Seattle celebrated its 11th Indigenous People’s Day on Monday with a march through downtown that drew hundreds of participants under unusually bright skies and cool autumn temperatures.
Matt Remle, a Lakota activist who was instrumental in the city’s 2014 decision to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day, continues to organize and lead the annual event more than a decade later. Seattle was among the first major U.S. cities to make the change, setting a precedent that has since spread to communities across the country.
Marchers gathered Monday morning at the Federal building before proceeding through the downtown with the procession featuring drumming, traditional regalia, and banners honoring Coast Salish peoples. The event pays tribute to the Duwamish, Suquamish, Snoqualmie, and other tribal nations indigenous to the Puget Sound region.
The sunny and cool weather brought out a diverse crowd including tribal members, families, elders, youth, and community allies. Participants filled downtown streets as drums echoed between buildings and voices rose in prayer and song.
The annual march has become a fixture in Seattle’s October calendar, serving as both a celebration of Indigenous cultures and a reminder of ongoing efforts toward decolonization and tribal sovereignty. Organizers like Remle have maintained consistent participation over the years, ensuring the observance remains meaningful rather than symbolic.
What began as a gathering of 15-20 healthcare workers and community activists quickly swelled to over 100 healthcare workers, union members, and supporters. The group first gathered at Harborview Park before marching through downtown Seattle. They made stops at Victor Steinbrueck Park and finally converged on Amazon’s headquarters.
Their message was urgent: looming federal Medicaid cuts threaten to severely reduce healthcare access. At the same time, they warned, billionaires stand to receive massive tax breaks. Speakers denounced this as “the biggest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in U.S. history.”
“We’re seeing billionaires grabbing everything they possibly can, leaving working-class and poor people to scramble for the crumbs,” said Kimela Vigil, a mental health practitioner and vice president of the Harborview Union. She linked the $4.5 trillion in proposed cuts to a broader agenda: “The dismantling of the legal system, attacking education systems, using the military to suppress free speech, all of those are the perfect formula for authoritarianism and fascism… We are in it right now… Our role is to resist, to not be complacent.”
The cuts threaten to reverse healthcare gains at safety-net hospitals like Harborview, where uninsured rates dropped from 12% to 3% under the Affordable Care Act. Now, Vigil warned, the hospital could “lose $8.4 million annually for every 1% of Medicaid patients shifted to uninsured status.” She accused lawmakers of deliberate timing: “They designed these cuts to kick in after the election so they won’t be held accountable.”
The human cost was made starkly clear by frontline workers. “Medicaid is not just for poor people, it is for everyone,” said Harborview RN Sam Conley. “When hospitals can’t get reimbursed for care, our whole system breaks down…When people can’t afford treatment, they don’t get better, they get sicker.” RN Naomi Morris shared a life-or-death example: “Right now I have a 13-year-old patient with diabetes. His care is funded by Medicaid. It’s the reason he continues to survive.”
The rally highlighted how proposed Medicaid cuts fit into a broader pattern of austerity measures, from the elimination of food assistance to reduced childcare funding, while corporations and enforcement agencies reap benefits.
“SNAP cuts have already spiked food bank visits by 200% since 2019,” said Carmen Smith, Executive Director of the White Center Food Bank. “This is not unique to White Center Food Bank. It’s a trend we’re seeing across Washington State and across the nation.”
Meanwhile, the bill triples ICE funding while shrinking child care subsidies. SEIU 925 shared the story of Nicolle Orozco Forero, an asylum-seeking daycare provider detained and deported just days before opening her business—along with her entire family, including her severely ill son.
Corporate tax breaks, dubbed the “Big Ugly Bill” by critics, further fueled outrage. “…the biggest transfer of wealth in American history,” said Sterling Harders, President of SEIU 775, “and yet Amazon has more workers who rely on Medicaid than any other employer in Washington State.”
Yolanda King of SEIU 1199 invoked the spirit of civil rights resistance: “My grandparents stood with Dr. King. They understood that they’re not going to give it to us, we have to take it. Today we are saying that we are going to take back what is ours. This country belongs to us. We are the people, and we need to make a demand.”
Girmay Zahilay, a King County Councilmember, delivered a blunt assessment of the cuts’ local impact: “The budget director of King County told us, there is no way that King County on its own can backfill the scale of cuts coming from the Federal Government.” Zahilay outlined stopgap measures, pointing to the county’s allocation of $1 million to shore up reproductive healthcare clinics after Medicaid cuts threatened Planned Parenthood and Cedar River Clinics.
