New Data Shows No Kings Was One Of The Largest Days Of Protest In Us

Bonisiwe Shabane

-Oct 22, 2025, 10:42 PM

new data shows no kings was one of the largest days of protest in us

The historic number of No Kings Day protesters and their expansive geographic spread are signs of a growing and durable pro-democracy movement. ( Waging Nonviolence ) – No Kings Day on June 14 was one of the largest single days of protest in United States history, and it was probably the second-largest single day demonstration since... The number of participants and expansive geographic spread that day are both signs of the persistent popular opposition to the second Trump administration. The Crowd Counting Consortium has been collecting data on protest events and participation since the first Women’s March on Jan. 21, 2017. Last week, we published our most recent monthly update, with estimated figures for the month of June, including the nationwide No Kings protests on June 14.

With 82 percent of anti-Trump events for which we tallied participation on June 14, our estimates suggest that between 2 and 4.8 million people participated in over 2,150 actions nationwide. (We could not confirm estimated protest figures at 18 percent of events; almost all of these missing figures were in small towns.) However, we estimate the turnout at No Kings to be substantially larger... The Women’s March in 2017 — which involved between 3.2 and 5.3 million people — was, at the time, probably the largest single-day demonstration in U.S. history. No Kings in June 2025 had comparable aggregate turnout, albeit across far more locations. Whereas the 2017 Women’s March involved actions in over 650 locations, No Kings saw events in over three times as many locations, with events organized in big cities, small towns and places in between.

In that regard, No Kings was geographically more similar to some of the dispersed protests that began to dominate the U.S. protest landscape in 2018. For instance, on March 14, 2018, between 1.1 and 1.7 million students walked out of their classrooms on the one-month anniversary of the school shooting in Parkland, Florida. In an unprecedented demonstration, students in about 4,470 locations — from kindergartners to university students and even some homeschooled students — participated in what was then the largest number of recorded locations in a... history. Ten days later, on March 24, 2018, the March for Our Lives drew an estimated 1.3 to 2.2 million participants in over 700 locations to demand safety from gun violence in schools.

(The 2018 Women’s March, about two months earlier, had drawn an estimated 1.8 to 2.6 million people in 407 locations.) Protests throughout the month of June 2018 turned out several million protesters, largely accounted... The “No Kings” protests in every state may have been the biggest day of demonstrations in American history, a data analyst has suggested. “Based on hundreds of crowd-sourced records of No Kings Day event turnout, and extrapolating for the cities where we don’t have data yet, it looks like roughly 4-6m people protested Trump across the U.S. yesterday,” independent data journalist G Elliott posted to X Sunday. For reference, that’d mean Saturday’s demonstrations featured 1-2 percent of the total population of 340 million taking to the streets in more than 2,000 cities to voice their opposition to the increasingly authoritarian, far-right... Based on hundreds of crowd-sourced records of No Kings Day event turnout, and extrapolating for the cities where we don't have data yet, it looks like roughly 4-6m people protested Trump across the U.S.

yesterday. Mobilized anti-Trump resistance is exceeding 2017 levels. 🧵 pic.twitter.com/DOEjJ9DA30 The “No Kings” rallies follow after a spate of demonstrations against immigration raids carried out in Los Angeles and the surrounding area last week, to which Trump deployed 4,000 members of the National Guard... This story has been updated to include new estimates of protest crowd size. Demonstrators filled the streets of U.S.

cities and towns in coordinated "No Kings" events, billed as a "national day of peaceful protest," in the largest outpouring of opposition to Trump's policies since he returned to power in January. The mostly calm marches, organized under the theme that no individual is above the law, coincided with the day President Donald Trump hosted a military parade on the streets of the nation's capital. At least one demonstration, about 70 miles from Washington, D.C., in Northern Virginia, was met with violence when a man intentionally drove an SUV through a crowd of departing protesters, striking at least one... Police in Los Angeles hit protesters with batons, fired tear gas and ordered a large crowd in downtown to disperse; authorities said they were responding to people throwing "rocks, bricks, bottles," and "fireworks" at... Activists in some areas braved wet weather to raise signs and chant slogans. supporting the rights of immigrants and criticizing what they view as a power grab by the Trump administration.

Crowds gather to listen to Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., during a No Kings protest, Saturday, Oct. 18, 2025, in Washington. Allison Robbert/AP hide caption One of the biggest days of protest against the Trump administration's policies happened on Saturday in cities around the U.S. The overriding theme of the marches was the accusation that President Trump is behaving more like a monarch than an elected official.

It marked the second massive wave of protests organized by No Kings — a network of progressive organizations fighting against Trump's agenda. Organizers said about 2,600 No Kings events were planned across nearly every state, and that it projected a bigger turnout than the 5 million it said attended its previous nationwide action in June. This aerial picture shows protesters forming a human banner during the "No Kings" national day of protest on Ocean Beach in San Francisco, Calif. on Oct. 18, 2025. Laure Andrillon/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

The scale of last weekend’s “No Kings” protests is now becoming clearer, with one estimate suggesting that Saturday was among the biggest ever single-day protests in US history. Working out exactly where the protest ranks compared with similar recent events has been a project of G Elliott Morris, a data journalist who runs the Substack Strength in Numbers, calculated turnout between 4... This could exceed the previous record in recent history, when between 3.3 million and 5.6 million people showed up at the 2017 Women’s March to rally against Trump’s misogynistic rhetoric. Morris estimated the No Kings Day protest turnout in two steps. First, his team gathered data at events for as many locations as possible, defaulting to tallies published in local newspapers. Where that wasn’t available, they relied on estimates from organizers and attenders themselves.

