The rain would not stop on the steps of the Suffolk County courthouse in Riverhead Saturday afternoon, but that didn’t stop more than 1,000 people, at the protest’s height, from coming to the No Kings rally against the autocratic tendencies of the current administration.
The event was one of more than 2,000 ‘No Kings’ rallies nationwide timed to coincide with a parade in Washington, D.C. honoring the 250th anniversary of the founding of the fighting force that became the U.S. Army, timed to coincide with President Donald Trump’s birthday, June 14.
Against the backdrop of increasing sweeps by immigration agents and the president’s decision to send National Guard members and active duty Marines to quell demonstrations against those sweeps in Los Angeles, over the objections of California lawmakers, the speakers at the Riverhead rally did not mince words in their summations of this past week’s events.
Speakers at the rally, organized by the Riverhead and Southampton Democratic Committees, included New York Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado; Congressman Dan Goldman; former congressional candidate John Avlon, Shinnecock Tribal Leader Denise Silva-Dennis; Southampton native Jon Lopez — a Georgetown University student and son of Mexican immigrants; Pastor Tisha Williams of the First Baptist Church of Bridgehampton; former Federal Prosecutor Dave Calone and State Assemblyman Tommy John Schiavoni and Southold Councilman Greg Doroski.
“Undocumented immigrants deserve due process,” said Mr. Lopez. “No one, not even a president, gets to rule like a king. California Governor Gavin Newsom is right. President Trump is not leading. These are the acts of a dictator. We reject kings here. We rise together and say enough!”
“We are the voice of the voiceless, the protectors of the oppressed, the descendants of immigrants,” he added. “We will not stay silent while our neighbors are hunted and our rights stripped away…. We have one choice. We can choose to stay, to build, to vote, to organize, to protest, to rise together. Latinos now make up more than half the student population on the East End of Long Island. One in four residents on the East End identify as Latino. These kids are watching us. They’re watching how we show up, how we speak up, and most importantly how we lead…. I choose hope and I choose love.”
“We reap what we sow, and while this movement of fear and division tries to take root, all it’s really done is awaken a sleeping giant, a generation filled with compassion, a generation that refuses to give up,” he added.”
“I will not sanitize the truth so it goes down easy. This is not about partisanship, it’s about power. This isn’t about red and blue, this is about blood and bones,” said Pastor Williams. “This is about the people in my pews and in your communities who are rationing insulin, about the mamas who have to skip meals and the elders who have to skip their meds and the youth who are skipping hope. If your gospel hasn’t got room for that, then it’s not gospel, it’s gaslighting.”
“Our people and the Corchaug people who were just right on this land — there were wigwams and wickiups for thousands of years, right here where you’re standing, where this courthouse is. These were villages of the Corchaug and Shinnecock people,” said Shinnecock educator and artist Denise Silva Dennis. “Their spirits do remain. As I grew up, we weren’t really allowed to speak our language. One word is Aquay, which means ‘hello,’ but it doesn’t just mean hello. It means ‘I see the light in you.’ You have a light in you that can shine to the true freedom that America is supposed to be.”
“If I took off my regalia that I am wearing right now, I could be easily pulled over and asked by an ICE agent to identify who I am, where are you from? What’s your ID? This is wrong and we need to stand up,” she added.
Southold Councilman Greg Doroski, who is running for a seat on the Suffolk County Legislature, serves as a Southold Police Commissioner in his capacity as Councilman.
“On Monday, the Southold Police Department, which I help oversee, reached out to ICE for clarity on tactics and procedures,” he said. ‘As of yesterday afternoon, we received no response. None. Zero. When local law enforcement seeks guidance in good faith and gets silence in return, that’s negligence. This is not public safety. This is a reckless disregard for the rule of law and the officers who uphold it.”
New State Assemblyman Tommy John Schivoni, who served for many years in local government, says now he sits in the “hallowed halls of Albany, under a symbol. On that symbol are two women — justice and liberty. The symbol of liberty on our seal is holding a scepter in one hand with a peasant hat on top of that, and under her left foot is a crown, symbolizing our rejection of a king.”
“We are talking about authoritarianism in the United States. That has no place,” he added. “Now is the time for us to stand firm and say we will not accept tyranny from this federal executive.”
“We’re confronting and standing up to an assault on the Constitution,” said John Avlon. “We are not gonna allow that…. These are the patriotic ideals we are defending as citizens across the United States of America today.”
“We are happy warriors,” he added. “When we get together in righteous protests like this, we need to remember the successful pro-democracy movements that push against autocratic power grabs. We’ve gotta be positive and patriotic, and that’s what you all are here today. We’ve also gotta make sure we are committed to peace. We’ve gotta hold ourselves to a higher standard.”
He added that Congressman Goldman believes Donald Trump is trying to incite violence.
“We’re not gonna give him what he wants,” he said. “We’re going to remember the lessons of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. — the power of non-violence, the power of the powerless…. It’s a discipline that we’ve gotta keep in mind.”
Rep. Goldman, who was a lead counsel in Donald Trump’s first impeachment, now represents lower Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn in Congress.
“I know that, unfortunately, you all in Suffolk County don’t get to hear very much directly from your representative in Congress,” he said, spurring a chant of “Where is LaLota,” referring to local Congressman Nick LaLota, a staunch supporter of the president. “When you do hear from him, it is rarely the truth. I thought I’d take a little drive so you can hear directly from a member of Congress and so you can get a little bit of truth.”
“We know we have a president who would be king. Today’s military parade that would make Kim Jong Un blush is just another example of it,” he said. “He’s not even simply just a king trying to grift off of his position, he is methodically and strategically attacking every form of accountability so that he can get revenge, retribution and more and more money in his pockets.”
“If you’re a human being, and you’ve got a heart and you can love, you’re free here in America,” said Lt. Gov. Delgado. “We don’t scapegoat. We don’t peddle fear. We don’t lean on division. We lean on each other, and our shared humanity as individuals and as people. We celebrate the greatest generation that beat back fascism, that beat back Nazism. We call them great, not because of their military might but because of the values and the principles that they fought to defend and protect.”
“This country is great. It need not be made great again. It is great because of what we represent to ourselves and the world,” he added. “The world comes here because of freedom and justice and equality and opportunity. That is what this country represents, not military might. Not parades up and down the streets of DC with tanks and missiles. Please never forget that democracy is built on a moral idea that we are all created equal. Everybody gets equal voice. Everybody counts.”
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