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international women's day
'Unite and Resist': Women's Day Rallies Against Trump Held From Coast to Coast
"This is our day to stand together, make our voices heard, and show the world that we are not backing down," said Women's March.
Mar 08, 2025
Women and their allies took to the streets of cities and towns from coast to coast Saturday for a "Unite and Resist" national day of action against the Trump administration coordinated by Women's March.
"Since taking office, the Trump administration has unleashed a war against women driven by the Project 2025 playbook, which is why, more than ever, we must continue to resist, persist, and demand change," Women's March said, referring to the Heritage Foundation-led blueprint for a far-right overhaul of the federal government that, according to the Guttmacher Institute, "seeks to obliterate sexual and reproductive health and rights."
"This is our day to stand together, make our voices heard, and show the world that we are not backing down," Women's March added. "Women's rights are under attack, but we refuse to go backward."
Women's March executive director Rachel O'Leary Carmona asserted that "the broligarchy that owns Trump is working to 'flood the zone' with hateful executive actions and rhetoric, trying to overwhelm us into submission."
"But we refuse to lose focus," she vowed. "We refuse to stand by."
In San Francisco, where more than 500 people rallied, 17-year-old San Ramon, California high school student Saya Kubo gave the San Francisco Chronicle reasons why she was marching.
"Abortion, Elon Musk, educational rights and trans rights, LGBTQ rights, climate change—all of these things, I am standing up for what I believe in," she said.
Her mother, 51-year-old Aliso Kubo, said that "we came out here specifically to support my daughter and women's rights."
Thousands rallied down the coast in Los Angeles, where protester Pamela Baez toldFox 11 that she was there to "support equality."
"I think I mostly want people to be aware that women are people. They have rights," Baez said. "We just want to show everybody that we care about them. People deserve healthcare. Women deserve rights."
Thousands of people rallied on Boston Common on a chilly but sunny Saturday.
"We are the ones who are going to stand up," participant Ashley Barys toldWCVB. "There is a magic when women come together. We can really make change happen."
Boston protester Celeste Royce said that "it was really important for me to be here today, to stand up for human rights, for women's rights, to protect bodily autonomy, to just make myself and my presence known."
Sierra Night Tide toldWLOS that seeing as how Asheville, North Carolina had no event scheduled for Saturday, she "decided to step up and create one."
At least hundreds turned out near Pack Square Park for the rally:
Today at the Women's March in Asheville, NC pic.twitter.com/BPAIZORSUd
— Senior Fellow Antifa 101st Chairborne Division (@jrh0) March 9, 2025
"As a woman who has faced toxic corporate environments, living with a physical disability, experienced homelessness, and felt the impact of Hurricane Helene, I know firsthand the urgent need for collective action," Night Tide said. "This event is about standing up for all marginalized communities and ensuring our voices are heard."
Michelle Barth, a rally organizer in Eugene, Oregon, toldThe Register Guard that "we need to fight and stop the outlandish discrimination in all sectors of government and restore the rights of the people."
"We need to protect women's rights. It's our bodies and our choice," Barth added. "Our bodies should not be regulated because there are no regulations for men's bodies. Women are powerful, they are strong, they're intelligent, they're passionate, they are angry, and we're ready to stand up against injustice."
In Grand Junction, Colorado, co-organizer Mallory Martin hailed the diverse group of women and allies in attendance.
"In times when things are so divisive, it can feel very lonely and isolating, and so the community that builds around movements like this has been so welcoming and so beautiful that it's heartwarming to see," Martin toldKKCO.
In Portland, Oregon, protester Cait Lotspeich turned out in a "Bring On the Matriarchy" T-shirt.
"I'm here because I support women's rights," Lotspeich
said in an interview with KATU. "We have a right to speak our minds and we have a right to stand up for what is true and what is right, and you can see that women are powerful, and we are here to exert that power."
The United States was one of dozens of nations that saw International Women's Day protests on Saturday. In Germany, video footage emerged of police brutalizing women-led pro-Palestine protesters in Berlin.
