WHAT NEXT?
As Oakland joins cities across the country in protest, the nation asks itself: What Next?
[caption id=”attachment_3581" align=”alignright” width=”300"]
Two female protesters display an anti-Trump sign at 8:50 p.m. on 12th and Broadway. The pair criticized the media for exploiting their image as they were pushed off the street by the Oakland Police Department. Their sign echoed a loud and frequently heard chant along the peaceful march. [/caption]For over 24 hours, from Nov. 8 to Nov. 9, the Bay Area burned with rage over the election of Donald Trump to the office of President of the United States.
As Hillary Clinton’s defeat became clear late on Nov. 8, hundreds of UC Berkeley students and Berkeley residents marched down Telegraph Avenue, filling the streets with chants of “Not my president” and “Fuck Donald Trump.”
[caption id=”attachment_3582" align=”alignleft” width=”200"]
A protester shouts at Oakland Police Department (OPD) officers in front of a fire at Telegraph and Williams in Oakland.[/caption]But only moments after the group marched onto the Highway 24 on-ramp, a sickening sound signaled the first serious injury of the next 24 hours: a student protester was hit by a car, with multiple witnesses saying the car sped up before impact.
Protesters blocked the car from trying to flee the scene, and switched their goal to diverting traffic for the expected ambulance.
The victim was reported as having sustained “major injuries” as of the morning of Nov. 9.
While many students fell back in devastation, several Latinx students urged the group to press on. Together with over a hundred Berkeley residents, the protesters continued down Telegraph Ave. before reaching a police blockade at 8th St around 2 AM.
Sometime thereafter, the protesters dispersed — but not without plans for the coming morning.
[caption id=”attachment_3589" align=”alignnone” width=”630"]
A Berkeley protester kneels to keep cars from advancing on Highway 24, just moments after a driver hit a UC Berkeley student protester a few yards behind him. The student was reported to have sustained “major injuries.” After the ambulance arrived on scene, the remaining protesters marched down Telegraph Ave. for hours until they reached downtown Oakland.[/caption]
[caption id=”attachment_3583" align=”alignright” width=”200"]
A protester snaps a cell phone photo of a burning Trump effigy at 14th and Broadway in Oakland. Others swung at the Trump-faced figure knocking it to the ground repeatedly, so that it had to be re-lit several times.[/caption]
SHOCKING RESULTS
As dawn broke on Nov. 9, the nation continued to reel from the unexpected turn of events the night before.
Defying the predictions of nearly every pundit and pollster, Clinton’s supposed “blue wall” of electoral votes crumbled and Trump captured the key states of Pennsylvania and Wisconsin to win the election.
Trump also won the battleground states of Florida and North Carolina. His victory came despite an unprecedented surge of Hispanic voting for Clinton, which won her New Mexico and the battleground state of Nevada.
[caption id=”attachment_3584" align=”alignleft” width=”300"]
Berkeley High School students protest the election of Donald Trump at the foot of the Campanile on the UC Berkeley campus. Hundreds of demonstrators shouted “Not my president,” as they surged across the campus.[/caption]It also made the result in normally Republican Arizona too close to call even 24 hours after voting had ended. The vote was also extremely close in the normally Democratic state of Michigan and in New Hampshire.
Although Trump’s electoral college triumph was clear, final counts of the popular vote had Clinton defeating Trump by a full percentage point. Ultimately, Clinton won 48 percent of the popular vote, and Trump 47 percent.
Thus, as in 2000, when Al Gore won the popular vote but lost the electoral college vote and the presidency to George W. Bush, a kink in the democratic election system determined who won the election.
Prior to 2000, it had been more than 100 years since a candidate who lost the popular vote won the presidency.
[caption id=”attachment_3585" align=”alignright” width=”300"]
A protester shouts at Oakland Police Department (OPD) officers in front of a fire at Telegraph and Williams in Oakland.[/caption]
POWERFUL REACTION
Without missing a beat, Berkeley residents — largely students — leapt to channel their confusion, shock, and outrage into mass action.
Nov. 9 was kicked off by a walkout by Berkeley High School students that terminated at UC Berkeley, where a university protest set for noon filled large sections of the campus with frustrated and angry residents.
Less than five hours later, the apex of that anger hit the streets of Oakland.
By 5:15 PM, over a thousand people crowded Oakland City Hall as speakers from organizations like Socialist International and the Anti-Police Terror Project vocalized what the crowd was feeling.
A series of chants, then drums, echoed through Oscar Grant Plaza, as the Imusai drumming group arrived around 6 P.M. to join a crowd that had by then tripled in size.
[caption id=”attachment_3586" align=”alignleft” width=”212"]
A piñata repurposed as a Trump effigy hangs by its neck from a makeshift pole held by protestors. [/caption]The next two hours saw everything from peaceful solidarity to fiery chaos. First, the Oakland Police Department (OPD) met protesters with blockades across downtown Oakland, in hopes of keeping the protest condined to Oscar Grant Plaza.
But the blockades grew and shifted as the sky darkened. OPD was dealing with a much larger protester presence than they’d expected.
[caption id=”attachment_3587" align=”alignright” width=”300"]
A woman whose family members were Holocaust survivors held a sign expressing her concern about Trump’s election while marching at 14th and Broadway in Oakland.[/caption]It was hardly 8 P.M. before they released their first tear gas canisters, pushing protesters back: some in tears, some with head injuries, and others arrested where they stood.
Then, around 9:30 P.M., in one of the evening’s most dramatic scenes, protesters and police traded fireworks and flashbangs at the corner of Telegraph and William. A fire set in the middle of the intersection continued to burn even after protesters were forced to disperse.
Their rage continued to burn, too.
[caption id=”attachment_3588" align=”alignleft” width=”300"]
An OPD officer and a female protester bump into each other as the protests of Nov. 9 grew more tense.[/caption]By the end of the night, over 7,000 Bay Area residents had taken over Oakland’s streets. Together, they showed Trump and his followers that, whatever the future held, they — and residents of cities across the country — were prepared to fight.
Protests are scheduled to continue today, Nov. 10 and through the month.
Additional reporting contributed by Fred Feller and Leilani Matthews.
[caption id=”attachment_3590" align=”alignnone” width=”630"]
A protester at UC Berkeley on the afternoon of Nov. 9 uses her signage to express shock at the election results. Stunned voters, pundits and poll takers were equally at a loss to explain the outcome.[/caption]
[caption id=”attachment_3591" align=”alignnone” width=”630"]
A protester shows his anger at a line of Oakland Police Department (OPD) officers advancing on the intersection of Telegraph Ave. and William St late on Nov. 9. Behind him, protesters threw sparklers and bottles in response to the OPD’s flashbangs and tear gas.[/caption]
