President Donald Trump's return has led to more sophisticated protest organizing tactics and an increased feeling of urgency and desperation among participants.
Lyndhurst Democratic Club and other local organizations held a rally to “Stop Elon Musk” outside the Tesla Motors Cleveland at 5180 Mayfield Road in Lyndhurst. The protestors expressed their concerns about the unchecked and unregulated power being granted by President Donald Trump to Elon Musk and DOGE.
In Cleveland, around Ohio, and throughout the country, demonstrators have turned out in the past eight weeks to protest a range of actions – both real and feared – by Trump and other Republican leaders. In some cases, protesters took to the streets. In other cases, they’ve targeted the local offices of Republican lawmakers, who they feel aren’t listening to their concerns. Ohio’s two U.S. senators, Republicans Bernie Moreno and Jon Husted, were bombarded with so many calls last month that The protest eruptions were inevitable, given the politically polarized times we live in and the number of demonstrations that followed Trump’s first presidential victory in 2016.Ohio lawmakers to drop DeWine’s ‘sin tax’ hikes from budget plan, add $600M in Browns stadium bonds Gov. Mike DeWine’s 2025 State of the State offers new education proposals, details Lt. Gov. Jim Tressel’s role: Capitol Letter However, Northeast Ohio anti-Trump organizers and political experts say there are some differences between today’s protests and the rallies of eight years ago – both in terms of more sophisticated tactics and an increased feeling of urgency and desperation among participants.Since last January, when Trump was sworn into office, there have been at least a dozen protests of various sizes held around Northeast Ohio.At some events, like the Women’s Day march and a President’s Day protest at West Side Market last month, attendees demonstrated about a wide range of topics, from preserving abortion rights to jeering billionaire Elon Musk, who heads Trump’s controversial government efficiency initiative. Those protests were held in coordination with similar demonstrations around the country.That increased focus on smaller, locally organized “popup” protests is one big difference from the protest movement during Trump’s first term, said Ellen Frank, a retired retail executive who volunteers with Many Northeast Ohio protest groups also now coordinate with each other to ensure that they don’t schedule competing events on the same day, Frank said.Turnout has, so far, generally been better than expected, several Northeast Ohio anti-Trump organizers said in interviews. “I thought it would die off, but every week, every day, there is someone new hitting our Facebook page,” said Barb Kaplan, lead organizer of Crooked River Action, a progressive activist group in Summit County. “It’s been exhausting, frankly, but it’s in a good way.” Kathy Wray Coleman, head organizer for the Women’s Day march in Cleveland, said the 1,500 people who attended “shocked” her and other organizers, as they expected a turnout of about 600 given that they only started planning for the march about three weeks prior. “I think people are upset as hell,” Coleman said, pointing to a range of issues that have led people to demonstrate, from mass layoffs of federal workers to fears that Republicans will slash funding to programs like Medicaid and food stamps. “What’s so sad is that President Trump seemed to check all the boxes in terms of the issues that we hold dear,” she said. David Niven, a University of Cincinnati political science professor and former speechwriter for Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland, said that for many Ohioans who dislike Trump, there’s a “greater sense of desperation” than after Trump’s 2016 victory. “There was, at least in first term, for most folks, a sense that this was kind of unprecedented, and things would get back to get back to normal at some point,” Niven said. “And going through this a second time, and actually going through it in a much bigger, more dramatic scope -- you know, it calls into question what normal is anymore.” Joining a march or protest, Niven said, gives participants a sense that, at least, they’re not the only ones who feel this way.Frank, a retired retail executive, said her group’s protest goals are to raise awareness about various political issues , get Moreno to provide more specifics about his stances on those issues, and convince the senator to attend a town hall meeting to discuss those specifics. Once Moreno -- a vocal ally of Trump -- fleshes out his opinions on those issues, Frank said, Mobilize the Vote can start urging and pressuring him to change stances they disagree with. “We’re like little terriers. We stay on it for the long haul, because we know we can’t just come in, swoop in, fly by night and affect change in like two months,” Frank said. “We will keep pounding on this with him until he starts changing some of his mindset.”“Assisting Ohioans is Senator Moreno’s top priority,” McCarthy said in a statement. “He meets with Ohioans every single day both in Ohio and Washington and has been transparent about his commitment to passing President Trump’s agenda.” Kaplan said her group has similar goals of spreading awareness and pressuring Republicans over their support of Trump policies. But Kaplan said another hope is to, eventually, elect candidates to school boards and other local offices. “Our ultimate goal is to keep people engaged and to channel their fear and their anger into positive work for the community,” she said. Some past protest movements have resulted in tangible political victories, such as the Tea Party movement that helped swoop many conservatives to high office during the Obama administration. But for protesters in Ohio, where Republicans dominate state government and Trump has won by significant margins in each of the last three presidential elections, that’s not as realistic a short-term goal, Niven said. “You have to have to crawl before you can walk,” he said. “Before they can worry about field organization, they need an outlet for their energies, for their frustrations, for their hopes.”Plans are also underway to hold a pro-reproductive rights march in Cleveland on June 24, the third anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, according to Coleman. “The more people that take to the streets,” Coleman said, “the closer we get to seeking justice and redress to our issues.”If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation.and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our
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