Too late to change, probably. Anyone with a job can't just swap vacation time on a whim, for example. This isn't a response to a particular action/event, it's an annual event.

That's a plausible take. But maybe it's really about using this as another mess of gaining more attention for their cause.

They gave them a convenient reason to reach out to media since there's a newsworthy story now; did any of us have heard about this if they didn't work to get this message out? Very effective.