A rolling wave of “No Kings” protests swelled through America’s small towns and big cities Saturday, with crowds gathering to blast President Trump, Immigration and Customs Enforcement crackdowns, the war in Iran and high gas and food prices.

Saturday’s demonstrations were expected to draw millions of people nationwide, including thousands for a downtown Los Angeles rally. More than 40 protests were planned for L.A., Orange and Ventura counties, part of the national “No Kings Day of Nonviolent Action.”

No Kings Coalition organizers were hoping that turnout for the rallies in all 50 states could combine to form the largest single-day protest in U.S. history. They pointed to growing anger over the country’s direction, including fatal ICE shootings and troops dispatched to the Middle East, since the first “No Kings” demonstration was held last June.

On Saturday morning, hundreds gathered around the reflecting pool at Pasadena City College. A band rolled through with a fascism-themed parody of Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues.” Sign-toting protesters lined Colorado Boulevard, drawing a constant stream of honking from the cars driving by. For many, the Iran war was top of mind.

“Every time we protest, there’s something completely new, which speaks to the chaos of the Trump administration,” Cindy Campbell told The Times. “ICE raids last year, Epstein files a few months ago. Now, war.”

“This administration doesn’t serve us. It serves billionaires,” said Kent Miller, of Monrovia, who participated in the Pasadena protest. “War with Iran is only making life harder for working people.”

Miller pointed to a Chevron gas station advertising gas for $6.45 per gallon.

“See?” he said.

National coordinators said there has been increased interest in smaller communities, including Republican bastions, with higher-than-expected attendance during Saturday’s protests.

“I’m out here because I’m disgusted with what I’m seeing,” said Kersty Kinsey, a mother who was protesting near the Beaufort, S.C., City Hall. “People are suffering, and he’s playing golf. People are suffering, and he’s going other places and blowing things up.”

In Beaufort, an antebellum city founded in 1711, an estimated 3,000 people turned out — a marked increase over earlier “No Kings” rallies, said Barb Nash, one of the coordinators. Amid the moss-draped live oaks and blooming pink and white azaleas, a person in a purple Barney dinosaur costume held a sign reading: “Dino’s for Democracy.” A young girl handed out homemade “Resistance Cookies.”

Los Angeles coordinators said they expect more than 100,000 people at the local events, which were being planned for Beverly Hills, Burbank, West Covina, West Hollywood and Thousand Oaks. One group planned a “Road Outrage” car caravan to motor through Mid City with flapping flags calling for “No War,” and “ICE Out of LA.” At a Torrance gathering, cars honked, protesters waved flags, and a person in an inflatable green cow costume hoisted a large American flag.

The White House, in a Saturday statement, dismissed the protests as a “Trump Derangement Therapy Session.”

Organizers said they have been particularly encouraged by the surge of interest from groups in rural communities that wanted to join the loose-knit No Kings Coalition and hold protests.

Jaynie Parrish, founder of the Arizona Native Vote project, started planning a protest for her tiny town of Kayenta, on the Navajo Nation in northern Arizona, only earlier this week.

“My dad, who’s a [military] veteran and an elder, said: ‘We should go,’ and I said, ‘OK,’” Parrish told The Times.

“Our folks don’t always protest for things, but this was very important,” Parrish said. “A lot of our families are feeling the impacts right now of higher prices and things being cut. A lot of our healthcare benefits are being cut … and our tribal sovereignty is being threatened.”

Upbeat Midwestern activists withstood whipping winds to form a line of protesters stretching nearly three blocks of Burlington Avenue in Hastings, Neb. Under the crisp blue skies, one of the protesters, Drew Fausett, told The Times in a phone interview that he is a registered Republican in the decidedly red state.

“My politics haven’t really changed — but the party around me has,” Fausett said. “It used to be the two parties were two sides of the same coin, and they would work together — but not anymore.”

He and his wife, Becky, have attended “No Kings” and other protests because “it’s the only way to show that people have different opinions,” he said. “People are out here speaking for their families and their neighbors. That’s what this is all about.”

Trump’s policies are hurting many in Nebraska — including farmers, said Debby Thompson, one of the Hastings organizers.

“We want to urge our representatives in Congress to not just rubber stamp whatever Trump wants because it’s really hurting rural folks and farmers,” Thompson said. “The tariffs and huge increase in prices on fertilizer are hitting farmers really hard.”

