By Connie Leinbach
Ocracoke was among 1,300 places nationwide on Saturday that participated in the “HandsOff!” protest of a wide range of recent activities from the Trump administration, from cuts and layoffs to federal departments, to mass deportations.
About 80 folks, including some visitors, joined in the gathering that began at the Island Inn Commons at noon, walked to the Ocracoke lighthouse and back again.
“This reverberates through a community whether they’re marching or not,” said Mickey Baker, the Ocracoke Democratic precinct chair, who organized the event and was appreciative of all those who showed up and even those who drove by and beeped or fist bumped.
Islander Jim Borland carried a sign that said, “Tariffs are taxes.”
“It’s a complete disruption of logic to think that a tariff is anything other than a tax,” he said. “Tariffs are on goods coming from other countries and it’s going to be paid for by Americans.”
Others said they are angry and worried about our country, and amid others singing an impromptu National Anthem, gave their comments.
“They’re breaking the law,” one woman said of the Trump/Musk initiatives, “and no one’s standing up to them.”
Jim Tiffany questioned why the National Parks are being targeted for cuts by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
“They’re a profit center,” he said. “So that makes absolutely no sense at all.”
Kevin Driscoll, visiting from Baltimore, Maryland, carried a sign against diminishing the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), an agency close to his heart.
“What NOAA does is amazing,” he said. “We need them badly, especially Ocracoke, with the hurricanes.”
A woman and her two daughters, who all live in the Triangle area but are staying in the tri-villages area up the beach for spring break, joined in the Ocracoke march.
“We’re here to show that people are paying attention,” said the girls’ mother, Sarah. “Hopefully, in eight years, they can still vote.”
Carla Wallace of Lousiville, Kentucky, said she was protesting because she thinks the country wants to target people and throw them away.
“It’s critical that folks say we are not OK with what’s happening,” she said.
An Ocracoke sixth grader said he is fearful for his friends.
“All of my friends are Mexicans and I’m scared for them,” he said.
Marcy Shoemaker and her two daughters came to the march from Buxton because she doesn’t feel safe protesting there.
She explained that during the last Trump administration, she was badly beaten inside a Buxton bar for wearing a facemask during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Wallace said no one in the bar helped her as she was being beaten into unconsciousness.
“And I was the only one arrested” she said, not the original perpetrator. “He got to continue drinking and I was arrested.”
Although her physical injuries have healed, her psychological trauma has not.
“But I am not wallowing in that anymore,” she said.
New island resident Sara Chauhan said she and her wife Monica Corcran are concerned about our public lands and schools, among other things getting the ax in this administration.
“We’re here to let the administration understand that it’s not OK,” she said. “He might have silenced us in other ways, but this is not ever going to stop because we are going to use our voices as long as it takes.”
