Refuse Fascism Free DC Protests Occupation

A large crowd gathered on Saturday at 2pm, August 16, 2025, for a Refuse Fascism and Free DC protest at Dupont Circle in Washington, D.C.

One of the core issues this week within Metropolitan DC is the Executive Order by President Trump "Declaring a Crime Emergency in the District of Columbia." This was accompanied by another order "federalizing" the D.C. Metropolitan Police. This includes sending in thousands of extra police including from the National Guard, Homeland Security, F.B.I., and Secret Service. For instance, just today the North Carolina governor approved sending an additional 400 National Guard to D.C.

This manufacturing of a crisis is creating a situation that concerns local residents because of the history of the District being a special place, the nation's capital, where people of all races, countries of origin, religions, and ethnicities gather for anything from international diplomacy, to business, conventions, advocacy, and especially the exchange of ideas across the socio-geographic spectrum.

Already this week, a few days after the announcements on Monday, August 11th, there are new rules enacted by the federal police under the authority of the U.S. Attorney General. There are checkpoints set up for all automobiles not only slowing traffic down, but in areas in which there are notable nightspots for tourists and people of color, such as 14th and U Street NW. There is a new curfew for youth enabling police to ask for identification, arrest people for smoking marijuana, and detaining anyone who looks as if they are not a U.S. citizen.

The worst part from the perspective of lower-income and working-class residents is concerns over racial and income-based profiling. This makes all people of color more vulnerable, particularly from neighborhoods which President Trump might categorize as containing "slums." The sweep of the city to sanitize it of homeless people or those who appear to be vagrant is especially troubling, but this is in line with the new orders to end "sanctuary cities" and according to the Executive Order, "Ending Crime and Disorder on America's Streets," dated July 24th.

According to one Street Sense Media vendor and writer this reporter interviewed today, the Trump Orders, including the March 28th "Making the District of Columbia Safe and Beautiful" Action of March 28, 2025, is alarming. This gal related that she has been in and out of hospitals due to her poor health condition, and that this is exacerbated by being homeless, and to such an extent that she counts herself lucky to be able to check into a hotel two days a month. Now she must also wear her tattered work vest 24/7 to ensure that she is not accused of loitering or vagrancy.

What is especially alarming to residents is that the Actions of President Trump indicate that he does not even care to have D.C. government bureaucrats involved in his "D.C. Safe and Beautiful Task Force." Trump stated from the August 11th Fact Sheet: "Just like I took care of the Border...I will take care of our cherished Capital, and we will make it, truly, GREAT AGAIN! Before the tents, squalor, filth, and Crime, it was the most beautiful Capital in the World. It will soon be that again."

However arguably the Capital has contained many sources of filth besides just from the bottom quartile of socioeconomic class. This is why there were a sprinkling of posters demanding accountability from Trump: "Show us the Epstein Files!", "People Over Profit", and "The Biggest Criminal in America is at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave."

This is why people are decrying the takeover of the DC-MPD, because they see and hear the writing on the wall, as even Congresspeople are telling us. According to Ms. Goldman, shouting to the crowd, this is an illegitimate government if it is so inhumane to the homeless, if there is "Taxation Without Representation", if the city is under "military occupation" with police stationed at "checkpoints" hunting down and kidnapping black and brown, and targeting the activities of hardworking National Mall vendors.

The grassroots rhetoric mirrors what House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries stated on August 13, 2025, ahead of the 90th anniversary of Social Security, how bad things are happening, because it is as if the GOP wants to turn the clock back to pre-1965 before the Voting Rights Act, destroy Medicaid, take a chainsaw to Social Security, cancel medical research, shut down hospitals and nursing homes, and deprive veterans and seniors of housing benefits.

"The Democratic Party is actually committed to making life better for everyday Americans. We don't just talk about it. We are about it. We have a track record that demonstrates it. Social Security. Rural Electrification Act. The G.I. Bill. Medicare. Medicaid. Head Start. The Civil Rights Act. The Voting Rights Act. The Fair Housing Act. The Elementary and Secondary School Act (ESEA). The Higher Education Act. The Children's Health Insurance Program. The Affordable Care Act. The American Rescue Plan. The Infrastructure and Jobs Act...."

Actually, more inclusive learning environments for students and children with disabilities were also the brainchild of legislations introduced by Democratic legislators, whether it was the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (EHA) in 1975, or the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which passed in 1990.

These and other bills that expand the social safety net and allow disabled people to assimilate into society rather than being warehoused in often very constrictive and restrictive institutions is supposed to be viewed as progress, even if today, with so many austerity measures in place, there are less ARC-work programs than ever. If the GOP really cared about the problems in the lives of the working poor, they would be creating more government-sponsored job-corps programs, mental health and social service outreach, and basic community housing projects.

It is this that the Refuse Fascism organization objects to, the shredding of the rule of law, and the creation of a kingship, that justifies a "refuse to comply" reaction and perception that "this is the worst clampdown ever seen in the history of D.C." Under a kingship, there is nothing unusual about dungeons or debtor prisons. There is nothing unusual about institutionalizing people in Victorian-style insane asylums and cancelling whole segments of "deplorable" populations.

RefuseFascism.org, and FreeDCProject.org hope to mobilize enough people to build a movement by November 5, 2025, that goes beyond Left and Right, and before all the gains from the 1960s are replaced with pre-1965 suppression of women's rights and rights for people of color and the erasure of LGBTQ identity and healthcare and other democratic labor rights.