Several Hundred Protestors at Peaceful but Boisterous Anti-Trump Rally at City Hall Park
The anti-Trump coalition in City Hall Park on Feb. 5 supported a wide variety of causes from immigrant rights to Ukraine to LBGTQ+ to Gaza. The unifying thread that stitched the small crowd together was an overarching alarm over the direction for the country under Donald Trump.
| 07 Feb 2025 | 05:22
NYU student Emma (center) came to an anti-Trump rally at City Hall Park on Feb. 5 to support transgender rights and immigrant rights. (
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Alexander Thornton, a law clerk, holds a sign referring to a New Testament passage. Thornton attended an anti-Trump rally with Lena Nowak-Laird, a philosophy professor at the New School. (
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Carl Dix, a New York rep for the group Revcom, said at the rally that Trump has unleased a “hailstorm of fascist shock and awe,” which he said must be stopped. (
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One participant at the anti-Trump really chose a tongue-in-cheek way to protest.
A protestor named Joe conceded the crowd “gotta be bigger” next time. (
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A woman who gave her name as Diana held a sign that read “Stop the Coup.” She says she is worried that an unelected tech billionaire seems to be calling the shots and getting access to confidential government personnel data. (
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There were threads from many different protest movements. Lee Anne G-Browley (with upraised arm) exhorted people to resist Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and Elliot J. Cohen, a longtime activist from the ’60s and ’70s, said the anti-Trump protests will involve a “long fight.” (
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On Feb. 5, the day after President Donald Trump called for the United States to take long-term ownership of Gaza and possibly send in American troops, a peaceful but boisterous crowd of several hundred people gathered in City Hall Park to protest.
Cries of “Hands off Gaza,” were heard, but so were chants for many other causes, from anti-tech, to anti-big business, to migrants’ rights, to LBGTQ+ rights, to wondering why an unelected tech “advisor” is getting access to confidential government info. And while the biting wind did not call forth any memories of the long-ago “summer of love,” there was at least one couple reminding everyone to love one another.
Some clearly hope the rally on a bitterly cold February day with the temperature hovering in the mid-20s was the start of something bigger. None of New York’s elected officials made an appearance.
Carl Dix, a New York rep for Revcom, said that “Silence is complicity. We are running every day, taking on this fascism.” He said the Trump regime, through executive orders, is working to “ethnically cleanse non-white immigrants, erase trans people, seize territories, accelerate environmental destruction, and more.”
”We need a revolution, nothing less,” he said.
One crowd cheerleader who would give his name only as “Joe” held a sign that read, “No Tech Takeover” and led a rousing chant of “We the people will never be defeated.” But looking around the crowd, he conceded, “It’s gotta be bigger.”
A woman in a green puffer jacket held a handmade sign over her head that had crossed out words for “Of Trump/By Musk/For the Rich” and replaced them with “The People/The People/The People.” “I’m very worried about what is happening in our government,” said Caroline Stephenson, who lives in Gramercy Park.
Diana, with a “Stop the Coup” sign was worried about tech billionaire Elon Musk. “An unelected man is taking control of our personal data.”
James Agard, a bartender at the 12th Street Ale House in the East Village, added a little humor to the protest. He held up a homemade sign that read: “Goodbye Democracy, Hello Cheap Eggs ! . . . Oh . . . Wait. . . .” He said he came because he wanted to “stand up to tyranny” and he acknowledged, “it’s better than sitting at home being angry. You gotta try.”
Lee Anne G-Browley was concerned about the mass deportation of migrants that Trump had vowed to undertake and was dispensing resistance and legal advice. “If ICE comes, resist. “Resist! Resist!,” she exhorted the crowd.
Emma, a student at NYU, was among only a handful of young people in the crowd. When asked what brought her and two friends to the protest, she said: “Everything. To protect trans rights, to protect migrant rights. These are the people I love.”
Toward the back of the crowd, Alexander Thornton stood with a friend and held a sign that read simply “Luke 12: 2-3.”
The Biblical verse refers to hypocrisy and warns that words spoken in secret will be revealed in time. “Therefore, whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in an ear in private rooms will be proclaimed on the housetops.”
His companion, Lena Nowak-Laird, a philosophy professor at the New School, said she came to the rally to show “love and kindness and the need for it. And to protect our neighbors.”
There was a contingent of NYPD officers who were ringing the outskirts of City Hall Park but stayed away from the protestors. There was a commandeered MTA bus; in some past protests such a bus was used to take detained protestors to 1 Police Plaza for booking. But on this day the bus was empty. “It’s been pretty quite so far,” said one deputy chief.
The crowd struck up a cheer: “Deport Elon Musk! Deport Elon Musk!” And at another point, “Feed the Poor. Eat the Rich,” and “Hands off Gaza!”
Elliot J. Cohen said he was a longtime LBGTQ+ activist who had been active in protests through the late ’60s, ’70s and ’80s.
”I came down here today to add my body to the rally, because I can,” said Cohen. “This is not a one-day rally. It is going to be a long fight.”