From WXXI news.

This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

Our connection this hour was made at more than a thousand locations this past weekend, where protesters followed a theme of Hands Off.

They were demonstrating against the Trump administration and for a wide range of reasons.

Hands off our Medicaid.

Some said.

Hands off our books.

The protest grew organically from online organizers in Washington, D.C. they expected about 10,000 people.

They got more than 30,000 in the Finger Lakes.

Small towns hoped for maybe a dozen people on street corners.

They saw protests in the hundreds.

In Rochester, an estimated 3000 plus turned down.

The question is always with mass demonstrations is what comes next and what is the impact of protesting?

Who is it for?

Who's listening?

President Trump dismissed the protests as fraudulent, filled with essentially paid actors.

Let's talk to some of those paid actor.

No.

They're non-actors.

They're real people who attended this past weekend.

And let me welcome our guests.

I don't remember Chris Thompson ever being a paid actor for a protest, although I've seen you have plenty of demonstrate.

I'm still waiting for my checks from 2020 that I was supposed to get.

Chris is an engineer and an activist.

Thank you for being back with us here.

Thank you.

Scott Fearing as a board member for Rainbow Seniors.

Rock, welcome to nice to see you.

Good to see you.

Good to be here.

Don Thompson is a defense attorney, although he also describes himself as a thorn in the side of oligarchy.

That's not that's not a formal term.

He didn't think I'd say that out there.

No, I did, but it's good to be back anyway.

Thank you for being with us, Don.

And welcome to Connor.

Jane O'Brien Connors, organizer for the Rochester Hands Off rally.

Welcome.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you so much.

How many did you expect to see?

Well, I'll tell you.

When we were first talking to the city about arranging this, and I said I had compared it with the Ukrainian rally that had been a little while ago, and they had over 500.

I thought, that's a safe number, right.

We can do about 500.

And then as it grew, I set out, you know, maybe 1000.

We were blown away by the number of people who actually showed up.

So it was fantastic.

More than 3000 is a comfortable estimate, do you think?

Yeah.

I I've heard 3500.

I've heard 4000.

I wasn't standing there counting.

I tried to do a head count at the beginning, but, you know, it was impossible.

I've read that it was enough for occasionally traffic to slow down and Chris Thompson to get yelled at.

Yeah, that was fun.

It was actually, I think that guy.

It was one guy I think he was turning out of, you know, out of his street and heading down Monroe.

And he could have done that because he was clear.

But then he just like, sat there was yelling at people or calling people various slurs, called me a couple of slurs.

And then as soon as I tried to step toward his car, he, like, got in his car and peeled off.

So, I mean, you know, I, I get this from like, biking to just, I don't know, people in large pickup trucks.

No offense to people who are like, there's a lot of great people.

And pickup trucks.

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

But there's a there's a certain tact who I expected that from, and that was the only one that I saw.

So.

Okay.

Traffic.

Traffic was amazing.

At one point in time, I walked over to the bridge over 490, and the exit ramps were backed up as far as one could see, and the streets all around the park were backed up by people you know, was asking them in the park, where did you where did you park your car?

And they're like, oh, we had to walk over from almost from Wegmans and, you know, like all over the place.

So traffic was an issue and parking was an issue.

One of our final speakers actually didn't make it because of the traffic.

Right.

So we had to substitute somebody else.

And so I probably in the category of good problems to have.

Connor.

Yes, absolutely.

Okay.

Well, and so this is an event that, as I mentioned, there were locations around the country, around the Finger Lakes, around the world.

There were there were different cities and different countries that that had these events.

and in rural areas, too.

Dick Morris in Batavia said that had upwards of 300 show up for the Batavia hands off protest, which is, he says, a big showing for Batavia.

He says we were stretched out along Main Street outside City Hall.

He says I haven't seen that many middle finger since the last bills game.

I was at.

Fortunately, there was a comforting number of thumbs up as well, from support of passers by to balance out the administration.

Apologies.

Giving the middle finger salute.

Did you guys get any middle fingers as well?

Are mostly thumbs up.

In Rochester, there were a lot of thumbs up and a lot of, honking in approval and a lot, a lot of people who were very excited to see us there.

So let me ask all of you, I'm going to start with the organizer counter for just some thoughts about number one, who this was for.

And there's that.

I realize there's not one single answer, but I was reading journalist Elaine Godfrey, who was covering, the Washington protest, and she writes the following.

She says demonstrators told me that they were under no illusion that Trump or Elon Musk would be much swayed by their anger or creative signage.

The point, they said, was to show the rest of America that the opposition exists and is widespread.

This is not for them.

Gina King, a retired teacher who came from New York City, told me, this is for us.

That's exactly right, Conor.

That's how you feel.

There's two things that a rally can do.

One show you you're not alone.

Because if you feel alone and you feel despairing, you're not able to act, you're not able to move.

