By Karen Rubin, editor@news-photos-features.com, news-photos-features.com
About 70 protesters turned out for the Manhasset, Long Island Tesla Takedown event – this time met with 40 pro-Trump counter protesters who Nassau County police were careful to keep separated across the wide boulevard.
The Pro-Trumpers didn’t really have a message beyond that, hoisting up industrial-sized Trump flags. Indeed, the pro-Trump/Musk/Tesla protesters did not advance an issue, only the man, Trump and seemed stuck in the time warp of the Big Lie, with flags imprinted with “Trump Won” (“Fuck Joe Biden” read one).
Standing among the anti-Muskers, Adam Marczyk said, “I came out to defend democracy against an unelected billionaire,” impressed that all the Tesla protesters carried their own hand-made sign and their own message. “Democracy in America is disappearing. We have to defend it while we still have time to do that.”
Marczyk, whosaid this was his first Tesla Takedown (he previously protested for Earth Day and immigrant rights) held a tiny cardboard sign, “Save Parks,” a nod to how Trump is not only firing tens of thousands of Park rangers who protect and conserve the parks, but also removing protections on public lands from the plundering and destruction of fossil fuel and mining extraction.
Sally Marzocek said she was glad to see the turnout despite warnings of intimidation by the pro-Trump contingent, especially after the organizer of earlier protests was trolled and harassed.
“But we cannot be intimidated,” she insisted. Her sign asked “How’s your 401(K)? Dump Trump. Vote Blue” – a swipe at the first insurrectionist and felon to be elected to office won on a promise of the biggest, best economy on Day 1, (ignoring that inflation had come down from a peak of 9% to just about 3%, always was lower than every other G7 nation and Biden had built an economy of historically low unemployment, wages increasing faster than inflation, and historic highs on the stock market, but since Trump took office, by igniting a tariff war and unhinged cuts in federal workforce and services, inflation and unemployment have ticked up, the stock market has lost $4 trillion in value – the amount Trump wants to give billionaires in tax cuts – and economists are now fearing recession.
“People don’t seem to care about a lot of things, but they care about their money, their investments. We’re headed straight for recession,” Marzocek. Indeed, economists have reversed their forecasts, and consumer confidence has slumped to a 12-year low.
“Hey hey, ho ho, corporate greed has got to go,” is the chant led by a young fellow wearing an “End Citizens United” shirt and carrying a blowhorn. “From Manhasset to DC, we demand democracy.”
Long Islanders bring a litany of grievances to a Tesla Takedown protest against Donald Trump, Elon Musk and DOGE © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com
Despite his young age, Chris is carrying sign, “Hands Off Social Security” – a nod to the fact that the Republicans don’t have to actually cut the nominal amount of a check, Elon Musk’s DOGE is firing so many workers, closing so many offices, and shutting down phone service while demanding people show up in person to sign up or make changes, that in effect, people won’t be able to get the benefits they are entitled to, checks will not go out on time, and if someone is “accidentally” declared dead and their bank accounts “clawed back”, they won’t be able to fix the problem for months, if at all. How many will die before they can obtain their benefits they need to pay for rent, food, medicine or healthcare?
Tens of thousands of federal workers being randomly fired or forced out (while being defamed as guilty of “waste, fraud and abuse”), 30 percent are vets.
“I want people to realize this is not normal. Not enough are taking to the streets, using their First Amendment Rights. MAGA are always eager to vocally show support. But what’s happening is not business as usual. Elon donated $250 million and was rewarded with a government position (without being confirmed or vetted) and going after social security, medical care, libraries,museums, research labs, vets, universities and bribing people to vote in Wisconsin, just like in Pennsylvania, skirting election law.
Long Islanders bring a litany of grievances to a Tesla Takedown protest against Donald Trump, Elon Musk and DOGE © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com
Today’s Tesla Takedown was Janet Riger’s first protest since Vietnam. What compelled her to come out? “Because everything I believed in is being shattered. The process, the checks and balances, the pillars of our democracy are being dismantled since the election and Project 2025 came to life. Random, capricious actions of Elon Musk. He’s shattered people, threatened health care, Social Security, undermining the functioning of government departments. Lawyers and law firms are threatened for who their clients are, disregarding judges’ rulings, snatching legal immigrants off the street without warrant or charges and disappearing them to prison and foreign gulag, undermining the Rule of Law, due process, dismantling democracy.” Riger’s sign was one-word on plain paper: “Democracy”
“I want my Government back,” is another sign, carried by Karin Johnson. “I am scared for my kids and their future,” she said.
“Wake up! We can’t be complacent. This is the future,” declared activist, Karen Bardash.
In a written statement, Bardash added, “I believe complacency in the last election got us into the dire situation we now find ourselves and I believe anyone who is unhappy with even one thing, owes it to themselves and the country (world) to not be complacent and to act. For me…it is way more than one thing!
“I am outraged by the administration and DOGE’s freezing of previously allocated funds which serve the underprivileged here and abroad and that will keep us safe now and into the future, to the firing of tens (hundred’s) of thousands of federal workers, for the disregard for our Parks (and the climate or world health), to the dismantling or harm being done with cuts to departments and agencies; FBI, DOE, VA, to HHS, FDA, to irresponsibly firing Nuclear Weapons workers, for the erasure of culture and history in the name of anti-DEI or “wokeness”, to the attack on the Trans community and the utter insult to the highly trained Trans servicepeople who risk(ed) their lives for this country, to the undocumented immigrants being sent to El Salvador (where we are paying $6milliion to imprison them in dangerous facilities without due process, likewise to the snatching of visa holders off the streets and taking them out of state (without due process) or prohibiting them from entering the US (researchers, scientists, doctors, scholars) because they express views contrary to Trumps, to excluding traditional media from press rooms, to the incredible INCOMPETENCE of DOGE in firing and then having to rehire, and the chaos that this brings to workers lives/futures and also those of all Americans, to the insanity of the leak on Signal and how Trump can actually blame that on Biden.
“We are living in a nightmare, an incredibly dystopian reality, and we are only a mere few months in. So, why do I attend these rallies? For all of the above and more, because I care about others as I care about myself, I care about the pursuit of justice (tzedek), repairing the world (tikkun olam) and ensuring that all people are treated with dignity and respect (derekh eretz). How can we not!?”
The protest in Manhasset, Long Island, was one of more than 200 Tesla Takedown protests in the nation and globally during a “global day of action.”
There already are plans to take to the streets again, April 5, when there will be massive protests in Washington DC, New York City (Bryant Park, 1-3 pm), Long Island (Mineola, 1 pm) and across the country — 950 already planned in all 50 states - being organized by a coalition of groups including Indivisible, Moveon, Public Citizen, WomensMarch, NYCLU, Mobilize.US, Democrats Abroad and many others.
From the handsoff2025.com website:
“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.”
Check out handsoff2025.com for more information, to find a protest and sign on.
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