No Kings!
People gathered in Jersey City on June 14 for a “No Kings” protest against Trump and his minions.
JERSEY CITY, JUNE 15, 2025. I’m normally not much of a patriot, certainly not in the “Yay America!” sense. But I did something yesterday that makes me feel patriotic. I participated in a “No Kings” protest in Jersey City, just down the street from where I live.
A coalition of progressive groups organized No Kings to protest how Trump and his minions have “defied our courts, deported Americans, disappeared people off the streets, attacked our civil rights, and slashed our services. The corruption has gone too far. No thrones. No crowns. No kings.”
Hard to disagree with that. According to The Guardian, millions of people protested at more than 2,000 sites across the U.S. yesterday. My sister marched in North Carolina, my sister-in-law in London.
I’d been going back and forth on whether to join in. The women in my family kept asking me if I planned to protest. I waffled.
The day before No Kings Day, I had dinner with a friend, a professor of history, who thought I’d be nuts to join a protest. He knew someone who’d gotten arrested protesting during Trump I and spent years dealing with legal hassles. And then there was the possibility of violence. These concerns, plus my laziness, had me leaning against protesting.
Yesterday morning I nonetheless look online and find several No Kings protests planned near me. The closest is at the Grove Street PATH station in Jersey City. It starts at 11. An Uber can get me there in 10 minutes.
I check the weather on my phone: rainy and unseasonably cold. I think, No one is going to this protest. I’ll go so I can say I tried and be back in time for lunch. I get dressed, order an Uber and head out.
My Uber driver is a young guy with an accent. I tell him--with trepidation, he could be a Trumper--that I’m going to a No Kings protest. Good for you! he says. If he wasn’t working, he’d go too! He came here from Algeria because American is a free country, he wants to raise his son and daughter here. Now he’s worried that America is becoming just another dictatorship.
To my astonishment, there’s a huge crowd, I’m guessing at least 1,000 people, in front of the Grove Street Station. Old, young, brown, white, a real mix. Men and women who are apparently local politicians are yelling through a bullhorn, people are cheering. A gray-haired trio, two men and a woman, lead the crowd in “We Shall Overcome” and other classics. I get a little choked up.
Almost everyone seems to be carrying a sign. A sampling: “NO CROWN FOR A CLOWN.” “WHEN CRUELTY BECOMES NORMAL, COMPASSION LOOKS RADICAL.” “I HATE TRUMP FOR FREE “(because Trump and Musk claim all protesters are paid). “PROTECT NEIGHBORS, NOT NAZIS.” “CONGRESS, DO YOUR JOB. IMPEACH TRUMP. NO KINGS.” “AMERICA: NO KINGS SINCE 1776.” “NO FAUX-KING WAY.” (took me a while to get that). “SENDING THE MILITARY TO AMERICAN CITIES IS… FASCISM!” “’DON’T MAKE ME REPEAT MYSELF’: HISTORY.”
Under a tent, someone has set up an information booth on our current “Constitutional Crisis!” Posterboards list Constitutional Amendments imperiled under Trump:
First Amendment: Freedom of speech & assembly.
Fourth Amendment: Right against warrantless search & seizure.
Fifth Amendment: Due process. No one should be deprived of life, liberty & property w/out due process.
Sixth Amendment: Right to a speedy trial by jury.
Eight Amendment: No excessive fines or cruel & unusual punishment.
Fourteenth Amendment: Insurrectionist ineligible to hold elected office. Congress shall have the power to enforce legislation. Guarantees birthright citizenship.
Fifteenth Amendment: Right to vote not denied by race.
Twenty-second Amendment: Two-term limit on Presidency.
Twenty-fourth Amendment: No poll tax. I.e., voter ID is a poll tax.
I stay for about an hour, taking pictures. Then, cold and wet, I take an Uber home, feeling much better about my country. Yay America!
Further Reading:
Scientific American and the Anti-Woke Bros
I Am One of Those Evil Woke Professors