For many, Donald Trump’s disgraceful language suggests the onset of a political Armageddon in the United States, but for others, the showman’s brutal honesty is what’s going to “Make America Great Again.”
As students, nonstudents, Chicagoans, and folks from throughout the surrounding suburbs hastily filled the Quad at the University of Illinois at Chicago’s (UIC) campus, the goals of the united protestors were made clear to any of those who may still be unsure: stop Donald J. Trump from speaking at all costs.
Some faces were grave, pondering the possibility of a shamelessly demagogic general election candidate. Any attempts to invalidate his run because of his hate speech had been neither successful nor unanimous, which was evidenced by both the thousands of Trump supporters present at the rally and the series of primary wins he had garnered in recent weeks. Other, less pessimistic eyes gleamed with excitement, clearly cognizant of the possibility that they would someday be telling their grandchildren about the notorious, historic evening.
The students and staff of the school, well known for its cultural diversity, had qualms about their wellbeing on campus that Friday afternoon, and with good reason. In the now infamous June 16 speech in which he announced his candidacy, the former reality television host claimed, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re sending people that have lots of problems and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they are rapists…”
At a Fayetteville, N.C. rally two days prior to the scheduled Chicago appearance, a nonviolent black protester had been sucker punched by a white Trump supporter as he was being escorted out of the event. That same day, in an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, the businessman-turned-politician admitted that he thinks the religion of “Islam hates us.”
The Quad was an array of different colored anti-Trump signs and pro-Democratic candidate, Bernie Sanders posters. Members from MoveOn.org, whose website claims that they are the “largest independent, progressive, digitally-connected organizing group in the United States,” were passing out fliers that read in bright red, white, and blue lettering, “STOP ISLAMOPHOBIA,” “NO RACISM,” and “TRUMP MAKES AMERICA HATE, OUR STUDENTS MAKE AMERICA GREAT.”
The Chicago-based sector of the ANSWER Coalition, an effort to stifle racism and perpetual warfare, had produced picket signs that were proudly being held high, a proclamation across them reading, “STOP TRUMP! SHUT DOWN WHITE SUPREMACY!” Homemade posters ranged from artful conjunctions of Trump’s likeness and an agitated baby’s body to crude illustrations of the candidate with a tiny mustache, reimagined as the 21st century’s answer to fascist regimes of decades passed.
The Republican presidential frontrunner had announced his plans to speak at the university’s Pavilion arena a week or so prior to the March 11 date, and the opposition had been immediate and fierce. Students voiced their concerns to the Vice Chancellor for Administrative Services, Mark Donovan, who responded with assurances “that UIC Police have started working with, and will continue to work with, local law enforcement, the Trump campaign, protest organizers, and the U.S. Secret Service to ensure that security plans are in place to address the safety of the UIC community.”
UIC junior and activist, Ethos (with microphone), speaking to protestors at the Quad before their march to the Pavilion.
In the days leading up to the event, UIC affiliates joined together with MoveOn representatives – an organization not unfamiliar with the process of petitioning for social change – in order to form a peaceful, solidified resistance against Trump’s campaign presence at the West Loop campus. In an interview with MSNBC, a UIC junior and activist named Ethos, who helped organize the protests, said of hearing about the Republican’s plans to speak at his campus, “We were immediately outraged, but even above that, a lot of our members were scared… they were fearful for their lives because of the rhetoric that Donald Trump and his supporters perpetuate.”
The multiple leftist organizations and grassroots protesting efforts worked in concert during the short amount of time they were given to try to call off the rally, and they ended up acquiring 4,000 signatures on a petition for its cancellation. As Ethos explained to the news anchor, the university does not own the arena, and the thousands of pleas could not stop Trump, the legal renter, from taking the stage at the public venue.
Protestors emptying the Quad, headed towards the rally with their posters and megaphones at hand, chanting along the way.
As the sun began to set on the invigorated crowds and the 6 p.m. scheduled show time crept nearer, the various groups who felt marginalized and endangered by Trump’s rhetoric and those who stood in alliance with them marched westward toward the Pavilion.
