LONDON—Activists in Britain vowed Monday to mobilize “in our thousands and our millions” against Donald Trump’s second term as president of the United States.
The Stop Trump Coalition of thousands of campaigners, which includes trade unionists and climate activists, released the statement on the day Trump was sworn in as the 47th president of the U.S.
This came as Amnesty International warned that multi-billionaire Trump was returning to power amid the dangerous tsunami of global conflict, rising authoritarianism, unchecked corporate power, and climate emergency.
The group organized some of the biggest protests in British history in response to Trump’s state visits in 2017 and 2018.
Zoe Gardner, a spokesperson for the Stop Trump Coalition, said: “In the coming weeks, we are likely to witness appalling attacks on migrants and minorities in America—just as we saw with the racist ‘Muslim ban’ in the opening days of the first Trump administration in 2017.
“It is essential that there is a broad, democratic coalition which can bring together the opposition to Trumpism—and to the new far right here in Britain.”
The statement described Trump’s inauguration as a “dark moment” and as a sign that “the far right is on the march.”
The statement said right-wing figures such as Trump, Elon Musk, Nigel Farage, and U.K. Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch “are symptoms of the failure of our political and economic system.
“Free market economics and austerity laid the ground. By failing to challenge the far right on immigration and other key issues, and instead mirroring their rhetoric and narratives, Starmer…is handing victory to the far right.”
“Fighting back means mobilizing in our thousands and in our millions—but it must also mean a more fundamental effort to unite and strengthen movements dedicated to social and environmental justice, working-class organization, and universal human and civil rights.”
The statement added: “We pledge ourselves to that work, and to building a resistance to Trump and the politics he represents.”
Activists from the Stop Trump Coalition were set to join with Stand Up to Racism, Friends of the Earth, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), Abortion Rights, Stop the War Coalition, Campaign Against Climate Change, Keep Our NHS Public, and others for a protest opposite Downing Street as Trump was being sworn in.
Campaigners are warning of a wave of racism that could be unleashed during Trump’s presidency, following the escalation of racist rhetoric during the election campaign.
The statement points out how Trump claimed migrants and refugees are genetically predisposed to commit crimes, describing migrants as “animals’” who will “cut your throat,” while telling nearly all-white audiences that they had “good genes.”
They also describe how Trump vowed during the election campaign to build detention camps and conduct mass deportations, claiming that migrants have invaded, destroying the country from inside its borders.
The statement also said that Trump, along with running mate J.D. Vance, spread baseless claims during the campaign about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio, allegedly eating pets which led to bomb threats at local schools.
Stand Up to Racism co-convener Sabby Dhalu said the incoming president “escalated the rhetoric, used dehumanizing, white-supremacist and violent language during the most racist presidential election campaign in living memory, pledging mass deportations of migrants and refugees.”
She added: “Our movement must be braced for the racist onslaught that is set to be unleashed by the next Trump presidency that will embolden the far right and racists in the U.S. and around the globe.”
CND General Secretary Sophie Bolt told the Morning Star that Trump’s “‘America First’ agenda is all about using military threats and economic coercion to maintain U.S. world domination—whatever the cost.”
She added that with the incoming president’s “sights on Iran and China, and his finger on the nuclear button, the need for a nuclear-free world has never been more urgent.”
Communist Party of Britain General Secretary Robert Griffiths warned that “the empowerment of this megalomaniac and his far-right and billionaire backers poses a grave threat to democratic rights, the environment, and peace.
“Trump and his clique’s contempt for women, trade unionists, immigrants, and for the national rights of the peoples of Palestine, Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Panama, and Greenland demands the united, militant opposition of left, progressive, and anti-imperialist forces around the world.”
Griffiths told Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his Foreign Secretary David Lammy that “instead of queuing up behind Nigel Farage to kiss Trump’s rump,” they should, instead, prepare to remove Britain from NATO and all U.S. military bases from Britain.
He added: “More than ever, we need an independent foreign and defense policy based on international peace, cooperation, and solidarity—not a ‘special relationship’ with the world’s aggressive, money-mad, war-mongering superpower.”
Co-leader of the Scottish Greens Lorna Slater described Trump as “a clear and present danger to our climate and to human rights around the world. The politics that he represents are the exact opposite of everything that Scotland should stand for.”
Slater added: “There are millions of people across the U.S. who will be concerned about what Donald Trump and his administration will do with their rights. Those are the people who we should be standing in solidarity with today.”
Amnesty International said Trump was beginning his second term “under a dramatically changed global environment of growing inequality, rising authoritarianism, ongoing conflicts, attacks on bodily autonomy, unchecked corporate and tech power, displacement from violence and insecurity, and a climate emergency accelerating and exacerbating human rights violations and suffering.”
Amnesty Secretary-general Agnes Callamard said: “Mr. Trump is taking office at a time when the already fragile multilateral and human rights system, often targets of the first Trump administration’s disdain, have been further severely undermined by President Biden’s inconsistencies and unwillingness to push allies and partners to respect international law.”
She added: “The decisions that President Trump makes will have far-reaching consequences that impact the lives of everyone on this planet and even future generations who have yet to be born.”
Morning Star
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