China, North Korea and Russia military cooperation raises threats in the Pacific, US official warns
Lolita C. Baldor – April 10, 2025
FILE – U.S. Indo-Pacific Command Commander, Admiral Samuel Paparo, gestures during a press conference at the Philippine Military Academy in Baguio, northern Philippines, Aug. 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila, File)FILE – Army Gen. Xavier Brunson testifies during an Armed Services hearing on Capitol Hill, Sept. 17, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib, File)ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The top U.S. commander in the Pacific warned senators Thursday that the military support China and North Korea are giving Russia in its war on Ukraine is creating a security risk in his region as Moscow provides critical military assistance to both in return.
Adm. Samuel Paparo, head of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that China has provided 70% of the machine tools and 90% of the legacy chips to Russia to help Moscow “rebuild its war machine.”
In exchange, he said, China is potentially getting help in technologies to make its submarines move more quietly, along with other assistance.
Senators pressed Paparo and Gen. Xavier Brunson, commander of U.S. Forces Korea, on China’s advances in the region, including threats to Taiwan. And they also questioned both on the U.S. military presence in South Korea, and whether it should be shielded from personnel cuts..
Both said the current U.S. force there and across the Indo-Pacific is critical for both diplomacy in the region and America’s national security, as ties between Russia and China grow. The U.S. has 28,500 forces in South Korea.
Paparo said North Korea is sending “thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of artillery shells” and hundreds of short-range missiles to Russia. The expectation, he said, is that Pyongyang will get air defense and surface-to-air missile support.
“It’s a transactional symbiosis where each state fulfills the other state’s weakness to mutual benefit of each state,” Paparo said.
In his opening comments, Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, the Republican committee chairman, said the greater alignment of Russia, China and North Korea “should be of great concern to all in the West. This concern should then lead to action. If we are to maintain global peace and stability, we must continue taking steps now to rebuild our military and reestablish deterrence.”
Brunson said North Korea has shown the ability to send munitions and troops to Russia while advancing development of its own military capabilities, including hypersonics. Pyongrang, he said, “boasts a Russian-equipped, augmented, modernized military force of over 1.3 million personnel.”
North Korea’s efforts to develop advanced nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles ”pose a direct threat to our homeland and our allies,” Paparo added.
North Korea also has sent thousands of soldiers to fight with the Russians against Ukraine. And Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Wednesday that Russia is actively recruiting Chinese citizens to fight alongside its forces in the Ukraine war. He said more than 150 such mercenaries are already active in the battle with Beijing’s knowledge.ADVERTISEMENTAdvertisement
Trump and his MAGA movement are conspiring with oligarchs to turn the U.S. into a rightwing authoritarian state. The labor movement can play a key role in fighting back.
Bill Fletcher Jr. – April 8, 2025
Letter carriers across the country rally to stop the Trump administration from stripping the U.S. Postal Service of its independence and possibly privatizing it.(PHOTO BY: JIM WEST/UCG/UNIVERSAL IMAGES GROUP VIA GETTY IMAGES)
One of the principal difficulties facing the Democratic Party establishment and most leaders of organized labor is a failure to accept a fundamental reality: there is no normality. The failure to grasp this state of affairs has led to strategic paralysis and a tendency to believe that by being the “adults in the room,” the Democrats — or the trade union leadership — can embarrass the Republicans and force them to engage in good faith behavior. That is not the case.
The rise of President Trump’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement has represented the morphing of a broad, rightwing populist movement into a fascist movement that seeks to destroy constitutional democracy. The current purging of the federal government, through Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), aims at both opening the doors to a kleptocracy as well as ensuring loyalty to the MAGA vision and its retrograde goals.
Yet while MAGA can be defined as fascist (or postfascist), what we do not yet see is full fascism in power. Rather what we are now witnessing appears to be something along the lines of Viktor Orbán’s regime in Hungary and, ultimately, a Putinesque regime, i.e., increased rightwing authoritarianism. Still, the aim of the Trump regime remains to destabilize all real and potential opposition.
MAGA, as a movement, has converged with the objectives of that segment of the capitalist class often referenced as “oligarchs.” Particularly situated in high tech, this group of capitalists has become very influential through their control over critical online and communications systems. Initially aligned, for the most part, with Democrats, the oligarchs appear to have decided that they are nothing short of superior beings that must seize the reins of government in order to operate it much like a business, and for their own ends. This includes expanding their wealth, but also for those, such as Musk, who have a quasi-science fiction vision of a future where the elite abandon Earth and settle Mars or some artificial satellite, there is the need for direct governmental involvement in such projects. Along with the oligarchs are those in the business class who simply wish to ravage the federal kitty, leading to the emergence of kleptocracy.
