Federal workers march on White House against Trump's shutdown

Video highlights of the rally and short march

On the 10th of January, thousands of Federal workers gathered in front of the AFL-CIO's headquarters, then marched on the White House demanding an end to Trump's lockout of Federal workers. Speaker after speaker denounced GOP Senator Majority leader Mitch McConnell for blocking any votes on bills to reopen the Federal government without caving to Trump's demand for a racist border wall.

Thirty-two different unions from AFGE to AFT to SEIU to the Teamsters and so many more were listed as sponsors of the rally. Several times, union officials referred to Trump's shutdown as a lockout. Concerns of both employees of the Federal government and contractors include eviction for unpaid rent or mortages, and in once case having to resort to a GoFundMe campaign to cover a daughter's monthly college tuition payments. If the shutdown continues past Feb 1, food stamp recipients will get nothing to eat, because USDA is shut down. Since USDA food inspectors are not working, in theory there is supposed to be no food on grocery stores shelves anyway but nobody has been stupid enough to attempt to demand that. Outright starvation is a known cause of political instabilty and even revolutions.

Despite the threats of eviction, having to turn off the heat, skip meals, or forego medical treatment to save money, not a single speaker called for submitting to Trump's "Make America White Again" wall project as a way of ending the shutdown. The US government will NOT be issuing paychecks on Friday, but not a single speaker decided to call for submitting to Trump's gutter racism to resolve this. The blame for the shutdown was places squarely on the shoulders of the one man who said he would not cooperate with the normal US government budget process unless his wall was added to it-Trump.

The racist agenda of Donald Trump is so foul that the Democrats have stood in absolute unity against the Wall, a level of resolve and determination normally entirely beyond the Democrats. Meanwhile Trump's pro-Wall coaltion in the Senate is crumbling, meaning if Mitch McConnnell allows Senators to vote at all, the House and Senate may vote to reopen the Federal government by a veto-proof majority in both houses.

If Trump vetoes the budget and that veto is overridden, Trump's presidency is effectively over according to many analyists. If the Democrats allow a budget to pass containing Trump's wall, Trump owns then for the next two years. Thus, this is for ALL the marbles and the only group that can break the deadlock is Republicans other than Trump and who are not tied to Trump.

In the meantime, we have a head of state (Donald Trump) who is behaving so badly that his own workforce is marching against him and many are demanding his removal from office e.g. "pay the workers, furlough Trump!"