Hundreds brave frigid temperatures during march in Chicago on Inauguration Day

Sarah Freishtat, Chicago Tribune on Jan 20, 2025

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CHICAGO — Hundreds of people braved single-digit temperatures to gather in downtown Chicago in opposition to President Donald Trump and his agenda as the 47th president was sworn into office Monday.

Championing a variety of causes including immigrant rights, support for Palestinians and protections for women’s reproductive and LGBTQIA rights, they gathered in Federal Plaza in the Loop to rally, then set off to march to Trump Tower across the river.

Demonstrators carried posters reading “Free Palestine Now!,” “Stop the Trump Agenda,” “Immigrant rights and legalization for all” and calling for an end to “police crimes.” They chanted “Donald Trump you racist clown, the people will take you down,” and “No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here.”

The rally was supported by a broad coalition of dozens of organizations, ranging from the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression to the Chicago Teachers Union, the U.S. Palestinian Community Network and the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights. Amid news reports that Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids would start Tuesday in Chicago, which Trump’s border czar appeared to walk back after the reports, representatives of the groups said they were united to defend their causes in the face of Trump’s “commitment to ramp up repression.”

A sister march also was scheduled to begin Monday in Streeterville but was postponed because of the cold temperatures.

The rally and march that moved forward at Federal Plaza marked the start of Trump’s second presidential term, eight years after the local Women’s March flooded downtown with an estimated quarter-million demonstrators and brought Grant Park to capacity. The 2017 Women’s March in Chicago, on an unseasonably mild day, was one of hundreds globally that day.

This year, in Chicago, the smaller rally marked the beginning of the “fight against this incoming racist, facist regime,” Muhammad Sankari, lead organizer with the Arab American Action Network, said at a news conference before the rally.

“We all remember what the first Trump administration looked like,” he said. “We remember the racist attacks against so many communities, from the Arab Muslim Community to the Black community to the Latinx community to so many other immigrant communities and communities here at home.”

Chicago Teachers Union representative Diane Castro said that in response to Project 2025, considered the Republican playbook for the new presidential administration, the teacher’s union was seeking to strengthen protections for the LGBTQIA community, sanctuary schools and housing.

“No child is a criminal,” she said, speaking at the pre-rally news conference.

Highlighting concerns about what the Trump administration could mean for immigrants, the Hana Center, an organization focused on Korean, Asian American and other multiethnic communities, used the Monday event to announce a new immigrant rights app the organization rolled out on Inauguration Day. The app reads a person’s rights out loud to a law enforcement or ICE agent and can send a message to an emergency contact, among other resources, said Executive Director Danae Kovac.

“A big part of our fight is making sure that our immigrant communities know our rights and are equipped to exercise those rights in every situation, wherever we are,” she said.

Faayani Aboma Mijana of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression vowed at Monday’s news conference to fight to “stop police crimes,” free wrongfully incarcerated people and stop mass deportations, pledging solidarity with immigrants.

“We recognize that Trump is a symptom of a system in decay, and we refuse to go down with it,” they said. “We’re going to fight against it. Black people in this country haven’t forgotten what the first Trump presidency got us. It got us further economic degradation, the intensification of police repression, and the further mass incarceration of our communities.”

Days before the rally, some organizers of the postponed sister march billed the event as a repudiation of both parties. Andy Thayer, co-founder of the Gay Liberation Network, denounced both Democratic and Republican policies on immigration and Gaza at a news conference last week, a view reiterated by some at the Monday rally. Though a ceasefire deal has been reached between Israel and Hamas, some organizers said their advocacy for Palestinians would continue.

“This is a march against both parties, not just Donald Trump,” Thayer said.

At that time organizers also spoke out against Trump’s plans for mass deportation.

“We want to make it incredibly clear to the community, Latin America and beyond, that they’re not alone,” activist Rafael Cervantes said through a Spanish translator at last week’s news conference. He added that “most of the things for which migrants are being scapegoated,” such as economic instability, are “unfounded” and “baseless.”

“These are our neighbors, both socially and across work,” Cervantes said. “We reject the message to be divided whereas the reality is one of peace.”

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(Carolyn Stein contributed.)

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