SAN ANTONIO — Dozens of demonstrators gathered at Main Plaza downtown under rainy weather conditions Friday evening to show support for the labor movement and voice concerns over myriad overlapping issues on International Workers Day.
Every year on May 1, working people around the world join together for a day of remembrance and demonstrations — also known as May Day — to celebrate workers and the history of labor organizing.
Various speakers addressed the crowd, and organizers intermittently led a call-and-response with a common refrain.
“When public schools are under attack, what do we do?” an organizer yelled into the mic.
“Stand up! Fight back!” the crowd responded.
Heather Kelley, a public school teacher, said she was there to do just that.
Kelley rebuked the Trump administration for “attacking other countries for no good reason, bad court cases and decisions, and incompetent [leaders].”
“We should not have concentration camps in the U.S.A.,” she said. “It’s going too much toward fascism, and I have to stand up for that.”
Kelley expressed specific concern about the Texas Education Freedom Accounts (TEFA) program – commonly known as the school voucher program, set to launch later this year. Kelley expects her district to experience budget cuts and declining enrollment as a result. She expressed concern that the reallocation of public education funds will put many students at a disadvantage and jeopardize the future of the state’s educational system.
Sam Durandard, a parent and organizer with Our Schools San Antonio, attended the May Day event with his family. Our Schools San Antonio is a parents’ union within San Antonio ISD that organizes with teachers for fully-funded, fully-resourced schools.
“Teachers’ working conditions are our kids’ learning conditions. We’re bound in this struggle together,” Durandard said. “The only way for us to get out of this mess, here in Texas, is for all of us to come together. Labor, parents, community, elected officials – speaking in one voice, shoulder-to-shoulder; and taking mass collective action – all of us together.”
Durandard also expressed concerns about ICE activity affecting local schools and said he feels it’s necessary to support the labor movement to preserve public education.
“We’ve lost 1,600 kids to ICE terror since the start of the school year — folks who are either no longer going to school out of fear, have moved to different areas of the country, or self-deported,” Durandard said. “The common thread between the lack of funding and the terror that our communities are experiencing is the billionaire power that’s being able to unfold unchecked in the face of the working communities. It’s in crisis in more ways than one.”
Unlike Kelley and the Durandard family, the Lopez family came to the May Day demonstration by happenstance. Anika and Gilberto came to visit the San Fernando Cathedral with their 10-year-old son, Ricky, and 2-year-old daughter, Messiah. They saw the May Day crowd, and after listening to what was being said, Anika and Gilberto Lopez wanted to use the event as a teaching moment for their son.
“We’re all from immigrants – his family, my family – we are a part of it. This is our community. When our community is affected, we’re affected,” Anika Lopez said. “The beauty of being an American is being able to do this. I told him, ‘People get beheaded in other countries.’ So, to instill that in his head, that he can always voice his opinion here in America – it’s absolutely important.”
