an interview with Fox<\/a> News Friday.<\/p>\n\u201cThey\u2019re referring to me as a king,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m not a king.\u201d <\/p>\n
Protesters also face increasing attacks from Trump\u2019s allies on the right, some of whom are branding their demonstrations as anti-American.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe call it the \u2018hate America\u2019 rally,\u201d U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson said Wednesday at a news conference. \u201cLet\u2019s see who shows up for that. I bet you you\u2019ll see Hamas supporters, I bet you\u2019ll see Antifa types, I bet you\u2019ll see the Marxists on full display, the people who don\u2019t want to stand and defend the foundational truths of this republic.\u201d<\/p>\n
Organizers expect a broad and diverse group of Americans to attend Saturday\u2019s \u201cNo Kings\u201d demonstrations. About 600 more events are scheduled than the 2,100 demonstrations that took place in June, and slightly more people have signed up, even though the organization is discouraging registrations.<\/p>\n
David S. Meyer, a professor of sociology at UC Irvine who studies social movements, said that people\u2019s opinions about the Trump administration have not changed too much since June. Rather, he argued, people felt a higher level of urgency about the danger of the Trump administration.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s increased is the willingness of people to take more action, to do something,\u201d he said. \u201cI think there\u2019s a hunger for action.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meyer said he was surprised to see key GOP leaders falling into line with Trump and pushing the idea that \u201cNo Kings\u201d is anti-American.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are plenty of presidents who\u2019ve encountered protests against their policies,\u201d Meyer said. \u201cThat\u2019s part of what America is all about. And usually presidents say, \u2018I have to represent everybody and do what I think is best for the country. And I understand that there are other Americans who disagree with me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
In an attempt to broaden the scope of \u201cNo Kings,\u201d Meyer noted, organizers are appealing to Americans upset over the rising cost of living, gutting of environmental protections, sweeping overhauls of federal agencies and the government shutdown over looming healthcare cuts. These issues, Meyer argued, are connected to the theme of American democracy.<\/p>\n
\u201cTrump doesn\u2019t consult with people who disagree with him \u2026 and the people surrounding him, and this is by design, are explicitly chosen because of their loyalty rather than their specific competencies,\u201d Meyer said. \u201cThe strategy of the \u2018No Kings\u2019 organizers is to provide a kind of large and inclusive bucket for all the grievances to fit into and for people with all kinds of different gripes to show up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another reason \u201cNo Kings\u201d touches on so many issues, Dunn said, is in response to the Republican tactic \u2014 articulated by Trump\u2019s former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon as \u201cflooding the zone\u201d \u2014 of overwhelming the public with a barrage of information, disinformation and controversy.<\/p>\n
\u201cRepublicans\u2019 strategy is to worsen the economy for everyone, to worsen the cost of living for the average American… to try to weaken the American people and make it harder for them to stand up against this administration\u2019s abuses,\u201d Dunn said. \u201cSo that\u2019s why we\u2019re standing up on all those fronts, because we have to meet them at every front that they\u2019re using to harm the American people.\u201d<\/p>\n
The goal of \u201cNo Kings\u201d goes beyond just getting Americans out on the streets together in solidarity against Trump. They want to connect people who are upset and frustrated with the Trump administration to local organizing groups.<\/p>\n
\u201cGetting involved in those groups, making those face to face connections and joining them will have a much larger impact over the next few days, the next few weeks, next few months, the next few years, than just one day of protest,\u201d Dunn said.<\/p>\n
Going forward, Dunn said, one of the key questions facing the Trump resistance movement is how to pressure leading Democratic elected officials to get on board. <\/p>\n
While legislators such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Bernie Sanders and Chris Van Hollen had done a lot to resist the Trump administration, he said, he wanted to put more pressure on mainstream Democrats across the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow do we get support from what is supposed to be the opposition party?\u201d<\/p>\n
Dunn said he was not worried about the prospect of violence Saturday when millions take to the streets. The rallies and demonstrations that took place on the June demonstrations were overwhelmingly peaceful, he noted. Organizers put a major emphasis on de-escalation and protest safety, bringing in community and faith leaders and training tens of thousands of volunteers across the country in de-escalation. He scoffed at the idea extremists might hijack any of the demonstrations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe biggest threat to safety at every protest I\u2019ve ever been at \u2014 unless law enforcement gets involved \u2014 is always dehydration and heat exhaustion,\u201d Dunn said.<\/p>\n
Olivia Negron, 73, an organizer with Studio City Rising who has protested in that L.A. neighborhood every weekend since April, said she was alarmed not just by the president\u2019s rhetoric, but by the Trump administration\u2019s actions against immigrants through the courts and in the streets.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe president doesn\u2019t know what it is to be American,\u201d said Negron, a Latina and the child of a U.S. Navy officer. \u201cThe American dream is about inclusivity and making sure that immigrants are welcomed into the United States.\u201d<\/p>\n
Negron, who marched against the war in Vietnam, said she felt the people in power have taken away what it means to be American and made it difficult to fly the American flag. But she said she was hopeful that the Trump administration\u2019s actions since the last \u201cNo Kings\u201d day would push more people to protest.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to turn the ship of state around and get this democracy heading in the right direction,\u201d Negron said. \u201cAbsolutely more inclusion, more equity, more diversity. Diversity is our strength and empathy is our superpower.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When millions of demonstrators took to the streets in June for \u201cNo Kings Day\u201d \u2014 depicting President Trump…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11798,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[2672,7363,10869,10935,2624,10936,48,52,51,47,50,49,63,10870,10937,1562,592,3020,2058,595,1291],"class_list":["post-11797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-administration","tag-country","tag-demonstration","tag-hunter-dunn","tag-june","tag-king-day","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-los-angeles-times","tag-many-americans","tag-meyer","tag-organizer","tag-people","tag-president-trump","tag-protest","tag-saturday","tag-street"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11797\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}