From Boston to Los Angeles, 1000’s of individuals rallied on Saturday to protest the presidency of Donald J. Trump, together with his dealing with of the struggle in Ukraine, his stance on reproductive rights and the firing of federal employees.
About 300 protests, organized to commemorate Worldwide Girls’s Day, had been scheduled across the nation. Some, just like the one at Washington Sq. Park in Manhattan, attracted a minimum of a number of thousand demonstrators. Others, in smaller cities like Richmond, Va., Sarasota, Fla., and Port Angeles, Wash., drew extra scattered curiosity. One in Madison, Wis., drew greater than 120 folks.
In New York Metropolis, protesters expressed outrage at Mr. Trump’s therapy of Ukraine’s president, restrictions on transgender rights and what they see because the tearing aside of the nation’s democracy.
Nancy Lewis, 80, attended civil rights demonstrations in Selma, Ala., as a youngster. Lauren Yoo, 26, had hardly ever protested earlier than. Each had been keen to hitch the group.
“Plenty of girls are feeling like they’re going again in time, so I really feel prefer it’s good to come back out right here and voice our issues, and stand with all girls,” Ms. Yoo mentioned.
Worldwide Girls’s Day will not be as extensively celebrated in the US as it’s in different nations. However organizers mentioned that People wanting to protest thought of the event an acceptable time to rally. Girls’s teams had taken the lead in coordinating the main protest that greeted Mr. Trump’s first inauguration eight years in the past, referred to as the Girls’s March. Hundreds of thousands of People joined that 2017 protest, the most important single-day public demonstration in U.S. historical past.
Mr. Trump’s second inauguration confronted a way more muted response, reflecting a shift in techniques and maybe a extra unsure opposition.
The current blitz of funding freezes, firings, government orders and extra has left many People on the lookout for alternatives to reveal, mentioned Rachel O’Leary Carmona, government director of Girls’s March, which organized Saturday’s rallies. The group was fashioned by a few of the organizers of the 2017 march.
Members in several communities targeted on totally different issues, such because the firings on the Nationwide Park Service or restrictions on abortion.
“What persons are involved about is all the things, as a result of there’s no side of those assaults that doesn’t contact all people,” she mentioned.
In Madison, some attendees carried indicators supporting Susan Crawford, a liberal candidate for the Wisconsin Supreme Courtroom who helps abortion rights. One attendee, Lynn McMahon, a 32-year-old engineer, mentioned the State Supreme Courtroom race is linked to a broader assault on girls.
“Simply sitting round in your sofa and ‘slacktivism’ isn’t going to assist, however popping out, speaking to folks, speaking to your pals is what makes a distinction,” she mentioned.
For Ricki Sajbel, a 67-year-old former stay-at-home mom and a member of a gaggle referred to as the Raging Grannies of Madison, Saturday’s rally capped a busy stretch of activism.
“It’s my fourth protest in per week,” she mentioned.
Christina Lieffring and Ana Facio-Krajcer contributed reporting.
