‘No Kings’ rallies against Trump planned in thousands of U.S. cities
Aaron Schwartz | Afp | Getty Images
Organizers said more than 3,200 events are planned in all 50 states for what they hope could be the largest single-day nonviolent protest in U.S. history. The two previous No Kings events attracted millions of participants.
Flagship rallies are taking place in New York, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and Minnesota’s Twin Cities, but two-thirds of participants are expected from outside major city centers, a nearly 40% jump for smaller communities from the movement’s first mobilization last June, organizers said.
“The defining story of this Saturday’s mobilization is not just how many people are protesting, but where they are protesting,” said Leah Greenberg, co-founder of Indivisible, the group that started the No Kings movement last year and led planning of Saturday’s events.
With midterm elections later this year in the U.S., organizers say they’ve seen a surge in the number of people organizing events and registering to participate in deeply Republican states such as Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and Utah.
Competitive suburban areas that have helped decide national elections are seeing “huge” increases in interest, Greenberg said, citing Pennsylvania’s Bucks and Delaware counties, East Cobb and Forsyth in Georgia, and Scottsdale and Chandler in Arizona as examples.
“Voters who decide elections, the people who do the door knocking and the voter registration and all of the work of turning protests into power, they are taking to the streets right now, and they are furious,” she said.
In a statement, White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson dismissed the rallies as “Trump Derangement Therapy Sessions” of interest only to journalists.
In northern Virginia just outside Washington, D.C., several hundred people began gathering on Saturday morning close to Arlington National Cemetery before a planned march across the Potomac River to the capital city’s National Mall.
Some passing drivers honked their horns in support but others slowed down to berate the protesters.
“You’re all idiots,” one man shouted from his car.
John Ale, 57, a retired air conditioning and heating contractor, said he drove 20 minutes from his home in Virginia to join the march.
“What’s happening in this country is unsustainable,” he said. “The middle class, the little people, can’t afford to live anymore. And he (Trump) is breaking the norms, the things that made us function as a country.”
Calls to action
Saturday marked the third No Kings Day of Action. The movement launched last year on Trump’s birthday, June 14, and drew an estimated 4 to 6 million people spread across roughly 2,100 sites nationwide. The second mobilization in October involved an estimated 7 million participants across more than 2,700 cities, according to a crowd-sourcing analysis published by prominent data journalist G. Elliott Morris.
That October event was largely fueled by a backlash against a government shutdown, an aggressive crackdown by federal immigration authorities, and the deployment of National Guard troops to major cities.
Saturday’s protest comes amid what organizers called a call to action against the bombardment of Iran by the U.S. and Israel, a conflict that is now four weeks old.
Deirdre Schifeling, chief political and advocacy officer for the American Civil Liberties Union, said protests have led to tangible results.
“Whenever we stand up to President Trump’s abuses of power, like most bullies, he backs down,” she said, citing administration reversals following earlier demonstrations over National Guard deployments in Los Angeles and ICE killings of two American citizens in Minneapolis.
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