The “No Kings” campaign sprouted in June as an act of defiance on Trump’s 79th birthday. He wanted a military parade in Washington to mark his milestone, and anti-Trump protesters came out in force — an estimated 5 million people around the country — with their own display. At the time, Trump’s second-term policies were coming into focus, including ramping up immigration raids, deploying the National Guard to L.A. in response to protests, and mass firings within the federal government.

A subsequent event in mid-October drew even larger crowds, with an estimated 7 million people protesting around the country.

Saturday’s event coincided with a dip in Trump’s approval ratings. A Reuters/Ipsos poll last week found 36% approve of Trump’s job performance, marking the lowest level since his return to office last year. In a separate Fox News Poll released last week, 59% disapproved of his job performance.

“Since the last ‘No Kings,’ we’re seeing higher gas prices and groceries, all while there’s an illegal war in Iran,” national organizer Sarah Parker of the organization 50501 said during a Thursday press briefing. “We’ve also seen our neighbors executed — American citizens executed.”

Widespread protests and candlelight vigils followed January’s fatal shootings by ICE agents in Minneapolis of Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, and Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care unit nurse.

“The defining story of this Saturday’s mobilization is not just how many people are protesting — but where they are protesting,” Leah Greenberg, co-founder of Indivisible, said during the press briefing. She said two-thirds of the RSVPs to national organizers came from outside of major urban centers.

The Los Angeles event was organized by the local chapter of 50501 (short for “50 protests, 50 states, 1 movement”) and other progressive groups, including the ACLU, Human Rights Campaign, Indivisible and Public Citizen, as well as labor unions such as Unite Here Local 11 and the Service Workers International Union.

“There’s an affordability crisis in this country — people can’t afford groceries or healthcare,” Joseph Bryant, SEIU executive vice president, said in a statement. “But this administration is focused on expanding its power, starting unnecessary wars that benefit billionaires, and targeting immigrants and citizens who dare to stand up for them.”

While Republican senators, like Texas’ Ted Cruz and Florida’s Rick Scott, were quick to condemn the policies that kept the illegal immigrant killer of 18-year-old Sheridan Gorman from being deported, Democratic senators dodged questions on whether Gorman’s killer should have previously been deported prior to this month’s murder.

Gorman, who was a student at Loyola University of Chicago at the time of her death, was allegedly killed by an illegal immigrant from Venezuela, Jose Medina, 25. Medina was apprehended by U.S. Border Patrol on May 9, 2023, but was subsequently released into the U.S. under the Biden administration, according to Trump’s Department of Homeland Security. 

A short time later, Medina was arrested for shoplifting in Chicago, but was again released on June 19, 2023, DHS said. A judge put a warrant out on Medina after he failed to appear in court for his shoplifting charge, which was still active at the time of Gorman’s killing, according to the Chicago Sun Times. 

“Shoplifting in and of itself is not a violent crime. It’s not an indicator of a person that’s leaning toward violent crime,” said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., when asked about Medina’s case and whether he should’ve been deported prior to Gorman’s murder. 

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“You’re asking me to speculate on a bunch of things and I can’t answer that,” said Sen. Catherine Cortez-Masto, D-Nev., when asked if Gorman’s killer, and other illegal immigrant murderers who had significant criminal records at the time of their arrests, should have been deported before people got hurt. “I don’t know the cases. I trust our justice system to do the right thing and hold people accountable.”

Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., responded that the Trump administration’s broad deportation crackdowns have prevented federal law enforcement from targeting genuinely dangerous people, an argument pushed by other top Democrats in Congress. “I think that if Trump cleared out Chicago and if ICE did their job, he wouldn’t be here, right?” Duckworth said as she got onto an elevator on Capitol Hill. “But they deported people who are not… [unintelligible].”

Meanwhile, Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., offered a more judicious response, but also suggested the style by which the Trump administration is deporting people is problematic. 

“Do I think violent criminals should be deported? Yes,” Slotkin said, adding it is an “easy” call to deport someone who has been “accused and properly prosecuted.” But, Slotkin added, “Innocent civilians who are protesting their government and using their freedom of speech should not be fingered and booted out.” 

Democrats who spoke with Fox News Digital did quickly agree that violent criminals who entered and are residing in the country unlawfully should be deported.

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“Anybody who violates, or creates crime in this country – particularly kills somebody – should not only be held accountable in the United States, but, yes, there should be immigration enforcement against that individual,” Cortez-Masto said. 

“Every community deserves to feel safe, and I think people who commit violent crimes should not be allowed to either be in our country, or to be among our communities,” added Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, D-Md. 