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Women’s Land Rights: The Missing Key to Climate Action
This year’s International Women’s Day theme, #AccelerateAction, calls on the world to address the structural barriers slowing progress. If we are serious about climate, we must start at the root of the problem: land access.
Mar 08, 2025
Land is not just a means of survival; it is one of our most powerful tools to combat climate change and nature loss. Healthy soil sequesters carbon, retains water, supports biodiversity, and—crucially—underpins food production. When land is degraded—through deforestation, overexploitation, or poor management—it shifts from being a carbon sink to a source of emissions, disrupting local water cycles, accelerating desertification, and sparking food insecurity. This degradation has direct consequences, such as the catastrophic flooding that hit Valencia last year, where altered landscapes and poor land stewardship exacerbated extreme weather impacts.
Without land security, women farmers remain locked out of decision-making, deprived of resources, and forced to fight climate change and nature loss with one hand tied behind their backs.
The link between land health, food security, and climate resilience is clear. But the role of women—who form the backbone of food production globally—is often overlooked. Women have extensive ecological knowledge and are key stewards of land, particularly those in rural and Indigenous communities. Women produce up to 80% of the world’s food, consumed by families and communities worldwide, and account for between 30-40% of the agricultural workforce. Yet, fewer than 20% of landowners are women—and, in half of the world’s countries, they have little to no rights or decision-making power over the land they work. This systemic land insecurity undermines their ability to implement long-term soil and land restoration practices crucial for climate adaptation.
The Three Systemic Barriers to Women’s Leadership in Land Restoration
To truly #AccelerateAction, as this year’s International Women’s Day theme calls for, we must address the root of the problem: land access. Without secure land tenure, women farmers face three systemic challenges.
Limited decision-making power results in less resilient agriculture: Studies from the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) indicate that women farmers with land rights are more likely to invest in soil conservation and water retention techniques, which are crucial for adapting to climate change. Without control over their land, women are often forced to comply with farming methods that may coincidentally be more planet-friendly (due to women lacking access to resources like chemical inputs) but are often less efficient and reduce resilience to yield variation. Women’s land insecurity translates into a lack of autonomy in adopting and scaling climate-smart farming methods that can both render their community more climate resilient and reduce hunger.
Restricted access to funding and training: Despite their deep knowledge of sustainable farming, women are often systematically denied access to credit, training, and agricultural extension services. A report by the World Bank found that if women had the same access to resources as men, agricultural yields could increase by up to 30%, reducing global hunger. Yet, because they often lack legal land ownership, they are sometimes ineligible for loans and grants that could help them transition to nature-positive forms of agriculture. Bridging this gap would not only benefit women but also strengthen global food security and climate resilience.
The disproportionate impact of climate change on women: Climate change exacerbates existing inequalities, and land degradation disproportionately affects women. Roughly 80% of the people displaced by climate disasters are women. In communities where women lack land rights, they have fewer options for adaptation and recovery. Secure land tenure empowers women to implement long-term solutions that enhance climate resilience, from agroecological practices to community-led reforestation projects.
The Path Forward: Solutions for Gender-Inclusive Land Restoration
Landscape restoration is only possible when everyone in the community—including women—has the rights, resources, and recognition they deserve. Ensuring land tenure for women is not just about equity—it’s about survival. Women are already leading land restoration efforts across the globe. In Kenya, the Green Belt Movement, founded by Wangari Maathai, has empowered thousands of women to restore degraded forests, leading to the planting of over 50 million trees. In India, women-led self-help groups have restored thousands of hectares of farmland through water conservation and agroecology. These initiatives prove that when women have control over land, they invest in solutions that benefit both people and the planet. And it’s not rocket science—there are concrete policy solutions that can ensure women can lead the charge in restoring land and combating climate change.
