By the time Congressmember Salud Carbajal and fellow Democrat dignitaries stepped to the microphone for the “Emergency Town Hall” at the Unitarian Society in Santa Barbara Saturday afternoon, the pews in the church’s main hall were packed with hundreds of people, as were the walls along the sanctuary room, the second-floor choir benches, the overflow parish hall, the hallways, and front steps. Outside in the parish courtyard, one of the event’s organizers with Indivisible Santa Barbara apologetically turned away a crowd of a couple hundred more waiting to get in.
All told, more than a thousand people showed up to take part in the rally, which was billed by organizers as a gathering to galvanize the Central Coast’s left-leaning political base to “Stop the Coup” and resist President Donald Trump’s recent onslaught of executive orders and administrative actions.
Along the sidewalks outside the meeting, signs revealed local residents’ mixed emotions of optimistic solidarity and frustration with the prospect of another four years under President Trump. “The U.S. is Not a Monarchy, and Trump is Not a King,” one sign read; “Hey Dems, Polite Politics Do Not Work,” read another.
Carbajal, the representative for California’s 24th Congressional District, did not mince words when he took to the pulpit in front of the packed house to relay what he was seeing firsthand in Washington, D.C.
“Unfortunately, the first few weeks of the new Trump administration delivered on the central pledge of his campaign: to be a dictator,” Carbajal said.
Rep. Carbajal said that many of the executive orders Trump has given are examples of “illegal, unconstitutional, and just plain stupid rhetoric,” and he urged those in attendance to remain focused on the impacts that are actually happening on the ground with immigration and attempts to slash federal funding.
“A lot of what [Trump] is saying is distraction, to get you to talk about Greenland instead of talking about the civil rights he’s violating,” Carbajal said. “So it’s important to not react to his bullshit on a daily basis. Don’t react to all the stupid things he says — react to the actions he takes.”
One of those dangers, Carbajal said, was the development of Elon Musk’s newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) gaining access to sensitive government offices, which Carbajal described as “empowering an unelected billionaire and his MAGA-racist cronies to get unvetted and unlimited access to the personal data of millions of Americans.“
Carbajal said Trump’s attempts at governing with executive orders were a tactic to create chaos, and that Democrats in Congress — only in the minority by three votes — were hopeful that some of the recent directives would hit obstacles when it came to funding. “They don’t have the money to do the things they want to do, like these massive deportations, ” Carbajal assured the audience.
Senator Monique Limón, who served in the state assembly during Trump’s first term, reminded the people in the crowd that California legislators were well prepared to deal with the battles ahead, and that work was being done year-round to protect communities “no matter who is elected into office.”
“We are not alone; we are in community,” Senator Limón said. “We will get through this.”
Regarding Trump’s push for aggressive immigration enforcement, Senator Limón explained that California’s local governments and law enforcement agencies were committed to making sure they “are not going to use California tax dollars to enforce immigration laws.”
State Assemblymember Gregg Hart said he wanted to remind people “how different it is in California than it is in Washington.”
“We are doing special things in the state of California,” Hart said. “We are the fifth largest economy in the world. If we were a separate country, we would be the most productive nation in the world.”
He said that California should continue to take the lead in embracing diversity and protecting rights for LGBTQ+ and immigrant communities, which Hart said were “critical to our foundation and economy.”
“The world is watching us in this moment,” Hart said. “What is California going to do in the face of these challenges? I can tell you with certainty we are going to resist.”
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As the event came to a close, County Supervisor Laura Capps took the opportunity to encourage people to take a break from the overwhelming and stress-inducing nationwide news cycles, and to lean on local organizations that are working to provide resources here in Santa Barbara County.
Then, channeling the poetic and alliterative speaking style of House of Representatives minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, Capps said that people should meet Trump’s muzzle velocity of executive actions with “methodic veracity”; meet chaos with clear-eyed vision; spread hope instead of hate; and fight fear with facts. “And in the face of a leader who is a convicted felon,” Capps said, “we have our conviction, and we have our faith.”
Capps fired off a list of local organizations in need of support and donations, including the Legal Aid Foundation, IMPORTA S.B., Santa Barbara City College Dream Center, 805 UndocuFund, LEAP, the Carpinteria Children’s Project, and the Immigrant Legal Defense Center — whose executive director, Julissa Peña, said that “the stakes have never been higher” for the local immigrant community.
“Instead of working to reform and modernize our outdated system, we have seen an administration actively dismantling the protections immigrants deserve,” Peña said during the town hall meeting. “And with each executive order, billions of taxpayer dollars are wasted, the immigration court backlog grows, families continue to suffer, and the very fabric of our democracy is strained.”
Check Indivisiblesb.org for more info on how to get involved or how to contact your local government representatives.
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