Millions of people in thousands of places said ‘No Kings’

This is what democracy looks like

The scene in St. Paul, Minnesota. (Source: Facebook)

The estimated turnout for “No Kings” rallies in big cities was staggering: a million people in Boston; 200,000 in New York and Los Angeles; 100,000 in Philadelphia, 80,000 in St. Paul (despite law enforcement officials asking the public not to attend, following the shootings of two Minnesota lawmakers); 70,000 in Seattle; 60,000 in San Diego; 50,000 in Portland and San Francisco.

But it was the breadth of the protests that may make “No Kings” day stand out in the history books: over 2,100 individual events across the country.

Picture yourself in Pentwater, Michigan, a town of 900 people on the shores of Lake Michigan, walking out onto the Village Green and finding 400 people reciting the preamble to the Constitution. (Here’s the report in the Ocean County Press; here’s some video.)

Or picture yourself in Bastrop, a small town in central Texas, where some 700 people lined the Chestnut Street bridge over the Colorado River on Saturday, waving signs and flags.

The message: No Kings.

The other message: You are not alone.

Do you want to experience that feeling again? Browse these wonderful photographs from the Associated Press, Getty Images, the New York Times, the Atlantic, and NPR. Watch the top of the Rachel Maddow show on Monday.

Organizers estimated total turnout at around 5 million, which would make “No Kings” day the second largest single-day protest in U.S. history (after the original Earth Day.)

Data journalist G. Elliott Morris’s estimated total attendance somewhere in the 4 to 6 million range, or roughly 1.2 to 1.8 percent of the U.S. population. See this crowdsourced attendance spreadsheet with estimates from over 1,300 different events as of this moment.

Scenes From Across the Nation

More than 10,000 gathered in Milwaukee, where protesters rallied in Cathedral Square Park before marching a mile loop around part of downtown. Signs depicted concerns with immigrants’ rights, veterans' benefits, abortion access, union jobs, and public education funding.

Janey Christoffersen, 49, of West Allis, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel she was attending a protest for the first time, motivated by local reports of federal arrests of immigrants.

"It was a no-brainer to be here," Christoffersen told the Journal Sentinel, speaking through tears. "I want to get out of my comfort zone to show people that we love and care about them, that the whole country is not angry."

Over 15,000 gathered in Madison. Here’s a photo gallery.

About 1,000 people gathered in the small town of Glens Falls, in Northern New York State (population 14,000). Ken Tingley, who writes a newsletter about the town, reported from the intersection known as Centennial Circle:

Each corner of the five-way intersection, like the points of a star, were jammed with people armed with their own personal messages, their own concerns and their obvious understanding that the country they loved was being ripped from their grasp.

Over 10,000 people protested in Kansas City. KCUR reported:

Myka Lawson, 43, brought her daughter, Hadley Lawson, 15, to her first protest on Saturday. She said she wanted to show her daughter what democracy looks like.

“I can't say that I stand for something and not do anything about it when something is threatening it,” Hadley said. “I want to be able to see democracy live after my entire life and not be threatened by some person. I want to see my kids be able to do this kind of thing.”

Boise had a huge turnout. The Idaho Capital Sun reported:

The crowd covered the Capitol steps, filled the section of Jefferson Street in front of the building and stretched deep and wide throughout nearby Cecil D. Andrus Park as people chanted “No more kings” and “Love, not hate, makes Idaho great.”

Tammie Baker was one of thousands who attended the protest. She carried a homemade sign that read “I prefer my ICE crushed” and said her concern over the Trump administration’s policies motivated her to attend her first political protest since the 1970s…

“There is not much one person can do, but you have to start somewhere,” Baker added.

Some 700 people – 10 percent of the population – turned out in Clarkston, Washington. The Moscow-Pullman Daily News reported that “the sidewalks near Bridge and Fifth streets were filled with people waving signs as motorists honked their horns amid sounds of whistles, cowbells and chants.”

Patch.com in New Jersey reported that “On a gloomy, rainy day in the deeply red township of Lacey, more than 500 people showed up to express their dissatisfaction with the federal government as part of the nationwide ‘No Kings’ protests.”