In order to increase and enforce land rights for women, countries must reform laws that restrict women’s access to land. In sub-Saharan Africa, for example, customary laws often prevent women from inheriting land, even when statutory laws permit it. Enforcing legal protections is critical. In addition, more funding opportunities must be available to women in agriculture: Only 6% of agricultural aid funding worldwide treats gender as a fundamental issue. Governments and financial institutions must close the agriculture funding gap for women through targeted grants, subsidies, and loan programs. In tandem, women’s traditional knowledge of farming and conservation must be supported with expanded access to climate-smart agricultural training. Finally, climate-smart agricultural training must consider gender dynamics, as poorly designed programmes can unintentionally empower men while sidelining women. Research shows that when gender is overlooked, existing inequalities can be reinforced. Organizations should recognize that technologies and policies often carry biases that can entrench power imbalances, restrict food security, and further marginalize women.
This year’s International Women’s Day theme, #AccelerateAction, calls on the world to address the structural barriers slowing progress. If we are serious about climate action, we must start at the root of the problem: land access. Without land security, women farmers remain locked out of decision-making, deprived of resources, and forced to fight climate change and nature loss with one hand tied behind their backs.
A just, climate-resilient future is not possible without women at the forefront of land restoration. By securing their rights to land, we not only restore degraded ecosystems but also unlock the full potential of those who have been caretakers of the Earth for generations. If we want to accelerate action, we must start by giving women the tools they need: land, security, and the power to lead.
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A Ribbon of Love Against Sexist Violence
On International Women’s Day in San Juan, Puerto Rico, 600 people came together to take a stand against violence against women and to call for education, not the penal system, as the primary way to eradicate it.
Mar 27, 2024
On March 8, the 50th anniversary of International Women’s Day, in San Juan, Puerto Rico, I participated in the Lazo de Amor Contra la Violencia Machista—the Ribbon of Love Against Sexist Violence. Six hundred people came together to take a loving stand against violence against women and against all forms of violence based in the traditional “machista” masculine gender role. Together, we called for the promotion of education, not the penal system, as the primary way to eradicate it.
The demonstration was organized by a team of seasoned activists, and sponsored by the Teachers’ Association of Puerto Rico (AMPR), the main teachers’ union. It took place on the grounds of the historic El Morro fort, symbol of Spanish colonization. We listened to a series of impassioned speeches from educators, activists, and students, decrying the epidemic of sexist violence in all its forms; calling out the failures of the penal system to rehabilitate offenders and to address the roots of violence; and calling on educators, the school system, and each of us, to take up the challenge of ending sexist violence.
Then we donned purple Lazo de Amor T-shirts, provided by the organizers, and formed the shape of a bow, similar to the ribbons people wear to represent commitment to a cause like AIDS awareness, MIA’s, and cancer survivors. We were photographed from the sky, taking our stand together. The organizers’ announced goal, represented by the Lazo, was to create an ongoing campaign for educating against sexist violence in the schools, to be expressed in yearly demonstrations.
The demonstration provided one of a multitude of potential answers to the core question that we progressive activists face as we work to shift the paradigm from fear to love: How can we use the power of love to transform our violent, fear-based practices and institutions?
Participating in the Lazo was a powerful experience for me. As an elder anti-racist, leftist feminist who has attended many demonstrations organized by many types of progressive movement over the past 50 years, I found it to be unusually empowering, uplifting, and inspiring. A demonstration against violence on the grounds of an historic colonial fort. The act of actually taking a stand together and being photographed doing felt like a work of political art. The presence of many men, also taking a stand against sexist violence. The sponsorship by a teachers’ union and preponderance of teachers and students, embodying the process being advocated for. And the naming, and calling on, of love as the true antidote to violence—rather than the greater violence of the state and the penal system. Fifty years after the declaration of the first International Women’s Day, feminism had come a long way from demonstrations where we marched in the streets to take back the night—without feminist men at our sides as our allies, and calling on the police as the main solution.
I was particularly excited by the naming of our ribbon as a ribbon of love. I am a retired professor of economics whose research has focused on the emergence, alongside of and within capitalism, of the solidarity economy—economic practices and institutions centered in cooperation, equity, democracy, sustainability, and pluralism. These new institutions are part of and require the emergence of a new paradigm of social life which is based on mutuality, unity amidst diversity, and love, within a crisis-ridden, dying paradigm based on competition, separation, violence, and fear.
