Crowds of people angry about the way President Donald Trump is running the country marched and rallied in scores of American cities Saturday in the biggest day of demonstrations yet by an opposition movement trying to regain its momentum after the shock of the Republican’s first weeks in office.
So-called Hands Off! demonstrations were organized for more than 1,200 locations in all 50 states by more than 150 groups, including civil rights organizations, labor unions, LBGTQ+ advocates, veterans and elections activists. The rallies appeared peaceful, with no immediate reports of arrests.
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Protestors shout slogans as they march during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump on Saturday, April 5, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Andres Kudacki)
Demonstrators march during a rally against President Donald Trump, in Anchorage, Alaska, on Saturday, April 5, 2025, as part of the nationwide "Hands Off!" protest. (Loren Holmes/Anchorage Daily News via AP)
Demonstrators carry signs during the "Hands Off!" protests against President Donald Trump and Elon Musk at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators carry signs during the "Hands Off!" protests against President Donald Trump and Elon Musk at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Protestors hold signs as they take to the streets and march during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump on Saturday, April 5, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Andres Kudacki)
Protesters form a human banner on Ocean Beach during a protest against President Donald Trump, part of the "Hands Off" rallies held nationwide, in San Francisco, Saturday, April 5, 2025./San Francisco Chronicle via AP)
Protestors shout slogans as they take to the streets and march during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump on Saturday, April 5, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Andres Kudacki)
Demonstrators carry signs during the "Hands Off!" protests against President Donald Trump and Elon Musk at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump in Portsmouth, N.H., Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Caleb Jones)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
A demonstrator twirls a ribbon during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Pro-Palestinian protesters carrying a depiction of President Donald Trump gather at a rally before marching toward the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) headquarters, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Civil rights demonstrators hold signs and speak to passing vehicles, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Beth Maddox, of Calhoun, Ga., right, participates in a civil rights demonstrators, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Greg McCollum, of Rome, Ga., participates in a civil rights demonstrators, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
A U.S. flag flies during a civil rights demonstration, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Civil rights demonstrators hold signs and speak to passing vehicles, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
A man in a vehicle cheers as civil rights demonstrators hold signs and speak to passing vehicles, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Civil rights demonstrators hold signs and speak to passing vehicles, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Protesters carry signs and chant slogans against the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
Protesters carry signs and chant slogans against the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
Protesters carry signs and chant slogans against the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Archer Moran, from Port St. Lucie, Fla., protests President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Protesters carry signs and chant slogans against the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
FILE - Protesters carry signs and chant slogans in protest to the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk across from the Federal Building in the Westwood section of Los Angeles, Saturday, March 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel, File)
Thousands of protesters in cities dotting the nation from Midtown Manhattan to Anchorage, Alaska, including at multiple state capitols, assailed Trump and billionaire Elon Musk 's actions on government downsizing, the economy, immigration and human rights. On the West Coast, in the shadow of Seattle's iconic Space Needle, protesters held signs with slogans like “Fight the oligarchy.” Protesters chanted as they took to the streets in Portland, Oregon, and Los Angeles, where they marched from Pershing Square to City Hall.
Demonstrators voiced anger over the administration's moves to fire thousands of federal workers, close Social Security Administration field offices, effectively shutter entire agencies, deport immigrants, scale back protections for transgender people and cut funding for health programs.
Musk, a Trump adviser who runs Tesla, SpaceX and the social media platform X, has played a key role in the downsizing as the head of the newly created Department of Government Efficiency. He says he is saving taxpayers billions of dollars.
Asked about the protests, the White House said in a statement that “President Trump’s position is clear: he will always protect Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid for eligible beneficiaries. Meanwhile, the Democrats’ stance is giving Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare benefits to illegal aliens, which will bankrupt these programs and crush American seniors.”
Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign advocacy group, criticized the administration's treatment of the LBGTQ+ community at the rally at the National Mall in Washington, D.C., where Democratic members of Congress also took the stage.
“The attacks that we’re seeing, they’re not just political. They are personal, y’all,” Robinson said. “They’re trying to ban our books, they’re slashing HIV prevention funding, they’re criminalizing our doctors, our teachers, our families and our lives.”
“We don’t want this America, y’all,” Robinson added. “We want the America we deserve, where dignity, safety and freedom belong not to some of us, but to all of us.”
In Boston, demonstrators brandished signs such as “Hands off our democracy” and “Hands off our Social Security.”
Mayor Michelle Wu said she does not want her children and others' to live in a world in which threats and intimidation are government tactics and values like diversity and equality are under attack.
“I refuse to accept that they could grow up in a world where immigrants like their grandma and grandpa are automatically presumed to be criminals,” Wu said.