But he stressed the disparity in resources: “We can use the tools that we have from the state legislator,” he said, referencing a newly passed criminal justice sales tax expected to generate $90 million annually for homelessness and behavioral health services. The state has also authorized a new sales tax, but Zahilay admitted the choice feels wrong. “It’s either use that regressive tax or allow devastating cuts to happen in our community that we can’t stomach,” he said.
Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates greater Seattle organizer Madeline Brown delivered stark projections about the Medicaid cuts’ impact: “These cuts to Medicaid are going to increase and are going to result in 200 clinic closures, 90% of which are going to be in access states like Washington.”
She warned of systemic consequences: “Our healthcare system cannot handle the influx of those patients…after the midterm election, we know that 17 million people are going to be kicked off of their healthcare.”
Brown concluded with the rally’s defining message, met with applause from healthcare workers in scrubs and union members holding signs: “When Republicans choose billionaires, we choose each other.”
Seattle activists with Jewish Voice for Peace staged a sit-in at the Palantir offices in South Lake Union to demand that Washington state sever financial ties with Palantir, accusing the tech giant of profiting from human rights abuses. “We demand that the Washington state investment board and our elected officials divest from genocide by cutting ties with Palantir,” organizers declared at the demonstration.
Speakers said Palantir’s software directly aids Israeli military operations in Gaza. “Palantir is selling surveillance technology to corporations and government, fueling fascism at home and the genocide in Gaza,” one protester said. “Palantir profits off the genocide in Gaza by providing advanced training artificial intelligence to the Israeli Government and the Israeli occupation forces. This means Palantir provides the technology to kill people…individual citizens who are starving and standing in lines trying to get aid and food for their families. More aid workers have been killed during this genocide than in all the wars of the last 30 years.”
Hossam Nasr, a former Microsoft worker who said he was fired “for organizing a vigil on campus to honor the lives of Palestinians,” spoke out about how major tech companies have become “effectively…weapons manufacturers.” Nasr, now an organizer with No Azure for Apartheid, said, “These tech companies have deepened the relationship with the genocidal Israeli military. They saw an opportunity in death and destruction and killing of Palestinians to make profits.”
Nasr singled out Palantir as “leading the charge…the most brazenly, the most explicitly, the most violently.” He added, “Their CEO is publicly saying they’re happy and proud that their technology is killing Palestinians, that their technology is being used to track and detain and kidnap our neighbors.”
He detailed how Palantir built its business by embracing government defense contracts. “Palantir said to hell with that. We are evil and we’re proud, and we’re going to partner with the government because we want to dominate, because we want to kill, because we want to achieve the government’s aims of imperialism,” Nasr said. “Their first…contracts were actually with the US government and the DOD to help them with the war in Iraq. And since then, they have deepened their partnership.”
Protesters warned that these surveillance systems now reach beyond war zones. “Most people don’t know that Palantir is here, let alone that it profits from death and surveillance,” one speaker said. Nasr pointed to Palantir’s $30 million contract with ICE, which he said is creating “a centralized database across the IRS, ICE, other government agencies…to make it easy for us to track and surveil and target people. It’s completely heinous, dystopian, Orwellian, and it is happening with our tax dollars.”
He added, “For them to identify what they claim are immigrants or refugees or whatever, they have to surveil everyone. Your data is in that system, even if you’re a law-abiding legal citizen.”
For two hours, activists blocked entrances and left just before police arrived to arrest them. Protesters pledged to keep organizing. “For far too long, these tech companies have wreaked havoc upon the world. With unity, we must pay our tribute to the Palestinian people and to all victims of US imperialism, and say no more,” they said. “We will not rest until Palestine is free from the river to the sea.”
Nearly 100 demonstrators gathered outside the Starbucks Reserve Roastery and Tasting Room on Capitol Hill in Seattle to protest Starbucks and their alleged* support of Israel. After disrupting the full coffee business, customers were told to exit through side doors, all entrances were locked and workers were sent home through alley exits.
The protest then moved to Westlake Park by marching down Pine St. via Melrose Ave. Upon entering the area of the holiday event, a circle was formed in the street after meeting up with another group of pro-Palestine protestors. Using banners and the bike brigade to create space, the area between the Westlake stage and the tree became a protest area. Some tables were overturned as activists took over the stage to hold a banner. Despite some yelling from those there to see a tree with lights, there was little interaction between them and those protesting for human lives.
Activists took turns speaking about the atrocities in Palestine, some protestors released balloons with signs reading “Merry Genocide”, “Free Palestine”, and “Let Gaza Live”, and eventually the tree was lit, and the crowds began leaving.