And if one person stands up, the next person will feel they have.

You know, courage is contagious and that is how it works.

So that's the number one thing that a rally does.

We're not alone.

We are here.

We're ready to act.

The second thing that a rally does is it's a recruiting effort.

But there are lots of groups in the Rochester area, and all of them are growing and growing and growing and so this is what it's for.

it's do we are we going to have an effect on Donald Trump?

No, he was playing golf.

I don't think he paid attention.

He actually literally was playing.

Yeah, he literally was playing golf.

And that's that's his approach to a lot of things.

so this is for us, by us, about us.

Our voice.

So that's what it's for.

Before I turn it down, I just want to mention, because the white House did put out an official bulletin.

So as a journalist, I will share it on the weekend after the biggest economic crash since Covid.

The president wanted you to know that he had won his club championship, and there's a shock.

We're all comforted.

yeah.

He's the winner.

Yeah.

Don Thompson, who was the protests?

Who are they for?

Well, exactly what Connor said.

I mean, that's that's the idea is, you know, everybody is not comfortable being the first person, but you can be the second person, or you can be the third person, and their strength in numbers.

And it's also for the people who maybe weren't paying as much attention to everything that's going on as they should have.

I saw a great sign at the protest that said, this is so bad, even the introverts are out.

So, you know, it's like, if this is happening, something must be going on and maybe we should pay some careful attention to it.

So it's a, it's a, it's a red flag I think for others.

Okay.

Scott faring who's it for.

Echo.

Echo echo.

in many ways, it made me think of that TV show.

What would you do in that?

It empowers folks to step up because they see somebody else doing it, and they're like, I want to say something too.

So it is about empowering groups.

And when I was walking through the crowd and actually I got there very early, so watching the crowd arrive, I literally was in tears a couple of times.

I'm getting choked up even thinking about it.

The number of people who were there who don't like what's going on right now and want their voice heard it.

And that was really important.

Chris Thompson I think it's literally for everyone, whether they wanted to participate in the protest or not.

Like everything is under attack, like federal jobs are under attack.

You know, schools, you know, public schooling, even private schooling to an extent, hospitals, science, science foundations, specific people.

Like, I just heard that Harriet Tubman was scrubbed from some database, like in the National Archives.

So, like, all this we talked about Jackie Robinson last week.

Yeah.

Jackie Robinson like, this is like.

And it's not just like black people being erased.

Like queer people are being erased.

Women are being erased from, like, national like this.

You got the Smithsonian like the the leader of the African-American museum.

The Smithsonian was put on, like, leave for who knows how long.

So this is for everyone.

And it's not just these, like, superficial things like, you know, this is the first black person to do this or something like that.

It's also kind of a like a, a warning that if you don't matter in the history, then you're not going to matter when they start hiring too.

So I think it's for everyone.

It needs to be for everyone.

So, just turn Chris's point about the erasure that you're seeing.

And you mentioned queer people.

just as a form of fact checking, this administration is, even erasing queer nuclear weapons, the Vietnam War.

Oh, the Enola Gay, you know, like.

Yes.

So they they ran a program looking for the word gay in literature and documents and then removed references to the Enola Gay, which dropped the nuclear weapon, I think, on Hiroshima.

So, yes, you know, gay aircraft are also being erased.

So, yeah.

so let me ask all all of you then when you say hands off or go around the table, because that was the theme of the protest around, Hands off.

What?

Chris.

Like hands off these institutions that were already here that were just at the precipice of making progress in equity and everything, but also a hands off or private lives like this is these these right wing people that are in office now claim that, you know, they don't want government meddling in, in their business, but they're meddling in everyone else's business.

So, you know, say what you mean.

Okay.

Yeah.

Scott fearing.

Hands off.

What?

Boy?

All of the above.

I mean, one of the things I was most impressed with walking around the park where all the different signs.

And it was like, hands off my Social Security, hands off my Medicare, hands off my life, hands off my identity.

So all of those things are important.

And the the current administration is finding ways to just eliminate so many people in so many ways.

I know working where I work at the University of Rochester doing LGBTQ plus education, I heard from staff, but I hear it most often from patients these days.

our affiliate hospitals and such in the region are getting threats because they do gender affirming care for adults.

We do not do children of despite the myths and stereotypes.

So from an LGBTQ perspective, which is my background, the lives have just been shattered and and programs of support, I mean, who knows how long my husband and I will still be married, even though we've been married for many, many years.

Apparently they want to nullify those things.

So it's it's a frightening situation.

Don Thompson, hands off my.

What?

Hands off what?

Well, my topic at the protest was a rule of law, and it will be my topic today because I think, like all the things that that Chris was mentioning, for example, depend upon the rule of law, and the destruction of those things is in clear violation of the rule of law.

You know, the executive orders relating to immigrants, the renditions of people who are lawfully here and removal from the country, the defunding of USAID, it's all patently unconstitutional.

