50501 Protests: Racine Protests Elon Musk, Trump
I am proud of my fellow Wisconsinites today.
Why? Well, there were 50501 protests (50501 means fifty states, fifty protests, one message, I think), also called “Hands Off” protests, all over the nation yesterday protesting Donald Trump, his cabinet, Elon Musk and Musk’s overinvolvement with said cabinet and the entirety of the federal workforce via his entity DOGE, and I approve of peaceful protest.
Right now, Americans are suffering. The prices of everything are already too high. We’re told to stock up during sales of whatever nonperishables we can get, because the chaos in Washington, plus the Trump tariffs, have made everything worse.
In case you’re not aware of this, tariffs are taxes. They’re not taxes on the other country so much as on your own people, to make it harder for them to buy whatever it is. So, the current and very strange tariffs on our longtime ally, Canada, mean that maple syrup is priced too high for most people to buy it. That means it hurts the seller of the syrup in Canada, but it mostly hurts the consumer to have fewer choices at much higher prices.
There’s a reason why countries try for both free and fair trade. The current Trump tariffs are neither, in my opinion.
Anyway, I was very glad to see the protests in Racine. There were around six hundred people in downtown Racine with signs such as “No One Elected Elon” to “Hands Off Our Social Security” and people with rainbow flags, asserting solidarity with the LGBTQIA+ community.
In addition, there were protests in Kenosha, Union Grove, Burlington, and apparently there also were a few people out in Waterford (a very small community) with signs. Good for them.
Throughout the nation yesterday, there were hundreds of protests in every state in the union because people are really concerned. The Stock Market fell off a cliff this past week, and no one understands why this is happening with our government. The Republicans in Congress mostly are doing whatever the President wants, which is in direct conflict with their office as Constitutional officers (there is still such a thing as checks and balances, and the Congress was designed as one of the checks and balances for the Executive branch), and they don’t appear to be listening to their constituents. Worse yet, some of them seemingly believed that the previous protests were only by paid protesters.
That was obviously a lie, which yesterday’s protests clearly called out.
I don’t know about you, but Butte, Montana, which had a good-sized protest, is not a Democratic stronghold. Neither is Couer d’Alene, Idaho. Neither is Ames, Iowa. Nor is Lincoln, Nebraska…but I could go on and on, and I think you get the point.
In Wisconsin, Union Grove, Burlington, and Waterford are all smallish towns (Burlington being the biggest of the three) out in Racine County. The City of Racine mostly votes heavily Democratic. The county of Racine mostly votes heavily Republican. We are possibly the most purple county, and most contested county, in the entirety of the state of Wisconsin.
So, if you see people protesting out in the county, you know they’re not paid protestors. (I mean, really.) They are folks worried about their Social Security. They’re worried about paying more for things that were already expensive due to the Trump tariffs. They’re worried about the Republicans in Congress doing almost nothing to push back against anything the executive branch does. They’re worried about Signalgate. They’re worried about our troops overseas, considering the recent contretemps where four men in a training accident in Lithuania came home in pine boxes only to be snubbed by the current President, who was out golfing instead.
I am not in good health. I am, if not old, no longer young. But my attitude toward all of this is summed up by a sign I saw online (which I wish I could find again): “Must Our Decline and Fall Be So Very Stupid?”
I don’t want to see the United States of America become an authoritarian country run by a dictator. I also don’t like seeing unnecessary chaos for the sake of chaos alone, and furthermore, I don’t like it when people my Mom’s age and up are worried that they won’t get their retirement — which pretty much consists only of Social Security and nothing else.
I’ve thought long and hard about this, ever since I saw the Turkish doctoral student rounded up off the street by masked ICE agents. She wasn’t doing anything wrong. She was a teaching assistant. She’d protested quietly, and apparently that was too much for the current President’s staff. Her visa was revoked, she was not told, then she was grabbed off the street by six ICE agents, all masked. Now, she sits in a Louisiana deportation facility.
This is not someone who took up arms against the US. This is not someone who did anything wrong whatsoever under our laws. She was granted no due process and she was grabbed off the street as if she were a piece of refuse.
Worse yet, another man, in Maryland, was accidentally deported to Ecuador to a notorious prison there. The US has said they can’t get him back. That makes no sense. A judge, a federal district judge at that, has said they’d better get him back. He’s here legally. His rights of due process were not followed. Plus, they didn’t even mean to deport him!
But they can’t get him back?
These things have to be fought, you know? No matter what political persuasion you are, these things must be discussed and known. We still have the right of free speech and also of free assembly in this country and we must raise our voices now, whether online or off, whether in protests online or off…we must, must, do these things.