*(A key element of Starbucks’ potential backing for Israel is found in its most prominent private shareholder, Howard Schultz. Recognized for his unwavering advocacy of Zionism, Schultz possesses a significant ownership stake in Starbucks and has actively endorsed Israel’s economic endeavors. Particularly noteworthy is Schultz’s high-profile investment of $1.7 billion in an Israeli cybersecurity startup named Wiz. This financial commitment underscores Schultz’s dedication to fostering Israel’s economic prosperity and technological progress, raising inquiries about Starbucks’ implicit alignment with Israeli interests.). https://fortune.com/2021/04/07/wiz-howard-schultz-investment-fundraising-cybersecurity-startups-starbucks-ceo/
According to Reuters, “Asked for comment, Starbucks referred to a statement on its website about its operations in the Middle East that was updated in October. The statement said the company was a non-political organisation and dismissed rumours that it had provided support to the Israeli government or army. Starbucks, which earlier this month reported record revenues for the fourth quarter, said it had nothing further to share on its business.” https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/boycott-campaigns-over-gaza-war-hit-western-brands-some-arab-countries-2023-11-22/
Thousands joined in a march from Heritage Park to the Capitol building in Olympia, WA in solidarity with pro Palestine demonstrations globally. Hundreds of thousands of people around the world joined in solidarity with the Palestinian people who are being killed and injured in attacks by Israel.
After reaching the Capitol building, hundreds participated in a “die in”, holding papers with the names and photos of people killed by Israeli bombs and bullets, and speaking their names out loud.
Capitol and Olympia police were present but there were no arrests or major confrontations.
In a demand that Senator Patty Murray call for a ceasefire in the conflict between Israel and Hamas, hundreds of activists with Jewish Voice for Peace and their allies shut down the Henry M. Jackson Federal building at 8am on November 3rd, 2023.
Activists blocked entrances on 1st Ave and 2nd Ave while one activist made it to the awning, hanging a banner demanding Senator Patty Murray call for a ceasefire.
Homeland Security and Federal Police pushed down several activists while attempting to remove the ladder used, injuring at least two. No arrests were made.
From the Jewish Voice for Peace – Seattle Facebook page… “In the last three weeks, over 9,000 Palestinians and 1,400 Israelis have been killed. Over 3000 children have been killed in Gaza. This week, the Israeli military has hit Gaza’s only hospital for cancer patients. They struck Gaza’s largest refugee camp, killing 100 people and burying others under rubble. Israeli warplanes have flattened entire neighborhoods. Shell-shocked children are left to search for their parents under the rubble. Millions of Palestinians have once again been made refugees, bombed as they tried to flee. Surgeons are operating by the light of their cellphones, increasingly without anesthesia. Over half the hospitals have been forced to shut down. In the West Bank, 120 Palestinians have been killed since the beginning of the war. Jewish settlers are burning down houses with families in them after they come with warning notes for the Palestinians who have not yet fled to do so immediately or they will be killed. Israel has doubled the number of Palestinian prisoners to 10,000 in the last two weeks. Every bomb dropped on Gaza threatens the lives of 2.2 million Palestinians in Gaza and 200 Israeli hostages. But the Israeli government has made it clear that they do not value life and will not negotiate, as it would rather continue its genocidal attack against Palestinians.
In Seattle, we need to demand that Senator Murray call for a CEASEFIRE NOW. We cannot stand for business as usual. We cannot stand by as a genocide is carried out in our names.
Join Jews and ALL people of conscience to cry out as loudly as we can: Ceasefire now to save lives. End the siege on Gaza. End Israeli apartheid. B’tselem Elohim: Every life is precious.”
Outrage continues to grow over comments made by Seattle police officer Daniel Auderer as he was caught laughing and joking while discussing 23-year-old’s Jaahnavi Kandula’s death.
September 23, 2023 An estimated 100 people marched, biked, or drove from Seattle’s International District to Seattle Police Officers Guild building. While there, family members affected by police violence spoke to the crowd demanding police be accountable to the community, not be investigated by their peers. The crowd dispersed less than an hour after arriving at SPOG HQ. Seattle police watched from a distance and a POET team tried to engage the protest before they were told to leave. A King County Sheriff’s helicopter circled the protest at the beginning and end of the march. There were no arrests.
At least 200 people gathered at Be’er Sheva Park for a prayer walk to Othello Park in honor of Missing and Murdered Indigenous People. Demands for justice and an end to violence against indigenous people were joined by songs and drumming as people moved North on Rainier Ave. A car brigade, bicycle brigade, and an indigenous motorcycle club provided protection for those on the march.
The Dignity Virus 