So many of the metaphors and memes we use on the left to describe our work are conceptualized as a process of fighting against something, a violent activity that brings to mind traditional, macho masculinity. The naming of love as a powerful force, embodied in a purple ribbon against violence, captured my imagination, representing as it did the power of the strong feminine. Women and feminist men standing up for themselves and for others, against all forms of violence, using the power of love, caring, education, good mothering and fathering. The demonstration provided one of a multitude of potential answers to the core question that we progressive activists face as we work to shift the paradigm from fear to love: How can we use the power of love to transform our violent, fear-based practices and institutions?
I was extremely impressed by the ability of a small team of lead organizers to manifest this demonstration very quickly and beautifully. The Lazo de Amor was the brainchild of my friend Margarita Ostolaza Bey, a retired women’s studies professor and former senator, and her friend Gretchen Coll-Marti, a retired appellate judge and former executive director of Legal Services of Puerto Rico. On Valentine’s Day, only three weeks before, the two had the idea to create a Lazo de Amor Contra la Violencia Machista on International Women’s Day. Gretchen had created an AIDS Awareness Ribbon campaign during the 1990s. Held annually for eight years, it grew from 500 people to a campaign organized in all of the island’s schools that brought together 8,000 men, women, and children. The idea was to use the same method to mobilize energies to fight sexist violence.
Margarita and her wife, Ivelisse Rivera Almodovar, a retired public relations director, presented the proposal for the Lazo de Amor Contra la Violencia Machista to Professor Victor Bonilla Sanchez, the president of the Association of Teachers of Puerto Rico. He immediately and enthusiastically committed to the project. Ivelisse took on the huge task of quickly coordinating permits, sponsorships, media announcements, and the participation of spokespersons in radio, press, television, and social networks, along with the design of the ribbon. Essentially these three women came up with the idea, engaged the head of the teachers’ association, and started a campaign for feminist education against sexist violence which they hope to be ongoing and growing yearly, like Gretchen’s AIDS Awareness campaign, in the space of three weeks. Their story makes me wonder what other kinds of campaigns could be created to help bring the paradigm shift we all need.
Another interesting aspect of the Lazo de Amor Contra la Violencia Machista that I would like to flag is the involvement of corporate sponsors. In my experience, left and progressive circles have tended to avoid funding from for-profit businesses, focusing instead on non-profits. But for-profit firms inhabit a spectrum of positions on the value scale from “low-road,” narrowly profit-motivated firms—union-busting, polluting, price-gouging, etc.—to high-road businesses that embody the triple bottom line of people, planet, and profits. Students from the School at the University of Puerto Rico designed the Lazo, but Goya de Puerto Rico stepped up to provide financial support, and El Nuevo Dia, the main newspaper on the island; Channel 2 TV; and Radio Isla all provided free air time to promote it. We need to remember that progressive, for-profit businesses and social enterprises can be valuable allies in the paradigm shift, even though they are capitalist, and can and should be called upon for support.
One question you may be asking—how did this demonstration relate to the political parties of the island, and to the question of the island’s political status? Puerto Rico’s people have been deeply divided into political parties based on the issue of how to relate to the U.S.: the pro-statehood New Progressive Party (PNP), aligned with the U.S. Republican Party); the pro-Commonwealth Popular Democratic Party (PPD), aligned with the U.S. Democratic Party; the pro-independence Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP), aligned loosely with the left in the U.S.; or the new Citizens’ Victory Movement (MVC) party. This demonstration attempted to bridge these political divides and was not affiliated with any political party.
There were other demonstrations across the island commemorating International Women’s Day’s 50th anniversary. A coalition of left feminist groups, the Coalition of the 8th of March, put on a press conference. One of their members, the Colectiva Feminista en Construcción (Feminist Collective Under Construction), held a demonstration and blocked a highway, protesting against a wide range of oppressions, including the occupation of Palestine, Puerto Rico’s colonial status, and racism, along with sexism, violence against women, and anti-trans violence. Is there a place in our feminist imaginations and strategizing both for this show of force and courage, and for the Lazo de Amor? What are the strengths and weaknesses of each in terms of shifting the paradigm?
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