< The Latest 2025-10-18T18:28:45+0000
The Pasadena Star-News | Sat 10/18 09:27am PST | Staff And Wire Reports
Millions of people are expected to gather today in the nation’s capital and communities across the U.S. for “No Kings” demonstrations to protest the direction of the country under President Donald Trump — or what the Republican Party is calling “Hate America” rallies.
This is the third mass mobilization and second No Kings Day since Trump’s return to the White House, and it comes against the backdrop of a government shutdown that not only has closed federal programs and services, but is testing the core balance of power as an aggressive executive confronts Congress and the courts in ways that organizers warn are a slide toward American authoritarianism.
Trump himself is away from Washington at his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida.
“They say they’re referring to me as a king. I’m not a king,” Trump said in a Fox News interview airing early Friday, before he departed for a $1 million-per-plate MAGA Inc. super PAC fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago. Protests are expected nearby Saturday.
More than 2,600 rallies are planned in cities large and small, including dozens in Southern California.
Around 2,000 people lined the streets and parking lots around Torrance City Hall on Saturday morning.
People dressed in rainbows, waving American flags and holding signs saying, “No Kings in America.” A handful of counter protesters were present, with signs advocating for the death penalty for “homosexuals, rapists, murderers and pedophiles.”
Katharine Nhyus with Indivisible South Bay, the group that organized the Torrance protest, encouraged those present to vote yes on Prop. 50, California’s redistricting ballot proposition, which seeks to favor Democrats in California’s congressional elections as a way to counter similar, Republican-led plans elsewhere in the country to boost the GOP.
“The way we make a difference is by doing things like this,” Nhyus told the crowd.
Assembly member Al Murastuchi, D-Rolling Hills Estates, also addressed the protesters, encouraging them to not be “silenced by Donald Trump.
“Americans from all walks of life need to stand up and fight back,” Murastuchi said.
The demonstrators brought up numerous issues, including immigration, education and the First Amendment.
“I think it’s more important than ever to stand up for the First Amendment,” said Lawndale resident Tom Tran, 42. “If we don’t use it ,then there’s a real danger that we’ll lose it. It’s a scary time we’re living in and it’s more important than ever to speak up.”
Large crowds took to the streets during the first No Kings protest in June to protest Trump’s policies, an event that fell on his 79th birthday. The June 14 protests were mostly peaceful until protesters and local law enforcement officers clashed in downtown LA, leading to officers deploying chemical irritants and flash bang grenades at civilians.
Law enforcement agencies in Los Angeles, Orange County and the Inland Empire said they support demonstrators’ right to protest but they will arrest any lawbreakers.
In downtown Los Angeles on Saturday afternoon, the demonstration will feature a 20-foot-tall balloon of President Trump wearing a diaper, a 20-foot-wide by 3-foot-tall banner that reads “No Kings for U.S.,” and thousands of handmade signs by participants as they march along a nearly two-mile stretch down Spring Street.
The L.A. protest is being organized by 50501 SoCal and Service Employees International Union Local 721, in partnership with Black Lives Matter Grassroots – Los Angeles, the Removal Coalition, Working Families Party, Black Women for Wellness, Clergy Laity United for Economic Justice, the TransLatin@ Coalition, Democracy Action Network, and the Human Liberation Coalition, among others.
SoCal 50501 is the Los Angeles chapter of 50501, which bills itself as “a peaceful, decentralized grassroots political movement with a mission to uphold democracy and constitutional governance.” Its name stems from “50 protests. 50 states. 1 Movement.”
“America has no kings and working Americans will not stand by as a wannabe dictator wages war on our rights and our democracy,” said David Green, president and executive director of SEIU Local 721, which represents more than 100,000 workers.
“Enough is enough. We will stop this authoritarianism in its tracks and work to revitalize and enhance our democracy, our rights, and our nation. We will not accept a regime that aims to put the interests of billionaires ahead of our families, workers, and communities,” he added.
“Every day, it seems like there’s something worse than the day before,” Lorraine Enriquez, president of the Redlands Area Democratic Club, said ahead of the planned protest in downtown Redlands. “We’re standing up as the voice of our community.”
“We’re in the Inland Empire, an economically suppressed community,” Enriquez said. “People are not able to pay their groceries, their rent, they’re about to lose their subsidies for their health insurance. We can’t believe the rule of law has gone out the door.”
Rallies also were held in major European cities, where gatherings of a few hundred Americans chanted slogans and held signs and U.S. flags.
While the earlier nationwide protests this year — against Elon Musk’s cuts in spring, then to counter Trump’s military parade in June — drew crowds, organizers say this one is building a more unified opposition movement. Top Democrats such as Senate Leader Chuck Schumer and Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders are joining in what organizers view as an antidote to Trump’s actions, from the administration’s clampdown on free speech to its military-style immigration raids.
“There is no greater threat to an authoritarian regime than patriotic people-power,” said Ezra Levin, a co-founder of Indivisible, among the key organizers.
As Republicans and the White House dismiss the protests as a rally of radicals, Levin said their own sign-up numbers are growing. Organizers said rallies are being planned within a one-hour drive for most Americans.
Republicans have sought to portray participants in Saturday’s rallies as far outside the mainstream of American politics, and a main reason for the prolonged government shutdown, now in its 18th day.
From the White House to Capitol Hill, GOP leaders disparaged the rallygoers as “communists” and “Marxists.”
They say Democratic leaders, including Schumer, are beholden to the far-left flank and willing to keep the government shut down to appease those liberal forces.
“I encourage you to watch — we call it the Hate America rally — that will happen Saturday,” said House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La.
“Let’s see who shows up for that,” Johnson said, listing groups including “antifa types,” people who “hate capitalism” and “Marxists in full display.”
In a Facebook post, former presidential contender Sanders said, “It’s a love America rally.”
“It’s a rally of millions of people all over this country who believe in our Constitution, who believe in American freedom and,” he said, pointing at the GOP leadership, “are not going to let you and Donald Trump turn this country into an authoritarian society.”
Staff writer Madeline Armstrong, the Associated Press and City News Service contributed to this report.