Scientists aren’t going to take this sitting down.
The people who predict and analyze our weather and climate, protect endangered species, guard against infectious disease, and even fight wildfires are under attack by President Donald Trump’s administration. They’re contending with layoffs, funding freezes and other systematic efforts to undercut and discredit their work.
Now these scientists and their supporters are rallying across the country and organizing countermeasures against Trump’s shoot-first-aim-later strategy. Thousands gathered Friday afternoon at Seattle Center as part of a growing national effort to push back against the right-wing policies and disinformation spreading around the country.
“No one is coming to save us from this,” said Abraham Flaxman, a professor of global health at the University of Washington. “We’re going to have to save ourselves.”
A deep roster of multidisciplinary scientists took the stage, some recently laid off in the widespread cuts across the federal government. They outlined how the Trump administration is cutting into their research.
Ira Hyman, a professor at Western Washington University, outlined Trump’s disinformation campaign meant to sow mistrust in widely accepted and peer-reviewed science. The president and his allies are spreading lies, he said. He took a brief moment to reaffirm two widely accepted principles recently under attack: Vaccines work and climate change is caused by humans burning fossil fuels.
By showing up to rallies like this one, and in droves, people across the country can see they’re not alone and feel empowered to push back, the ralliers hoped.
Friday afternoon, this crowd felt empowered. For hours, the group repurposed old protest songs, loud enough, they hoped, to be heard in Washington, D.C.
“Hey hey, ho ho, defunding science has got to go!”
“When DEI is under attack, we stand up, fight back!”
They booed — and loudly — mentions of Trump’s efforts to dismantle the scientific community, taking particular aim at newly minted Secretary of Human Health and Services Robert Kennedy Jr.
Many were stirred to action, swapping protest signs and phone numbers, grabbing from stacks of available post cards they’ll later address to their representatives in Congress. Among them stood Ragan Masterson, who drove up from Puyallup because she was tired of feeling frustrated and helpless for months on end.
Masterson said she’s inspired to become more vocal, especially toward her representatives, and she’ll be paying more attention for rallies like this one. Scientific research is the bedrock of the American economy, and the Trump administration shouldn’t be allowed to unilaterally decide which findings are important and which see the light of day, she said.
Some public officials were also in attendance. Recently elected Gov. Bob Ferguson took the stage for a few minutes. He expressed dismay that he and other politicians must confirm their support for science.
Ferguson touted his record as state attorney general when he successfully and repeatedly sued the first Trump administration, and he promised more legal pushback from Washington in the months and years ahead.
Public Lands Commissioner Dave Upthegrove also took the mic, yelling that evidence, research and truth deserve to be supported, not silenced.
Upthegrove said his team is still assessing the damage to its federal partners and what that means for things like widespread drought and wildfire risk. At the very least, chaos from the Trump administration has spread uncertainty and created additional risk throughout the field. But the newly elected commissioner said he’s trying not to panic and instead is preparing to make the necessary adjustments to fill gaps left by the federal government.
