I see homeless children eating pizza as, down the hall, Supervisors vote against investing in their long-term housing. I hear anguish in a trans person’s public comment on how a prior Board vote on a budget line item resulted in them losing their job, jeopardizing their survival. I feel the in-sync clapping and gentle singing of my Latine community as we traverse the Supervisor offices, finally serenading a mayor’s staffer with pleas to not cut us. I am one of many in the People’s Budget Coalition raising a ruckus at city hall this month with aims to restore the billionheir mayor’s proposed budget cuts. These cuts target the same vulnerable, marginalized people that the Trump administration is targeting. We don’t want to fight our local government and representatives, but they force us to.
Last June masked ICE employees began abducting people from immigration courts in San Francisco, stuffing them in unmarked vans to disappear into concentration camps.
Last June I stood for hours and hours on end, week after week, month after month, on the sidewalks of Montgomery St looking out for ICE. I reported on what I saw so my San Francisco community would know the truth, a truth many local news outlets were silencing. I saw the violence ICE wielded against immigrants, against us. I did all I reasonably (legally) could with my body, my heart, my words to deter these abductions of innocent people. I stood watch in the mornings, running to city hall in the afternoons pleading in my public comments to Supervisors to do something. They will say they did; they passed a couple laws. I say they could and should have done so much more.
The federal government just ruled that abducting people from immigration court is, indeed, illegal. Last June San Francisco had 20+ immigration courts. Now it only has two whose administrative control will fall under the Concord Immigration Court in September. San Francisco, an immigrant sanctuary city with no immigration courts of its own, accomplished within 2 years.
Last June required discretion, confronting fears of federal retribution and risk. This June is meant to be public, confronting smiling politicians on their home court, not with “FUCK YOU, TRAITORS!” (still applicable, IMO) but with printed budget requests delivered with singing, chanting, and yeah, sometimes yelling. One time the Budget Committee deliberately wrapped up their meeting early to avoid a protest we planned for said meeting. En masse we chanted down the white halls to the legislative chambers, watching Supervisors and mayoral staff quickly evacuate, Sheriffs locking the doors upon our arrival. “We will be back,” we yelled. We returned yesterday for a full day of making one-minute public comments on why we need a People’s Budget, “Don’t cut this life-saving service, don’t cut that one either,” on repeat for hours and hours. Today Supervisors will make their budget adjustments.
People argue that the Supervisors don’t have that much control over the budget. It’s the mayor who does. I argue that if the Supervisors really wanted to, they could unite and not pass such a harmful budget. Can we at least see what would happen if the Supervisors literally stood with The People?
Having representatives actually risk their careers, not their LIVES, but their careers, to save our lives? I didn’t see any Supervisor on the sidewalk trying to protect their constituents from abduction, so yeah, that’s not gonna happen. But it could if we actually had a society that cared for its people and each other. Currently we have representatives more invested in advancing their careers within a hate-fueled government, adopting hatred of the poor, advancing racism and transphobia, sanctioning genocides in Palestine, the DRC, Sudan, Cuba, every imperialist American venture to kill, extract and dominate. Some representatives do less harm than others, but they all do massive harm. That is the nature of our current government. Those that truly try not to are ejected, one way or another, from the government. Americans are normalized to all the harm and violence. My wife always points to school shootings. We let that happen instead of fighting for our children’s safety.
I have slowly learned these past few years that I am not “normal.” I thought I was. But now I know I am not. It was not “normal” for people to show up Last June and risk it all to protect people they don’t know. It is not “normal” to publicly let people know that you’re doing that.
That was the question Protectors kept trying to answer Last June. Protectors tried bringing in the anti-genocide non-profits, the immigrant rights non-profits, the unions, the pro-democracy groups, any organization that had masses of people they could easily mobilize. But they didn’t like the risk. They spoke of liability. They ended up staying away from Montgomery St sidewalks. Except for Democratic Socialists of America. The showed up a little later and I’ll always give them credit for that. I also give massive credit to all the people who did show up, even if for one day, using their body to provide protective community presence for immigrants. I know some were scared and still showed up. Every person counted, but more was needed to sustain daily presence for an unknown amount of time. Protectors tried enticing people with workshops, with free concerts, with drag shows and political clowns. It worked a little, but never reached the heights that the official orgs could bring in. However I must share that we were successful in deterring abductions despite these hardships. I must share that people donated food and supplies to keep us sustained. I’ll never forget that either. Still, I was bitter towards these official groups.
The System isn’t just the government and its laws. The System is also how our government has offloaded its responsibility to care for us to non-profits and organizations. The System controls who gets the funding to care for us. The System yanks funding to keep the orgs in check, to keep us oppressed. If the non-profits commit harm or fraud, it’s not the government’s fault, The System will say. Accountability avoided.
While I’m aware of small-scale mutual aid and care networks that operate outside of The System, they’re not built out enough to replace the care and services these non-profits and orgs are providing. I know people who are getting paid low-wage or small salaries in these non-profits that are truly there to help others. They’re working there because it’s one of the few ways our society allows us to make a living helping others. So while I do not believe in The System, I want to show these people doing the caring, doing the hard work, that I support them. I will advocate for their funding. I would also like for care networks outside of The System to replace this whole capitalist, non-profit machine, but I don’t see that happening (yet). At this moment I can only hope that after however many more years of defunding some of these non-profits will take their people, relationships and knowledge, and experiment with pivoting their work out from under The System.
These identities have inhibited my success in joining any official group. I don’t know how to exist in a group that ignores that we’re in the midst of an escalating trans genocide, nor do I want to join them. I don’t want to join a group where the leaders are all white, or white-appeasing. I don’t want to gain power in The System, nor have a good relationship with it. This stubbornness may be too American of me, a self-sabotage. I’ve asked that of myself this past year. The only conclusion I’ve come to is I have repeatedly tried various things in good faith, and being an intersectional, fluid supporter while retaining my independent, critical voice is what I am still most comfortable with. I will forever be learning, open to change, and believing we all deserve better than what we’re being given. I just hope people realize that we can’t wait to be given a better future. We must create it, The System be damned.
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June 20, 2026 People will chastise you for suffering too much for suffering incorrectly for suffering too loudly keep your suffering to yourself or present it with a pink bow on top aesthetic consumption ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Human Capital An animal a creature captured conditioned trained bred repeat No recollection for generations of a life pre-capture pre-conditioning pre-training pre-breeding to pass on to the next generation profiting off your worn captured conditioned trained bred body My dreams dream of a clay to sculpt timeless unbound squish & suck squeeze & shape emote into physical form lazy afternoon riverside rushing wiggle worms smiles & winks luscious cool waters wash over tender toes & earthen feet --Poems by me
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