To come up with a rough approximation of nationwide numbers, he then estimated the attendance in each unreported protest would be equal to the median of the attendance in places where data did exist. “That’s a tough approximation, but at least an empirical one,” Morris wrote in an email. “We use the median instead of the average to control for outliers, [such as the fact that] big cities pull the average up, but most events are not huge urban protests.” Morris stressed that the Strength in Numbers tally remains unofficial, and he hopes that researchers will “build” on his data when they conduct more studies. But his estimation is similar to that made by Ezra Levin, the co-founder of Indivisible, the progressive non-profit that organized the event. He estimated that 5 million people across the globe took to the streets.

The nationwide protests are playing out as a federal government shutdown lingers and troops are being deployed in cities. More than 2,600 protests against the Trump administration are scheduled to take place across the country on Saturday in a demonstration known as No Kings Day. Organizers are attempting to build on the momentum from their previous event on June 14, when around 2,000 rallies were held in all 50 states and drew more than five million people. It was the same day a military parade was held in Washington for the Army’s 250th anniversary and on President Trump’s 79th birthday. This time, the protests are taking place against the backdrop of a government shutdown, immigration raids and the deployment of federal troops in cities. Organizers say that the tenor behind the protest movement feels more charged and that they expect an even larger number of participants.

The number of people who have already signed up, which is not a requirement, is nearly double what it was in June, said Hunter Dunn, a spokesman for the coalition behind No Kings. Published: Thursday, June 19, 2025 at 11:00 am No Kings Protests: A Record-Breaking Demonstration? Recent estimates suggest the "No Kings" protests held last weekend may have been one of the largest single-day demonstrations in United States history. Data journalist G. Elliott Morris, using data from various locations, calculated a turnout between 4 and 6 million people, representing 1.2% to 1.8% of the US population.

This figure could potentially surpass the 2017 Women's March, which drew between 3.3 and 5.6 million participants. Morris's methodology involved gathering attendance data from local newspapers and, where unavailable, relying on estimates from organizers and attendees. He then used the median attendance from locations with data to approximate the numbers for unreported protests, aiming to control for the impact of large city events. While the tally remains unofficial, it aligns with an estimate of 5 million people provided by Ezra Levin, co-founder of Indivisible, the organization behind the event. However, not all experts agree on the final ranking. Jeremy Pressman of the Crowd Counting Consortium stated that an official count would take time.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump's director of communications dismissed the protests as a failure. The scale of the "No Kings" protests has sparked comparisons to other significant historical events, including the 1963 March on Washington and the 1970 Earth Day protests. The 1963 March on Washington had up to half a million people in attendance. The Earth Day protests had 20 million people in attendance, which was about 10% of the US population. Other large-scale events include the 1986 Hands Across America fundraiser, which drew an estimated 5 million participants, and the 2020 protests against the murder of George Floyd, which saw between 15 and 26 million... The 3.5% rule, a concept discussed in the wake of the protests, suggests that nonviolent movements with the support of at least 3.5% of a population have historically succeeded in triggering change.

While the "No Kings" protests may not have reached this threshold, they have invigorated organizers, who are planning further demonstrations. BNN's Perspective: The "No Kings" protests, regardless of their final ranking, highlight the power of public assembly and the importance of civic engagement. While the sheer number of participants is impressive, sustained change requires more than just a single day of protest. It necessitates ongoing grassroots organizing and a commitment to democratic principles. Keywords: No Kings, protests, demonstration, turnout, Women's March, G. Elliott Morris, Ezra Levin, Indivisible, crowd size, March on Washington, Earth Day, George Floyd, 3.5% rule, nonviolent movements, civic engagement.

E.J. Dionne, Jr., Elaine Kamarck, Darrell M. West, William A. Galston No Kings protests (also called No Kings 2.0[12][13][14] and No Kings Day 2.0[15][16]) took place on October 18, 2025, as part of a series of demonstrations taking place largely in the United States against... The demonstrations, which followed the June 2025 No Kings protests, took place in some 2,700 locations across the country, including the National Mall in Washington, D.C., Chicago, and New York City.

Organizers of the protests estimated that the protests drew nearly 7 million attendees,[17][18] while a partnership between data journalist G. Elliott Morris and The Xylom, an independent Atlanta-based science newsroom, estimated 5 million to 6.5 million participants. Either estimate would make this one of the largest single-day protests in American history.[19] The October 18, 2025, protests followed the No Kings protests in June, the Free America Weekend on July 4, and the Good Trouble Lives On protest on July 17. About 200 organizations worked together to organize the October protests, including 50501 and Indivisible groups, as well as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Democratic Socialists of America, the American Federation of Teachers,... Outside the United States, protests were organized by Democrats Abroad.

New Data Shows No Kings Was One Of The Largest Days Of Protest In Us

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Yesterday. Mobilized Anti-Trump Resistance Is Exceeding 2017 Levels. 🧵 Pic.twitter.com/DOEjJ9DA30