In response to the coordinated assaults on the Occupy encampments, the Bay Area Occupy movement declared Jan. 20 to be “Occupy Wall Street West”—a shutdown of San Francisco's financial district. Due to a large turnout, the San Francisco headquarters of three of the largest banks in the nation were forced to close for the day.
Despite pouring rain, protesters were already busy as early as 6 a.m. when activists, including members of the Party for Socialism and Liberation, blocked the entrance to the Goldman Sachs building in downtown San Francisco. A breakfast of grilled squid was served, as the company has been described as a “great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity.”
Between 7 and 9 a.m., hundreds of Occupy protesters set up camps in front of the downtown headquarters of Wells Fargo, Chase and Bank of America, making it impossible for employees to enter and for the banks to open. They remained closed the entire day. At times, police attempted to break up the occupations but were met with militant resistance and driven back.
At 8 a.m., the ANSWER Coalition (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism), of which PSL is a member, organized a shutdown of a Bank of America branch at Powell Square, one of the busiest intersections in the city.
Outside the bank, ANSWER speakers noted how the 2008 bailouts of the largest banks, overseen by both the Bush and Obama administrations, had handed over billions in taxpayer money to parasitic financial institutions, when that money could have been paid back to the workers in the form of investments in education, housing and jobs.
A PSL organizer and fourth-grade teacher spoke of the hardships of having to pay for her students' supplies due to cuts to education. Why, she asked, could the government always find more money for wars when that same government claims there is no money for schools. Several bystanders, moved by the speakers, asked how they could assist in shutting down the bank.
Four ANSWER activists and an Occupy SF organizer surreptitiously entered the BofA. When they unfurled their banner, which read “Jobs Not Genocide! Banks are War Profiteers!” the security guards locked the doors and escorted the remaining customers out. The activists read their charges against BofA, which included war profiteering in Iraq and Afghanistan, foreclosing on 45,000 homes, laundering drug money, and buying political influence, among others.
The occupiers then addressed the bank employees, telling them that the shutdown was not an action against them, and that they, too, were victims of BofA, as they, as employees, were exploited by their employer as are all workers under capitalism. One of the security guards mouthed to the protesters outside, “I'm with you!”
Throughout the city, even in quiet residential neighborhoods, outlets of the major banks were shut down for parts of the business day by groups of Occupiers. The fear of the banks was apparent. As a troop of ANSWER activists, including this reporter, passed a Chase bank to get coffee, frantic bank employees locked the doors to block our potential entry.”
Unions used the day to demonstrate their solidarity with Occupy and highlight their own struggles. National Nurses United picketed the planned site for a new Sutter Health-owned hospital. The new hospital will be on the site of low-income housing, its erection necessitating the eviction of many low-income residents. The new hospital will also be non-union, and its construction will divert funding from community health care for the 99 percent by whisking away specialists from St. Luke's hospital, which serves primarily low-income Cal-Med recipients.
Later in the afternoon, UNITE HERE Local 2, which represents hotel workers, held a picket in front of the Union Square Hyatt. The fabulously wealthy Pritzker family, which owns Hyatt, helped influence San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee to evict the Occupy SF encampment. Hyatt workers have been fighting for a decent union contract for nearly three years.
At 5 p.m., Occupy San Francisco organized its Closing Unity March. Despite pouring rain and gusting wind, a multinational crowd of thousands assembled at Justin Herman Plaza, the site of the original Occupy SF encampment, to express their support for the movement. We marched by the banks that had been closed for the day, chanting: “We are the 99 percent!” and “This system has got to die! Hella, hella occupy!”
A bus owned by a protester, which had been navigating the city bringing food and supplies to the various bank occupations, was pulled over by the cops. But the crowd encircled the vehicle and demanded that the bus be allowed to continue on its way. The officers let the Occu-bus go.
The day of action was seemingly coming to an end with a celebratory rally that featured speakers from Occupy SF and the ANSWER Coalition. But then, a young protester used the people's mike to inform the crowd that a handful of occupiers had seized the Cathedral Hill Hotel in the working-class Tenderloin District. The protester pleaded for a few of those attending the rally to come and support the takeover of the hotel. Instead, the entire crowd of thousands started marching to the Tenderloin in the rain.
The Cathedral Hill went out of business over two years ago and has since been owned by a bank. The eight-story building could house thousands of the Bay Area's homeless population. Instead, it sits boarded up and empty. When the procession arrived at the building, police guarded the entrance. ANSWER activists were among those on the front line trying to move past the lines of cops. This reporter heard one officer make the ridiculous claim to others that a protester held a “spear.” At this point, police started clubbing protesters. They arrested three people, who they pepper-sprayed after they were handcuffed on the ground.
The marchers decided to go to City Hall to express their outrage, but half-way there heard news that 15 occupiers had made it into the building and reversed course to support them. Once back at the Cathedral Hill, a back door was opened by the Occupiers and hundreds of people entered the building, preparing to make it their home. The occupation of the hotel lasted over an hour before a platoon of cops burst through the front entrance and occupiers retreated, restoring the building to its former uselessness.
Occupy Wall Street West was a great day for the 99 percent of the Bay Area. The city of San Francisco was transformed into an urban topography of resistance! The very right of the banks, the institutions of the 1 percent, to hold property was thrown into question, and with it the capitalist system itself!
Mazda Majidi and Forrest Schmidt contributed to this article.