Roger Broom, 66, a retiree from Delaware County, Ohio, was one of hundreds who rallied at the Statehouse in Columbus. He said he used to be a Reagan Republican but has been turned off by Trump.
“He’s tearing this country apart,” Broom said. “It’s just an administration of grievances.”
Hundreds of people also demonstrated in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, a few miles from Trump's golf course in Jupiter, where he spent the morning at the club's Senior Club Championship. People lined both sides of PGA Drive, encouraging cars to honk and chanting slogans against Trump.
“They need to keep their hands off of our Social Security,” said Archer Moran of Port St. Lucie, Florida.
“The list of what they need to keep their hands off of is too long,” Moran said. “And it's amazing how soon these protests are happening since he’s taken office.”
The president golfed in Florida Saturday and planned to do so again Sunday, the White House said.
Activists have staged nationwide demonstrations against Trump and Musk multiple times since Trump returned to office. But before Saturday the opposition movement had yet to produce a mass mobilization like the Women's March in 2017, which brought thousands of women to Washington after Trump's first inauguration, or the Black Lives Matter demonstrations that erupted in multiple cities after George Floyd's killing by police in Minneapolis in 2020.
In Charlotte, North Carolina, protesters said they were supporting a variety of causes, from Social Security and education to immigration and women's reproductive rights.
“Regardless of your party, regardless of who you voted for, what’s going on today, what’s happening today is abhorrent,” said Britt Castillo, 35, of Charlotte. "It’s disgusting, and as broken as our current system might be, the way that the current administration is going about trying to fix things — it is not the way to do it. They’re not listening to the people."
Among thousands marching through downtown San Jose, California, were Deborah and Douglas Doherty.
Deborah, a graphic designer, is a veteran of the 2017 Women’s March and was nervous that fewer people have turned out against Trump this time. “All the cities need to show up,” she said. “Now people are kind of numb to it, which is itself frightening.”
Associated Press journalists Julie Carr Smyth in Columbus, Ohio, Fatima Hussein in West Palm Beach, Florida, Erik Verduzco in Charlotte, North Carolina, Nicholas Riccardi in San Jose, California, and Mark Thiessen in Anchorage, Alaska, contributed.
Protestors shout slogans as they march during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump on Saturday, April 5, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Andres Kudacki)
Demonstrators march during a rally against President Donald Trump, in Anchorage, Alaska, on Saturday, April 5, 2025, as part of the nationwide "Hands Off!" protest. (Loren Holmes/Anchorage Daily News via AP)
Demonstrators carry signs during the "Hands Off!" protests against President Donald Trump and Elon Musk at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators carry signs during the "Hands Off!" protests against President Donald Trump and Elon Musk at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Protestors hold signs as they take to the streets and march during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump on Saturday, April 5, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Andres Kudacki)
Protesters form a human banner on Ocean Beach during a protest against President Donald Trump, part of the "Hands Off" rallies held nationwide, in San Francisco, Saturday, April 5, 2025./San Francisco Chronicle via AP)
Protestors shout slogans as they take to the streets and march during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump on Saturday, April 5, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Andres Kudacki)
Demonstrators carry signs during the "Hands Off!" protests against President Donald Trump and Elon Musk at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump in Portsmouth, N.H., Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Caleb Jones)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
A demonstrator twirls a ribbon during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Pro-Palestinian protesters carrying a depiction of President Donald Trump gather at a rally before marching toward the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) headquarters, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Demonstrators hold up signs during a "Hands Off!" protest against President Donald Trump at the Washington Monument in Washington, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Civil rights demonstrators hold signs and speak to passing vehicles, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Beth Maddox, of Calhoun, Ga., right, participates in a civil rights demonstrators, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Greg McCollum, of Rome, Ga., participates in a civil rights demonstrators, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
A U.S. flag flies during a civil rights demonstration, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Civil rights demonstrators hold signs and speak to passing vehicles, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
A man in a vehicle cheers as civil rights demonstrators hold signs and speak to passing vehicles, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Civil rights demonstrators hold signs and speak to passing vehicles, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Rome, Ga. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)
Protesters carry signs and chant slogans against the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
Protesters carry signs and chant slogans against the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
Protesters carry signs and chant slogans against the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Activists protest President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Archer Moran, from Port St. Lucie, Fla., protests President Donald Trump, who was a few miles away at his Trump National Golf Club, during a "Hands Off!" demonstration Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Protesters carry signs and chant slogans against the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Saturday, April 5, 2025, in Miami. (AP Photo/Marta Lavandier)
FILE - Protesters carry signs and chant slogans in protest to the policies of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk across from the Federal Building in the Westwood section of Los Angeles, Saturday, March 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel, File)
