Residents rally for democracy in No Kings protest | Community gathers to defend constitutional principles and celebrate island’s inclusive values

By Darrell Kirk

Sounder contributor

On a beautiful day in downtown Eastsound, more than 200 Orcas Island residents gathered on June 14 in the Village Green for a No Kings protest, celebrating democratic principles and the island’s tradition of inclusion and safety.

The crowd, spanning generations, carried handmade signs reading “A Woman’s Place is in The Revolution” and “No Faux*King Way” as voices rose in songs of protest that echoed across Eastsound. Community activist Sharon Abreu, who led with the song “We are the Ones We’ve Been Waiting For,” mentioned that the gathering was one of the most significant and well-attended events on Orcas in her 24 years on the island.

Former Land Bank Commissioner Brian Wiese read the Declaration of Independence in a forceful and patriotic way to the gathered crowd, bringing the past to present and present to past. It seemed that it took all that he had in him to give this reading the weight and importance of the times that it deserved. That last sentence almost overcame him physically and emotionally and helped the large crowd to find their own release, and his passionate and firm delivery gave confidence that this time too in America, we will overcome tyranny again.

Another protester in the crowd was Susan Slapin, an author and artist who has called Orcas home for 29 years. When asked what she would do if she witnessed discrimination against a neighbor on the island, Slapin’s response was immediate and fierce: “I would scream and yell and call the police and kick. And at this point, I would put myself in harm’s way. Up until two weeks ago, I wouldn’t have. I would have been too scared. But now, even though I’m a sensitive artist, I’m not a combat bully, I would rather put myself in harm’s way than have the memory that I didn’t and someone got taken because I was that scared.”

Slapin draws her strength from family history. “My 95-year-old second cousin, Aranka Siegel, was the youngest survivor of Bergen-Belsen, the Women and Children’s Concentration Camp. She was in the camps the same time as Anne Frank,” Slapin explained. “And I asked Aranka how she thought she survived the camps, and she said ‘Because I could read people, and I had compassion even for the Nazi soldiers.’ She witnessed and was the victim of so many atrocities, and now she’s 95.”

Slapin continued: “I was brought up by experiences of family in the Holocaust and fearful of the times we now live in. With that said, the kindness of the human spirit is what is going to pull us through this and we will do this as individuals and together as a community.”

The demonstration reflected Orcas Island’s reputation as a haven for diverse communities. Helena Handbasket, a transplant from Southern California, stood out wearing a beautiful red dress, heels and a tall wig crowned with a tiara.

“I feel the need to represent all the people who cannot make it here, who are maybe staying in their closets because of the communities they live in, and can’t be out and proud,” Handbasket explained.

Having lived in major cities, Handbasket found a different kind of acceptance on Orcas.

“I feel a lot less tension, a lot less fear than I did in that area, definitely. I have no fear at all, standing here in heels and a dress.”

Marta Nielsen, former head of the Prevention Coalition, delivered an impassioned call to action, urging residents to persistently contact not only their own congressional representatives but all congressmen, emphasizing the need for sustained engagement rather than one-time efforts. When asked how the island comes together to protect their own, she recalled how the community rallied around an undocumented resident many years ago, with the entire community mobilizing to support him. That man now owns property and runs his own business on the island.

The No Kings gathering reflected not just political resistance, but the fundamental strength and compassion of a community that refuses to let fear divide them, and that democracy’s greatest defense lies not in grand gestures, but in neighbors standing together, speaking truth, and caring for one another.