Protesters gathering for No Kings rallies across the Kansas City metro say they are angry with the actions of the Trump administration, including the president's decision to go to war with Iran, increased immigration enforcement and laws they believe amount to voter suppression.
The rallies joined more than 3,100 demonstrations planned across the country on Saturday, the third nationwide No Kings protests since President Donald Trump assumed the presidency more than a year ago. Along with Mill Creek Park in Kansas City, more protests were planned elsewhere in the metro, including Independence, Lee’s Summit, Platte City and Liberty, Missouri. Across the state line, rallies were planned in Kansas City, Kansas, and from 75th Street to 119th Street in Johnson County.
Beverly Harvey is the founder of Indivisible Kansas City, the group organizing the Mill Creek Park protest. She said it’s hard to list the actions Trump has taken that are worth protesting since last fall’s demonstration because there have been so many. That includes the ongoing war in Iran and federal immigration officers’ killings of two people in Minneapolis.
She also noted increased federal immigration enforcement across the country, including the presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers around the Kansas City area.
“There's a laundry list of things that he has done, basically to destroy democracy and to destroy America, and people are just fed up with it,” Harvey said.
Harvey said Kansas City residents feel the impact of federal actions, including more immigration detention facilities. An immigrant detention center has already opened in Leavenworth, Kansas, with 20 detainees after a drawn-out legal battle and public pushback. And the development company that owns a south Kansas City warehouse that federal agents considered for an immigrant detention center halted its sale amid public pressure.
Harvey said they’re focused on protesting peacefully.
“If any ICE or any troublemakers show up, we're just going to ignore them,” Harvey said. “So if there's any trouble, it's going to be other people that start that. It's not going to be the peaceful protesters."
What is driving people to protest?
Among the first to show up was Carter Taylor, an elementary school teacher in Kansas City who also attended the first two No Kings rallies.
Her driving force, she said, was her students. Already, she's seen federal policies impacting the children in her classroom: Benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps, have been rolled back, hitting some of their families directly, she said.
"They can't be out here advocating for themselves the way that they will a decade from now," she said of her students, "and so that leaves it to the adults to try to make a better world for them."
Taylor also criticized cuts to the U.S. Department of Education, which she said have trickled down to budget cuts at the state and local levels, and are hurting public school teachers who are already underpaid.
"It's getting to a point where we are about to be left with nothing, and so many people are feeling it in a job where it's already really difficult," she said.
Carina Kagan drove from her home in Lake of the Ozarks to protest with others in Kansas City. She said she was motivated to act on behalf of her daughter, who is in the U.S. Army and is stationed in South Korea, and because of the ongoing war in Iran.
"The military boots-on-the-ground possibility is the biggest thing in my head right now," she said. "It's a useless, vain war by a demented old man, and to know that Americans might die for that is top of mind, every single day, every single minute."
Kagan said she had a very direct message for U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who has cited evangelicalism in many of his speeches and interviews: "Dude, pull the f— back, man. Don't make young Americans die for some crazy s— that 'God's war, Jesus is giving his blessing,' that's crazy. You're pushing our military away, you're pushing people who believe in God away because you've got this warped idea of what's going on."
Ryan Reed, of Olathe, Kansas, said he was protesting to help protect the rights of girls and women, including his 33-year-old daughter.
"She needs to have the ability to go ahead and feel safe in expressing her voice politically," he said. "It's hard for girls and women because we have been trying for so long to represent their rights and have their voices heard, and right now the political landscape is trying to strip that away from them at every turn."
Reed also criticized the SAVE Act, a sweeping election overhaul that would introduce new proof-of-citizenship requirements to register to vote. The Republican-backed legislation is a top priority for Trump, who has long railed — falsely — about widespread voting by non-U.S citizens, NPR reports.
"This SAVE Act is not a saving of the American way to vote," he said. "It is a restriction of how Americans are allowed to vote, and I am absolutely against voter suppression."
During a speech to protesters, the Rev. Tino Herrera, lead pastor at Trinity United Methodist Church in Kansas City, called the administration's focus on immigration enforcement a "moral emergency where our immigrant siblings are treated as threats instead of neighbors." He cited last month's reversal of a company's plans to sell a Kansas City warehouse to the federal government for use as an immigrant detention center, adding that protests work.
"What did we all do? We came together, we organized, we rallied and marched," he said. "We stood in unity — people of faith, neighbors, community — and we made them tear up that contract because that is the power of organizing."
