Protesters of the President Donald Trump administration gather outside the federal courthouse in Fargo, North Dakota, on March 4, 2025. (Jeff Beach/North Dakota Monitor)
FARGO (North Dakota Monitor) – Cathy Williams is a retired teacher and lifelong voter, but she had never been politically active.
That changed with the second term of President Donald Trump and the rise of the Department of Government Efficiency and Elon Musk.
Now she’s an organizer of a Grand Forks chapter of a national group behind protests of the Trump administration on Saturday.
“I’ve never been terrified before,” she said.
Ed Schafer, a former Cabinet secretary and North Dakota Republican governor, said he believes people want the smaller federal government Musk and Trump are trying to create. But he said he knows many people don’t agree with the means to that end.
“To be successful, you have to build public trust, and I don’t see that,” Schafer said. “You have to do it in a manner that is sustainable.”
The fear that Williams and others are feeling has led to Hands Off!, a national day of action on Saturday. In North Dakota, some of the events are organized by a group called Indivisible.
“This mass mobilization day is our message to the world that we do not consent to the destruction of our government and our economy for the benefit of Trump and his billionaire allies,” a description of the Fargo-area event planned for Saturday says.
Other groups, including 50501, also are participating in events Saturday. Protests also are planned Saturday in Grand Forks, Bismarck, Jamestown and Minot. An event in Valley City was scheduled for Friday.
Rick Loftus, center, organizer of the Fargo Indivisible chapter, had a table with information about the group at the Fargo Sanctuary Center on March 27, 2025. Tory Vetter, left, and Lyn Dockter-Pinnick, right, also are involved with Indivisible. (Jeff Beach/North Dakota Monitor)
Rick Loftus, a doctor at the Veterans Administration hospital in Fargo, is the organizer of the Indivisible Fargo chapter, also known as Fearless.
“Indivisible wants to focus on connecting citizens with their elected officials, holding electeds accountable to the people they represent,” Loftus said.
He said the group is nonviolent and nonpartisan, with the Fargo chapter including Democrats, Republicans and independents, meeting every other Sunday.
“Everyone is respected. Everyone is welcome,” Loftus said. “We are explicitly pro-democracy, anti-fascism.”
There is a partner chapter on the Minnesota side of the Red River — Red River United, that also is taking part in Saturday’s event.
The Grand Forks area group formed in March, which as of Monday had more than 100 members, Williams said. That membership includes East Grand Forks, Minnesota, and other towns in northeast North Dakota, such as Grafton and Mayville.
Williams said she is worried about the treatment of federal judges, how her former education colleagues from other countries may be treated and about cuts to the Social Security Administration by the Department of Government Efficiency.
“If Elon Musk destroys the department, it’s not going to be able to issue checks with any kind of efficiency,” she said.
Schafer, who was secretary of agriculture under President George W. Bush, said he is very familiar with how difficult it is to change the entrenched bureaucracy in Washington.
“It needs to be done,” Schafer said.
He said Trump “just breaking down the doors” was perhaps the only way to get it started.
Schafer said his experience is that the people in government best positioned to save money are those who work on the front lines of the programs.
“Unless you can encourage or enlist the people who are out in the street delivering the programs, you’re not going to find a sustainable situation,” Schafer said.
Nearly 67% of North Dakota voters supported Trump in the 2024 election, his strongest showing in the state in his three presidential campaigns. A North Dakota News Cooperative poll released in March showed a 52% approval rating for Trump’s policies.
Sandi Sanford, chair of the North Dakota Republican Party, said in a statement that Trump is delivering on his campaign promises, “from securing our borders to revitalizing the economy.”
“As new policies take shape under his administration, we are confident that North Dakota — and
America — will continue to prosper,” Sanford said.
House Bill 1442 in the Republican-dominated North Dakota Legislature seeks to create a state version of DOGE.
While DOGE is trying to make federal employees accountable, Indivisible seeks to do the same with elected officials.
Loftus said the Indivisible group promotes reaching out to elected officials through phone calls, letters and meetings with the official or their staff.
“Sometimes holding a protest outside an office if they’re not willing to meet with us,” Loftus said. “It’s about getting messages to the elected about what people care about.”
North Dakota Hands Off! events Saturday
Fargo: 4 to 6 p.m., starting on the Veterans Memorial Bridge over the Red River on Main Avenue and moving to Woodlawn Park in Moorhead at about 5 p.m.
Grand Forks: 2:30 p.m. in the Town Square on DeMers Avenue, downtown.
Bismarck: 4 to 6 p.m. on the state Capitol grounds
Minot: 4 to 5 p.m., City Hall
Jamestown: Noon, Mill Hill
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