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No Kings protests live updates: hundreds of thousands rally in cities around the world against Trump and his administration | Protest (US)
Key events
Fabiola Cineas
As one of DC’s No Kings marches wound down at the Southwest Waterfront, protesters said they want the country to remember that DC was the “guinea pig.”
“Donald Tump unleashed this on Washington DC first,” Ama’d, 27, said as a group of National Guard members stood a few feet away. “We need to rest of the country to know that we are being over-policed in our communities.
Ama’d, an activist and music artist, helped design protest music that he performed on a float. “No one man should have all that power! We need our rights back! We’re taking back ours,” one musician rapped as crowds of protesters chanted, “Free DC! Free DC!”
As protesters made their way to the Waterfront metro station, organizers distributed flyers for future protests, including a daily “Hands Off the Arts” protest to “keep the Kennedy Center open” and “save jobs,” organizers told the Guardian.
For a 1 May protest, activists are demanding a day of “No work. No School. No shopping,” another flyer states.
“Part of what we are trying to do is be in solidarity with other groups and movements that are being attacked and one of them is the labor unions and working people here in DC,” said Nachama Wilker, 64, a volunteer with Free DC, the local organization advocating for DC home rule and DC statehood. “The May action is in solidarity with all of these labor organizations as Trump guts union jobs in DC”.
Wilker added, “People come out to these big rallies, and they don’t know how to plug in after the rally. That’s a big reason why I am handing out these flyers”.
Rachel Leingang
Jane Fonda, Joan Baez and Maggie Rogers are closing out the day’s speakers in St. Paul.
“This is not the America I was told existed,” Fonda said. “I was told we are the people.”
Rogers praised Minnesotans for their resilience, saying it was inspiring. “So much love in the face of evil,” she said.
Baez praised Minnesota’a resistance, saying “thank you, Minneapolis”.
Then, Baez and Rogers ended the rally by singing “The Times They Are A-Changing.”
As No Kings protests begin to wrap up on the east coast, they’re just getting started in California.
Here’s a glimpse of the demonstrations under way in San Francisco and Los Angeles:
Lex McMenamin
The multiple No Kings contingents in Manhattan merged through Times Square, continuously flanked by photographers. Families carried LGBTQ pride flags and Palestinian flags, while older marchers held pun-heavy protest signs, and others handed out whistles. Across age groups and race — though the crowd did overall lean white and older, it was by no means homogenous — the consistent themes were anti-ICE, pro-LGBTQ, and, obviously, anti-Trump.
But perhaps the most consistent theme was anti-war. Multiple signs connected the Epstein files to the Trump administration’s decision to target Iran and spend immense amounts of funding on warfare. “This war has to stop,” said M.B., 55, who came in from Queens to protest. “American people do not want what this administration is doing. We don’t want it. We need healthcare, we need jobs. We need infrastructure.”
The front of the march reached the dispersal point at Madison Square Garden by 3:30 local time, and more than an hour later, protesters still streamed through the closed intersection. Leftist organizing groups and political parties set up shop to peel protesters off as they walked to the subway, flyering for future actions and ways to get involved in their work.
Rachel Leingang
Organizers in Minnesota estimate at least 200,000 are at the main march at the state capitol in St. Paul.
The crowd stretches back further than I can see in multiple directions.
“Fuck ICE” and “ICE OUT” signs and pins are a frequent site, an indicator of how much the federal government’s incursion into the state left a mark on its people.
Speakers on the stage talked about how they and their organizations responded on the ground to their neighbors’ needs during the surge.
Bernie Sanders riled up the crowd with remarks about the role of the ultra rich in politics.
My colleage Amy Qin is continuing to report live from Chicago, where a diverse slate of speakers, including faith leaders and legal advocates, have addressed a crowd gathered at Butler Field in Grant Park:
The loudest cheers came when two student protest leaders came on stage, including Leah Sophia Lopez, a student at Social Justice High School in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood, a predominately Latino neighborhood that was a frequent target of Trump’s immigration enforcement campaign last fall.
“My fellow Americans: kids are being put into cages while our government funds war and genocides,” said Lopez, who led hundreds of students in a school walk out protesting ICE last year. “America is built off of protest, immigrants, slaves, we built this county.”
Illinois lieutenant governor Juliana Stratton closed out the rally to thunderous cheers from the crowd. “We came here to make it clear that we will never bow to a king,” she said. “Illinois will stand up and fight back like we always do.”
Fabiola Cineas
Thousands of protesters are rallying across the Washington, DC region as No Kings protests spread across the nation’s capital.
One protest group, made up of about a dozen Palestinian mothers, stood at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and waved a massive 10-foot-tall Palestinian flag. One of the mothers, activist Hazami Barmada, 42, said she was protesting to draw attention to “Israel’s atrocities against the Palestinian people.”
“Most Americans don’t know that our tax dollars are being used to subsidize violence,” Barmada said. “This is happening while many Americans can’t afford housing, milk, school, or healthcare. Prices continue to go up as we are fighting Israel’s wars.”
