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As the nation approaches its 250th anniversary, two veteran activists are celebrating one of the country’s foundational principles: the right to protest, as embodied in the Declaration of Independence. But they warn that this right is under attack.
“Our ability to protest is key to moving forward on a whole range of environmental and social issues … which is why I’m so terrified at the thought of losing this democratic right,” said Annie Leonard, who spent 17 years with Greenpeace USA, serving as executive director from 2014 to 2023.
She and André Carothers are co-authors of “Protest: Respect It, Defend It, Use It.” Carothers spent 13 years with Greenpeace USA and co-founded and led the Rockwood Leadership Institute.
The two have direct experience of the power of the protest and the ferocity of the pushback.
Anti-protest laws are spreading and becoming increasingly repressive. Nearly 400 anti-protest bills have been introduced in 45 states, according to the International Center for Not-For-Profit Law. Activists are now being charged with felonies and accused of terrorism.
One of the most draconian anti-protest tools is known as a strategic lawsuit against public participation, as was filed against Greenpeace by Energy Transfers, builder of the Dakota Access Pipeline. The company accused Greenpeace of inciting violence and spreading misinformation during indigenous-led protests in 2016 and 2017 that delayed construction. Last year, a North Dakota jury awarded Energy Transfers $660 million, later reduced to a still-staggering $345 million.
SLAPP lawsuits “are designed to intimidate, silence, scare, distract and bankrupt critics,” Leonard told me. “It’s a kind of corporate legal bullying” intended to prevent people from protesting. Forty states, including Vermont, now have anti-SLAPP statutes.
“Protest” describes creative and successful acts of resistance from around the world. Among these are the 2015 protests by “kayaktivists” in Seattle aimed at stopping Shell Oil from drilling in the Arctic. Hundreds of people in kayaks, sailboats and tribal canoes took to the water to block an oil drilling rig, Shell’s Polar Pioneer, as it was being moved to Alaska. The boaters held up signs saying, “Save the Arctic,” “Oil-Free Future” and “Shell No!”
After spending $7 billion on Arctic oil exploration, Shell ultimately canceled the project, citing high costs and “the challenging and unpredictable federal regulatory environment,” which protesters took credit for.
Leonard said that what made the Seattle protest successful was that it was “part of a long intentional escalating campaign” that included family kayak training each weekend and free kayak rentals. “There were community meetings and art builds. It was a very inclusive and participatory set of activities for a couple of years leading up to filling the actual bay with kayaks to try to stop the Polar Pioneer from moving forward.”
Carothers noted that “a lot of these protesters are not honored at the time.” Rosa Parks and her husband lost their jobs and had to leave town after her refusal to give up her seat for a white person on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955. It took nearly 40 years before Parks was honored by President Bill Clinton with a Presidential Medal of Freedom.
“There are so many ways to get involved,” said Carothers, highlighting how citizens have protested the federal immigration crackdowns in New Orleans, Los Angeles and Minneapolis. He said he counted 27 different ways that people in Minneapolis resisted U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, “from people driving their neighbors’ kids to school because they didn’t want to leave the house,” to lawyers offering their services in cars, to people delivering food to their immigrant neighbors, to others “who went to the detention center with a blanket and a cup of hot soup when someone was released.”
Leonard and Carothers want their book to be both inspirational and practical. They are speaking at the Patagonia store in Burlington on June 5 and offering a training in nonviolent resistance the following day.
“If you’re feeling alone and if you’re feeling isolated, don’t be alone,” Carothers said. “Find a neighbor, find a mailing list that is describing what’s available to you in your community … and do what it takes to support the universe of people who are perhaps more inclined to go in the street, or perhaps more inclined to be arrested because they have the social capital (or) the economic flexibility to risk arrest in a way other people don’t.”
“There’s lots of ways to be involved,” Carothers added, emphasizing: “Protest works.”