Durbin, meanwhile, qualified his comments about Medina’s shoplifting charge by admitting “We ought to do a careful examination of people coming into this country and those who want to stay in this country,” adding that, “If they are dangerous to the community, they need to be denied entry or taken out of the country later.”

But Republican Senators Cruz and Scott were quick to bash Democrats for allegedly caring more about illegal immigrants than American citizens.

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“It’s tragic and it was avoidable,” Cruz said when approached about Gorman’s death and Medina not being deported. “The Democrats are so radical they prioritize illegal immigrants over American citizens.”

“It’s disgusting that these people say, ‘Oh, they act like they care about Americans.’ But then you look at their actions – they care about people who are here violently hurting Americans,” Scott complained.

WASHINGTON — A lead attorney for the Department of Homeland Security suggested that federal agents should have “just started hitting the rioters and arresting everyone that couldn’t get away” during an anti-ICE protest in Los Angeles last June, internal emails show.

The note was in an email chain obtained by the nonprofit watchdog group American Oversight through the Freedom of Information Act and shared exclusively with The Times.

In it, attorneys for Homeland Security appear to be discussing the June 9 lawsuit filed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom over President Trump’s deployment of thousands of California National Guard troops to Los Angeles.

Under the subject line “California DOD Lawsuit,” officials coordinated legal filings defending the Trump administration and included a draft declaration by the Los Angeles field office director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement supporting the deployment of military forces.

The final email in the thread was from Joseph Mazzara, then-acting DHS general counsel, and he appears to be referring to an incident in which protesters tried to breach a protective line at a federal building.

On June 11, he wrote: “Every time I read about the battering ram incident I’m just floored at how wild that is.”

Referring to law enforcement as “they,” he continued: “They should have, when they brought the line in, just started hitting the rioters and arresting everyone that couldn’t get away from them. No one likes being hit by a stick, and people tend to run when that starts happening in earnest.”

The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Mazzara was later appointed deputy commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Politico reported that Mazzara is among 10 staffers who followed former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to the State Department after she was fired this month from DHS and given a new role as special envoy for the Shield of the Americas.

The battering ram incident Mazzara referred to is detailed in court documents for the lawsuit.

A June 19 order from a panel judges from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals states that Trump administration attorneys presented evidence of protesters interfering with federal officers. The protesters threw objects at ICE vehicles, “pinned down” several Federal Protective Service officers and threw “concrete chunks, bottles of liquid, and other objects,” the order said.

Protesters also “used ‘large rolling commercial dumpsters as a battering ram’ in an attempt to breach the parking garage of a federal building,” the order states.

Mazzara’s comment in the email thread with other Homeland Security attorneys was given to American Oversight with a watermark showing the agency had intended to withhold it. American Oversight also received a version of the documents with that statement redacted.

Chioma Chukwu, executive director of American Oversight, said it’s no wonder the administration wanted to keep Mazzara’s comments hidden.

“They reveal a level of hostility toward protesters that is deeply at odds with the government’s obligation to protect civil liberties — and there’s no FOIA exemption that justifies hiding them,” she said.

Kerry Doyle, the former top ICE attorney during the Biden administration, said Mazzara’s comments show a shocking carelessness about the potential for harm against both the general public and the officers he was employed to protect.

The email, she said, “seems to encourage, or, at the very least, support constitutional violations by the operators that are supposed to be getting legal counsel from him to avoid violating the law.” Plus, commenting on operational strategy is outside the scope of his responsibilities, she said.

“He’s doing a disservice to the people that are on the front line, that rely on him and his colleagues to give them the parameters of what they can and can’t do,” Doyle added. “If you give them bad legal advice, you are setting them up for liability.”

Noem’s removal came amid backlash against an escalation of violence during Trump’s crackdown on immigration, including the shooting deaths of U.S. citizen protesters by immigration agents.

Doyle said part of the secretary’s job is to set the tone for the agency so the rank and file know what is expected of them. Mazzara’s comments, she said, show how that tone has permeated all facets of the agency.

After the U.S. Supreme Court cast doubt on the Trump administration’s legal theory for using troops in domestic law enforcement operations, the president in December began removing the National Guard from Los Angeles and other Democratic-led cities.

The protests last summer caused significant property damage in a small section of downtown Los Angeles. But grand juries refused to indict many demonstrators accused by federal prosecutors of attacking agents, and a Times review of alleged assaults found that most incidents resulted in no injuries.