Other protesters, led by local activist organizations including Free DC, gathered at the Frederick Douglass Bridge in southeast Washington, DC. The crowd marched across the bridge to Fort McNair in Southwest DC where White House senior advisor Stephen Miller resides. The protest’s organizers say Miller is “running the effort to take over DC.”
Protesters told the Guardian they wanted to draw attention to the occupation of Washington, DC. In August, President Trump issued an executive order that put the federal government in charge of the Washington, DC Metropolitan Police Department. Trump used an additional executive order to deployed more than 2,000 members of the National Guard to the nation’s capital. Trump said the Guard members were mobilized to fight crime, though violent crime in DC is at a 30-year low.
Bruce Springsteen headlines rally in Minnesota
Rachel Leingang
At the flagship protest in St Paul, Minnesota, many tens of thousands filled the streets around the state capitol to commiserate, mourn and speak out again the Trump administration.
Bruce Springsteen sang his song about the death and destruction brought by ICE to this state, Streets of Minneapolis, leading the crowd in chants of “ICE OUT NOW.”
Governor Tim Walz introduced Springsteen, saying it was clear America needed “no damn kings” but it needed The Boss.
Walz praised his state as the “freest” in the country and commended the state’s people for standing up for each other and for immigrants when Trump sent in thousands of federal agents, who killed two Minnesotans.
The names of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti featured heavily in the No Kings protest and signs here in Minnesota.
“We will never forget what they did here,” Walz said of the Trump administration. “You’ll still be here when that orange clown is in the dustbin of history.”
Thousands of protesters are rallying at Butler Field in Grant Park, Chicago, where my colleage Amy Qin is reporting:
As they filed into the park, protesters chanted “ICE out” and “Trump must go now, facists gotta go now”.
Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson was the first to speak at the event, opening by addressing the size of the crowd: “Look around: Our movement is bigger, our resolve is bigger.”
“We’re sending a clear message: we’re gonna end these assaults against working people, against immigrants and end these endless wars,” Johnson said.
In the crowd, protesters held aloft signs reading “No country for orange men” and “Imagine hating immigrants more than pedophiles”. Others waved signs denouncing ICE, supporting voting rights and criticizing wars.
Later in the rally, Dian Palmer, president of SEIU Local 73, said, “Fascism is really just one thing: powerful people using force to keep everyone else down, and unions exist to push back against that.”
Also at the event, social worker and Chicago Therapy Collective executive director Iggy Ladden denounced the Trump administration’s attacks against transgender people.
“Trans people are a direct threat to fascism because depends on control telling people who they can and cannot be,” Ladden said. “When we build a world that protects trans people we build a world that’s better for everyone.”
As demonstrators gather across the United States, the White House and Republican leadership are denouncing the No Kings day events planned today as “Trump Derangement Therapy Sessions”.
In a statement, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said the demonstrations were created by “leftist funding networks” and that “only people who care about these Trump Derangement Therapy Sessions are the reporters who are paid to cover them.”
The National Republican Congressional Committee echoed the White House. “These Hate America Rallies are where the far-left’s most violent, deranged fantasies get a microphone,” spokesperson Maureen O’Toole told the Associated Press.
Protesters are gathering in Minnesota’s Twin Cities for a flagship No Kings rally in St Paul. Bruce Springsteen is expected to headline the event and perform Streets of Minneapolis, which he wrote following the deaths of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti earlier this year.
Joan Baez, Jane Fonda and senator Bernie Sanders are also expected at the St Paul rally, which organizers believe could attract about 100,000 people.
Lex McMenamin
Well before the main New York City No Kings march was set to touch off near Central Park’s south-west edge, protesters milled through the frigid midtown streets with posters and banners, donning costumes, keffiyehs and parkas.
By 1.50pm, Letitia James, the state attorney general, Jumaane Williams, the city public advocate, Robert De Niro, Rev Al Sharpton and Padma Lakshmi filed into the front of the crowd behind hand painted banners reading: “WE PROTECT OUR DEMOCRACY – PEOPLE OVER BILLIONAIRES – WE PROTECT OUR NEIGHBORS.” They joined union members in AFT merch and protesters of all ages.
Press photographers swarming the celebrities slowed the progress of the march down 7th Avenue, making it difficult for them to take off. “From Palestine to Mexico, all the walls have got to go,” someone boomed into a small speaker, half a block ahead of the celebrities. “Racist ICE, you can’t hide, we charge you with genocide!” Hundreds more people awaited the march in Times Square, while another march proceeded parallel down Broadway to convene.
Protest against the far-right underway in UK
With No Kings protests under way in the United States, my colleagues across the pond are covering a massive, although unrelated, demonstration against the far-right in the United Kingdom.
Organizers believe about half a million people gathered in London today in what was expected to be the biggest multicultural march in UK history, organized by the Together Alliance.
