Hundreds of people flocked to Massachusetts Street Thursday with signs and chants to protest recent actions by President Donald Trump’s administration.
The march was part of a movement of national protests on May Day, bringing awareness to Trump administration actions that protesters say violate the Constitution.
Protests on May 1 have roots dating back more than a century and have often centered on labor rights, but many of Thursday’s protests across the U.S. turned the attention toward the Trump administration’s policies targeting immigrants and federal workers.
The protesters gathered at the corner of Ninth and Massachusetts streets before beginning their march to City Hall.
Lawrence residents have been gathering to protest every Sunday for the past few months, but Thursday’s march drew one of the biggest crowds yet.
For Iris Craver, one of the march’s organizers, the group on Thursday was just scratching the surface of what was needed for the mass protest to fully push back on Trump’s agenda.
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She cited the “3.5% rule,” which says that no government has withstood 3.5% of the population mobilized against it. Craver said she hopes Lawrence can reach that threshold of about 3,500 people attending protests.
“We’re in an emergency situation here,” Craver said. “You know, there’s been flagrant disregard for the Constitution, and we need to stop it now.”
Megan McGlinn attended the march carrying a huge sign that read “Honk for honesty” and “nazis suck.” She said her father and father-in-law both fought in World War II. She has regularly joined downtown protests.
“If they can sacrifice that much, I can sacrifice this much,” McGlinn said. “I’m the type of person when things are going bad, I can’t sleep at night. But I can sleep if I at least go do something.”
State Sen. Marci Francisco also joined the march, saying that although the current administration was democratically elected, it was not elected to violate the law.
She decried federal actions that have impacted Lawrence, such as the firing of dozens of employees at Haskell Indian Nations University (many workers have since been reinstated) and cutting of AmeriCorps funds at agencies that serve Lawrence.
“I am so pleased at the reaction from so many people in Lawrence to the unreasonable decisions that are being made by our government,” Francisco said. “Many of us thought government was supposed to bring stability, and now we’re seeing chaos.”
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Cuyler Dunn (he/him), a contributor to The Lawrence Times since April 2022, is a student at the University of Kansas School of Journalism. He is a graduate of Lawrence High School where he was the editor-in-chief of the school’s newspaper, The Budget, and was named the 2022 Kansas High School Journalist of the Year. Read his complete bio here. Read more of his work for the Times here.
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