On October 18, Mattapoisett became one of the many communities across the commonwealth and the country to host a “No Kings Day” rally to demonstrate against what a large number of people call Donald Trump’s authoritarian king-like rule as President.
The Mattapoisett rally began at the corner of Route 6 and North Street and marched to Shipyard Park. There, under bright, sunny skies, attendees representing a wide age-range filled the park to rest their protest signs and listen to speeches blaring from speakers inside the central gazebo as cars passing by on Water Street occasionally honked their support.
The first to speak were Bryan Winters, an Iraqi War veteran, former Rochester School Committee member Michelle Custolito of Authors Against Banned Books, and Andy Pollock, Executive Director of the New Bedford LBGBTQ Network. Michael Kovachevh of Mattapoisett then told the crowd his family are survivors of World War II’s dictatorial tyranny; his father spent tortuous years in a prison camp, and his mother lost relatives in the holocaust. Such tyranny must never happen again, he said.
“My mother and father right now are rolling in their graves at the sight of the slide the country is currently taking,” Kovachevh said. “Let us not look away at the signs of fascism. When we speak out, we erase the normalization of hate. Let us not be passive inheritors of the past; let us be active guardians of the future. Let us remember not just what has happened, but what never happens again.”
Nicki Demakis, Chair of the Mattapoisett Democratic Town Committee that helped to organize the event, then introduced Frances-Feliz Kearns, the group’s Vice-Chair and the Mattapoisett representative on the ORR Regional School Committee. She identified herself as a bio medical engineer who’s learned that engineering systems need to be diverse to work together and as a Latino woman who learned a lesson of resilience and working hard from her family. Her words of standing up to the current administration ended with “This country doesn’t belong to strongmen or corrupt billionaires. And we say to this administration, we will return the power to the people. No kings yesterday, no kings today, and no kings tomorrow!”
Meanwhile, Custolito moved to manning a busy table within the park that collected signatures for the group “Mass Freedom to Read” in support of state legislative act S2328, which seeks “to provide explicit protections for student’s rights to access books… protects librarians from retaliation due to their work… prevents the removal of books for political reasons” and require libraries to establish written policies for book challenges. “All very important right now,” she said.
Demakis explained as the rally was winding down that organizing it was a joint effort between the Democratic Town Committees of Rochester, Mattapoisett, Marion, Fairhaven, and Acushnet and the 50501 Committee that helps groups organize anti-Trump demonstrations nationwide.
To elaborate on the mission of these rallies, she added, “We are in throws of an authoritarian takeover of every faction of our government. This brings people together against that. If this attracts five new people that would have never shown up before, we’ve given them the courage to show up again, and then again. We have to keep showing up and speaking truth to power.”
Mattapoisett No Kings Protest
By Michael J. DeCicco