【Just a Stranger】

Scientists are Just a Strangertaking a cue from last week's Women's Marches and planning their own protests in Washington, D.C., and far beyond.

Frustrated and alarmed by what they said were President Donald Trump's "clear anti-science actions," march organizers told Mashable they hoped to bring together people from across the political spectrum to stand up for scientific progress.

"This is not a partisan issue," the March for Science team said by email. "Scientific research moves us forward."

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Organizers haven't yet picked a date for the D.C. demonstration. But a planning team is meeting on Saturday to develop a firmer mission statement and ensure the movement is "inclusive of all people (and all fields of science)," they said.

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Separately, environmental and climate groups are planning a People's Climate March in April to protest Trump's plans to scrap former President Barack Obama's climate policies and advance construction of controversial oil pipelines.

Both climate activists and scientists said they were bolstered by the Women's Marches, which drew millions of women and men around the world, from Washington down to Antarctica.

Next to signs promoting women's reproductive rights and dismissing Trump's past xenophobic and misogynistic statements, many demonstrators carried posters urging participants to "Stand Up for Science" or declaring that "Climate Change is Real" -- a fact that Trump said he doesn't fully accept.

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Amid those events, several scientists were talking on Reddit last weekend about how they could respond to an administration that has vowed to scrap environmental and climate change programs and is generally hostile to science.

A participant suggested scientists hold their own march, and the idea quickly snowballed. Scientists and concerned civilians alike have since shown an outpouring of support.

The March for Science's private Facebook group, which started with just a couple hundred members last week, had nearly 263,000 members as of Wednesday afternoon. Its related Twitter account, @ScienceMarchDC, was up to 47,000 followers. A public group, meanwhile, has 35,000 followers.

The numbers ratcheted up in recent days after the Trump administration took steps to silence arms of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and U.S. Department of Agriculture.

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Officials also froze the EPA's environmental grants and contracts, and this week, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention abruptly canceled a major climate change conference planned for February.

On Tuesday, Trump signed an executive action to revive the Keystone XL pipeline, which the Obama administration rejected in 2015 on the grounds of climate change. He also signed an action to help Energy Transfer Partners complete its Dakota Access Pipeline in North Dakota.

Environmentalists on Wednesday vowed to double down their opposition to those pipelines with the People's Climate March -- slated for April 29 in Washington -- and other related actions across the country.

"Our planet is in crisis, and voices from around the nation must and will be heard," Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club, said in a statement.

If you are a scientist who is worried about your research during the Trump administration, please send an email from your personalaccountto [email protected].

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Topics Donald Trump