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Furloughed and mostly unpaid, federal workers took to the streets on Saturday.<\/span>Courtesy of Federal Unionists Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cFed Up Fed!\u201d<\/span> one protest sign in Oakland, California, proclaimed. Across the nation, in DC, other \u201cNo Kings\u201d protesters lofted signs reading \u201cFurloughed And Fired Up\u201d and \u201cStop Using Federal Workers As Pawns.\u201d An estimated<\/a> 4 million to 6 million people hit the streets of US cities and towns on Saturday to protest the Trump administration\u2019s actions, and though not all of the federal employees among them were advertising their particular vantage point, they were well represented.<\/p>\n \u201cI think federal workers are more aware right now than maybe other people are of how our democracy is being undermined, because we\u2019re on the front line of a lot of the things that are happening,\u201d said Natalie, a Veterans Affairs employee who was attending the Oakland protest.<\/p>\n Plenty of civil servants participated in the earlier No Kings actions back in June, but current and former federal workers now have even more reason\u2014and time\u2014to mobilize. The government is almost three weeks into a shutdown during which the administration has committed possible ethics violations<\/a>, threatened to withhold back pay<\/a> selectively<\/a>, and have fired even more government employees<\/a> without reasonable cause.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen they come for one of us, they come for all of us. We stand with them.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n Those who have already <\/strong>lost their jobs in the administration\u2019s DOGE-fueled <\/strong>mass firings and coercive buyouts were not scarce at Saturday\u2019s protests. \u201cI keep running into people I know. I\u2019d guess every former fed is here,\u201d said a former federal employee who was doing crowd control in DC as a volunteer, and with whom I communicated remotely.<\/p>\n There has been a surge in organizing among federal employees since Donald Trump began his second White House stint: <\/strong>Union membership has sharply increased<\/a> among remaining federal workers. In response to the administration trying to strip many agencies of their union rights, the unions have\u2014in addition to filing lawsuits<\/a>\u2014increased involvement in civil demonstrations like No Kings. <\/p>\n The unions have sponsored No Kings protests in many cities and encouraged their members to attend. Natalie, the Veterans Affairs worker I spoke with, wore a shirt with the logo of the Federal Unionist Network, an umbrella organization of unionized government workers that has grown rapidly in the past year.<\/p>\n These organizations, and public protest events, provide important avenues for federal workers to express their grievances, as many are reticent to speak out for fear of retaliation. (Almost every current or former federal worker I talked to on Saturday asked for some degree of anonymity.) \u201cThe fear of retaliation is by design,\u201d Jonathan Knapp, a local government attorney, told me the day before the No Kings protest. \u201cAs public sector workers, a lot of us take oaths to defend the Constitution, and the First Amendment is a critical part of that.\u201d<\/p>\n Knapp is a member of IFPTE Local 21, a union that represents public servants in the Bay Area and was a co-sponsor of the Oakland protest. Many Local 21 members, like Knapp, are employees of state, county, or city governments, and saw Saturdays action as a moment to show solidarity with the federal workforce. \u201cWhen they come for one of us, they come for all of us. We stand with them,\u201d he said. \u201cIt impacts all of us that the federal administration denigrates what we do.\u201d<\/p>\n Russell Vought<\/a>, Trump\u2019s Office of Management and Budget chief and mass-firings architect who famously promised<\/a> to put federal workers \u201cin trauma,\u201d has followed through on that vow. He also said: \u201cWhen they wake up in the morning, we want them to not want to go to work because they are increasingly viewed as the villains.\u201d<\/p>\n But at Saturday\u2019s protests, the marchers clearly had those workers\u2019 backs. Signs proclaimed, \u201cWe Support Federal Workers\u201d and \u201cFund Science.\u201d Some featured the Forest Service icon Smokey Bear saying, \u201cOnly You Can Fight Fascism.\u201d DC protestors unfurled a giant banner<\/a> representing the Constitution, the very document federal workers are sworn to uphold.<\/p>\n \u201cI took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution,\u201d Sarah, a federal archivist who showed up at the Oakland march in a rat costume, told one of my Mother Jones<\/em> colleagues. \u201cAnd that is exactly what I\u2019m doing here today, and I love this country.\u201d<\/p>\n\n