St Paul (Minnesota), March 29: Large crowds protested Saturday against the war in Iran and President Donald Trump’s actions in “No Kings” rallies across the US and in Europe.
Minnesota took centre stage, with thousands of people standing shoulder-to-shoulder to celebrate resistance to Trump’s aggressive immigration enforcement.
Minnesota’s flagship event on the Capitol lawn in St. Paul drew Bruce Springsteen as its headliner. He and other speakers praised the state’s people for taking to the streets over the winter in opposition to a surge of US Customs and Immigration Enforcement agents.
Springsteen performed Streets of Minneapolis, the song he wrote in response to the fatal shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal agents. Springsteen lamented Good and Pretti’s deaths but said the state’s pushback against ICE has given the rest of the country hope.
“Your strength and your commitment told us that this was still America,” he said. “And this reactionary nightmare, and these invasions of American cities, will not stand.”
People rallied from New York City, with almost 8.5 million residents in a solidly blue state, to Driggs, a town of fewer than 2,000 people in eastern Idaho, a state Trump carried with 66 per cent of the vote in 2024.
US organisers have estimated that the first two rounds of No Kings rallies drew more than 5 million people in June and 7 million in October.
This week they told reporters they expected 9 million participants Saturday, though it was too early to tell whether those expectations were met.
Organisers said more than 3,100 events, 500 more than in October, were registered, in all 50 states.
Rallies overseas
Demonstrations were also planned in more than a dozen other countries, from Europe to Latin America to Australia, according to Ezra Levin, a co-executive director of Indivisible, a group spearheading the events. In countries with constitutional monarchies, people call the protests “No Tyrants,” he said.
In Rome, thousands marched with chants aimed at Premier Giorgia Meloni, whose conservative government saw its referendum for streamlining Italy’s judiciary fail badly this week. Protesters also waved banners protesting Israeli and US attacks on Iran.
In London, demonstrators held banners with slogans such as “Stop the far right” and “Stand up to Racism.”
And in Paris, several hundred people, mostly Americans living in France, along with labor unions and human rights organizations, gathered at the Bastille. (AP)