And I think it's designed to create chaos.

and so, you know, that has to be pushed back against.

And, you know, when you're good with a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

So I look at the constitutional arguments and I think maybe a lot of people aren't as familiar with the real live constitutional crisis that we're in now.

and the need to respond to that, in the spirit of the previous hour, I'm going to try to steelman some of what's going on with the court.

So as an attorney yourself, you know, surely you've encountered a judge who you think has gotten something wrong.

Yes.

Oh, on a regular basis, let's say.

So what this administration and Stephen Miller said this last week was we are beyond the judges occasionally getting things wrong.

We have an activist bench that is acting so far outside of bounds that we need to take some of their power away from them.

Absolutely false.

We've never done that since.

Well, 1876 was the last time when Andrew Jackson said so you've issued an order to try to enforce it to the courts, right?

Right.

the there is a process for addressing, decisions that are incorrect that you believe are incorrect, and it's built into the system.

It's not impeaching judges.

It's not taking power away from judges.

It's not the argument that, well, you weren't elected as a judge, so you have no authority.

And we can do whatever we want to do, and we don't have to listen to you.

What would it look like for an out of control bench that needs to be reined in?

you know, if we had an out of control bench, I could probably, answer that better.

You don't become a judge because, you are going to go off on a tangent.

you become a judge because you're a stable, upstanding part of the system at that point.

and it's very reliable in that way.

But but there's appeals.

There's two levels of appeal, at least from the district court, in federal court.

So, you know, if you're really, far off, then the there's an appellate court to look over your shoulder and to see that there's a problem there.

It might be an out of control bench in the Fifth Circuit in Texas with Matthew Kazmir, who the right wing judge shops for in every case that they want to win.

And he's more than willing to impose nationwide injunctions.

And he's not being checked by the Fifth Circuit because they're all pro Trump judges for the most part as well.

That might be an out of control bench, but that's not what Stephen Miller meant.

He meant they're not deciding the way we want them to.

So we either have to do something about it or we're just going to ignore them.

They can't tell us what to do.

Andrew Jackson approach.

Yeah, yeah.

Hands off.

What?

Connor.

Well, I just have to follow up a little on Dan because I'm an attorney as well, and I worked for the federal government.

I served as an administrative law judge.

and the idea that a judge making a decision based on the law is somehow out of control is just brutally offensive to so many people.

When when I was talking with people about planning this event, people were saying, I'm watching my country fail and I cannot sit idly by.

And that's really hands off our country hands off us, hands off our due process.

Hands off our civil rights.

Hands off our person.

Hands off my identity.

Those are the things that we drove this rally.

Those are the reasons that we pulled it together.

And I started this whole organization.

Knowledge and Action.

Rochester, with a group of other people, obviously.

And a rally doesn't happen with one person.

A rally happens with a minimum of 25 people coming together and doing all the work.

I got to be the face of it, which was great, but I'm not the only person involved.

there were multiple groups involved in this, and knowledge and action in Rochester was one of them.

Knowledge and action.

Rochester now has a website.

And, maybe you're going to talk about what we're doing next, but I want to share that website with people, because if you want to know what's happening, okay, it's knowledge and action Rochester talk.

It's pretty easy.

And we we will talk about what all of our guests think needs to happen next.

I if I'm not careful, every phone line will get filled up.

So let me just take some phone calls and listeners at 844295 talk.

If you want to join the conversation.

(844) 295-8255 Tom.

First.

Hello, Tom.

Go ahead.

Hi.

Hi.

I was there and I was smiling the entire time.

I just felt so heartened by all the people that that showed up.

But the one thing that concern me was that I didn't see as many people of color as I would have liked to have seen, and I was wondering if there was some, like, oversight as far as trying to gather groups together.

If you know, because I was part of the Black Lives Matter protests.

and then there was, I don't know how many hundreds of people that that it was, you know, wonderful to see the diversity there.

but, you know, this this was a little disappointing.

Okay, Tom, thank you.

And I can't make Chris Thompson speak for all black people as the only black panelists.

you're going to speak for yourself.

But this is a conversation I see carrying out online some spaces on do we go, do we not for various reasons.

You want to talk about that?

there are a couple, there are probably a couple of reasons.

And yeah, I did see that the most diversity that I saw was that there were people from Brighton, but also Penfield.

but like, on a serious note, yeah, there were.

I didn't even know it was a very safe rally.

I also kind of didn't feel safe because I counted like five.

And there's a couple of reasons for that.

One, after the election, after all the work that, like everybody did to try to get out the vote and everything, there were a lot of protest votes against, Harris for various reasons.

a lot of black activists in even locally were like, we're sitting this went out like, y'all, we we were trying hard.

We were the one getting teargassed him getting out in the streets, getting beaten, getting like federal charges for minor things that were like inflated that, you know, we're just going to sit it out.

