On April 5, an estimated one million-plus people nationwide participated in the largest one-day protest yet against the Trump, Musk, Republican party agenda, since the former reality TV star returned to the White House. “Hands Off” protests took place in over 1,400 cities and towns in all 50 U.S. states, in Canada and some European cities as well. Those opposing Trump’s policies focused on a long list of issues, from the dismantling of federal agencies, the mass layoff of government workers, deportation of immigrants without due process, major cuts to education and vengeful executive orders targeting law firms, universities, media outlets and anyone perceived as a critic of the regime.
Trump’s imposition of unprecedented tariffs on nations around the world triggering a stock market crash, the intentional sabotage of the Social Security system and the GOP plan to cut billions of dollars from Medicaid and Medicare, was on the minds of many protesters who marched and rallied on April 5.
As Trump attempts to assert ever greater executive authority, ignoring checks and balances by the courts and Congress, there’s growing alarm that the nation is in the midst of a deepening constitutional crisis. Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with Fred Glass, a labor historian and documentary filmmaker, who talks about the history of general strikes as a tactic to challenge injustice and autocracy, and United Auto Workers Union President Shawn Fain’s idea for a general strike on May Day 2028.
FRED GLASS: We have three lines of defense right now against encroaching fascism. First is the courts. And while the results there have been mixed so far, I think that ultimately the courts, if Trump continues to ignore them, the courts will simply be a holding action. It’ll be a delay in implementing his programs and especially with the Supreme Court. And it’s not quite MAGA majority, but definitely conservative majority.
So then there’s the 2026 elections. And you know, Trump has dropped hints that he doesn’t think maybe elections are necessary anymore. And maybe he’s going to run a third term if there is, which is illegal at this point in time. He can’t do that. But maybe the elections are not going to happen either.
So that leaves the streets. And the streets are not meant to be a third line of defense that we put into place once the other two have failed. We have to be working on the streets all along because they will be bolstering the other two to the extent that we can.
And also, we need to build the muscles of the streets because we need it to get bigger and better. I’ve always been skeptical when I’ve heard calls — even for very good causes for a general strike — because I’m a labor historian. I know about the general strikes that we had had in the United States and it’s a mixed record.
We’ve only had about 15 or so, depending on how you define them. Citywide general strikes and none since 1946.
General strikes don’t emerge out of a vacuum. They tend to come during or as the crest of a strike wave. And what happened out of the UAW strike was Sean Fein, its president, asking unions around the country to line up their contracts the next time they negotiated them for expiration — at the same time, May 1st, 2028. This has gotten a lot of buzz within the labor movement.
On the face of it, a call for a general strike now would be dicey. But this is a different moment now. Fascism is a new circumstance at the national level of the United States. We’ve had proto-fascism, you know, at different times in different places here in the United States. You could look at the Reconstruction South with the rise of the KKK and Jim Crow, you know, fascism.
But we haven’t seen yet until now, this kind of effort to install fascism on the national level for everybody.
The other reason, I think that we can take some heart, that there’s this motion going on toward this, is that it’s a very considered call that Fein made. He didn’t say, “Let’s have a general strike.” People call general strikes all the time and we don’t have general strikes. What he said was, “We need to organize a general strike.” And he started to put in place the conditions for doing so.
SCOTT HARRIS: Fred, I just wanted to ask you. Things are moving pretty fast in these first 75 days of the Trump regime. With lots of violations of the Constitution, there are certainly warning signs that Trump intends to and has already done, in certain instances, violated court orders.
Prospects for a lot of these appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court may not go a very good way for the Constitution, given its extremist supermajority.
So we’re girding for a constitutional crisis that may occur long before May 1st, 2028. Is it possible this framework that Sean Fein, UAW president, put out there could be speeded up where it’s needed most, which may be in the coming months?
FRED GLASS: I’m hoping that that is the case. But let’s talk about what a general strike requires. You need four elements. You need to have a generalized anger in the working class, which is what we’re seeing develop day by day. And so that’s good news for general strike fans.
The second thing that’s required is a structure that can pull off a general strike. So that would be the labor movement. We have, you know, central labor bodies in every state and in most of the major cities. And this is a framework upon which we could hang the organizing of a general strike. But not everybody in the labor movement at this point in time is convinced of the need of that.
The third requirement is that you have a leadership that’s willing to stick its neck out and call a general strike. It would be very embarrassing for labor leaders to call a general strike and for it to fizzle. Plus, there are some consequences. According to U.S. labor law, you know, that would accrue to the leaders and to unions who go out on unauthorized strikes. The labor movement didn’t get the rights that are now crumbling by paying too close attention to the anti-labor laws that existed before.
So I’m not as worried about that part. If everybody violates these laws. They’re not going to have enough space in the jails for everybody.
The fourth thing is there’s a spark, which almost inevitably is a worker getting killed. Not every time, but more than half of the times we’ve had citywide general strikes. It’s possible, with the kind of violent rhetoric coming out of the White House and the MAGA forces with his release of the Jan. 6th insurrectionists, you know, sending a signal that violence on behalf of Trump and Trumpism is just fine.
There’s that. A spark could well occur that involves that kind of violence.
Listen to Scott Harris’ in-depth interview with Fred Glass (17:35) and see more articles and opinion pieces in the Related Links section of this page. For weekly updates on the Trump authoritarian playbook now underway, subscribe here to our Between The Lines Radio Newsmagazine Substack newsletter to get updates to our “Hey AmeriKKKa, It’s Not Normal” compilation.
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