Feature Archives

The Anti Police-Terror Project again joined with multiple organizations to lift up the radical legacy of Martin Luther King all weekend long, culminating in the 6th Annual Rally and March on Monday, January 20. The Oakland MLK march demands were: Housing as a Human Right, Close the Camps, No School Closures, End Police Repression, Climate Justice, No More War. Cities that held Martin Luther King Jr weekend events around the Bay Area included San Francisco, San José, Santa Rosa, El Cerrito, and Hayward.

On January 4, thousands of people rallied and marched in Northern California, proclaiming "US Out Of Iraq" and "No War With Iran." Various groups, including ANSWER Coalition and Code Pink, called for a rally and march in San Francisco before the U.S. assassinated Iranian general Qassem Suleimani near the Baghdad airport on January 3. That extrajudicial killing swelled the turnout in San Francisco while anti-war activists quickly announced similar actions at other Northern California locations then and throughout the month. A Global Day of Protest occurred on Saturday, January 25.

One of the largest demonstrations ever in the United States was the Women's March in Washington D.C. the day after Trump was inaugurated. Solidarity marches were also held across the country. On January 18, for the fourth year in a row, women again marched to affirm that Women’s Rights are Human Rights and Human Rights are Women’s Rights. The goal is to create a society in which women — including Black women, Native women, poor women, immigrant women, disabled women, Muslim women, Jewish women, lesbian queer and trans women — are free and able to care for and nurture their families, however they are formed, in safe and healthy environments free from structural impediments.

On December 6, Bay Area youth groups led the local activities of the Global Youth Climate Strike. Organizations such as Sunrise Movement, Youth Vs. Apocalypse, and Students for Climate Action called for protests, marches, rallies and die-ins. Organizers of the Climate Strike wrote: The September 20th Climate Strike was the largest day of action for climate justice ever. On December 6th, as world leaders gather at the UN’s annual climate conference, young people across America will join a national #ClimateStrike to take the momentum from September to our elected officials’ doorsteps.

On November 1, Nancy Pelosi said she is "not a big fan of Medicare for All." Likewise, U.S. Representative Anna Eshoo, who chairs the Subcommittee on Health, has been criticized for being "in the pocket of Big Pharma." At rallies in front of both Congresswomen's offices this fall, protesters asked why neither of them represent what their constituents want. Both Congresswomen will face opposition from candidates who support Medicare-for-All. The primary election in California is set for March 3, 2020.

The Kincade Fire has created a calamitous path through Northern California’s wine country, forcing nearly 200,000 people to flee their homes. Many of them are reliving the disastrous fire that raged through the same area in 2017. On October 25, PG&E admitted its electrical equipment may have ignited the inferno, despite electrical blackouts imposed across Northern California to prevent blazes. In the San Francisco Bay Area, activists say we need to replace private control of utilities. Two new campaigns, Let's Own PG&E and Utility Justice Campaign, are calling for a publicly-accountable takeover of the monopoly. Protests have been held in San Francisco, Santa Cruz, and other cities.

On October 4, the Trump administration dismissed protests and made a formal decision to open 725,500 acres of public lands and mineral estate across California’s Central Coast and the Bay Area to new oil and gas drilling and fracking. The public lands the U.S. Bureau of Land Management has earmarked for leasing are in the counties of Alameda, Contra Costa, Fresno, Merced, Monterey, San Benito, San Joaquin, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz and Stanislaus. The move will end a more than five-year-old moratorium on leasing federal public land and mineral estate in the state to oil companies.