We're not we're not doing this.

Y'all have fun.

you know, call me if you want.

We're probably not going to pick up.

I know that is the that is the mindset of a lot of activists in like nationwide, a lot of black activists in the community.

So, yeah, they they share the same concerns.

But like, you know, they're tired.

Of course.

of course, I think that that was part of it.

I'm not sure about like, the media push, like, I know, like I, we were discussing, I saw it on Instagram, and Instagram is fine, but like, if it's not on like a platform that a lot of people, you know, use.

So like basically TikTok, maybe, maybe the news wasn't out there, but yeah, I feel I have a feeling I'm not even sure I was going to ask you how many black organizations you may have, like, even, like, reached out to you.

Have you talked to the local NAACP?

Have you talked to FDP?

Rock?

Have you like black in the burbs?

Was one of them black in the burbs?

and obviously Pastor Wanda and Candace reached out.

and and Pastor Hannah was there and spoke.

Oh, yes.

Yeah, yeah.

So, you know, yes, I think you're absolutely right.

And I think one of the things that I'm a white person, I live in the city, but I'm a white person and I think that there is a need for people like me to start standing up and to support, you know, we shouldn't expect one segment of our community to do all the heavy lifting.

We've got to do it.

It's and so there's part of that.

but I think we do need to have to do more.

and that's one of the reasons I was asking how you found out about it, because we need to know how are we not reaching out?

What am I not doing?

I need to learn how to reach out to people that I don't see on a daily basis.

How do I reach out to the people who need to be there?

And how do I protect and support the people who are at risk?

And so that's that's something that we're trying to do.

Obviously, we didn't do it well enough, but I also think it's our turn to stand up and we need to start showing up on a regular basis every time.

One of the things that I got to correct myself because the website is actually knowledge and action rock, rock walk, why not let your action rock knowledge and action rock work?

What that group is trying to do is to create a calendar for all of the groups in the area.

You can submit an event and it'll be published there.

And then anybody who wants to know what's happening this week can go to that website and say, oh, there's this.

Because one of the things that happened on April 6th was there was another rally, and it didn't cross any of my feed until after the fifth was over.

And that's impossible, you know, so you can't rely on Facebook or any of the, the social medias.

That's why we're creating the website.

That's one of the reasons why.

So I hope it works.

And some of it, as Chris mentioned, is, was awareness, but some of it was choice.

Why did you choose to come out despite everything that has happened, Chris.

honestly, I there are a couple of reasons.

Number one, it's around the corner from my house.

So was going to eat it.

so I didn't have any problems parking.

the other one was one of my friends who has been, like, very itching to do something.

He's actually a doctor, and he's extremely frustrated with everything going on.

He wanted to go to the rally, and I'm not going to, like, I'm just from experience.

You don't let somebody go to a rally alone.

if something goes down, you have a buddy.

So I'm like, yeah, I'll, you know, I'll go.

So, after after our, training class, we we drove up together.

We parked at my house, and, we went and then we got, we met up with a couple of other people, like, I've got a neighbor who was interested in going who's very concerned about, like, his kids in public schools, and then, like, one of my friends who I just, like, know around town whose, partner has, small business who's probably going to be affected by all these tariffs.

I, I ran into her, so I wound up finding people there.

So it was like a group of four of us at base.

going together.

So my main thing was safety for my friends.

And it let's be honest, it was convenient for me.

but Dom writes to say, the left is going to pull itself apart again just when it needs to come together.

what do you think, Chris?

Man, the left's been pulling itself apart since the left existed.

We I I get it.

I do understand, like there's a there are a lot of different factions and I will say that like while I was there, like there were people that were like the one person who was holding a pro-Palestine flag and people are giving her mean looks and like you, they're nobody's like talking to her, to ask her why she's got that flag up.

And I think a lot of people were just thinking she was anti-Semitic when she was just like anti, you know, death, you know?

So like I think in general the left needs to make their tent large and they need to work through those differences instead of immediately gatekeeping when one aspect of a person's views is like, you know, divergent from theirs.

So but I mean, this is a thing that was going on.

I think the people, the people who hate leftists the most are other leftists like this.

It's been like that since the 60s.

I think go ahead.

Counter.

I think it's bad enough now that we can say, all right, we're all going to agree this is a constitutional crisis.

And we all need to stop.

And that's that's where we need to go.

I don't know how we get there exactly, but that's what we're working for.

because if we pull ourselves apart, that's it's just plain stupid.

And we don't have time for stupid.

Are you worried tonight about a movement pulling itself apart?

Well, if we look at the LGBTQ plus community, it's been an issue we've been dealing with for a long time.

the inside joke in our community is that we're a movement of exes.

And so it's always about trying to fight that other person.

And, you know, what about my identity?

And you're not giving me enough respect, and you forgot to say this letter or this word or whatever it might be.