In earlier eras the expression “offensive of capital” would be used for moments when the capitalist class would move to reverse the victories that working people had won. We are now experiencing something more dramatic than that. This is a ‘blitzkrieg’ of segments of capital in alignment with a mass rightwing movement, making the current attack especially dangerous. To put it another way, the millions of diehard MAGA supporters are not just observers but have become the foot-soldiers for Trump even when they may have an ambivalence about the objectives of the oligarchs.
Organized labor has been divided over whether and how to respond to this offensive. Roughly speaking, there are three general categories: the collaborators, the ostriches and the resisters. The “collaborators” are those unions that are going along with Trump’s agenda. The “ostriches” are those that are attempting to avoid conflict and hoping to simply last out the next four years. The “resisters” are those that seek to reject MAGA and the current offensive. Each of these categories are quite uneven and their approaches have their own limits. The resisters, for instance, are prepared to ally with other groups to a certain extent, but have a tendency to work on their own. The federal sector unions that are being forced to resist are mainly relying on litigation and lobbying, for instance, appearing to be largely uncomfortable with, or unprepared for, more mass actions, such as work stoppages. This dynamic may soon shift as a result of Trump attempting to obliterate collective bargaining for nearly one million federal workers.
The difference in approach among sections of organized labor is not, primarily, a disagreement over tactics. Rather, it reflects differences over how to understand the nature of the moment and, as a result, the question of what is the necessary strategy. The reality is that we are living through a time when forces of fascism are on the march. This means that confronting MAGA solely on the grounds of deteriorating working (or living) conditions is insufficient. The Trump regime is aiming to roll back all of the progress made throughout the 20th century, and is targeting political opposition wherever it arises. This requires an all-hands-on-deck response. This is not a moment for faux bipartisanship; it is a moment for resistance and obstruction to block the Trump administration from carrying out its far-right objectives.
Rank-and-file members of our unions should be won over to fully appreciate the nature of the danger facing us, and all that it implies. This begins with a major education effort among the membership coinciding with mobilizing against the specific attacks workers are facing, be they loss of jobs, loss of union recognition, moves against migrants, further attacks on the social safety net, failure to respond to increasing natural disasters or a dragnet on political speech. The job of working-class leaders is to link these threats together into a story about how Trump’s allies and the oligarchs are conspiring to steal from the majority, and institute a white, Christian nationalist authoritarian state, i.e., minority rule. Workers must be convinced of the possibility of beating back the darkness and winning.
Taking on MAGA will need to involve, but not be limited to, labor militancy. Accompanying shrewd and creative tactical actions must be a proactive vision regarding an alternative to rightwing authoritarianism, an alternative many of us summarize as the fight for a “Third Reconstruction” — a political realignment carried out through a multiracial democratic movement from below. This is a challenging but essential task since many in this country have not only lost faith in constitutional democracy, but they have lost faith in the ability to bring about lasting progressive change.
Reversing this sense of pessimism is key to the survival of the labor movement, both among established trade unions as well as more nontraditional forms of labor organizing. Workers must be convinced of the possibility of beating back the darkness and winning. Indeed, our work must be guided by the notion that we are fighting for a future without fear.
BILL FLETCHER, JR. is a talk show host, writer, activist, and trade unionist. The Man Who Changed Colors is his latest novel. His first novel is The Man Who Fell From the Sky. He is also co-author (with Fernando Gapasin) of Solitary Divided, and the author of “They’re Bankrupting Us” — Twenty Other Myths about Unions. You can follow him on Twitter, Facebook and at www.billfletcherjr.com.
US warns China intelligence targeting fired federal workers
Lauren Irwin – April 9, 2025
The Trump administration is warning federal workers about efforts by Chinese intelligence to target current and former U.S. officials for recruitment.
The National Counterintelligence and Security Center (NCSC) warned that current and former workers are being targeted by Chinese intelligence officials posing as “consulting firms, corporate headhunters, think tanks, and other entities on social and professional networking sites.”
The center warned that contact could come via email or messaging platforms, and federal workers should not accept online invitations to connect with strangers.
The NCSC warned that deceptive practices have become “more sophisticated” and have targeted individuals with a federal government background who are seeking new employment.
“Current and former federal employees should beware of these approaches and understand the consequences of engaging,” the center said in its warning.
The Chinese foreign ministry said it was not aware of the situation and accused the U.S. of spying on China, Reuters reported.
