Hundreds of Puerto Ricans Join Protests Against Trump's Authoritarian Policies

Hundreds of Puerto Ricans demonstrated this Saturday in front of the Federal Court in San Juan to denounce what they called the 'authoritarian, racist, dictatorial policies and abuses of power' by U.S. President Donald Trump, under the slogan 'No Kings.'

"As a colony of the United States, Puerto Rico is tremendously impacted by the neofascist policies, the violent policies, the policies of death that Donald Trump's government is implementing," stated Mari Mari Narváez, director and founder of the non-profit organization ‘Kilómetro 0’.

With this demonstration, which began at 4:00 PM local time (20:00 GMT), Puerto Rico joined the thousands of people who took to the streets this Saturday in cities across the United States, including New York, Washington, and Miami, to protest what they consider Trump's authoritarianism.

Protesting Remilitarization and Migration Policies
"Our people have fought for decades against the remilitarization of this archipelago, and now they are using us again as a platform for aggression against a country that has done nothing to us and is our Caribbean neighbor," added the activist, referring to the persecution of Dominican and Haitian migrants by federal authorities.

Chanting phrases such as 'No human being is illegal' and 'What the people need is anti-racist consciousness,' protesters carrying anti-fascist and anti-racist signs showed support for the Caribbean archipelago's migrant community.

Unique Demands Within a Broader Movement
"We are joining the day of protest in the United States, but with our own demands," Manuel Rodríguez, spokesperson for the organization Socialist Democracy, told EFE. "We believe the protest in the United States is very important against the authoritarian policies of Donald Trump's government, but in Puerto Rico we have additional demands."

Rodríguez pointed out that migrants come to the archipelago to 'build the country and are an integral part' of society. Therefore, he finds 'the complicity' of the Puerto Rican government with federal authorities 'very serious,' for allowing the deportation and 'kidnapping' of immigrants who have not committed 'any crime.'

In his view, 'there is an extraordinary potential for mobilization against the remilitarization of Puerto Rico' because the people of Puerto Rico 'already have experience in expelling the U.S. Navy' from their territory.

The U.S. Navy used Vieques and part of Culebra as a bombing range until May 2003, when they were expelled after several massive citizen protests in the island-municipalities. To this day, the cleanup of unexploded ordnance on both islands has not been completed.

The organizations that formed the demonstration include: ACLU Puerto Rico, Amnesty International Puerto Rico, Socialist Democracy, the Dominican Committee of Human Rights, the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Puerto Rico, Casa Pueblo, the Broad Front for Social Action, and the Bar Association of Puerto Rico, among others.

Puerto Rico's political status as a U.S. Commonwealth, established in 1952, grants the archipelago a certain degree of autonomy and a local Government and Parliament, but leaves areas such as defense, borders, and diplomatic relations under Washington's control.