And absolutely, it's playing out the same way now in sort of the political left, as it were, more broadly.

So it is a matter of people needing to open their hearts and minds to each other, being willing to have a conversation.

you know, again, years ago when I first started doing community organizing, I had a mentor of mine who explained that community organizing is all about relationships and being able to have a conversation, even if it's a tough one.

And that's in many ways what we need to be doing.

and, you know, folks who were at the rally on Saturday, they heard stuff, lots of different stuff coming from the stage and from each other and again, different signs.

So hopefully picking up all these different pieces, trying to find that way to come together to say, wait, we can move together, and try to make change happen.

Because as I learned in fifth grade, supposedly no one person is above the rule of law in our country, and it certainly seems that somebody thinks that they are above the rule of law.

Donald Thompson I mean, you just said no one's above the rule of law.

You agree with Scott, although, I don't know, maybe you feel differently these days, though.

Well, no one's supposed to be.

Exactly.

Are you worried about people pulling each other apart at this moment?

That you want people to know?

Not as much, I think.

I mean, I think the, you know, the the alarm has kind of been sounded at this point.

this is not a time to talk about or argue about where the ashtrays are in the house.

The house is on fire, you know, put put the house out and leave your your minor disagreements aside.

I mean, we have to pull together.

And I think, you know, the more of these events that we have, the more this gets out there, maybe the more knowledgeable people become about how serious this challenge is really to our our democratic republic and how how unique it is.

And how this is really a crisis moment where we need to stand up together and do what we can together.

After we take our only break of the hour.

I've got a boatload of feedback from listeners, and I wish we had multiple hours to do this.

We're going to do as much as we can, and it's a it's a conversation about what those who demonstrated this weekend in the hands off rallies are hoping to accomplish not only this weekend, but going forward.

You just heard Don Thompson, a defense attorney.

The organizer of the Rochester rally is Connor Jane O'Brien, who is with us.

Chris Thompson, an engineer and activist, is with us.

Scott Fearing, board member for Rainbow Seniors.

Rock, your feedback on the other side of this only break.

I'm Evan Dawson Tuesday on the next connections.

Prison reform has been in the headlines in New York State following a massive strike by corrections officers.

We talked with Capital News Bureau reporter John Union about the state of reform, the Halt act, and more in our second hour.

Bald eagles are at risk, including local eagles.

Nate Barber gets he says, if you got an eagle in your yard, they own your yard.

We're going to talk about how we can protect them.

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In our efforts to be the public square here, it's all feedback the rest of the way, and I'm going to try to move fast here and let our guests talk to you about your thoughts about what you've seen and heard, Tim says, walking up Monroe Avenue, heading to the rally this weekend, I saw an attendee engaging a self-described Republican in a conversation that was respectful and could have been impactful.

But as I passed by, a young woman yelled to the Republican.

How's your 401 K?

That felt like an opportunity missed to me.

While the rally felt empowering, we have to remember that we have to respect our MAGA neighbors if we want to heal our divisions.

It's great to be heard.

I look forward to the next one.

That's Tim okay, Connor, what do you think?

Absolutely correct.

I think that there are studies that show we, in order to defeat an oligarchy or, autocracy, we need to get 3.5% of the population.

That's more than the people in this room.

That's more than the people at the rally.

That's more than the people at all of the rallies.

We need to be appealing to everyone, educating everyone, and getting everyone involved.

This the harm that's being done by this administration is a lot broader than even the things we talked about on Saturday.

When it comes to Chris Thompson persuading people who voted differently.

I'm sure there are times where it's easy to snark.

what do you make of Tim's point that he thinks yelling how's your 01K is not a helpful thing if someone is engaging in a civil dialog.

I don't know if it's helpful or not.

you also need to like, take into account the person who yelled, who's supposedly yelled, how's your fro and K?

They probably are hurting just as much.

Like maybe they didn't come into the conversation.

But here's the thing if two people are having a dialog, a third person comes in and yells something snarky and like pulls off.

If that's all it took for the person to disengage, it's how engaged where they in the first place.

Like, if I'm talking to like, Scott about something and then somebody comes by in about and and yells something and Scott says, oh well, you know what?

I was really into this conversation, but now this other person, you know, just threw me off.

I'm out.

Like, where are we really having a conversation?

Are we just hearing each other talk?

Okay.

Does anybody else want that?

Okay, I appreciate that, Tim.

Thank you.

let me, let me get back to your phone calls.

Jim in Brighton, who spoke at the event?

He's with veterans for peace.

Hey, Jim.

Go ahead.

All right.

Well, thanks for taking my call, Kevin.

sure.

Kevin.

I have to say, I was absolutely blown away.

what?

I, one of the speakers before me made a remark about looking like Woodstock.

but the a lawyer representing veterans for peace, as you just mentioned.

when I called out how many veterans are in this crowd, and there was just a huge response.