The warning comes as the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), under the Trump administration, has pushed to lay off hundreds of thousands of employees, leaving many former federal workers looking for a job.
Some fund managers worry Trump ‘might be insane,’ analyst says
Kevin Williams – April 9, 2025
Photo: Anna Moneymaker (Getty Images)
The worldwide ripple effects from President Donald Trump’s tariffs have been so widespread that one analyst says some in the business world fear the issue may go beyond Trump simply taking a political stand.
Thomas Lee, a managing partner and the head of research at Fundstrat Global Advisors, sent a memo Wednesday that painted a picture of the fallout from the president’s trade war. Lee wrote that he has had “many conversations” with macro fund managers who are expressing concern that those in the White House aren’t acting rationally — and who worry the tariffs go beyond politics and policy.
“Some even fear that this may not even be ideology,” Lee wrote. “A few have quietly wondered if the President might be insane.”
Lee’s report came before Trump issued an unexpected 90-day pause on tariffs Wednesday afternoon that sent markets rallying after a days of losses and volatility.
In his report, Lee said the tariffs could still go one of two ways. The first possibility is that everyone tires of a grinding trade war, sues for peace, and reaches new bilateral agreements. But Lee said that, while he still thinks this is the likely outcome, with each passing day the tariffs remain in place, the odds decrease.
The second way the trade war could go, Lee said, is that tariffs stay in place for an extended period, which results in the government effectively “freezing” the economy. Then, companies would be so pummeled by the tariffs that the “shock” to the economy would ripple, leading to a cascade of slowing economic activity and the very real risk of a recession.
Ultimately, though, Lee said there is one variable — and only one — that will determine these tariffs’ endgame:
“This path is determined by a single person, President Donald Trump.”
Trump Administration Opens More than 50% of Protected U.S. Forest Land for Logging: What That Means
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins claims that turning trees into timber will help prevent wildfires, though experts have deemed it a harmful and inefficient method
Meredith Kile – April 7, 2025
Robert F. Bukaty/APMilan Lumber Co. in Milan, New Hampshire, on Thursday, March 13, 2025
More than 50% of the United States’ formerly protected national forests are now on-limits for the logging industry.
Following an executive order from President Donald Trump aimed at increasing U.S. timber production, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins has announced plans to remove environmental protections that will allow logging on millions of acres of national forest land.
In an April 3 memo titled “Increasing Timber Production and Designating an Emergency Situation on National Forest System Lands,” Rollins cites a goal to remove “heavy-handed federal policies and increase domestic timber production to protect our national and economic security.”
To comply with Trump’s directive to increase U.S. timber production by 25%, the Forest Service’s acting associate chief, Christopher B. French, sent an additional memo to regional National Forest System officials instructing immediate action.
According to the Department of Agriculture, French’s memo directs on-the-ground leadership to “increase timber outputs, simplify permitting, remove National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) processes, reduce implementation and contracting burdens and to work directly with states, local government, and forest product producers to ensure that the Forest Service delivers a reliable and consistent supply of timber.”
Millions of acres of that timber, Rollins’ Emergency Situation Determination explained, will come from land previously protected by the National Forest System.
Rollins’ office states that 66.9 million acres of NFS land have been designated “very high or high wildfire risk” and 78.8 million acres have been identified as “experiencing declining forest health” from insects, disease, invasive species and more.
Scott Olson/GettyA fire danger sign in Yale, Oklahoma, on March 17. 2025
Allowing for overlap, Rollins has now designated a total of nearly 113 million acres of NFS land — which amounts to 59% of the total forest land — as an emergency situation, making them candidates for logging and other “emergency actions” to supposedly ensure public safety.
“I am proud to follow the bold leadership of President Trump by empowering forest managers to reduce constraints and minimize the risks of fire, insects, and disease so that we can strengthen American timber industry and further enrich our forests with the resources they need to thrive,” Rollins, who co-founded the Trump-aligned America First Policy Institute think tank, said in a statement.
However, when Trump issued a similar logging directive during his first term — during a federal shutdown — experts warned that clearing trees does not necessarily reduce wildfire risks.
“We can’t log our way out of the fire problem — thinning all the forests is not possible,” University of Colorado Boulder Professor Jennifer Balch told TheWashington Post in January 2019. “And even if it were, it won’t stop fires in the extreme weather that is happening more frequently, and will in the future.”
Balch explained that thinning federal forests near homes makes sense, however, only 2% of lands treated by the Forest Service between 2004 and 2013 experienced a wildfire. The more serious issue, she wrote, was a shrinking snowpack in the western U.S. due to steadily rising temperatures.