There were more than 2,000 people protesting in Ithaca, New York, (population 33,000) reported the Ithaca Voice:

Matthew Muscheid… said he felt compelled to attend because of Trump’s “effective suspension of habeas corpus,” referring to the administration’s deportation campaign that has been riddled with legal challenges as federal immigration officials seek to remove people from the country without first putting them on trial. He said such a tactic is akin to authoritarian regimes.

“It’s so important for us to come together and see each other,” Muscheid said. “It’s for each other as much as it is for everybody else, and for our elected representatives, to know that we’re not alone, to know that there are still people that share our same values.”

About 500 people gathered outside the county courthouse in the small town of Oregon, Illinois. Shaw Local reported:

Homemade signs criticized Trump’s tariffs, immigration policies, executive orders, and ICE raids.

Some of the signs read "When Cruelty Become Normal Compassion Looks Radical"; "Love Thy Neighbor — No Exceptions"; "Preserve the Constitution. No Kings"; "Due Process for Everyone}"; "Trump Has 'Tarrified' Our Farmers"; "Get Real...No King"; "Resist Like Its 1938 Germany. Save Democracy"; "No Kings. No Dictators. No Oligarchs. No Police State"; and "Wake Up This is Fascism".

In Rockville, Maryland, Maryland Matters reported:

Sylvia Greenberg, 56, drove from Gaithersburg to attend the Rockville rally with her daughter, Evlin. She said the Trump administration’s “centralization of power, ignoring our checks and balances,” is “just not American.”

“Which one is more American? People standing up for what they feel is right or a show of tanks and guns with somebody who’s centralizing power for himself?” she asked. “I think we’re the more patriotic.”

More than 2,000 people protested in Lincoln, Nebraska, where Trenton Morales, 17, told the Nebraska Examiner he came out to protest against the workplace immigration raid in Omaha this week and other similar raids nationally. “My grandpa recently got deported,” Morales told the Examiner. “That’s one reason why I’m out here.”

In this video, the Wall Street Journal’s Kris Maher reports on the “fairly raucous crowd” of about 1,000 protesters in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. Greensburg is in Westmoreland County, which Trump won in November with 64 percent of the vote.

Indivisible Oklahoma told The Oklahoman there were 23 “No Kings” rallies across the state. Estimated attendance: Oklahoma City, 8,500 to 10,000; Tulsa, 5,000 between three separate protests; Broken Arrow, 100; Catoosa, 50; Lawton, 150; McAlester, 150; Ada, 200; Bartlesville, 260; Norman, 200; Tahlequah, 200; Okmulgee, 45; Durant, 250; Ardmore, 200; Elk City, 50; Ponca City, 150; Chandler, 75; Stillwater, 250; Pauls Valley, 25; Idabel, 50.

“Large crowds” turned out in Rochester, New York, according to WHEC News, which interviewed 13-year-old Maddie Keefer. “A lot of people will say that since we’re kids, we can’t, like, do anything about it, so we shouldn’t start problems,” she said. “But I want to have a good future, and I want other people to be able to be welcomed and, like, feel like they have a purpose here.”

Some 3,000 seniors protested at the Villages in Florida – about four percent of the total population.

Former labor secretary Robert Reich summed up the significance of the “No Kings” protests this way, in the Guardian:

As we resist Donald Trump’s tyranny, America gains in solidarity. As we gain solidarity, we feel more courageous. As we feel courageous and stand up to the president, we weaken him and his regime. As we weaken Trump and his regime, we have less to fear.

Faith Leaders Step Up

Chicago held a Mass on Saturday for home-town hero Pope Leo, who live-streamed an address to a crowd of 30,000 at White Sox stadium.

The pope avoided any controversial topics, but as the Chicago Sun-Times reported, Cardinal Blase Cupich, who led the Mass, “used the occasion to speak out about immigration and the treatment of undocumented people in the U.S.”

“It is wrong to scapegoat those who are here without documents,” Cupich said during his homily. “For indeed, they are here due to a broken immigration system. And it is a broken immigration system which both parties have failed to fix.”…

“So many of the undocumented have for decades been connected to us,” Cupich said. “They are here not by invasion, but by invitation — an invitation to harvest the fruits of the earth that feed our families; an invitation to clean our tables, homes and hotel rooms; an invitation to landscape our lawns; and yes, even an invitation to care for our children and elders.”

