Trump news at a glance: anti-Trump protests draw huge crowds across the US

Crowds of people angry about the way Donald Trump is running the country marched and rallied in scores of American cities on Saturday in the biggest day of demonstrations yet by an opposition movement trying to regain its momentum after the shock of the US president’s first weeks in office. The so-called “Hands Off!” demonstrations were held in more than 1,200 locations in all 50 states by more than 150 groups, including civil rights organizations, labor unions, LBGTQ+ advocates, veterans and elections activists. Demonstrators voiced anger over the administration’s moves to fire thousands of federal workers, close social security administration field offices, effectively shutter entire agencies, deport immigrants, scale back protections for transgender people and cut funding for health programs. Here are the key stories at a glance. More than 1,000 ‘Hands Off’ anti-Trump protests hit cities across the US People across the US took to the streets on Saturday to oppose what left-leaning organizations called Trump’s “authoritarian overreach and billionaire-backed agenda”. Organizers estimated that more than 500,000 people demonstrated in Washington DC, Florida and elsewhere. Read the full story Tens of thousands rally against Trump at DC protest Demonstrators estimated to be in the tens of thousands gathered in Washington on Saturday in a display of mass dissent against Trump’s policies that organizers hoped would snowball into a rolling cycle of protests. Anger with Trump and his billionaire lieutenant, the SpaceX and Tesla leader Elon Musk, was expressed in a sea of placards and banners on the Washington mall. Multiple messages denounced the two men for shuttering government agencies, cutting jobs and services and – in often graphic terms – for threatening the survival of US democracy. Read the full story Cory Booker urges action in first event since historic speech The Democratic senator Cory Booker took a version of his record-breaking Senate floor speech on the road Saturday to a town hall meeting in a New Jersey gymnasium, calling on people to find out what they can do to push back against Donald Trump’s agenda. Booker took questions at suburban New Jersey’s Bergen Community College the same day that more than 1,200 ‘Hands Off’ demonstrations took place around the country. The town hall event was punctuated both by celebratory shouts of “Cory, Cory” as well as at least a half-dozen interruptions by protesters. Read the full story Obama calls on Americans to defend democratic values in face of Trump Barack Obama has called on US citizens, colleges and law firms to resist Trump’s political agenda – and warned Americans to prepare to “possibly sacrifice” in support of democratic values. “It has been easy during most of our lifetimes to say you are a progressive or say you are for social justice or say you’re for free speech and not have to pay a price for it,” Obama said during a speech at Hamilton College in Clinton, New York, on Thursday. Read the full story US revokes all visas for South Sudanese over country’s failure to repatriate citizens Washington is revoking all visas for South Sudanese passport holders and blocking new arrivals, secretary of state Marco Rubio said on Saturday, complaining the African nation is not accepting its nationals expelled from the US. The state department “is taking actions to revoke all visas held by South Sudanese passport holders and prevent further issuance to prevent entry”, Rubio said in a statement. Read the full story Mahmoud Khalil says his arrest was part of ‘Columbia’s repression playbook’ Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University student activist who led campus pro-Palestinian rallies and is now resisting the Trump administration’s deportation efforts, has accused the university of laying “the groundwork for my abduction” and called on the student body to continue demonstrations and protests. Khalil, a green-card holder who is in custody in Louisiana as his case moves through the courts, was detained on 8 March. The Trump administration is seeking to deport him under a provision in federal immigration law that permits the state department to deport non-citizens considered to be a threat to US foreign policy. Read the full story Trump administration apologizes for telling Ukrainian refugees to leave Ukraine Trump’s presidential administration has acknowledged and apologized after it says it accidentally informed some Ukrainian refugees fleeing their country’s invasion by Russia that they needed to leave the US because their legal status was being revoked. About 240,000 Ukrainians have been settled in the US as part of the Uniting for Ukraine – or U4U – program launched during Joe Biden’s presidency. But according to CBS News, some resettled Ukrainians received emails this week telling them that the US Department of Homeland Security would be terminating their legal protections. Read the full story Ted Cruz warns of midterm ‘bloodbath’ if Trump tariffs cause a recession Ted Cruz, the US senator from Texas, has warned that his fellow Republicans risk a “bloodbath” in the 2026 midterm elections if Donald Trump’s “liberation day” tariffs cause a recession. Cruz also warned that the president’s tariffs, if they stay in place for long and are met by global retaliation on American goods, could trigger a full-blown trade war that “would destroy jobs here at home, and do real damage to the US economy”. Read the full story What else happened today: Another round of torrential rain and flash flooding on Saturday hit parts of the US south and midwest already heavily waterlogged by days of severe storms that also spawned deadly tornadoes. Forecasters warned that rivers in some places would continue to rise for days. New York state officials have told the Trump administration that they will not comply with its demands to end diversity, equity and inclusion practices in public schools, despite the administration’s threats to terminate federal education funding. Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) will pause shipments of its UK-made cars to the US for a month as it considers how to mitigate the cost of Trump’s tariffs. The 25% tariff imposed by the US on imported cars and light trucks took effect on 3 April. Catching up? Here’s what happened on 4 April 2025.