The Energy Is With The People

While the defiant "No Kings" protests attracted millions across the country, Trump's self-serving parade was a sparsely attended bore

“This is what democracy looks like,” New Yorkers chanted Saturday. (Photo by the author)

The rain was coming down in the streets of New York, but it didn’t dampen the spirit of the “No Kings” demonstration. People came to protest—here and in over 2,000 locations all across the country Saturday—and they were not about to be denied by a little inclement weather.

I was walking with thousands and thousands along Fifth Avenue from 42nd Street, heading downtown toward Madison Square Park, when I heard one chant, “This is what democracy looks like.” It made me pause and pay fresh attention: I moved straight into the middle of the crowd and watched as a multiplicity of Americans carrying signs flowed by. This was a day to express yourself, to communicate defiance of an authoritarian regime that has abandoned democracy and the rule of law.

The messages were powerful and clear: “I Won’t Give Up, I Won’t Give In”… “We Are Not Afraid”…“Hate Will Not Make Us Great”… “Enabling a Fascist Is Not Patriotic”… “Stop the Steal of Our Constitution”… “If This Was About Getting Rid of Criminals, Why Elect One As President… “We the People, Not Kings.”

This is just a handful of the messages that flowed by in less than 20 seconds. There was an ocean of thoughts and feelings released by protestors all across our beloved country in what organizers estimated to total over 5 million people.

The energy in this one city, the hopefulness illustrated by coming together, was palpable and contagious. And it matches what I’ve heard from many in our own America, America community—in large cities and small towns—who were struck by the joyful enthusiasm and turnout that exceeded their expectations or in several cases surpassed anything they’d witnessed in their communities before.

This could not have provided a starker contrast with Trump’s parade—the sparse crowds, the empty bleachers, the periodic dull chants of “USA, USA” and the general sense of boredom exemplified by a yawning Marco Rubio as he watched Army tanks rolling by. As The New Republic described the “pathetic” proceedings in Washington, D.C., “The parade itself was quite boring…so quiet you could clearly hear the creaks and squeaks of the armored vehicles.”

While the untethered, bloviating Trump insisted in his speech “we’re the hottest country in the world right now,” New York Times Pentagon reporter John Ismay described the outcome of his $45 million show. “Overall,” he wrote, “this was a pretty listless and low-energy parade and crowd.”

I get that Trump is narcissistically incapable of grasping how despised he is in America, especially since he’s surrounded by sycophants who refuse to tell him the truth and sadists like Kristi Noem and Stephen Miller who are determined to prove the harsher the cruelty and criminality, the greater the success.

But Saturday’s protests boosted my belief that this false and failing proposition will not last. Americans will not bow down. Americans will not be silenced. Americans will not be broken by a malignant madman who hates America.

I asked a number of protesting New Yorkers what single issue topped their list. The consistent answer was simple and all-encompassing: To help save democracy. Coming protests will continue to need clear messages that are both inclusive and prescriptive in their goals to increase the pressure on the Trump regime. That will be the challenge, I think, to drive change.

Increasing prospects of a worsening economy, intensifying efforts to flout the law to round up and deport people who are not criminals, and growing attacks on American citizens and elected officials all may (and should) drive a sustained protest movement. What would that look like? Five million protestors becoming 10 million (or more) as more and more Americans grasp we’ve reached an inflection point where enough is enough. This is doable—and not far in the future.

The “No Kings” protest was an important next step toward a larger, more sustained effort that must reach the White House and strike fear—at least among cabinet members and other officials who are capable of recognizing the country is rejecting them. The authoritarian playbook only succeeds if the people fail to recognize that the government’s survival depends on the consent of the governed.

As Frederick Douglass told us back in 1857, “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them.”

The coming together and protestations around the theme of “no kings,” the palpable fervor and the refusal to be silenced tells me that Americans will not concede their freedom without a fight. Count me among the uplifted.

Here is a short video—with chanting—and a few of my favorite photos. Feel free to share your own in the subscriber chat room.

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