Cupich said that by looking for connections instead of differences, people can “respond to this moment and thus reclaim our calling to live as authentic persons in the image of divine persons.”

Meanwhile in San Diego, the Latin Times reports that the first U.S. bishop appointed by Pope Leo “called on priests, deacons and ministry leaders across the Diocese of San Diego to accompany asylum seekers to court on International Refugee Day, June 20.”

Religion News reported that at one Los Angeles rally, faith leaders “spread out in front of the line of officers, held hands and occasionally burst into song,” in an attempt to both protest against ICE and keep the peace.

“Since the inauguration of the president, we’ve been training and preparing to respond to actions like this,” the Rev. Brendan Busse, a Jesuit Catholic priest, told Religion News, which further reported:

His words were echoed Monday by the Rev. Jaime Edwards-Acton, pastor of St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Hollywood. Edwards-Acton spoke at a press conference convened to support 14 families whose loved ones were among those apprehended by ICE.

The Los Angeles Times credited faith leaders for helping quell violence there last week. At one point, a group of faith leader marched to the Federal Building, took a knee and prayed, even as Department of Homeland Security officers trained pepper ball guns on them.

“We see that you are putting on your masks, you don’t need them,” Rev. Eddie Anderson, pastor of McCarty Memorial Christian Church and a leader with LA Voice, said to the officers and guardsmen. “The people have gathered together to remind you there is a higher power. To remind you that in Los Angeles everybody is free, and no human is illegal.”

The Associated Press reported that the Rev. Edward Anderson last week positioned himself between law enforcement and his fellow protesters in Los Angeles, serving as a human buffer.

Anderson, who leads McCarty Memorial Christian Church in the city’s West Adams Terrace neighborhood, believes he was upholding his moral duty to stand against injustice, but in a nonviolent manner that his faith demands.

“It is imperative that people of faith speak out because silence in the face of injustice is complicity,” he said.

The AP took note of several other religious leaders who are supporting nonviolent protest.

“The moral message is clear: we do not accept the world as it is. We respond to cruelty with courage, to hatred with love,” Rabbi Sharon Brous said this week at an interfaith vigil in Los Angeles…

The Rev. Jacqui Lewis, senior pastor of Middle Collegiate Church in New York City, said nonviolent resistance is a core belief of her congregation, which has been feeding and helping newly arrived immigrants and demonstrating to support them.

“We’re like Jesus — nonviolent,” said Lewis.

But nonviolence isn’t silence, she said, adding that it “often means confronting people with the truth. ... We understand that social change has happened because people of faith and spiritual imagination guided the streets peacefully.”

Lawsuit Watch

• A federal judge in Boston ordered the National Institutes of Health to reinstate hundreds of research grants it had terminated because they allegedly focused on diversity, equity and inclusion, gender identity and other topics. “I‘ve sat on this bench now for 40 years. I’ve never seen government racial discrimination like this,” said Judge William Young, who was appointed to the federal bench by former President Reagan. “Have we fallen so low? Have we no shame?”

• A federal judge in Boston temporarily blocked the Defense Department from carrying out steep cuts to federal research funding.

• Trans rights suffered a massive blow on Wednesday, when the Supreme Court upheld a Tennessee law that prohibits some medical treatments for transgender youths. But there was a minor victory last week, when a federal judge enjoined the State Department from enforcing the Trump administration's passport gender policy, which bars passport holders from select an X or identifying as a gender other than their sex at birth.

• A federal judge in Massachusetts granted a preliminary injunction blocking stringent new voting ID requirements that Trump laid out in an executive order in March.

Mark Your Calendar

Groups are now mobilizing for “Good Trouble Lives On,” a nationwide event on July 17, the anniversary of the passing of civil rights icon John Lewis.

“Across the country, we will take to the streets and into communities to uplift his non-violent struggle for justice, voting rights, and dignity for all,” the organizers say.

There are information sessions coming up, including one the evening. Sign up here.