DOWNTOWN — With their city caught in the country’s largest immigration enforcement operation, tens of thousands of Chicagoans flooded Downtown on Saturday to condemn Donald Trump’s administration as part of the second nationwide No Kings protest.
At one point, the march stretched a full two miles, from south of Washington Boulevard up Michigan Avenue to Wacker Drive and back south along Clark Street and Jackson Boulevard to Grant Park’s Butler Field, where it had begun hours earlier. The Chicago No Kings protest in June drew a crowd of an estimated 75,000 people Downtown.
Saturday’s event kicked off about noon Saturday with a rally in Butler Field at the Petrillo Music Shell. Well before noon, thousands of people converged on the lakefront park and settled in to hear from speakers including Gov. JB Pritzker and Mayor Brandon Johnson.
Pritzker walked out to chants of “JB!” from the crowd, which packed the field from end to end.
“We will never surrender!” the governor 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.”
As “U.S.A!” chants erupted through the crowd, Pritzker called on Chicagoans to come together in the face of the Trump administration’s actions.
“Peaceful, democratic resistance is always scary for authoritarians,” Pritzker said. “We in Chicago are not afraid to stand up … today we are resisting more than just Donald Trump’s attacks on democracy, and he knows it.”
“They want a rematch of the Civil War,” 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.”
Carrying hand-lettered signs with slogans including “When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty,” “No crown for the orange clown” and “Hate does not make America great,” the crowd spilled out onto Downtown streets after 1 p.m. Despite some initial confusion in the crowd about the route, the destination was a usual one for anti-Trump rallies: Wacker Drive across from Trump Tower, 401 N. Wabash Ave. After rallying there, the crowd was expected to circle back to Butler Field.
“It’s my duty to do this as a Mexican American who has citizenship here,” one protester, a Chicago resident named Paulina, said. “I’ve been seeing a lot of terrifying realities on social media and it’s easy to let that fear take over my life. But now that I’m here, seeing protesters of all ages and abilities, it takes the fear out.”
A line of police officers with bicycles ushered demonstrators north on Michigan Avenue as bystanders on the sidewalk cheered on the protest.
Kurt, a Brighton Park resident who declined to share his last name for safety reasons, said that Saturday’s protest was the first he’d attended since 1990 protests against the Gulf War. He was inspired to go to the march after being hit with tear gas in his neighborhood, he said.
“That’s why I’m here,” he said. “They’re kidnapping people off the streets — in my neighborhood — and it feels like a ghost town. People are scared, I’m scared too, but I’m mostly angry. History is repeating itself and this feels like Nazi Germany. I mean, I’m carrying my birth certificate around with me nowadays just out of fear of what they might do.”
Kurt turned over his wrists, revealing surgical scarring on each.
“I can’t get zip-tied,” he said. “I’m disabled. They could really hurt me and mess up my wrists.”
Chicago’s demonstration is one of many No Kings protests to be held Saturday across the United States. The Downtown rally seeks to show President Donald Trump and his administration there is unified opposition to “illegal and unnecessary attacks against our neighbors, our communities and our democracy,” according to an organizing page.
A group of protesters, some dressed in inflatable costumes, brought a custom-made piñata decorated to look like an ICE agent to Saturday’s march.
“We’ve all been protesting at Broadview, so we’ve been there and seen everything firsthand as far as how these savages are behaving,” a protester from West Chicago named Oli said. “So, people get to punch him and then there’s treats in there eventually.”
Oli, who along with her friends declined to have her last name used because of safety concerns, said she and her friends started going to the ICE detention center in Broadview to protest after seeing how federal agents were treating other immigrants in the Chicago area.
“There’s masked men going in and kidnapping people off the streets, out of school parking lots and drop-off lines, people’s work, their homes,” she said. “I come from a family of immigrants. I’m actually an immigrant myself so I have the voice and the ability to be out here and spread awareness so that’s what motivates me.”
All modes of transit heading downtown were clogged in the hours leading up to Saturday’s rally. Hundreds packed into train cars. On the Blue Line, south of California, riders had to wait for several trains to pass by before being able to get on the train, protesters said.
Bridges were lifted starting around 9 a.m. Saturday for Chicago’s annual fall boat runs, further congesting some downtown streets.
Demonstrators came prepared with creative, homemade costumes and signs that mocked President Trump and others in his administration, including Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who accompanied masked federal agents on raids in Chicago earlier this month.
The protest and march come as the Trump administration’s large-scale immigration operations in Chicago — ICE’s Midway Blitz and Customs and Border Patrol’s At Large — are well into their second month. More than 1,000 people have been arrested during Operation Midway Blitz, Russell Hott, former ICE field director in Chicago, told Block Club earlier this month.
Since the operations began, federal agents in and around Chicago have shot at least two people, killing one; repeatedly tear-gassed protesters and first responders; shot rubber bullets at protesters; detained U.S. citizens, including children; handcuffed a Chicago alderperson in a hospital; smoke-bombed and tear-gassed people in Logan Square, Albany Park and East Side; fired a chemical weapon at a TV reporter and detained a journalist.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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