Rollins’ April 3 memo made no mention of climate change.
JOSH EDELSON/AFP via GettyThe Pasadena Jewish Temple & Center burns during the Eaton fire in Pasadena, California on January 7, 2025.More
During his presidency, Democrat Joe Biden proposed new protections for some of the oldest trees on NFS land. Old growth trees store large amounts of carbon, provide needed animal habitats and are also more likely to survive forest fires.
“Protecting our old growth trees from logging is an important first step to ensure these giants continue to store vast amounts of carbon,” Randi Spivak, public lands policy director with the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement in December 2023. “The Forest Service also needs to protect our mature forests, which if allowed to grow will become the old growth of tomorrow.”
The 22 Most Clever Signs From The “Hands Off” Protests
Michaela Bramwell – April 6, 2025
This weekend, thousands of people participated in the “Hands Off” protests across all 50 states to express their opposition to the policies of the Trump administration and cuts being made by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
“Hands Off” event organizers said in a recent statement, “They’re taking everything they can get their hands on — our health care, our data, our jobs, our services — and daring the world to stop them. This is a crisis, and the time to act is now.”
Anadolu / Getty Images
Demonstrators got very clever with their protest signs, so here are some of the most memorable ones:
Doge’s attack on social security causing ‘complete, utter chaos’, staff says
Michael Sainato – April 6, 2025
The Arthur J Altmeyer Social Security Administration building in Woodlawn, Maryland, on 19 February.Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images
Office closures, staffing and service cuts, and policy changes at the Social Security Administration (SSA) have caused “complete, utter chaos” and are threatening to send the agency into a “death spiral”, according to workers at the agency.
The SSA operates the largest government program in the US, administering social insurance programs, including retirement, disability and survivor benefits.
An average of almost 69 million Americans per month will receive a social security benefit in 2025, totaling about $1.6tn in benefits paid during the year and accounting for 22% of the federal budget. While expensive and challenged by an ageing population, social security remains overwhelminglypopular with Americans. But the agency has been dubbed a “Ponzi scheme” by Elon Musk, the billionaire whose so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) is currently slashing its staff and budgets.Advertisement
“They have these ‘concepts of plans’ that they’re hoping are sticking but in reality, are really hurting American people,” said a longtime SSA employee and military veteran who requested to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. “No one knows what’s going on. They’re just coming up with ideas at the top of their head.”
The SSA website has crashed several times this month. Wired reported Doge staff want to migrate all social security data and rewrite code in months, which could cause system collapse and further outages.
The agency plans to eliminate the jobs of 7,000 workers at the agency through voluntary buyouts, resignations or firings, though the union representing SSA employees anticipate even more firings beyond cutting staff to 50,000 workers.Advertisement
Acting commissioner Leland Dudek has acknowledged to staff that Doge are making the decisions at the agency. Musk, Donald Trump and others have claimed action is being taken to tackle widespread fraud at the agency.
Dudek was appointed acting commissioner after he reportedly secretly shared information with Doge staff. He has threatened to shut down the agency in response to a court order barring Doge from accessing the data.
“It’s just been a lot of craziness, a lot of foolishness. Until they get rid of Doge and the person in office right now, and the Republicans actually get a backbone and stand up for something for once in their lives, things are just going to be complete chaos. That’s really the best word to describe SSA right now, just complete, utter chaos,” the worker added. “They couldn’t understand the coding, so everything they said SSA was doing illegally, they weren’t. Common sense is something they lack. They don’t know what they’re doing.”
Rich Couture, a spokesperson for the American Federation of Government Employees’ Social Security Administration general committee, the union representing roughly 42,000 social security workers, said Doge’s public targets for cuts make no sense.Advertisement
Why are they cutting 7,000 jobs, asked Couture. “It has never been explained with any degree of clarity how they came up with that figure. What’s being served by that by a loss of 7,000 jobs? How does any of that supposedly makes this operation more efficient? How does it improve service? How does it improve productivity? Our position is that losing 7,000 people doesn’t do any of those things,” he said.
“I don’t think they’re going to stop at 7,000 people lost. If they lose 10,000 or 12,000, they’re running up their high score. They’re able to brag about it.”
Departments at the agency have been closed and reorganized, with workers forced to take reassignments or risk firings, and all workers have been ordered to return to the office five days a week.
Couture noted the return to office order occurred a day before a buyout offer was set to expire, in violation of union contract agreements, and the offices were not prepared or equipped to handle it, as many workers had no desks or equipment to work.Advertisement
Phone services for the public have also been cut, and field and regional offices are slated for closure around the US.
