rebellions and protests that followed the murder of
George Floyd may appear to be an exception to this but one must be
careful with such a conclusion.  The 2020 revolt was both amazing and
historic.  Black-led but multi-racial, it appeared to shake the
foundations of the country.  In fact, the protests resulted, almost
immediately, in shifts in policy by government and corporations
alike.  I would further argue that it contributed to the defeat of
Donald Trump in the 2020 elections.

Nevertheless, that movement failed to build and sustain a progressive
institutional presence.  While many organizations received
significant financial grants to do their work, few of them turned in
the direction of mass organizing and the building of mass democratic
organizations.  There was also little attention paid to the
inevitable counterattack that we should have all been expecting from
the far Right.  When that counterattack occurred, specifically in the
context of the attacks on alleged Critical Race Theory, along with the
hysteria built by the far Right in connection with Latin@ immigration,
the progressive movements of color were caught flat-footed.  Of
course, there was resistance but the momentum arising from 2020 was
lost during the remaining Covid years and the period of the Biden
administration.  The far Right was able to shift the narrative and,
along with frustration and anger in connection with Biden’s support
for the Israeli genocidal war against the Palestinians in Gaza,
cynicism, nihilism and paralysis grew.

Thus, today we have found ourselves attempting to come to grips with a
level of despair and demobilization that is the result of a
combination of the pounding that Black America in particular has
received, as well as the absence of a counterstrategy that will take
us to a post-Trump/post-neo-liberal USA.  Arguments about African
Americans being fearful of demonstrating are ludicrous, though there
are some African Americans who have promoted such a fear, encouraging
us to sit home lest we somehow provoke Trump to bring about martial
law.  Those who say that the demonstrations fail to address the
demands of Black people have only an element of truth in that, yes,
the demands need to expand.  That said, Black folks have marched many
times under banners that have not specifically addressed us.  Ask any
number of Black trade union members who have gone on strike over
wages, hours and working conditions (sometimes with demands that
ignore outright the issues faced by Black workers).

If anything, I would suggest that there is a challenge for the Black
Left and, for that matter, all leftists of color.  During the Vietnam
War it was not unusual to see antiwar demonstrations that were
overwhelmingly white.  Though people of color were always active in
such demonstrations, things tended to change when leftists of color
organized and mobilized their respective constituencies to engage. 
Probably the most notable example among people of color was the 1970
Chicano Moratorium against the Vietnam War that mobilized tens of
thousands of Chicanos in the streets of Los Angeles.  Within Black
America, significant work was done by the Black Panther Party, SNCC
and others to reach Black America in connection with the war, not to
mention the impact of the oration of Dr. Martin Luther King during the
final year of his life.  The antiwar work among Black Americans also
included organizing among enlisted personnel in the military.  The
Young Lords Party, the Puerto Rican Socialist Party, and other Puerto
Rican radicals mobilized Puerto Ricans on the island and the mainland
in opposition to the war.  There was nothing short of a ‘rainbow’
of opposition to US aggression and the growing Right led by then
President Nixon.

Today’s Black Left—indeed, all leftists of color—needs to make
it their mission to replicate such an approach but under 21st century
conditions.  There is nothing wrong with having our own contingents
in larger rallies; there is nothing wrong with specific outreach to
our constituencies.  In fact, that is precisely what we need to do. 
But we must also connect this to a fight for what many people refer to
as a _Third Reconstruction_, that is a progressive future grounded in
demands we articulate right now which reflect the needs and
aspirations of the oppressed.

A few weeks ago, I was invited to address a community gathering in
Baltimore, Maryland that a friend of mine helped organize.  The aim
was to speak about ICE and the threat that it held for not only Latin@
immigrants but for all immigrants of color and for non-immigrant
populations.  Perhaps thirty people in the room.  They were Black
Baltimore residents, many of whom had little to no _historical
background_ on ICE, nativism in the USA, and the threats to democracy
that are hiding behind the sophistry of the Trump administration. 
They sat there and listened; they asked great questions; and many of
them wanted to do something as a result of the meeting.  They were
not viewing this gathering through a computer screen, doing their
email at the same time.  They were there in-person and were
engrossed.  That’s how we begin.

_BILL FLETCHER, JR (born 1954) has been an activist since his teen
years. Upon graduating from college he went to work as a welder in a
shipyard, thereby entering the labor movement. Over the years he has
been active in workplace and community struggles as well as electoral
campaigns. He has worked for several labor unions in addition to
serving as a senior staffperson in the national AFL-CIO. Fletcher is
the former president of TransAfrica Forum; a Senior Scholar with the
Institute for Policy Studies; and in the leadership of several other
projects. Fletcher is the co-author (with Peter Agard) of “The
Indispensable Ally: Black Workers and the Formation of the Congress of
Industrial Organizations, 1934-1941”; the co-author (with Dr.
Fernando Gapasin) of “Solidarity Divided: The crisis in organized
labor and a new path toward social justice“; and the author of
“‘They’re Bankrupting Us’ – And Twenty other myths about
unions.” Fletcher is a syndicated columnist and a regular media
commentator on television, radio and the Web._

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* No Kings Day
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* Black participation
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* freedom struggle
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