Thousands protest around U.S. to defend science

Seattle 

Science workers squared off against the billionaires’ dictatorship with mass rallies and walkouts on March 7. Mass protests were held in 32 U.S. cities with coordinated walkouts held in over 100 big cities, state capitals and campus towns across the country. The day of action was international, with 30 cities in France participating!

Stand Up for Science is the campaign of science workers protesting the orders from President Donald Trump and Elon Musk for mass cutbacks and layoffs of scientists, researchers, health care workers, harming their patients. 

At the Seattle rally of 2,000 people, rage and opposition to all the cuts and layoffs affecting essential health care positions spilled out. One speaker talked about being censored and alone at work and being overjoyed at seeing huge numbers of chanting and cheering workers. Another speaker condemned federal attacks on diversity in the recruitment of new scientists, pointing out that new scientists must come from underrepresented communities. 

One of the 800 people who was laid off from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration said the layoffs would set back the implementation of policies to halt global warming. Speakers warned that federal threats against the 450,000 workers at the Veterans Administration could coerce workers to quit and cause veterans’ health care to suffer.

Science workers are in hospitals, college research labs, biotech firms and more. They are representative of the whole federal workforce under attack, which includes even more workers in state, local and nonprofit organizations. Many of them are low-paid laboratory workers. Many workers at the protest were members of United Auto Workers Local 4121 at the University of Washington. 

Attacks on science endanger the population

Workers know what ignoring science can lead to, since under the previous Trump administration over 1 million workers died in the U.S. from COVID-19 due to Trump-led anti-science rhetoric, prejudice and neglect. Many of the dead were health care workers. The mention of the new Health and Human Services secretary’s name, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., prompted a loud chorus of boos. 

Many of the people participating in the national actions are patients of the scientists and health care workers. They include trans people threatened with losing gender-affirming care and people with mental health and addiction challenges who could lose their treatments. 

Health care workers have a close relationship to those suffering from the harsh ills of capitalism. They are resisting Musk’s efforts to shred the scientific safety net and are in solidarity with their patients. They do their work despite the negative influence of insurance company executives and investors such as UnitedHealth Group Inc. 

The Stand Up for Science mass rallies and strikes were organized by a large grassroots effort of volunteers. Speakers at the main rally in Washington, D.C., included Bill Nye, the Science Guy, and former National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins, who helped map the human genome. 

The goals of Stand Up for Science are: Restoration of federal scientific funding; reinstatement of wrongly terminated employees at federal agencies; an end to governmental influence and censorship in science; and a renewed commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and accessibility in science. (standupforscience2025.org)