“There is no safe office in this country,” added Couture. “It’s a concerted attack on the legitimacy of social security itself. The promise that this country has made to the public with respect to income security is being broken.”
The cuts come as staffing is already at a 50-year low despite the agency serving a record number of recipients as the US population above the age of 65 is growing.
The office of the inspector general at SSA reported in August 2024 that a record backlog of payment actions impacting social security beneficiaries was due to lack of staffing, increased workloads, and decreased funding for the agency, driving improper payments because staff weren’t available to update records.Advertisement
Couture noted the operating overhead of the agency, as a share of benefits paid out, has shrunk by 20% over the last 10 years and is now less than 1%. He disputed any claims of inefficiency or waste at the agency, claiming the agency is already a model of efficiency and as effective as possible under its fiscal and staffing constraints.
He said he was concerned the situation was creating a “negative feedback loop” where, as more employees leave, more work is put on those remaining, depressing morale and inducing more to leave “until the agency ends up in a death spiral with staffing, inducing office closures”.
“You’re going to see a wholesale collapse in the agency’s service structure. Call wait times will skyrocket, wait times for appointments, processing times, all of it going to skyrocket because there won’t be enough people to do the jobs, which opens the door to privatization.”
Musk has called social security “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time” and has consistently pushed false claims and conspiracies about the program.Advertisement
On senator Ted Cruz’s podcast last month, Musk repeated a white supremacist conspiracy theory that Democrats use entitlements to “attract and retain” undocumented immigrants as voters.
This week, Musk shared a chart of immigrants receiving social security numbers, falsely claiming they were receiving benefits, though the program of providing social security numbers to legal immigrants began under Trump’s first term as part of program to facilitate employment. He’s also falsely claimed dead people are receiving benefits, despite the acting commissioner of the SSA has dispelled the claim.
In 2024, social security direct deposit fraud was at a rate of 0.00625% and less than 1% of social security payments had been found to be incorrect.
US commerce secretary and billionaire Howard Lutnick claimed in an interview on a podcast earlier this month that only a “fraudster” would complain about missing a social security benefit check.Advertisement
“I worked there for 32 and a half years, and I rarely saw cases of fraud,” said John Oertel, a retired SSA employee for over 32 years in Redding, California.
“Because the agency is so understaffed that people who report their income, that’s not getting reported into the system. Musk and his group are saying look at all these people who are being overpaid, they must be committing fraud. They’re not committing fraud. They’re doing what they’re supposed to be doing, but because there are so few employees, none of that information is getting into the system.”
Oertel also dismissed false claims from Trump and Musk that dead people are getting social security benefits.
“They don’t understand or they don’t care. Those people aren’t collecting benefits, but the numbers are still technically active, because you can’t just erase social security numbers,” he said, noting that the numbers began being issued in the 1930s and are not deleted or reused, so they still remain in the system. “President Trump, Elon Musk and whoever the next commissioner is going to be, I really think their ultimate goal is just to destroy social security.”Advertisement
A spokesperson for the SSA deferred to press releases on the cuts and reorganization of the agency.
“We have listened to our customers, Congress, advocates and others, and we are updating our policy to provide better customer service to the country’s most vulnerable populations,” said Dudek, the SSA’s acting commissioner. “In addition to extending the policy’s effective date by two weeks to ensure our employees have the training they need to help customers, Medicare, Disability and SSI applications will be exempt from in-person identity proofing because multiple opportunities exist during the decision process to verify a person’s identity.”
They said in regard to office closures, that “to use our space more efficiently, we provided [the General Services Administration] a list of leases for termination,” and claimed that the return-to-office mandate was ordered to ensure “maximum staffing is available to support the stronger in-person identity proofing requirement”.
On claims of waste, fraud and abuse, a spokesperson said in an email: “The agency will continue to monitor and, if necessary, make adjustments to ensure it pays the right person the right amount at the right time while safeguarding the benefits and programs it administers.”
‘Hard to imagine a bigger betrayal’: AZ judge reveals men’s Russia aircraft parts scheme
Mary Jo Pitzl, Arizona Republic – April 6, 2025
An Arizona judge sentenced two Russian men to prison for sending aircraft parts to Russia in an illegal export scam.
U.S. District Court Judge Dominic Lanza handed Oleg Sergeyevich Patsulya an almost six-year sentence on April 2, while Vasilii Sergeyevich Besedin was handed a two-year sentence.
