For 39 years, the third Monday of every January has been celebrated as a national holiday in remembrance of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his tireless work toward racial equity. This Monday, Jan. 20, the date is shared with the inauguration of Donald Trump for his second term as President.
“Trump is the literal opposite of everything that Martin Luther King Jr. stood for,” said Wumi Ogunlade, Student Union Assembly (SUA) vice president of diversity and inclusion. “Those two people [are] being celebrated at the same time, on the same day …. I think it’s quite literally a slap in the face for everyone who fought for civil rights. It’s a slap in the face for a lot of social activists and people who are championing the movement of social justice.”
On campus, in Santa Cruz, and across the nation, communities are joining together to protest the incoming Presidency, and celebrate the late civil rights leader. Among them is the SUA office of diversity and inclusion alongside M.O.V.E., a campus civic engagement cohort organized this past fall. Together, they are hosting the “Not My President” event on Inauguration Day from 5:30-7:30 p.m. at the Cervantes and Velasquez Conference Room.
To activists locally and across the world, Dr. King’s advocacy during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s serves as inspiration for organizing movements and leading impactful resistance in adversarial climates.
“It’s just, it’s too depressing to just sit and wallow and pity,” Ogunlade said. “I think it’s time for us to actually take action.”
Organizers will be facilitating open discussion and activities to build community, empower students and inspire change.
“The significance of this is also that we are all scared and not a lot of us know what to do,” said Isaac Ríos, member and primary signer of M.O.V.E.. “So, we should be able to hear ourselves out from across multiple like aspects [and] identities — not just only seeing this from my perspective on how I’m gonna be affected, but we should also see this on how everyone else [is] also gonna see this regardless of race, gender or sex.”
As important as being in community is at this time, the organizers also speak to the necessity of creating tangible change within our communities and working in solidarity with one another.
“[We’re] having this event to mobilize ourselves,” Ríos said. “To actually do something, we can call our representatives, we can resist, we can protest, we can do all of these things, especially because a lot of our communities are in danger. So, we want people to take their frustration and then use it in order to take action.”
