Not even two weeks into President Donald Trump’s second term, his critics in Utah are coalescing, fearful the rights of historically marginalized groups are on the line.
Protesters gathered at the Utah Capitol in Salt Lake City hours after his inauguration on Jan. 20 to sound off against the president, and another group took to the south steps of the building on Wednesday, sounding a similar message. The stepped-up efforts to detain and deport immigrants here illegally, a focus of the Trump administration, was a big issue for many of the demonstrators, though it wasn’t the only thing.
“If you could chalk it up into one thing, it would be injustice and discrimination,” said Nicole Gonzalez, one of perhaps 200 demonstrators. “It seems like every minority, every diverse group is being targeted.”
Jessica Galileo cited concern with increased enforcement efforts by agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, for her presence. Trump and his backers say illegal immigration poses a security threat to the country and that immigrants need to follow the law in coming to the country.
“I just think everybody deserves basic human rights. Being here undocumented isn’t a crime. It’s a civil issue,” Galileo said.
Sue Widdison took part, worried the rights of women and the LGBTQ community, among others, are at risk. “I think they’re just chipping away and seeing when ... we will say that is enough,” she said.
Worries about the rights of the transgender community spurred Tenille Taggart, who helped organize Wednesday’s demonstration, dubbed an anti-fascism protest. She pointed to HB269, the measure under consideration in the Utah Legislature that would limit access of transgender students to dorm rooms aligning with their gender identity.
The measure is “extremely discriminatory and hateful, and that’s something that spurred me, in particular, to get involved in these marches recently and these protests. I don’t think it’s right,” Taggart said. HB269 proponents see the measure as a means of protecting the privacy rights of biological women.
Noelle Lynne, another organizer of Wednesday’s event, alluded to what she sees as friction between groups and subgroups of the U.S. public, underscored by the algorithms of social media companies that factor in the online material they see. “Algorithms make people hate, and our mission is to stop that. Neighbors shouldn’t be calling ICE on their neighbors. Neighbors shouldn’t be hating someone because of their gender or sexuality,” she said.
For Taggart, continued efforts to stand up for the rights of traditionally marginalized groups can be tiring, but she plans to keep at it. “We don’t need to be perfect. We just need to keep showing up if just to not let them win,” she said.
Indeed, more activity is in the offing, with another demonstration tentatively in the works for mid-March, Lynn said, and online chatter referencing another one in early February.