Bushwick’s Maria Hernandez Park was packed on Sunday for the Undocumented Women’s Fund’s (UWF) 10th annual Women’s Strike NYC Fest, a grassroots celebration of International Working Women’s Day that blends protest and performance. 

Each year, the UWF and its partner organizations host the festival to advocate for universal social services, with a particular focus on supporting immigrant women. This year’s slogan “Care beats hate. Our love melts ICE” set the tone for a diverse roster of performances including sets from Alt Tlachinolli, a Conchera dance group; Rude Mechanical Orchestra, a radical protest marching band; and a musical project called “Thank God for Abortion.”  

For Ximena, the founder of UWF and a key organizer of Sunday’s rally, performance and cultural celebration is itself a means of resistance, especially when taking up public space.

“Celebrating our languages, cultures, and forms of popular art… When we also frame that with the struggles that many of us as grassroots organizations are fighting for, that together is what makes it even more powerful,” Ximena said.

Highlighting how the feminist movement has been co-opted by neoliberals and heavily commercialized within the past decade, Ximena noted that Strike Fest is really about bringing back grassroots, labor focused feminism. 

In much of Latin America, March 8 — known as 8M— is marked by mass feminist strikes and demonstrations against gender-based violence, economic inequality, and restrictions on access to abortion. According to Ximena, the NYC festival intentionally draws from that tradition.

“It’s a massive day of action,” Ximena said. “So we have always tried to honor that genealogy.”

While the UWF served as the anchor organization, Sunday’s rally was the product of a coalition of New York City groups including Planned Parenthood and the DSA. 

“It’s all grassroots-led, completely volunteer,” said Olivia, a representative from NYC for Abortion Rights, one of the co-hosting organizations. 

Much of the event was geared towards uplifting those without— or with limited— access to care, whether that’s childcare, reproductive care, or otherwise. Organizations like NYC Public Schools Multilingual Learners, Immigrant Working Justice Group, and Planned Parenthood had booths set up with various pamphlets and resources. However, it was “also about the rights of the workers that are providing that care,” said Ximena. 

As Rosanna, a member of the New York State Nurse’s Association, noted, caregiving labor is often synonymous with female labor— whether it is paid or unpaid.

“Nursing is a predominantly female profession. Almost 90 percent of nurses and nurse practitioners are female.” 

Referencing the 41-day nurse walk out that ended about two weeks ago amid attempts by some of New York City’s largest private hospitals to roll back workers’ benefits, Rosanna continued, “When we are under attack it is not by accident. This administration has made it clear that they want to attack the rights that women have.” 

Taking the stage, Ximena situated the Trump administration’s imperialism abroad and fascistic crackdown at home within the broader movements that form the core of Strike Fest: feminist labor organizing and immigrant rights movements. 

“On the 10th anniversary of the 8M Women’s Strike Fest in New York City, the need to put forward an affirmative vision against fascism and its politics of terror— one grounded in socialist feminism and an ethics of care— is more dire than ever.” 

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