And I am willing to bet that, well, in fact, quite a few of them came up and spoke to me.

There are people who had never in their life considered joining veterans for peace.

To them, that's, sounds like prayers, but, they appreciated the fact that we're speaking out for veterans.

Congressmember Rowley was there.

I hope he got the word that the V.A.

is being drastically cut.

Suicides are rising with veterans.

health care, in fact, for the first time ever, I can't get response from my VA doctors.

Their services is being cut so much.

That's just one element.

And and as a former college educator, history professor, I am just absolutely appalled at the attacks on education, the attempts to dismantle the Department of Education.

So it's not one issue.

The the with the the clout I believe the that the people they have had signs for saved my, Social security or saved his office or hands off that what people engaged with multiple issues, free speech, the press, the media censorship, the attempts to defund, NPR and PBS.

All of these are things that everyone is engaged in.

The only disappointment was finding out from people the there was such a huge crowd that those who were further up towards Mineral Avenue didn't hear any of those speeches.

and hopefully the next time it's going to be bigger and we have to keep doing it.

And as a historian, I want to say that historians now have agreed that all the protests during the Vietnam War did have an effect.

It was, in fact, the mass protests, especially after Kent State, that Congress started listening and turning against Nixon and the funding.

So when people say these protests don't do anything, they're wrong.

Historically, they do eventually have an effect.

It may take time to get all Republican congresspeople and senators to listen, but eventually they are going to.

And if they don't, the November elections in and 2026 are going to show the result of a people's frustration.

and I just want s Carter to please repeat the website that she said knowledge something like.

Thank you Jim.

Good counter knowledge and action r o c.org.

And that's just one of the organizations that was co-sponsoring this, Indivisible Rochester did a huge amount as well.

and, and Rochester now a long list of people.

But that website is for everybody.

So to build on Jim's point there, I'm going to ask all of you briefly to sum up what you think must come next here, because what Jim is talking about is building the momentum.

What do you want to do next, Conor?

I have a long list.

The first thing that I want people to do is to talk to each other.

I think talking to their neighbors, listening to their neighbors, bringing them out.

If we can get people.

There are so many new indivisible groups in this area, it's phenomenal.

It's all been happening since January, and there are indivisible is on the west side, on the east side, down in Canada, happening in Lima.

There's a small group out in Hamlin.

These groups all need to go to an indivisible national.

Join that group, become a group.

So then you're clued in because if we can get all of these threads to come together, then we can really do something.

And I want it to happen even more in the city, you know?

So that's what that's what I want people that do get involved in a local group, go to town board meetings, run for office.

All of those.

Don Thompson, what has to happen next?

Same thing.

The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for principled people to do nothing.

Right.

What each of us chooses to do or not to do in this moment will define not just our legacy, but the future of American democracy itself.

So what do you do?

Well, you do something you can't.

The answer can't be I did nothing.

Right.

It's the question about if you were in 1930s Germany, what would you have done?

It's what you're doing right now.

You have to do something.

It's.

It's a demonstration of civic courage.

And if you do it, it makes it easier for the next person to do it.

And, you know, there's been no time in my lifetime, and I'm older than you are.

Even where we have needed this much civic courage right now.

Scott fearing what's next?

Boy, there's so much that needs to be done.

but I think the idea of, again, sharing, talking, being visible.

You know, take the posters that you made at the rally and put them on your fence.

getting people to understand, what needs to happen.

Chris Thompson well, we got a local election coming up.

Like this year?

Yeah, that needs to be.

That needs to be addressed.

So if you are at the rally, pay attention to which politician were at the rally, pay attention to the ones who are listening to everybody.

Because just because a politician's at a rally doesn't mean they actually care about what's going on.

yeah.

Get involved in that.

Whether it's signing a petition for someone, whether it's getting you know, getting signatures out, whether it's volunteering, if you are one who has a mind to vote, then definitely make sure you're registered.

Make note of our primary, our primary dates, and make note of when the elections are and who is running.

Get that done because like honestly we're talking about nationwide.

But like these people on a national level, with the exception of Trump, people on a national level were local before.

So if you want to change something nationally, you start locally.

Absolutely.

and I just want to clarify one other thing.

There's a lot of people wondered why people like Joe Morelli didn't speak.

And we made a conscious decision as organizers to not have any elected official speak at all, because this was our time to speak to them.

Well, I wasn't trying to hear any politician.

Well, no, but Chris was point was asked about be discerning on who's actually listening.

Yeah.

Susan in Fairport says so happy you're showcasing Saturday's rallies.

Congressman Morelli showed up, did not speak.

I think Sandra, Senator Brouk and others.

Senator Brouk might have been there as well.

The rally was for us, but listeners might want to know the politicians were there as well, listening.

Yeah.

So that is from Susan in Fairport.

And on that note, Greg listening in San Diego, California, on the mobile app.

