Defund Musk Seattle, a local organization known for its anti-oligarchy protests targeting Tesla dealerships, held another demonstration on Saturday, July 26th focusing on recent rollbacks of reproductive and women’s civil rights.
Following the theme of The Handmaiden’s Tale, protestors wore red gowns and white Quaker bonnets along with signs that read “Make Atwood Fiction Again” and “Under His Eyes We All Die.”
Demonstrators gathered at University Village with men, women, and even pets defiantly picketing together. Musical performances came from drummers, whose instruments were fashioned from red paint buckets and metal bins decorated with eye decals reading “Smash The Fascist Patriarchy.”
Amanda, co-leader of the Defund Musk Women’s Rights group, stated at the event, “the first-term really showed the true intentions and the agenda of Trump, and people who are like-minded to him within the Republican Party, in their role in dismantling Roe which he has claimed credit for in his own words.”
She requested her last name remain anonymous to the SGN due to privacy concerns.
Amanda further stated “that has allowed a lot of the abuses we are highlighting today happening in 2025.”
Commenting on how the Trump administration has recently weaponized feminist causes, she pointed out “to attack Trans people, the whole LGBTQ+ community, and a bunch of other examples, like attacks on DEI, are all attempts to divide and conquer the American people and to sow division between women.”
Emphasizing the harmful impacts had on Trans women in particular, she remarked “quite frankly to me it doesn’t matter, a woman is a woman and that includes Trans women.”
Midway through, the demonstration moved over to the front of the U-Village Tesla dealership. The streets had been cleared to allow marchers symbolically dressed as handmaids, with black electrical tape covering their faces, to pass through. Standing in front of the dealership's display window, they held signs detailing statistical data of injustices against women.
Near the event's conclusion, Seattle city council member Alexis Mercedes Rinck spoke to demonstrators saying “we know there are a number of states in this country that are taking up actions to restrict abortion access.”
Touching on WA state’s role providing reproductive care in her speech, she said “we feel those impacts too, we have folks coming here to access services and care, basic healthcare because abortion is healthcare, gender-affirming care is healthcare.”
Ending her remarks to the group, she concluded “people are coming here for refuge and support and care, and we are going to keep providing it. And with that is gonna come also new neighbors, because some of these folks they stay with us. To that I say, I love having new neighbors!”
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