People in Oregon and Washington filled the streets Thursday as part of May Day demonstrations.
The international event, which commemorates the fight for workers’ rights, has often been used to express broader political unrest.
This year, President Donald Trump and his administration’s actions are front and center.
At May Day events overseas in France, Italy, Spain, Japan and elsewhere, protesters condemned policies from Washington, D.C., namely tariffs and their contribution to global instability. Thousands of demonstrations were planned across the U.S.
In the Pacific Northwest, cities like Portland, Olympia and Seattle, as well as smaller towns like La Grande and Ellensburg, Washington, saw protests.
Hundreds of people took to the streets at the Oregon capitol in Salem on Thursday in support of May Day. While the event is annual, many immigrants and farmworker advocacy groups said this year was different.
Several demonstrators showed up against what they said are the Trump administration’s relentless attacks on immigration rights and working families.
“There’s been many attacks on our immigrant community from executive orders to ICE being able to now have free rein,” said Reyna Lopez, executive director of Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste (PCUN), an advocacy group for Oregon farmworkers that helped organize the Salem rally.
On Monday, PCUN and several religious groups sued the Trump administration to block immigration enforcement at so-called “sensitive locations” like schools, churches and hospitals.
“Immigrant Oregonians are home. They are what makes the state beautiful and prosperous,” she said. “They’re our friends, our neighbors, they’re farmworkers, they’re grocery workers, they’re people that make the state work.”
Several demonstrations drew thousands of people downtown. At one event near Portland State University, Margaret Hess was ringing a large bell, engraved with the word “shame.”
“I am at every single one I can go to,” Hess said, who traveled to the protest from Vancouver, Washington. “We are fighting for our lives here. I don’t plan on sitting this one out.”
At a press event ahead of the demonstrations, Portland police said they plan to send out white-shirted officers to talk with protesters, while others watch for criminal activity from a distance.
A protester who identified herself as Julia Marie said she thought the crowds that gathered during the day Thursday were different from what she had seen at May Day protests in the past. She believed the goal was to attract as many people as possible to the demonstration.
“I feel like the energy has been positive. I haven’t seen major agitators. It just feels like people show up and they just want to march,” Julia Marie said.
She also noted that police helped direct traffic away from the demonstrations.
In Seattle, protesters packed Cal Anderson Park. Activists said this year’s rally and march are primarily a response to the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigrants and pro-labor groups.
Demonstrators there called for the abolition of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the end of the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts. They also advocated for the shutdown of the Northwest Detention Center, a privately-run prison in Tacoma, Washington, that houses undocumented immigrants before they’re deported by ICE.
KUOW’s Casey Martin contributed to this story. Photos from Northwest News Network members OPB, KUOW and JPR.
