Hundreds of thousands of people turned out at the New York City “No Kings” protest on Saturday. Participants gathered around Columbus Circle and Central Park South as they prepared to march down Seventh Avenue and Broadway to Midtown. Participants were vocal about their grievances regarding a multitude of issues, including federal immigration policies, the US and Israeli-led war on Iran, Trump’s blockade and threats of political action in Cuba and healthcare cuts. A multitude of organizations and coalitions such as Refuse Facism, Sunrise Movement, NAACP, 1199 SEIU, and Alliance For Quality Education represented their causes during the protest.
Many felt it was necessary to protest due to heightened unrest and dissatisfaction in the United States.
“I'm scared to death that this country is hurtling towards destruction. The price of everything going up, my children not being able to get jobs, [lack of] affordable housing. The racism, the violence that's going on, that's pretty scary,” Lisa, a demonstrator who attended the protest, told WBAI.
President Donald Trump exercising his power beyond constitutional authority was a primary concern throughout the demonstrations—many likened his leadership to a fascist or authoritarian regime in their signage. Countless demonstrators held signs explicitly condemning the Trump administration, only a few days after Trump’s approval rating hit a new low of 36% early last week. The rally this Saturday marks the third organized “No Kings” gathering in less than a year and the numbers of participants keep growing.
Demonstrators in Manhattan detailed the ways in which the current administration has affected their personal lives, as well as the lives of their neighbors and loved ones.
“Personally, I am a transgender American. I have had terrible experiences with the healthcare system, with terribly long wait lines. I've had issues with my passport. I've had issues with many of my friends being too terrified to actually come out and be who they truly are,” Gio told WBAI.
Cheryl Sterling, a professor and academic, alluded to the war in Iran and US-backed involvement in Palestine, and detailed her own experience with repression in this country,
“It’s about what is really going on with other people in the world, and how we are affecting them. How we're creating wars, how we’re killing and supporting killing, and we're just supporting the destruction of the world economy at the moment . . . Even with work, I'm an academic. We're becoming too limited in what we can speak about because there's so many repercussions on the part of our administrators.”
The rally concluded in Midtown at 6pm. No arrests related to the protest were made. In addition to the two rallies held in Manhattan, dozens of others were planned throughout the five boroughs. “No Kings” organizers estimate that eight million people participated in protests nationwide, with more than 3000 rallies in total.
