Every Saturday at noon—rain or shine, snow or hail, in frigid cold or blistering heat—a crowd forms at the corner of Beacon and Centre streets in Newton Centre, waving signs and cheering to passing cars.

The weekly rituals, known as “Saturday Standouts,” are the heartbeat of Newton Indivisible, a grassroots activist group that has grown from a handful of neighbors meeting in a church hall to a mailing list of over 1,200 members in about 18 months. 

“Newton Indivisible is a group of American citizens who are concerned about what’s happening with our democracy right now, and we want to make sure that we continue to have a democracy,” said Karen Bray, a member of the group’s executive committee. “We are fighting for democracy—we fight with creativity and joy and non-violence and passion.”

From National Movement to Local Chapter

Newton Indivisible is the local chapter of the national Indivisible network, which is a “nationwide movement of millions of people working to stop the rise of authoritarianism in the United States and to demand a real democracy,” according to its website. 

Indivisible has over 2,500 groups throughout all 50 states and a few foreign countries. The movement first originated after President Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election.

“It’s a pretty big and powerful organization, and we’re lucky because we have a strong local group,” said executive committee member Pat Burdick. “There’s a statewide group, and then there’s the national [group].”

When Trump was reelected for a second term in 2024, longtime Indivisible members from Newton and surrounding communities decided the city needed its own chapter, and they started it from scratch. 

“There was an Indivisible chapter started in Natick, and I started going to their meetings when Trump was elected the second time,” Bray said. “There were a number of people there from Newton, and we just said, ‘Hey, we need to start a Newton chapter.’ So we got together, and I’ve been in it from the beginning.”

The group’s efforts have been hard to ignore. Last month, Newton Indivisible helped set up the third iteration of the “No Kings” protests against the Trump administration, which saw more than 2,500 protesters gather on the Newton Centre Green. 

It was just one of the frequent rallies the group sets up. The weekly protests in Newton Centre typically see a turnout of around 55–70 people, according to Burdick. 

“I would say that we are remarkably strong in turning people out to change people’s opinion,” Burdick said. 

A Decentralized Structure

What differentiates Newton Indivisible from other activist groups is its decentralized structure. Rather than having a rigid agenda, the group operates through a system of 10 “action teams,” which evolved from their first meeting in a church parish hall. 

“We put out stools, and on each stool was a different sign that said something like ‘immigrants’ rights’ or ‘election action’ or anything that people were interested in, and people would gather around that stool if they were interested,” Bray said. “We ended up creating 10 action teams within Newton Indivisible.”

Today, the group’s action teams include the Bridge Brigades Action Team, who hold high-visibility signs over commuters on bridges up to four times a week, and the Laughtivism Action Team, which aims to connect with people through light-hearted and humorous initiatives.

“We tell people that if you don’t see an action team that lights your fire and that makes you excited, then start the one you want to start,” Bray said. “Hopefully, there will be one that will ignite people’s passions.”

Other action teams specifically devote their efforts to defending immigrant rights, setting up rallies, and pressuring public officials, such as current U.S. Representative for Massachusetts’ 4th District Jake Auchincloss, and more.

Bray is the leader of the Laughtivism Action Team, which was inspired, she explained, by Serbian activists who helped topple Slobodan Milošević in 2000 by using humor and street theatre. 

“You really need to use your humor, your sense of humor, and your creativity,” Bray said. “So we have to overthrow a potential dictator—we’ve created all these silly actions that we do, for example, the Fascism Fashion Show, which we did at Halloween in Newton Center.”

Advocacy and Political Pressure

Burdick is most involved with the Elections Action Team, who focus their efforts on advocacy towards keeping elections free and fair, and the Auchincloss Action Team, who devote their energy solely to the congressman. 

“We try to keep in touch with the congressman and give him praise when he does something that seems to promote justice and democracy, and we try to call to his attention his policies and his positions and his votes we feel are detrimental,” Burdick said.

Burdick stressed that one of the most prevalent issues within the group is federal immigration enforcement. Newton Indivisible’s Immigrant Rights Action Team works with LUCE, a coalition of immigrant-led grassroots organizations across the state, and has launched outreach to local businesses explaining how to respond if Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents were to arrive.

“As far as ICE is concerned, we don’t want them wearing masks in our communities,” Burdick said. “We want them to not go into the city property like libraries and schools, and we want them to stay out of churches and other places where people should feel safe … And it’s clear that the mayor, Mayor Laredo, doesn’t want to put the police in the position of having to be in opposition to ICE.”

Building Community Through Action

One of Bray’s favorite aspects of the group is the work of the Bridge Brigades Action Team.

“It’s amazing, and it’s happening all around the country also,” Bray said. “We have a Newton bridge brigade, one woman who’s in charge. [The signs] are all over there on 128, they’re on 93, they’re on the pike, and they have just fabulous messages.”

In addition to helping lead action teams, both Bray and Burdick serve on the group’s executive committee, which handles big-ticket issues and provides support and coordination to the action teams. 

“The executive committee meets once a week for an hour and a half at least, and there are seven of us,” Bray said. “And before the executive committee meeting, we work on a newsletter—every week, we put out a newsletter that’s online.”

Looking Ahead to the Midterms

Bray and Burdick both emphasized that the most important current focus of the group is the upcoming midterm elections. In Newton’s home district, Auchincloss is fighting for renomination against a pool of rather unknown newcomers.

At a national level, all 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and 35 seats in the U.S. Senate are going to be contested. Bray explained that members of the Democratic Party are hoping to regain a majority of seats in both chambers after losing the House in 2022 and the Senate in 2024. 

“[The executive committee] votes on what we want to focus on,” Bray said. “It’s pretty clear that the midterms are what has to be focused on. Helping people around the country get votes so that more and more people can vote, and working on swing states and elections around the country that are close in the House and the Senate.”

Bray hopes that one day, she won’t need to do this job anymore. But for now, she has a lot of work to do. 

“I just don’t want our wonderful, beautiful country to dissolve into an authoritarian dictatorship,” Bray said. “I hope that we don’t need to do this job anymore someday, although there’s always work to do, there’s always more and more ways that we can have people have their voices heard and create a better and better America.”