Santa Cruz, San Francisco protests President Trump's 2nd term
Protesting Trump's second term in Santa Cruz
People in Santa Cruz came out to protest President Trump's second term.
SANTA CRUZ, Calif. - People gathered in Santa Cruz - and around the nation – on Tuesday to protest the second term of Donald Trump's presidency.
The protests were organized by the grassroots and fledgling 50501 Movement, where the idea is to hold 50 protests 50 states on one day.
"Without these big protests, it could fall by the wayside," Timothy Wilkins of Santa Cruz said, while out with others by the clock tower to try to get Congress to hear their concerns. "But we can put pressure on these senators."
Michelle Stupar from Santa Cruz said she was out on the street to say: "This is not acceptable and we're going to fight this."
A similar protest was held in San Francisco as well as throughout the nation. Protesters also chanted "Hey, hey, Let's Go. Elon Musk has got to go."
In San Francisco, Michael Gray also pointed to that White House exchange with the Ukrainian leader. "The meeting with Zelenskyy ... just made us so disgusted to see an American president act that way on the world stage," said the Santa Rosa, California, resident.
They mark the latest attempt at national resistance to the hardened support of Trump’s "Make America Great Again" base and the success it has had in reshaping the Republican Party in the president’s populist image.
Yet some early scenes Tuesday vividly demonstrated the difficulty Democrats, progressives and everyday citizens face in marshaling a tangible response to Trump and the swift, sweeping actions of his second administration. Protesters have so many things to push back against — from tariffs to Trump’s reset on the war in Ukraine to the aggressive and sometimes legally dubious actions of the Department of Government Efficiency and its leader, billionaire Elon Musk, that it’s hard to know what to focus on.
Multiple demonstrators said they want to see Democrats relentlessly highlight the real-world impact of Trump’s executive orders, Musk’s commission and the pending Republican budget plan.
Events were scheduled throughout the day in all 50 states, ending late Tuesday in Hawaii.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.