“Together was formed in response to last September’s far-right ‘unite the kingdom’ demonstration, when violent groups went on the rampage. The overwhelming majority of people reject the racism, Islamophobia, division, hatred and violence promoted by Tommy Robinson and the far right,” Sabby Dhalu, of Stand Up to Racism, one of the members of the Together Alliance, told the Guardian.
As crowds continue to gather in Washington DC and Minnesota’s Twin Cities – where two of the largest protests of the day are planned – demonstrations are underway across the country.
Here are some more images from protests in Georgia, Kansas, Texas and elsewhere.
What is the 3.5% protest rule and what does it mean for the US?
The number is frequently cited in leftwing circles, serving as a rallying cry for people who oppose Donald Trump: if 3.5% of a population protests against a regime, the regime will fail.
Left-leaning content creators, activists and media have boosted the 3.5% rule as the anti-Trump resistance has grown. A Pod Save America episode in June was headlined The 3.5% Protest Rule That Could Bring Down Trump. Social media posts from protest groups broke down the rule and its limitations.
In the lead-up to mass days of protest, organizers have referred to the target as a goal. After the No Kings protests in June 2025, for instance, the progressive activist group Indivisible sent an email to its supporters noting how “3.5% is a historically important target – but not a magic number”. Another day of protests is set for Thursday [July 2025], dubbed “Good Trouble”, a reference to the late congressman John Lewis on the fifth anniversary of his death.
The figure stems from research of prior mass movements, though it’s often oversimplified. Still, the gist is accurate: sustained mass participation in a resistance movement can topple authoritarianism.
Hundreds of demonstrators have gathered outside the Capitolio de Puerto Rico in San Juan where my colleage Joseph Gedeon is reporting.
Here’s a scene of the crowds:
In an op-ed published today, California congressman Ro Khanna said, “The Epstein class thinks it runs America. Today, No Kings protesters send their response.”
“As more Americans are sent to fight abroad and the survivors of abuse are silenced at home, people increasingly feel dispensable,” the California congressman wrote in MS NOW. Khanna co-sponsored the Epstein Files Transparency Act. “For too long, Americans have seen our leaders fight harder for the Epstein class than for the working class. They have watched our system shield elites instead of delivering fundamentals such as affordable health care, housing and education.”
The UK government announces further air defence systems will be sent to countries in the region along with troops to operate them.
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UK billionaire Chris Rokos donates record £190m to Cambridge University | University of Cambridge
The British billionaire hedge fund manager Chris Rokos has donated a record £190m to the University of Cambridge to establish a new school of government, which will bear his name.
It is believed to be the single biggest donation to any UK university in modern times and is intended to support Cambridge to become a leading training ground for future world leaders.
Rokos, 55, one of the UK’s richest individuals, is giving an initial £130m, plus further funds of up to £60m that will be matched by the university.
Discussions have been under way for some time, but the Rokos school of government will open its doors in temporary accommodation this autumn, offering PhD and master’s degrees.
It will ultimately move into a new building in the Cambridge West Innovation District and aims to rival the University of Oxford’s Blavatnik school of government, which opened in 2010 with a £75m donation from the Soviet-born businessman Len Blavatnik.
Rokos, who went to a state primary school before being offered a scholarship to Eton college and studying maths at Oxford, said: “I was fortunate to be given the opportunity of an education which transformed my life, and I would like to give something back to Britain.
“My hope is that, in time, the influence of the Rokos school of government across the world becomes an important element of that soft power, which has been a great asset to the UK.”
According to the university, the new institution is a response to the growing turbulence in domestic and international politics, the growing polarisation of political opinion and long-term structural changes in the economy.
“New challenges and opportunities require new responses,” said Rokos. “For me, there can be no better home for the Rokos school of government than Cambridge University, with its long tradition of scientific innovation and synergistic culture.
“It will provide the school with a unique forum for radical and remarkable thinking, capturing the inspiration of the brightest minds from around the world and harnessing new technologies in order to meet the needs of modern government.”
The vice-chancellor of Cambridge, Prof Deborah Prentice, said: “Tackling the enormous challenges facing our world requires radical new ways of thinking and approaches to leadership. Cambridge, with its strengths across all disciplines and its convening power, is uniquely positioned to drive this innovation.
“Thanks to Chris’s generous support, the Rokos school of government will become a place where leaders and governments – both current and future – together with experts from across our institution generate the insights and solutions needed to respond to our rapidly changing world.”
Rokos is among the UK’s biggest taxpayers and, according to last year’s Sunday Times rich list, is estimated to be worth £2.6bn. He is known for his role as a bond trader, having started his career at Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse before co-founding the hedge fund Brevan Howard.
He launched Rokos Capital Management (RCM), which employs more than 350 people, in 2015, making a further name for himself in the finance world. He recently made headlines after it emerged RCM was in talks to hire Peter Mandelson, the former ambassador to the US, in an advisory role, but terminated negotiations after the recent Epstein revelations.
Labour say they have suspended the whip from Hull East MP Karl Turner over his recent conduct.
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