On Saturday, Americans took to the streets of cities large and small in all fifty states to protest President Donald Trump and his billionaire majordomo Elon Musk, who have jointly endeavored to dismantle the federal government, undermine the Constitution, and upend the U.S. economy. In Chicago, thousands of people packed Daley Plaza and surrounding streets as part of the protest, which was organized by Indivisible Chicago along with the Chicago Federation of Labor, Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, Equality Illinois, Personal PAC and others.
Saturday’s protests followed dozens of smaller demonstrations outside Tesla dealerships in Chicago and elsewhere. Those peaceful protests took place amid a spate of arson attacks on Tesla stores in cities across the United States and Europe. Meanwhile, the company’s share value has plummeted in recent weeks, and Trump, at odds with Musk over tariffs, is reportedly considering sidelining him.
Trump has called the Tesla dealership attacks “terrorism” and threatened to send people convicted of burning the cars to El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison. If the Department of Justice follows through on that threat, it would be extraordinary, and decidedly unconstitutional.
The Constitution, however, hasn’t slowed Trump’s authoritarian spree. His administration has already used the extremely shaky pretext of the 1798 Alien and Enemies Act to deport hundreds of migrants accused of having gang ties to El Salvador, where they were summarily thrown into CECOT. Some of them—like Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who fled to the United States to escape the very gang he’s wrongly accused of belonging to and is now imprisoned with—were deported mistakenly. All of them had their right to due process violated.
Trump has similarly flouted the Constitution with his myriad executive orders that ran the gamut from illegally pulling already-approved federal funding from teachers to shuttering federal agencies that were established by Congress. The president who declared he would be a dictator on “day one” in office is doing all he can to make good on that. In the Senate, the Democrats have thus far only managed to muster a single (if record-breaking) filibuster in opposition to Trump. Judges have ruled against some of his worst unconstitutional excesses, but Trump seems determined to defy the courts. Whether the Supreme Court with its conservative majority can curtail the president is anybody’s guess.
Resistance to authoritarianism works only when it is concerted, sustained, and patient. It will take more than a symbolic single-day demonstration, even one held in hundreds of cities and towns simultaneously, to stop Trump and Musk. Another fifty-state protest is planned for April 19. We—the people—must continue to organize and resist. It’s the only way we will save our democracy.