Chanting bespoke the presence of the dissidents before they reached their destination at the corner of Racine and Harrison. “Viva, viva, Palestina!” “Donald Trump has got to go, hey-hey, ho-ho!” “Sin papelés, sin miedo!” (“Without papers, without fear!” has become a popular slogan amongst the undocumented UIC student population ). In what would be remembered as a fleetingly peaceful moment in the days following the demonstrations, protesters and supporters were segregated by the streets’ intersection, the former preparing to disrupt the convocation, the latter anticipating the arrival of their favored candidate.
A swarm of CPD officers surrounds the protesters (visible by their signs that seem to float above law enforcement’s heads) in front of UIC’s Pavilion arena.
Dusk engulfed the scene, and as the mood darkened with the skies, members from opposite sides of the political spectrum engaged one another – nonviolently and otherwise. Racial slurs were heaved against protesters, “Make America Great Again” signs were torn into pieces. Brief physical altercations ended as hastily as they began, and the Chicago Police Department (CPD) struggled to maintain control of the situation.
Trump quickly canceled the rally, citing purported safety issues, encouraging his supporters to disengage the “violent thugs” and return home. Although no deaths or serious injuries were reported, the media’s looping of videos that highlighted the few instances of protester and supporter clashes characterized the evening as one reminiscent of the city’s turbulent past.
On all major news networks in the hours following his calling off the rally, Trump defended himself against insinuations that he had intentionally incited violence at his gatherings, encouraging his passionate supporters to suppress protesters through brutality. The candidate and his surrogates denied all allegations, and instead took the airtime to demonize the dissidents, insisting that they had denied Trump of his first amendment right.
In the days following the events in Chicago, news anchors, political pundits, legal experts, and campaign contributors all weighed in on the pressing question: were the protestors, in practicing their right to assembly, depriving the likely GOP nominee of his right to free speech? Overwhelmingly, if you are either a Millennial, a person of color (POC), a woman, a 
member of the LGBTQ community, a college student, a Muslim, or you belong to more than of these communities, your answer to that question is, resoundingly, “NO!”
“I don’t think he deserves the platform he’s obtained through hurting people,” said John Kozlowski, an openly gay University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) student. The voices and votes of historically marginalized communities matter, arguably, more than they have ever before in a presidential election, and the LGBTQ vote is crucial not only to the Democratic primary nominees but also to both of the eventual general election candidates.
“People do have a right to express how they feel… but, ultimately, this right should not be extended to speech that can mentally harm others,” Kozlowski asserted, condemning Trump’s less than impressive LGBTQ record, and echoing the sentiments of his many detractors.
UIC Mexican-American sophomore, Nelida Plascencia addressed the anti-immigrant fear-bating tactics of the Republican front-runner’s campaign rhetoric, saying, “As the family member of an undocumented immigrant, I feel targeted by his campaign. Under his presidency, I really believe he will disregard the basic human rights of those without citizenship status.”
Trump has categorically and unapologetically dehumanized the Mexican people, soliciting apologies for his controversial stances from the White House. “People protesting him at his rallies aren’t keeping him from speaking, they’re only trying to protect the civil rights so many have fought for, and continue to fight for in America today,” Plascencia declared.
Aside from Trump, his surrogates, and his supporters, there is a minority of liberal voters who appreciate what Trump’s off-the-cuff, xenophobic, racist, and misogynist language has to offer a government that strictly adheres to an unofficial policy of political correctness. African American DePaul junior, Michael Lynch, is part of that minority. “On one hand, he endangers the lives of so many minority and marginalized groups when he spews hateful rhetoric. On the other hand, you have him exposing the truth of America, and that is we are not in an inclusive society.”
The student reiterated the sentiments of former American revolutionaries, insisting that if politicians are not blatantly honest about their feelings, there is no way to eradicate the long-held beliefs that buoy their poisonous agendas. Instead, Lynch suggested, “For social progress to occur, it is essential that we tell the truth and leave no parts out… We have to be transparent, raw, and honest in how we discuss and move forward in these areas because the problem will continue to grow if we do not.”
The Trump phenomenon can be explained by examining the quality about him that makes any candidate appealing to a voter, which is his candor (his speech checking out at a second-grade comprehension level doesn’t hurt him, either). The question of whether or not Chicago teetered on unconstitutionality on March 11 may never be answered, but the protestors’ fears of a President Donald J. Trump will be dashed if the voices of the marginalized consolidate against his message and its proponents at the polls this November.
Sarah J. Wotaszak 