As I said, my health is bad. I worry that if our country gets worse that I’d be a sitting duck. I am obviously disabled, I can’t run from anyone, and in a situation like that poor Turkish doctoral student, I’d be less able to react than she was (and she couldn’t do anything at all). My main value, if you call it such, is that I care about others, I am creative, I help others, and I do whatever I can to make the world a better place.
The current Powers that Be in Washington, DC, mostly do not care about such things. But I do.
That’s why I’m finally, finally raising my voice in protest despite the obvious risks. I hope you all will do the same.
P.S. For those who blame Joe Biden’s creeping overuse of Executive powers to have led to the current POTUS’s overuse of same, you may have a point. But Biden’s people did not threaten Social Security, they did not create so much chaos for what appears to be no reason other than fear, and they did not take inoffensive female Turkish grad students off the streets.
Written by Barb Caffrey
April 6, 2025 at 6:56 am
Posted in Congress being utterly stupid, Prescient observations, Stupid, United States Presidents
Tagged with 50501 protests, Burlington Wisconsin, Donald Trump, Hands Off protests, Kenosha Wisconsin, News, nonviolent protests, peaceful protests, political activism, politics, protest, Racine protests, Racine Wisconsin, Signalgate, Social Security, trump, Union Grove Wisconsin, Waterford Wisconsin
8 Responses
Subscribe to comments with RSS.
Barb Caffrey's Blog 
“There’s a reason why countries try for both free and fair trade. The current Trump tariffs are neither, in my opinion.”
Actually, Europe and other western nations have tariffs against American goods but the US didn’t, so “Free Trade” means “We can have Tariffs but America can’t”.
As for “deportations”, I’ve heard differently. The people deported are either Violent Criminals or supporters of violence against Jewish Students, supporters of Hamas, etc.
As for “threatening Social Security”, that just a Big Lie.
Paul (Drak Bibliophile) Howard
April 6, 2025 at 10:13 am
Paul, there may be some folks who are legitimately bad that have been sent to that El Salvadoran prison. We know at least one of them was sent there mistakenly. This has happened before in other administrations. The only difference now is, they don’t plan to try to get him back. The other administrations, whether Obama’s, Biden’s, or even Trump’s first administration, did try to get them back.
Europe has some odd tariffs. This is true. They also have standards that are different from ours, for good or for ill. That’s one reason why I didn’t discuss them, though. There is a legitimate reason for some tariffs, and maybe there’s some legitimate reason there. But I don’t see any for Canada. I especially don’t see any because Canada, quite rightly, has impressed the same sorts of tariffs on stuff that we’ve sent them. The Kentucky bourbon industry has been hit hard by this. Wisconsin grows cranberries and ginseng, among others. Plus, some of the stuff that we were exporting will now become too expensive for other countries to buy…some of that is supply and demand, some is because of economic theories I don’t entirely understand, and some of it is because of a very old phrase: Out of sight, out of mind.
So, if we make it harder for Canada’s stuff to come in here, including potash (which is needed by Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, etc., farmers), they’re going to make it harder for our stuff to come in here. It’s all so interdependent that it can be a real hassle trying to figure out who does what where and how is it going to affect people on the ground — that is, people like you and me, who are just plain folks trying to get by.
I hope you’re right about Social Security, Paul. I want you to be right. People are worried, though, because they’ve seen so much other stuff that’s scary and, quite frankly, wrongheaded, out of this second Trump administration. It’s possible there were real reasons why some of this was done and that it wasn’t just to create chaos for the sake of chaos. But there’s so much chaos that it’s impossible to tell what’s what.
That’s why I, as a normal person, worry about my own safety when I speak up. You may think I shouldn’t worry about it. I would hope I do not have to worry about it. I am not going to try to change other people’s minds as only the other people can do that, but I can at least say I don’t like this. I don’t like what I see, and as a former graduate student and teaching assistant, I easily put myself in that poor young Turkish woman’s place. There was no reason to go after her. None. They could’ve just sent her something by mail and then let her wind up her affairs and pack her stuff and go. It still would’ve been wrong, but it wouldn’t have added substantial insult to injury.
Anyway, I agree there’s misinformation out there. (Did you see where hundreds of people were in line in Iowa, worried they’d have to prove they were still alive to get their Social Security?) But when every day seems to bring a new low of one sort or another, what are we as a people supposed to think?
There are some tariffs such as the ones put on Vietnam that will hurt people almost immediately. Not just in Vietnam. Here. Prices will go up for things you don’t expect, like NBA jerseys, as everything is so interconnected, as I said before.
There are all sorts of reasons for why markets can fail and all sorts of reasons for why a country can fail. I don’t want to see either one fail. I really don’t, Paul.
That’s why I said what I did in the PS. Many presidents, not just this one, have done a lot of stuff via executive order rather than go through Congress, as Congress is slow, often dysfunctional, and difficult.
