Nearly 7 million protesters in small towns across the country turned out for No Kings protests to rally against Donald Trump’s presidency, according to organizers.
The president declared he was “not a king” on Fox News Friday, but that didn’t stop millions of rally-goers in more than 2,500 locations across the United States from protesting the second Trump administration.
Saturday’s event marked the third mass mobilization since Trump recaptured the White House — and one of the largest single-day nationwide demonstrations in U.S. history, surpassing the more than 5 million demonstrators who turned out for the first iteration of “No Kings” protests in June, organizers said.
“Today, millions of people showed that we, the people, will not be silenced,” Deirdre Schifeling, chief policy and advocacy officer for the American Civil Liberties Union, said in a statement.
Protesters at rallies across the country chanted a common refrain: “Hey hey! Ho ho! Donald Trump has got to go!” Inflatable suits, Revolutionary War references and posters depicting Trump in a crown were ubiquitous.
Organizers called the protests “overwhelmingly peaceful.”
More than 350,000 people across New York City protested Saturday, organizers said, while New York City police made zero arrests in connection with the protests. Rallies from Charlotte, North Carolina, to San Diego, California also saw no arrests, according to police.
As millions of Americans marched against him, Trump spent the day in Palm Beach, Florida. Some Democratic officials — including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Massachusetts Rep. Jim McGovern – showed up at rallies, while several prominent Republicans urged Americans to stay home and watch college football instead of attending the protests, which they baselessly called “Hate America” rallies.
“We’re calling it the ‘Hate America’ rally that’s going to happen Saturday,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said earlier this week. “Let’s see who shows up for it. I bet you see pro-Hamas supporters. I bet you see Antifa types. I bet you see the Marxists on full display.”
Washington, DC
Taking the stage in Washington, DC, where more than 200,000 protesters turned out, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders immediately took aim at Johnson’s comments.
“Boy, is he wrong,” Sanders said. “Millions across thousands of cities across the country showed up not because they hate America, but because they love America.”
He warned that the American experiment is “now in peril,” citing several Trump actions, including sending masked federal agents into cities, the president’s lawsuits against media companies and Trump’s threats to arrest and jail his perceived political enemies.
“This moment is not just about one man’s greed, one man’s corruption, or one man’s contempt for the Constitution,” Sanders told the crowd. “This is about a handful of the richest people on earth who, in their insatiable greed, have hijacked our economy and our political system to enrich themselves at the expense of working families across this country.”
He denounced the billionaires who helped fund Trump’s re-election campaign and participated in his inauguration, specifically naming Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg.
“We rejected the divine right of kings in the 1770s. We will not accept the divine right of oligarchs today,” he said.
Miami
Down in Miami, where thousands of protesters had gathered, Enrique Tarrio, the former Proud Boys leader, showed up with a videographer for the “No Kings” protests. In 2023, Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years behind bars in connection with the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021. He was among more than 1,600 people connected to the riots whom Trump pardoned earlier this year.
“Get away from the agitator,” organizers told the crowd using megaphones, the outlet reported. “Please do not engage with any outside agitators.”
“I support all these people, especially her with the bullhorn,” Tarrio said.
“These protesters are expressing 100 percent the same rights as on January 6,” said the person who live-streamed Tarrio.
Chicago
Up north in Chicago, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker addressed a massive crowd of 100,000 people in a city where Trump recently asked the Supreme Court to allow him to deploy National Guard troops after lower court judges ruled against the move.
Pritzker, who has repeatedly opposed the Trump administration’s demands, spoke of resistance.
“History will judge us by where we choose to stand right now, today. Future generations will ask, ‘What did we do when fellow human beings were persecuted? When our rights were abridged? When our Constitution was under attack?'” he asked. “They want to know if we stood up or if we stayed still.”
“Tyranny demands your fear, your silence, your compliance; Democracy demands courage,” the Democratic governor continued.
“Resistance means choosing solidarity over fear and means recognizing that an attack on free speech rights of immigrants after due process is an attack on everyone’s rights,” Pritzker told the audience. “It means understanding that we are either building a society based on human dignity, or a society based on dominance.”
Actor John Cusack also noted Trump’s Supreme Court appeal. Speaking to CNN Say anything Star had a direct message for the president: “No, you can’t put troops on our streets. You can’t create enough chaos to invoke the Insurrection Act to stay in power. We all know what your plan is.”
Cusack, a Chicago native, said the city has a message for the administration: “To hell with you!”
Atlanta
More than 35,000 protesters rallied in Atlanta, where Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock told the crowd that Americans should be “concerned” about Trump’s recent remarks about the military.
Last month, Trump told top military leaders in Quantico, Virginia, “This is going to be a big thing for the people in this room because it’s the enemy from within, and we have to deal with it before it gets out of hand.” He told them that some of them would be involved in using American cities run by Democrats as “training grounds” for troops.
“Listen to me: I don’t care what your politics are today. I mean it,” Warnock said on Saturday. “If you’re an American citizen, you should be deeply concerned. And I know you are. That’s why you’re gathered here today. We should all be deeply concerned about an American president who stood in front of our military and said the real concern is the enemy within.”
The senator also criticized Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which has led the administration’s mass deportation agenda.
“Government agents fly in Blackhawk helicopters into Chicago and rappel down an apartment building in the middle of an American city,” he said. “Literally separating black people from brown people. I’m a preacher, but I have to say this. What the hell is going on? And we should all be concerned.”
