Why We’re All In This May Day

By Felicia Gustin

​“This May Day is more than just a march. It is the refusal to comply with a violent regime and its billionaire backers. It’s choosing our families and our neighbors over their fortunes. Our futures over fascism.“
-- Bay Resistance, a Bay Area network of community groups, faith organizations, unions, and neighbors standing together to defend our communities 

May Day is just days away and across the country, thousands of organizations and millions of people are coming together with a common purpose: using non-cooperation to stand together against the billionaires waging war on working people. We’re calling for a day of No Work. No School. No Shopping. ​

To better understand why, here are the voices of just a few of the coalitions, organizations, unions, and individuals who are showing up this May Day, International Worker’s Day 2026.

“We make this country run and we know how to take care of each other. Our families and our freedoms need defending. Together we will ensure access to opportunity and a better life for all.
Our Demands to Build the Society We Deserve: 
          • Tax the Rich: Our families, not their fortunes, come first.
          • No ICE. No war. 
          • No private army serving authoritarian power.
          • Expand democracy, not corporate power. Hands off our vote.”
 — May Day Strong, a coalition of hundreds of national organizations, trade unions, community groups, and local coalitions

Building on the Legacy of Worker Organizing
This year, May Day is building on a long history of labor struggles and organizing that led to the establishment of International Workers’ Day in 1889. From 2006’s “Day Without an Immigrant” boycott and strike in over 200 U.S. cities, to the Black-led campaigns against corporations like Target when they abandoned DEI, we are witnessing people power in action.

“May Day comes out of a long history of workers standing up and risking everything for our basic rights that we take for granted every day, like the eight-hour workday and the week-end … And this year Mayday is no different. It’s being led by the people who have the most at stake … working-class people, immigrant and undocumented communities, who are continuing to put their livelihoods and their lives on the line.

And that matters to me. I’m showing up because I want to be in solidarity with and fighting alongside people who are leading this fight. I’m showing up because Trump and his billionaire agenda are betting on our fear, our exhaustion, our overwhelm, our despair, and our silence.”
— Corri Frohlich, Leadership Team, SURJ Bay Area
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Resisting ICE’s War on Our Communities
ICE has encountered powerful resistance across the country. And non-cooperation took center stage when, on January 23, 2026, a massive general strike and "ICE Out of Minnesota" protest drew some 100,000 people in Minneapolis, despite -10°F temperatures. 

Still, as of mid-January, some 73,000 immigrants are being imprisoned in facilities operated by private prison corporations who are raking in billions. According to Time Magazine, the two largest operators, GEO Group and CoreCivic, both surpassed $2 billion in annual revenue last year and project their 2026 revenue to reach between $2.9 billion and $3.1 billion. Those are our tax dollars! Those are our neighbors!

“It is on each of us to take action at this moment … We want to make sure that this is our largest antiwar mobilization yet. Members of Congress, corporate actors, and billionaire profiteers who are making violence possible against our communities here and abroad must hear from us.“
— Rising Majority, a coalition birthed by the Movement for Black Lives along with a multiracial network of organizations serving communities on a wide range of issues

The High Cost of Wars Abroad
Our tax dollars are financing Israel’s war on Palestine and Lebanon. Trump’s own Department of State estimates that the U.S. provides $3.8 billion annually to Israel.

And the daily cost of Trump’s violent escapade against Iran? According to CNN, it’s somewhere between $500 million and over $1 billion per day. The Harvard Kennedy School puts the costs even higher, in some cases hitting $2 billion per day. Our pockets!

What could these dollars be used for instead? The same programs being slashed to pay for these wars at home and abroad: affordable housing and health care, initiatives that address the ravages of climate change, equity programs for those who’ve been marginalized, and free education from pre-school through university level, to name a few.

“On May 1, 2026, educators will join workers, parents, students, and community members to rise up for dignity, justice, and public investment in our lives, not in billionaires' profit margins … May Day is one of many opportunities we will seize to make our voices heard. We won't be silent or ignored. There's too much at stake.”
— National Education Association, the largest labor union in the United States, representing some 3 million teachers, faculty, and staff

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We also cannot forget the human costs of these wars. According to the Human Rights Activists News Agency, over 3,600 people have been killed thus far in Iran, including 1,701 civilians (254 of them children). In Lebanon, some 1,500 deaths have been reported.

And the death toll in Palestine continues to soar: the Gaza Ministry of Health reports that as of April 2026, over 72,000 Palestinians have been reported killed in Israel’s most recent war on Palestine,  with thousands more still under the rubble. 
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We have to remember that it is our government waging these wars in our name and it is on us to raise an anti-war message in all our organizing. Global solidarity must mean more than how a foreign war is impacting our gas or grocery prices. 

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The Threat to the Elections
Given his unpopularity, this year's midterms are a looming threat to Trump’s agenda. His remedy? Trump is pushing several bills that would tilt the elections in his favor.

The SAVE (Safeguard American Voter Eligibility) America Act that’s making its way through Congress would require those registering to vote to produce a passport or birth certificate—documents that, according to the Brennan Center for Justice, over 20 million Americans of voting age do not have access to.

Then there’s the Make Elections Great Again (MEGA) Act, which would eradicate universal mail-in voting and take election administration away from the states and put it in the hands of the federal government.

“May Day offers us an opportunity to test our movement’s ability to do nonviolent, economic disruption. We need to gauge our strength, identify what power we still need to build, and implement a collective plan to get there. We can’t wait to figure this out after Trump has stolen an election—that work must happen now, before it’s too late.” 
— Indivisible, a nationwide movement organizing to stop the rise of authoritarianism and build democracy 
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The worse-case election scenario takes on even more ominous possibilities, like the deployment of ICE agents to polling places to intimidate voters (remember how many legal immigrants and even citizens have been harassed or picked up by ICE?) along with dispatching the National Guard or federal agents from the Department of Justice to seize ballot boxes, declaring the elections rigged. May Day gives us the opportunity to flex our collective muscles as we prepare for Trump’s attack on democratic elections.

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SURJ Is Showing Up Across the County
SURJ Bay Area is just one of some 175 chapters nationwide that’s all in this May Day. Bringing more white people into the multiracial movement for economic and racial justice requires sustained on-the-ground organizing, like having one-to-one conversations with neighbors, friends, family members, and networks, and providing ways we can all be in solidarity with each other. 

“Organizing for May Day, SURJ Bay Area members are inviting white folks into practicing non-cooperation and being in solidarity with working class people, with immigrants, with undocumented people, who are leading this May Day and the fight against the authoritarian machine. This May Day is so important because we’re showing this regime—this billionaire class—that we have the power: we the people, the consumers, the workers, who make the system run. We also have the power to shut the system down.”
— Mack Boyle, Leadership Team, SURJ Bay Area and the chapter’s representative to Bay Resistance

There are so many ways that you too can make history! You can decide to not go to work or school, or not to shop. If you take even one of these actions, you’ll be joining the nationwide movement sending a powerful message to the billionaires running our government. 

We the People aren’t just a few words at the top of one of this country’s founding documents. It is each and every one of us, joining together collectively, to insure that authoritarianism’s stranglehold on this nation is dismantled.

What are you willing to do? What are you willing to risk to stop fascism?
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Sign the May Day Pledge!  

Learn more about the Oakland Mobilization led by Sin Fronteras. Follow Sin Fronteras on Instagram

Join the SURJ Contingent at May Day in Oakland!

Learn about the San Francisco Mobilization from Bay Resistance.

Not in Oakland or San Francisco? Find a Mobilization Near You