That said, I don’t approve of tariffs that are higher than what we already had in the previous Trump Administration, especially on Canada and Mexico. Those made sense; these do not.
There has been talk that we may even see higher prescription prices because so many of our generic meds are made in China. This is one of those law of unintended consequences things. I really hope that will not happen, Paul. But we’ve got to be aware of this, and fight for sanity and transparency in our government. From now on. We have to have these things. Otherwise, what good are we doing?
Barb Caffrey
April 6, 2025 at 10:45 am
Sorry Barb, there’s too much nonsense in the News about Trump’s actions.
The sad part is that the News ignored all the people suffering thanks to Biden’s actions.
Paul (Drak Bibliophile) Howard
April 6, 2025 at 10:49 am
That may be true, Paul. The big news media corporations have not done a good job, at all, which is what a lot of people of all political persuasions would say. And we’d all be right.
The problems right now that we have to deal with that are absolutely 100% true are the tariffs. If it’s a negotiating tactic, it’s not one I recognize. I also don’t understand, nor do I appreciate, high tariffs on Canada and Mexico. My view is to go back to what they were when Trump was in office the first time, partly because we badly need them as our allies. We don’t need adversaries at either border. (As bad as it is now, it will be much worse if we have two active enemies at both borders.)
And as I said, it’s 100% true that the young Turkish grad student was taken off the street in broad daylight by six ICE officers, all but one of them masked, and sent to a Louisiana detention facility (read: prison). There was no reason to do things this way. She was not a threat. Turkey is still one of our allies, last I checked, despite worries over their leader Erdogan’s actions. All we had to do was let her know her passport was being revoked, and let her go home. That’s it. She’s a student. Her country would’ve helped her leave or would’ve interceded for her, and in either case we’d not end up with a young, innocuous woman who’d done nothing in her life to cause this to happen being taken off the street in broad daylight.
If you can point to one action where Biden’s WH or staff did anything remotely similar to a young grad student, please do. But as far as I know, nothing like that happened under Biden, or Trump’s first term, nor Obama before that. Nothing like that happened during George W. Bush’s terms in office, either. This is an extraordinary event, and it’s not a good one. It’s not something that we should want in this country. Due process still matters if we are to believe in the rule of law and justice.
Finally, Paul, one thing I’d like you to consider that I hadn’t raised in my blog because I don’t know how to do it just yet. Tourism. It’s way, way down. People from Europe are refusing to come here. People from Canada are refusing to come here, too. It’s obvious as to why they’re not, especially the Canadians, as they’ve been insulted over and over again for whatever reason by the current president. But those are all sources of income for many states, many places, that have almost completely evaporated.
If our country is perceived as unsafe, if our country is perceived also to be one where overseas men would worry about their pregnant wives not getting decent medical care (ectopic pregnancies are real and are life-threatening; at least twenty states don’t seem to understand that, and we do not have the technology available to transplant the wanted fetuses into the womb rather than, say, in the Fallopian tube where they should not be), why should they come here? If they’re pregnant, and they go to a state like Texas where there are laws allowing people to report doctors for giving D&Cs (which is not an abortion; I had one once, because of uterine fibroids), they’re taking their lives into their own hands. Most people are not going to be willing to do that, not even to see the history and majesty of Texas — and it really does have history and there is a lot of majesty there, to name just one place where there’s going to be a decided lack of tourism from non-US citizens.
Every action has unintended consequences, and we’re already seeing some of them in action. A prudent administration makes course corrections to avoid unnecessary pain and promote the greater good. I truly hope this administration of Trump’s will do just that, and soon; otherwise we are in for a very long summer with almost no hope in sight, and I refuse to believe that we’ve become that dystopian already.
Barb Caffrey
April 6, 2025 at 2:30 pm
Have you blocked me?
Paul (Drak Bibliophile) Howard
April 6, 2025 at 10:14 am
Not as far as I know, Paul. I did upgrade my site recently, though, and it cleared all comments it thought was spam. I know this because before I updated, I had something like 5K spam (real spam, not you). Now I have zero.
I appreciate respectful dissent, and for the most part you’ve been respectful. I also want to hear from people who don’t immediately think the way I do, or even after some long thinking still don’t. The world is meant to be a place where we can learn from others, or share ideas, or at least realize there are more shades to God’s tapestry (or the Goddess’s) than we may realize at the time.
So, I didn’t do anything. But I do know this site upgrade might’ve.
Barb Caffrey
April 6, 2025 at 10:28 am
The post was delayed. My apology.
Paul (Drak Bibliophile) Howard
April 6, 2025 at 10:45 am
It’s OK. It happens.
Barb Caffrey
April 6, 2025 at 2:16 pm