Hey, Greg, go ahead.

Hey, how's it going?

a couple of things.

I've been disappointed at the lack of people who already have no real exposure.

Whether it be okay, Bernie Sanders and AOC, they led or wrongly, they they are no, they inspired a lot of people.

You have other people President Obama, Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, Senator, others who, you know, who feel that the democracy movement, that is the thread that ties all of the things that we want but are threatened now.

We want democracy.

And that is a thread that can bring.

Well, I think it'll be we'll burnings or the Supreme Court being taken over, and rendered, you know, basically eligibility to make it all, surrounds.

What do we want?

Autocracy.

Do we want a man like Musk who has no right to be in our U.S. federal government dictating the rules, the laws for this country?

you know, we have to make it clear that so much is at stake.

And if the people who are well known as a few of the people that I mentioned that would help, that would help if they spoke out more frequently and were more visible.

I mean, Martin Luther King was not known before, the civil rights, but he, he made he made himself a leader.

And I think that can happen again.

Well, Greg, I appreciate the phone call.

Don, he talked about his concern about courts being taken over.

Right now, there's not an indication that the U.S. Supreme Court is in the hands of this administration.

If anything, John Roberts, the chief justice of the United States, rebuking the president over the notion of calling for impeachment of judges was extraordinary last month.

Well, that was pretty weak to you this week.

Yeah.

I, I'm not just don't generally like, like, weigh in on politics.

Yeah, they generally don't.

And I think, you know, Roberts was compelled to do something.

I'm not convinced that the Supreme Court hasn't been largely taken over by this administration.

And I you know, I think we're in a dangerous place when we're hoping that Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett and John Roberts are going to stand up to this administration and say, no, you can't do that.

No, I think some of the things that where they have stood up is just been as a result of lousy lawyering on the part of, you know, Trump's attorneys.

You know, they don't whatever the argument is you're making, they don't want to sign on to lousy advocacy.

But if you know, if they get things lined up and if they get things put together, you know, are they going to shut down some of these, ideas, like Trump started with the the joking idea of, revoking the 22nd amendment, and now it's not a joke anymore.

Now he's he's saying, yeah, I'm really going to try to run for a third term, which is how he approaches all these things.

You know, you float the trial balloon and then you go a little bit further.

What's the Supreme Court going to do about that?

I don't have a completely warm and fuzzy feeling about their approach to a challenge in that regard.

let me read a three emails on the same subject here.

First is anonymous.

This person says I'm a green card holder that has lived in the U.S. for over 30 years.

I've attended rallies for past issues, but for the first time in my life, I am uncomfortable expressing my views in a public setting where I could be photographed.

I've had to cancel a trip home because I cannot be certain that I would be allowed back in this country.

I have friends who are oblivious to the impacts and are not taking the time to understand what is happening.

It is tragic and truly makes me sick to my stomach.

Mike writes to us and say anyone who continues demonstrating against this administration is putting a target on themselves.

Jennifer says regarding the hands off protests, it was my understanding that Bipoc folks were encouraged to sit this one out for their safety because the Trump administration is hostile toward these groups.

And yes, it is way past time for white folks to step up.

That is from Jennifer.

So I don't know about encouraged to set out.

but it doesn't sound like I hope they're not encouraged to sit out, but I totally understand it.

You're saying you understand why individuals might say, right?

I'm not comfortable with that, right?

I mean, their judges are being threatened for making decisions.

Their families are being threatened for making decisions.

We're living, you know, in an environment where people can be threatened for an opinion in the land of freedom of speech.

People are afraid for saying anything, and they have every right to be afraid.

I'm over 65.

I've had a good life so far.

I'm the one who needs to start spending her privilege and standing up for all of the people who cannot.

I know so many green card holders.

I know you've had keeping our promise here and your talks before.

People like that who are here, legitimately working, contributing to our community and are under threat.

The idea that the administration can take a man from Maryland, send him down to a prison and then claim, oh, we no longer have jurisdiction, we can't get him back.

That's obscene.

And we need to be objecting to that.

Those of us who can need to be speaking out.

And again, though to the point of the last email.

It's not that people of color were encouraged not to come out.

It was.

We understand if you don't feel comfortable.

That's correct.

I get it.

Yeah, absolutely.

Okay.

And Chris, what would you say to this idea that the second email said the more people protest of all backgrounds, the more you're going to be targeted?

I mean, that's just true.

Like, he's going after anybody who says anything against him.

And like, we've been like, I'm used to being targeted.

We were targeted in 2020, in 2021 when we were doing George Floyd protests and Daniel Prude protests.

We were getting targeted.

People were getting kidnaped, like people like vans were pulling up and arresting people.

So I know that that's a possibility.

But that's been like, I've been I've been doing this for like 30 years.

I've been doing I did this in Baltimore.

I've been targeted by the state for that long, if not longer.