The two Florida residents presented themselves to U.S. companies, including one in Arizona, as brokers seeking aircraft parts on behalf of clients in other countries. However, they intended to send the parts to Russia, in violation of heightened export controls in the wake of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, according to court documents.
The two were charged with violating the federal Export Control Reform Act. Patsulya’s sentence also reflected his guilty plea to money laundering. He agreed to forfeit more than $4.5M in assets, including a luxury vehicle and a boat, to compensate for the money he made off of the scheme.
In a statement, Lanza identified Patsulya as the leader of the plot, which Patsulya hatched after he had been granted a visa to be in the U.S. legally.
“It’s hard to imagine a bigger betrayal of the United States than what you did,” Lanza said.
In his plea agreement, Patsulya acknowledged that by pleading guilty it was “a virtual certainty” that he would be deported from the U.S.
The duo’s efforts to obtain parts for a carbon disc brake system used on Boeing 737s led them to an Arizona firm, identified in court documents as “Arizona Company 1.”
During a Sept. 8, 2022 visit, the two said they were interested in buying brake parts for a Turkish client and signed forms indicating the transaction complied with export rules. Both actions were lies, court documents stated.
The Arizona deal never went through, but the two pursued other companies and ultimately were able to ship some of the brake systems to Russia, records show.
The case was investigated by the Phoenix field office of the U.S. Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security and Phoenix-based FBI agents. They were aided by federal investigators in Boston and Miami.
This week, they are targeting the man who gave him that role: President Donald Trump.
In coordinated demonstrations that organizers said took place across all 50 states, the “Hands Off!” protest accused Trump and his administration of championing policies that benefit the rich while making life harder for everyone else.
Business Insider sent reporters to protests in different parts of the country to hear from them directly. Many said they were most worried about the economy and their retirement investments, which have dwindled in tandem with Trump’s tariff announcements.
Trump says the tariffs will help jump-start US manufacturing, promote US goods, protect jobs and ultimately create more of them. He has urged Americans to wait out the initial market volatility and price increases.
That has, however, so far done little to alleviate fears. Here’s what protesters told us and what surprised us the most.
New York City
A large crowd protests the Trump administration in Midtown Manhattan.Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for Community Change Action
As I rode the train from Brooklyn to Midtown Manhattan, the subway car filled with protesters, their cardboard signs bumping up against umbrellas on a rainy Saturday in New York.
By 1 p.m., the 42nd Street station was even more crowded than usual. Older people clutched slippery canes, and young kids clutched their parents’ hands. One man wore a once trendy Harris Walz camo hat. Another waved a small American flag, an unusual display of patriotism at anti-Trump rallies.
The damp horde of protesters shuffled toward Bryant Park, and in some ways, it all felt familiar. There were chants about abortion, signs featuring the face of now-deceased Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a progressive icon, and a steady cacophony of car horns.
But some things were different this time.
For one, the crowd looked older, with middle-aged Americans seeming to outnumber the 20-somethings that dominated rallies during the pandemic. It makes sense since many Americans are watching their retirement savings dwindle in the face of crashing markets and worry that staff cuts to the Social Security Administration could impact the crucial safety net.
While the anti-government protests held during Trump’s first term focused on social issues — like abortion and civil rights issues — many of the signs today targeted the economy.
A protest sign at the Manhattan demonstration.Alice Tecotzky/Business Insider
Most of the people I spoke to didn’t want to share their last names because they worried about their privacy in the current political environment. Yet they weren’t shy about their rage and despair.
Dorothy Auer, 62, told me she wished people would get angrier.
“I’ve been working for over 40 years, and I looked at my investments yesterday — my retirement plan — and I literally don’t think I’ll ever be able to retire,” she said, starting to choke up.
Wiping her eyes with her free hand — the other held a black and white sign bashing Musk — Auer told me it’s distressing to see a man of such wealth “turn around and crap on us.”
Jian, 33, held a sign that read, “Tariffs are killing my 401(k),” but he told me he’s most upset about what’s happening to his retired father.
“My dad just lost about 25% of his savings in the last three days because of the tariffs,” he said.
It’s not just the economy, of course, that brought thousands of people out to Midtown Manhattan.
Penny, 54, said the Trump administration affected virtually every issue she cares about. Even so, we ended up talking about Musk.
“I’m horrified that a person who wasn’t born here, wasn’t elected, seems to be getting carte blanche to do whatever he wants in our government,” she said. “How did he get a security clearance?”
Most of those I talked to as they slowly trudged toward Madison Square Park didn’t think the protest would change Trump’s mind.
