On Saturday, tens of thousands of Coloradans turned out for more than 50 local “No Kings” protests against the Trump administration. Colorado Times Recorder columnist Logan M. Davis was a featured speaker at the event in Colorado Springs, where an estimated 12,000 to 15,000 people showed up for the demonstration. Below, we have published a video and transcript of his remarks.
My name is Logan Davis, and I’m glad to be here with you today.
I am an advocate, writer, and researcher. For the last decade or so, I have specialized in right-wing extremism: what it is, where it comes from, and how to fight back against it.
As an expert in that subject, I want to tell you that what you are doing here today matters. It works. In this exact moment, you are engaged in one of the methods that we know can be effective in pushing back on the forces attempting to warp our democracy – and I thank you for it.
These days, writing, research, and reporting occupies most of my effort for our democracy, and I have been incredibly fortunate to find a home for that work at the Colorado Times Recorder, an award-winning progressive outlet based in Denver.
I firmly believe that journalists who share their viewpoint are more trustworthy than those who pretend not to have one — something the local Gazette strongly disagrees with me on.
I see no value in taking a view from nowhere, or in documenting all the facts but failing to reach any conclusions.
Regardless of viewpoint, though, the foundational element of good journalism, research, and advocacy is the same: it is a basis in fact. I believe it is a progressive act to describe the world as it is, not simply as we wished it would be – because if we cannot get our minds around the present, we have no chance of building the future.
Today, I want to share with you some of the important facts of our present reality, not just as Americans but as Coloradans; facts that I have written about at length, thanks in no small part to the courage of many in this crowd.
It is a fact that this nation was founded on the same fundamental statement as this rally: No Kings.
And it is a fact that that foundational principle is now under threat.
It is a fact that Donald Trump threatens our rights, our freedoms, our system of government, and our way of life, and it is a fact that he is not unique in that – that the threat does not stem from him alone or from him personally; that we are not simply opposing a man, but a larger movement with the same goals.
And it is a fact that that movement has not been confined to the Beltway; that its tendrils have extended well outside of Washington D.C.; that many of them are present here, in Colorado.
For the last few years, I have found myself returning to Woodland Park, just up the pass, time and time again, in an effort to chronicle those local tendrils of the movement against democracy, and what I have found has filled me with dread and hope in almost equal quantities.
The dread came first, as I interviewed locals, sifted through archival documents, and came to understand what was happening. The small school district just uphill from here, I found, was selected as a testing ground for that movement; as an experiment in conquest. I found that a coalition of think tanks, right-wing consultants, and Christian nationalist organizations had conspired to seize control of the district, and use it as a test case not just for new curriculum, but for new methods of school governance, and new restrictions on teachers.
Worst of all, I learned that they were succeeding, and that students, teachers, and parents were paying the price.
In the midst of that dread, the hope took longer to settle in – but when it finally did, I realized that Woodland Park was not just a test case for the dismantling of democracy, it was also a test case for the defense of democracy.
As turmoil has consumed Woodland Park for the last four years, relationships in the town have shifted. Old friendships have ended. But new ones have begun as well, built around a common cause. And in those friendships, the town has found its voice to fight back. Amid an unrelenting onslaught from billion-dollar foundations and a hostile school board, locals have fought back at every turn.
They organized themselves, they filed records requests, they launched a blog. They found the others in their midst who felt the same way, and they got stronger.
Without outside money or mega donors or consultants or infrastructure, they have stood their ground.
The fight for the future of Woodland Park continues – and as I tell the local activists as often as possible, that’s a victory. If it weren’t for their actions, the fight would have been over years ago.
The same is true of the fight for the future of Colorado Springs, the fight for the future of D11 and D20 and D49. The same is true of the fight for the future of the United States.
Of all the facts I have chronicled in my writing, this is the most important one:
It is a fact that successful resistance does not come from D.C., it does not come from Denver. It does not come from the consultants and congressmen and suits. It comes from us. It comes from the space in between us that we are able to fill with dreams and visions of a better future.
It is a fact that no one can resist authoritarianism alone; that relationships and community are vital components for the preservation of democracy.
It is a fact that protest can work. That refusing to quiet down and accept the new reality can have reality-changing powers of its own.
And it is a fact – one I try to remember every day when I wake up and every night when I go to sleep – that no regime has ever lasted forever.
Together, we will see the end of this one. Thank you.
