Crowds hit the streets Saturday in cities and cities throughout the nation to vent their anger over President Trump’s insurance policies in “No Kings” protests, which Republicans have slammed as “Hate America” rallies.
Individuals carrying indicators with slogans resembling “Nothing is extra patriotic than protesting” or “Resist Fascism” packed into New York Metropolis’s Occasions Sq. and rallied by the thousands in parks in Boston, Atlanta and Chicago. Demonstrators marched by Washington and downtown Los Angeles and picketed exterior capitols in a number of Republican-led states, a courthouse in Billings, Montana, and at a whole lot of smaller public areas.
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Mr. Trump’s Republican Occasion disparaged the demonstrations as “Hate America” rallies, however in lots of locations the occasions appeared extra like a avenue social gathering. There have been marching bands, enormous banners with the U.S. Structure’s “We The Individuals” preamble that folks may signal, and demonstrators carrying inflatable costumes, notably frogs, which have emerged as an indication of resistance in Portland, Oregon.
Greater than 2,700 demonstrations have been deliberate coast to coast, with at the least one in each state and even close to Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida, the place he’s spending the weekend.
Organizers mentioned the nationwide rally drew extra folks than similar events on June 14, which was Mr. Trump’s birthday and the day of a large military parade in the U.S. capital, the No Kings Coalition mentioned in a information launch.
“The tens of millions of individuals protesting are centered round a fierce love for our nation. A rustic that we imagine is value combating for,” mentioned Katie Bethell, the chief director of MoveOn, an advocacy group that is a part of the bigger coalition.
Protestors mentioned they have been outraged over the Trump administration’s crackdown on undocumented migrants and its deployment of Nationwide Guard troops to Los Angeles.
Since then, Mr. Trump — who returned to the White Home in January — has ordered Nationwide Guard troops into Washington, D.C. and Memphis. Deliberate deployments to Chicago and Portland have to this point been blocked within the courts.
Demonstrators are additionally upset over Mr. Trump’s assaults on the media, prosecutions of his political opponents and a bunch of different actions they see as authoritarian.
On its web site, “No Kings” organizers say, “The president thinks his rule is absolute. However in America, we do not have kings and we cannot again down towards chaos, corruption, and cruelty.”
“This president is a shame and I hope there will probably be tens of millions on the street right now,” Stephanie, a 36-year-old hospital employee who didn’t give her final identify, instructed AFP within the Queens borough of New York, the place a whole lot had already gathered within the morning.
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Tens of hundreds of individuals gathered in Portland for a peaceable demonstration downtown. Later within the day, tensions grew as a couple of hundred protesters and counterprotesters confirmed up at a U.S. Immigration and Customs enforcement constructing, with federal brokers at occasions firing tear gasoline to disperse the group and metropolis police threatening to make arrests if demonstrators blocked streets.
The constructing has been the positioning of largely small nightly protests since June — the explanation the Trump administration has cited for attempting to deploy Nationwide Guard troops in Portland, which a federal decide has at the least briefly blocked.
Greater than 10,000 folks confirmed up at Lafitte Greenway for the No King New Orleans rally, organizers instructed CBS Information. When requested about how numbers have been counted, they mentioned it was based mostly on RSVPs on-line and different on-the-ground crowd-counting measures.
In Chicago’s Grant Park, Democratic Congresswoman Delia Ramirez led the group in a chant, “After I say folks, you say energy!”
“Might that highly effective voice be heard from right here to Washington, D.C., and each nook of this nation,” Ramirez mentioned, CBS Chicago reported. “I’m the proud daughter of Guatemalan immigrants, and I’ll by no means be ashamed of my roots.”
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker joined the demonstration.
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In San Francisco a whole lot of individuals spelled out “No King!” and different phrases with their our bodies on Ocean Seashore. Hayley Wingard, who was dressed because the Statue of Liberty, mentioned she too had by no means been to a protest earlier than. Solely lately she started to view Trump as a “dictator.”
“I used to be really OK with the whole lot till I discovered that the navy invasion in Los Angeles and Chicago and Portland — Portland bothered me essentially the most, as a result of I am from Portland, and I do not need the navy in my cities. That is scary,” Wingard mentioned.
In Miami, one demonstrator told CBS Miami that she confirmed as much as give voice to those that really feel essentially the most marginalized within the nation.
“I am most apprehensive about individuals who aren’t doing effectively on this nation, people who find themselves being marginalized,” mentioned Roxanne Featherly. “The hate [and] I assume you possibly can say the bipolarism that we’ve got.”
Greater than 1,500 folks gathered in Birmingham, Alabama, evoking and overtly citing town’s historical past of protests and the crucial position it performed within the U.S. Civil Rights Motion two generations in the past, the Related Press reported.
“It simply seems like we’re dwelling in an America that I do not acknowledge,” Jessica Yother, a mom of 4, instructed the AP. “It was so encouraging. I walked in and thought, ‘Listed here are my folks.'”
Outdoors of the U.S., crowds gathered exterior U.S. embassies in Berlin, Rome, Paris and Sweden in solidarity with the protesters within the U.S. Images present them holding indicators denouncing fascism and dictatorships.
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Thus far, the president’s response to the occasions has been muted.
“They’re saying they’re referring to me as a king. I am not a king,” he instructed Fox Information present “Sunday Morning Futures,” in an interview that may air on Sunday.
Talking to reporters on Air Power One later Sunday night time, Mr. Trump known as the protests “a joke” and mentioned the individuals have been “not consultant of this nation.”
High surrogates, like Home Speaker Mike Johnson, dismissed the occasion. Johnson known as it the “Hate America Rally.”
“You are going to convey collectively the Marxists, the Socialists, the Antifa advocates, the anarchists and the pro-Hamas wing of the far-left Democrat Occasion,” he instructed reporters.
Republican lawmaker Tom Emmer additionally used the “Hate America” phrase and referred to individuals because the “terrorist wing” of the Democratic Occasion. Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin activated the Nationwide Guard and introduced a “considerably elevated police presence” forward of the deliberate occasions. He mentioned that protestors have the correct to free speech however that “doesn’t embrace the destruction of property, looting, vandalism, disruption of visitors, or violence of any sort—for which there will probably be zero tolerance.” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott additionally mentioned the Nationwide Guard and public security staff will probably be surged to Austin to deal with anticipated protests.
High Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer inspired demonstrators to let their voices be heard.
“I say to my fellow Individuals this No Kings Day: Don’t let Donald Trump and Republicans intimidate you into silence. That is what they need to do. They’re afraid of the reality,” he wrote on X. “Communicate out, use your voice, and train your proper to free speech.”
Franz Barraza 
