May Day Rallies Celebrate Workers, Immigrants on Central Coast

More than 3,000 coordinated events were held across the country for May Day, an international day of celebration for workers and a nationwide day of action in solidarity with the labor movement. Here on the Central Coast, rallies and marches were organized in Santa Barbara, Carpinteria, Lompoc, and Santa Maria, where people took to the streets to demand the prioritization of workers and immigrants over corporate interests.

This year’s May Day events brought together labor unions, student groups, and community organizations all pushing toward the same goal of “Workers over Billionaires.” Here in Santa Barbara, a couple hundred community members packed into De la Guerra Plaza for a rally and march against corporate greed, and calling for an end to aggressive ICE enforcement in working-class communities.

The Santa Barbara event featured performances by Danza Azteca and the Brasscals, speeches from community organizers with CAUSE and SBResiste, and testimony from local high school students who spoke about the impacts of immigration enforcement on working families.

“Across the nation, ICE raids are tearing families apart, and parents are being taken from their children,” said Brianna Gomez, a student organizer from San Marcos High School. “These aren’t just headlines. These are real people, real families living in fear every day.”

Gomez said immigrants and their families are often forced to live in fear, unable to seek medical care or go to the grocery store without a wave of uncertainty about ICE enforcement.

“No child deserves to grow up afraid that their family could disappear overnight,” Gomez said. “Immigrants are not criminals for wanting safety, opportunity, or a better life. Many of them are the backbone of our community. They are mothers, fathers, workers, students, and dreamers.”

During the rally, Reverend Julia Hamilton, lead minister of the Unitarian Society of Santa Barbara, presented a branch packed with monarch butterflies that her church created as a visual reminder of just how many local community members have been arrested by ICE in the county since January 2025. The “butterfly branch,” which she says is updated during each week’s Sunday service, now hangs heavy with over 750 monarch butterflies.

“They’re here with us in spirit today, and we carry them with us in our hearts on this march and throughout our lives in this community,” Rev. Hamilton said. “They are not here in body; they’re here in spirit, and they are not forgotten.”

Before the crowd marched up State Street to Pershing Park to celebrate the remainder of the May Day festival, SBResiste organizer Ana Garcia laid out the demands for the day’s protest. 

The top goal was to abolish ICE and to stop the sharing of data between ICE, the jail, and local law enforcement. They demanded an end to the local city and county contracts with Flock surveillance cameras, and asked that more resources be made available to people affected by immigration enforcement.

They asked that city and county budgets reflect the needs of the people, and demanded livable wages, affordable housing, and healthcare for all. Lastly, they asked to boycott mega-corporations that hurt local businesses. 

“We are doing ‘No school, no work, and no shopping’ to show them we mean business,” Garcia said. 

Organizers with the May Day Strong movement estimated that the thousands of actions nationwide spread beyond the rallies and marches, with hundreds of school-based walkouts, workplace disruptions, and consumer boycotts across the country.

“On May Day, workers across the globe stand together to show that we have the power, not the billionaire class,” said Faye Guenther, president of UFCW Local 3000. “We can and will shut it down to secure prosperity for all working people.”