A few said they hoped Congress would pay attention, but more than that, people said they felt they needed to do something.
“Even if it’s sort of hopeless right now, at least it’s showing people that we’re here,” Pyare, 49, told me. “And that we don’t like it.”
Novi, Michigan
Another week, another protest.
On Saturday, I attended the Hands Off! rally in Novi, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit where 55% of the vote went to Kamala Harris during the election. Thousands of people showed up.
The crowd was emotionally charged and united by the spirit of collective action. Many attendees said they were first-time protesters. The Tesla Takedown protests I attended last weekend seemed somber by comparison. Protesters here got loud.
The artist calls herself the “Old Lady Army Fighting for Democracy” or “OLAFFD.”Lakshmi Varanasi
“Call me Old Lady Army Fighting for Democracy,” one 66-year-old woman, who didn’t want to give her real name, told me. She held up a sign she had made. It was a charcoal drawing of the Statue of Liberty, whose hands covered her eyes in shame.
“I just copied this off of Facebook,” she said. But to her it symbolized that “everything that our country stands for is being destroyed, and the world is looking at us.”
A pin that said “Keep your laws off my body” was of several Liana Gettel, 58, was wearing at the Hands Off! rally in Novi, Michigan.Lakshmi Varanasi
Liana Gettel, 58, said she was outraged for several reasons, including the administration’s stance on abortion. She said she had an abortion 29 years ago.
“I had lost a child. The child would not come out on its own. So I had to have a procedure. Had I not had that procedure, I wouldn’t be here,” she said. “And that’s what they want to block, is things like that?”
Protesters targeted many different issues, including abortion, trans, and minority rights. One protester holding up a sign for trans rights said, “Trans people are just the appetizer, but everyone will be on the menu now.”
The line echoed remarks made by human rights advocate Channyn Lynne Parker at the Rally for Trans Visibility in Chicago last weekend.
Protesters at the Hands Off! rally fought for many causes, including trans rights.Lakshmi Varanasi
Unlike protests during Trump’s first term, which focused on social issues, however, many people today were also worried about the president’s economic policies.
Matt Watts said he was protesting Musk’s takeover of Social Security and Trump’s tariffs on “countries that don’t deserve it.” After the stock market began to take a hit from all the talk of tariffs, Watts said he took his money out of his 401(k) and invested it into a more stable fund. “I’m getting ready to retire pretty soon. I’ve got to count on that savings,” he said.
Most protesters were middle-aged or older, but they captured some younger activists with their energy.
Yajat Verma, 18, and Patricia, 53.Lakshmi Varanasi
Yajat Verma, 18, said he hadn’t known about the protest but was driving by with a friend when he saw the crowd. He decided to join in and started handing out water bottles to protesters.
“Everyone should be protesting,” he said.
San Francisco
Thousands of protesters gathered at Civic Center Plaza near San Francisco City Hall.Lloyd Lee
Protesters crowding together near the San Francisco City Hall had much to be angry about.
On one end of the 150,000 square-foot Civic Center Plaza, a man’s voice boomed through the microphone about the dangers of fascism and how it was time for people to go “on the offensive.”
On the other end was Michelle Gutierrez Vo, president of the California Nurses Association, warning folks about Trump’s move to strip federal workers of their union rights.
With so many grievances against the current administration in the air, some protesters resorted to bullet-point lists of the issues on large signs.
Protesters hold signs listing several issues they have with the Trump administration.Lloyd Lee
That spoke to one of the concerns for Maria, a 67-year-old San Francisco resident who declined to provide her last name.
“My focus has been a lot about the environment,” Maria told BI, later adding, “There’s so much going on right now, but I know it’s important to try and stay focused on one thing and hope other people are focused on the other things.”
Maria’s friend chimed in, saying she was worried about her Social Security, which she said she had been paying into for six decades.
For Frida Ruiz, 18, a student at the University of San Francisco who held a sign that read “Billionaire Cucks,” Trump’s stance on immigration hits close to home as a daughter of Mexican immigrant parents.
For George Chikovani, a 42-year-old SF resident, who came to protest with his wife Lisa Isola, 40, and their three-year-old and 10-months-old children, his most personal issue was the Ukraine war.
“My grandmother is from Ukraine and then I grew up in Georgia, so that cause has felt very personal to me. I still have family and friends there,” Chikovani said.
At least 7,500 people gathered near city hall on Saturday afternoon, according to an officer with the San Francisco Police Department.
Some protesters were in full-body costumes.Lloyd Lee
As my colleague observed in New York, older millennials and seniors made up large swaths of the crowd. Some came out in full costumes, sticking true to SF’s colorful character.
