DOWNTOWN — With their city caught in the country’s largest immigration enforcement operation, as many as 250,000 Chicagoans flooded Downtown on Saturday to condemn Donald Trump’s administration as part of the second nationwide No Kings protest.
“We will never surrender!” Illinois governor JB Pritzker said. “Throughout history we have learned that tyranny doesn’t arrive with dramatic proclamations. We learned that it comes wrapped in ‘law and order’ … The reality here in Chicago is this: Black and Brown people are being targeted for the color of their skin. Children are being zip-tied and separated from their families … These people are not abstractions. They pay taxes on their businesses. They work hard — these people are the fabric of our society.”
“They want a rematch of the Civil War,” Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson said to the crowd. “But we are here to stand firm, to stand committed — that we will not bend. We will not cower. The attempt to divide and conquer this nation will not prevail, because when the people are united, justice always prevails.”
Johnson closed out his remarks by calling for a general strike.
Yeah, I get it. I did say city and the suburbs around, what would be “Chicagoland”, all had their own as well such as Evanston, Wilmette, Oak Park, La Grange, Elmhurst, etc.
I’m sure people from the burbs came into the downtown for this as well, but there were so many all over beyond downtown which is what that 250,000 is counting I believe. It was a 2 mile long stretch of protesters for downtown Chicago.
I made my body present at one of the smaller ones in the burbs because I was not going to get stuck downtown where I live. However, I did drive by on my way to the library And it was sizable.
Wow this does put a spark of hope into my doomer heart, this needs to happen every weekend, with a growing population, until we get what we want – which I guess is different for everyone so this might be difficult