Activists are staging at least 682 separate "Solidarity with Charlottesville" events in response to this weekend's attacks by white supremacists and neo-Nazis in the Virginia city.
The resistance group Indivisible shared the following map with Vox showing events across the country, the overwhelming majority of which will be held on Sunday. The events were put together by more than 60 different progressive organizations in the past 24 hours, according to Sarah Dohl of Indivisible.
Since the 2016 election, organizers have seen a widespread resurgence of activism and street protests — from the Women’s March that drew more than 1 million people this winter to thousands of people flocking to airports to oppose Trump’s travel ban and, more recently, an outpouring of opposition to the Republican health care bill.
Activists are now trying to channel that energy into a response to the Charlottesville riot. “This is a moment when we need to demonstrate that we as a nation have the capacity to stand together in the face of hate,” said Ben Wikler, Washington director of MoveOn.org, one of the groups coordinating the demonstrations on Sunday.
“Just as Trump’s election led to the Women’s March, this white supremacist terror is sparking a nationwide outpouring based on the idea that we can build a democracy of shared religions and shared races. This attack is a reminder of the nation’s darkest heritage; the outpouring of solidarity following is a reminder of its best.”
Other groups involved in putting together the events were Pantsuit Nation, CREDO, and the Working Families Party. (You can find the full list here.) One site of demonstrations: Metairie, Louisiana, which was also a hotbed of activism against the health care bill. Lara Crigger, lead organizer for Metairie Indivisible, explained the group’s protest this way: “It is on us to stand up and shout as loud as we can, ‘You don't speak for us,’” she said about the reaction to white supremacist groups. "And then it is also on us to match our actions to those words. Lives are at stake.”