Maria, who is also a member of Third Act, a left-leaning political advocacy group focused on mobilizing senior voters, said she was encouraged by people who came out to protest but was “hoping to see more.”
Trump, Elon Musk ‘Hands Off’ protest in Palm Beach Gardens
Maya Washburn and Jennifer Sangalang – April 4, 2025
More than one thousand people lined the north and south side of PGA Boulevard near Kew Gardens Avenue with handmade signs as part of the national Hands Off! protests in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., on April 5, 2025.
PALM BEACH GARDENS – People are taking to the streets to make one message clear to President Donald Trump and Elon Musk: “Hands off!”
According to USA TODAY, there are more than 1,000 protests across the nation against Trump and Musk scheduled for Saturday, April 5, 2025. Three of those protests are in Palm Beach County, including one in Palm Beach Gardens.
Trump returned to Florida on Thursday, April 3, with trips to three of his golf courses (including one in Jupiter) high on his agenda for his weekend trip to the Sunshine State – the same weekend that the nationwide protests are planned against him. Some will happen just down the road from his private club, Mar-a-Lago.
Many of these Hands Off Mass Mobilization rallies have “Hands Off!” plus the name of the city and state and “fight back!” in their titles. They are happening just days after April 2, what Trump called “Liberation Day,” when he imposed sweeping tariffs affecting all U.S. trading partners and imports.
Where is the Trump, Musk protest in northern Palm Beach County? Intersection near Barnes & Noble
There will be a Hands Off rally in Palm Beach Gardens on April 5 from 10 a.m. to noon at Campus Drive and PGA Boulevard near Barnes & Noble and Palm Beach County Library.
According to the Hands Off Mass Mobilization website, handsoff2025.com, Florida will host 45 rallies − including at least one in Spanish − on Saturday, April 5, 2025, at various times and locations.
Where are Trump, Musk protests in Palm Beach County?
There are three Hands Off rallies this weekend in Palm Beach County:
Boca Raton, Florida: Hands Off! Boca Raton Indivisible Fights Back rally will be from 1 to 2:30 p.m. EDT Saturday, April 5, 2025, at City Hall, 201 W. Palmetto Park Road, Boca Raton, near the Boca Raton Museum of Art, Brightline Boca Raton Station and Ichiyami Buffet and Sushi.
Palm Beach Gardens, Florida: Hands Off! Palm Beach County Fights Back rally will be from 10 a.m. to noon EDT Saturday, April 5, 2025, at Campus Drive and PGA Boulevard in Palm Beach Gardens near Barnes & Noble and Palm Beach County Library.
West Palm Beach, Florida: Hands Off! Palm Beach Fights Back rally will be from 3 to 5 p.m. EDT Saturday, April 5, 2025, at Palm Beach County Courthouse, 205 N. Dixie Highway, West Palm Beach, near Clematis Street, Elisabetta’s Ristorante and West Palm Beach GreenMarket.
Hands Off is the title, filter and group behind the “mass mobilization” nationwide rallies and protests aimed at Trump and Musk, SpaceX and Tesla CEO who is leading the Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE for short.
Most of the Hands Off Fight Back rallies on Saturday, April 5, 2025, have this message online: “Donald Trump and Elon Musk think this country belongs to them. We are fighting back! They’re taking everything they can get their hands on — our health care, our data, our jobs, our services — and daring the world to stop them. This is a crisis, and the time to act is now. On Saturday, April 5th, we’re taking to the streets to fight back with a clear message: Hands off!
“This mass mobilization day is our message to the world that we do not consent to the destruction of our government and our economy for the benefit of Trump and his billionaire allies. Alongside Americans across the country, we are marching, rallying, and protesting to demand a stop the chaos and build an opposition movement against the looting of our country.
“A core principle behind all Hands Off! events is a commitment to nonviolent action. We expect all participants to seek to de-escalate any potential confrontation with those who disagree with our values. Check out handsoff2025.com for more information.”
Why are people protesting Trump and Musk at Hands Off rallies?
Topics and signs will likely include:
Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, jobs, abortion, fair elections, personal data, public lands, veteran services, cancer research, NATO, consumer protections, clean air, clean energy, schools, libraries, free speech, LGBTQ+ rights, immigrants and courts, the rally site states.
The theme of the “fight back,” nonviolent, peaceful protest rallies are, “We must stop Trump and Musk’s illegal, billionaire power grab.”
Maya Washburn covers northern Palm Beach County for The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Florida-Network.
