Local "Good Trouble Lives on!" protests
Indivisible groups held a protest in East Portland and another met at a Gresham park
On July 17, 2025 the activist organization Indivisible called for nationwide protests in response to various actions and policies implemented by the Trump administration and the Republican controlled congress. The significance of the date and the name chosen for the mass action: “good trouble lives on!” commemorates civil rights leader and former congressman John Lewis who died July 17, 2020.
At 2:18 that very morning the Senate passed the Recissions Act of 2025. The act rescinded funding to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which provides grants to local NPR and PBS member stations around the country.
One such protest took place at the SE Stark St and Cesar E. Chavez Blvd intersection near Laurelhurst Park. The protest was one of a series of protests that have followed since the Hands Off and No Kings day protests called for by Indivisible and 50501. The signs I saw protesters holding showed that continuity: some warned that Trump wanted to be a king, some held sings protesting ICE, some were concerned about the cutting of funding to NPR and to state Medicaid programs. One sign I saw protested the US sending military aid to Israel.
One of the organizers at the event told me the protest was made up of multiple local indivisible chapters. They told me that the chapters were created according to the new Portland City Council district map.
Later that afternoon at a Gresham park, the organizers of the Multnomah East Indivisible group held an event to recruit more members to their leadership team. Two current Oregon Senators spoke at the event: Chris Gorsek whose district includes Gresham, and Senate Majority Whip Lou Fredrick. Sen. Fredrick recounted how he met John Lewis and had mutual connections with him as well. During his speech he condemned the current state of immigration enforcement he said that immigration officials “clearly have a quota of brown-skinned people to rough up” and that the US now has concentration camps that cruelly and inhumanely lock people in cages. He told those present that they should step up to make the change for a better future they wanted to see. He said that “no one else is gonna come up and do it, you have to do it.” Fredrick condemned the banning of books and efforts to impose increased restrictions on voting and noted the high levels of voter turn-out in their election which they attributed to Oregon’s use of mail-in voting.