If you count what inspired me to step out in the first place.

So yeah, of course.

Yeah, it's very scary right now.

I think the scary thing is there was like some sort of guardrail.

So they would do as much to make you as miserable as possible.

But now I, you know, I have no idea.

Like, I'm a natural born citizen, but I, some of my friends were either naturally or they've got like, you know, long term green cards.

I'm more worried about them getting targeted than me.

I'm, you know, I was born in upstate New York.

I lived in the US, with the exception of, you know, a little bit of time for work.

So, yeah, there's not much they can do to me.

I say that now and then.

I will be in a gulag next week.

But like, you know, it's.

Yeah, I get the fear and it's valid.

Absolutely.

All right.

let's keep it rolling here, Andrew.

And around the coin.

Hey, Andrew.

Go ahead.

Hey, you guys, I'm a Republican, but I do not like Donald Trump.

And I don't like Elon Musk either.

I understand that, you know, unfortunately, the Democratic Party does not understand.

You cannot have open borders and you can't have a government that you can't afford for too long because then you're going to go broke and nobody's going to get anything.

No Medicaid, no Medicare, no Social Security.

You'll be flat broke.

So you have to do some of these things that the Republicans want to do.

But this Trump administration is way to their whack.

There's they're full of complete, you know, like what you guys have been saying just bad people and but please you can Democrats please don't put up the AOC because they're not going to win.

And they have just as bad ideas about spending and stuff.

So if you want to win any elections, try not to go Uber liberal.

You could have won if you had put up that governor from Pennsylvania.

A lot of Republicans would have voted for him.

But you guys don't get it.

You don't need Uber liberal.

You need someone that's middle of the road.

No more Bernie Sanders and AOC crap.

Please.

All right.

All right.

I got you, Andrew.

Thank you very much.

Scott fearing you had kind of a visceral reaction.

The last part of that call.

he says he wants you to win, get centrist.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, I was thinking we need them to get centrist as well and get off of their extreme politics of the right wing.

so all of us need to sort of, again, find that common ground where we can have these conversations and, you know, have the Democrats messed up on some things?

Yeah.

And so maybe it is time that we again, try to figure out how to come together and, have our, our, our peace loving Bobby Sherman times again.

Chris Thompson no AOC, he says get centrist.

I mean, sure, like that's his opinion.

And like, I feel like I would be able to talk to him and like, meet some middle ground, but like, yeah, all all of these, all the candidates look extreme.

the things that AOC was saying and what Bernie were saying, we're not really all that extreme in my opinion.

You know, monitoring private, private businesses and how much they spend and influence government.

I think that's a thing that we should be worried about.

So like, yeah, we we do need a candidate that will get run.

But like, I don't even I'm only registered Democrat.

I'm a little bit left a Democrat honestly.

But like yeah we like it's it's fine.

All of them are extreme at this point.

I don't trust any politician.

Even AOC, even Sanders, you know.

So yeah, it was just it was keep going.

Okay.

Briefly.

Connor I saw I think the reaction there, I think one of the important things that Cory Booker said during his phenomenal 25 hour, 25 hours was this isn't about right or left.

This is about right or wrong.

And I think that's where we can all agree.

even the gentleman who just called in understands that what is happening is wrong.

It's not about policy disputes.

This is about our Constitution.

Marxist.

Thanks to everyone who was on your show today.

He couldn't come out to the rallies, but he was there in spirit.

Says keep going.

Heather.

And Brighton says this event was for everyone, regardless of registered party or personal past voting record who is being or will be harmed by this administration.

He says the harm is coming to everyone in one way or another, and we want to welcome all people to take action.

Saying this is what you voted for or didn't vote for is admittedly satisfying in the moment, but then you need to move on and move in with real information because everyone's being harmed.

That's part of building a movement.

That is Heather in Brighton.

So she says, build the movement.

Include everybody who sees the harm.

One of the things I want to stress about that I saw that would really impressed me was the cross generations there.

I mean, we had little kids.

We had very old folks, and everyone in between.

So that was necessary.

Don't always that doesn't always happen in protest.

So and you've been a few in your life, a few evolved, I think been to a few.

The question is what comes next?

And we're going to continue to talk to us.

keep keep telling us what you're doing and we'll keep the conversation moving.

I hope everyone, no matter how you voted, no matter what your thoughts are right now, treat this as the public square and let's keep the conversation going.

So I want to thank everybody for being here.

Conor Jane O'Brien who organized the Rochester hands off.

Thank you for being here.

Don Thompson, a professional sport inside of oligarchy and a defense attorney.

Thank you Dan.

Thank you.

Evan.

Chris Thompson, engineer and activist.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you.

And read more.

Huey Newton Scott fearing board member for C rainbow seniors rock.

Thank you sir.

Thank you from all of us in connection.

Thanks for watching.

Thanks for listening.

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