Allegedly, there were over 1,200 anti-Trump/Anti-Musk protests across the country on Saturday, April 5.
Various anti-Trump groups like Indivisible, 50501, and area Democratic Party groups appear to be the organizers again for this latest round.
Scrolling through images and videos from that day, the largest of these protests took place in cities that trend Democrat or are considered dark blue like Boston, Chicago, New York, and Philadelphia.
There were also large protests in Washington, D.C., which included a large anti-Israel march demanding the release of Mahmoud Khalil and calling for an intifada as part of a Muslim "week of rage."
The D.C. crowd was estimated to be 20,000 up to 100,000 depending on the source. The protesters were given pre-printed signs and fliers with talking points and chants on them, per a video posted by former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani. The video was taken by Ted Goodman, a name I was unfamiliar with but who has a very interesting resume.
The sign the man is holding says “ResistFascism.org” on the top. The website has a “chapters tab,” which provides a list chapters of the Democratic Socialists of America. The list has five chapters located in North Carolina; Asheville, Triangle, Wilmington, Winston-Salem, and Charlotte Metro.
The “resist fascism” website also has a page of resources to make your own signs, buttons, and fliers. One of the button designs includes an f-bomb and there is also a “YDSA 2024 Election Kit.” The kit’s documents are on a Google drive that includes a document on “handling the media.”
Another folder on the Google drive is called “tabling supplies” includes palm cards for abortion on demand, growing socialism, the anti-Israel BDS movement, unionization, trans rights, and several promoting a “free Palestine.”
One of the fliers in the “tabling supplies” folder is the same poster "socialism beats fascism" sign seen in the D.C protest.
The same was true for signage in Raleigh.
Protesters showed up with signs one might expect, including the DSA sign previously mention as well as signs with pictures of President Trump and Elon Musk with their faces crossed out, and some signs with Nazi swastikas.
The D.C. protest, as well as other urban area protests, didn't seem to last very long.
Here's one account from on the ground in D.C., where an individual apparently affiliated with Charlie Kirk's Turning Point USA left the protest for a short break and came back to an empty mall.
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NC Democratic Party Chair Anderson Clayton gave a bizarre estimate that there were 45,000 people who showed up in Raleigh.
Matt Mercer, the communications director for the NC Republican Party responded to Clayton's claim.
Disclosure: Mercer is the former editor-in-chief at North State Journal.
Media footage and drone footage, as well as the images and video posted on X, just don't support Clayton's total. At best, the crowd was perhaps a few thousand people — and the crowd dissipated quickly.
CBS 17 can't make up its mind how many people were there in its article, but the numbers they do list are nowhere near 45,000.
In its opening, the article says the protest drew around 5,000 people." Later the article cites North Carolina State Capitol Police Chief Terry Green who said the crowd was "between 4,000 and 6,000" before going on to cite an "organizer with Wake Women Have Mercy" who claimed "more than 10,000 people" were there.
CBS 17's article also confirms the groups behind the protest as 50501(NC), Bull City Indivisible, North Carolina Poor People’s Campaign, Iron Front NC, Common Cause NC, Union of Southern Service Workers, Wake Women Have Mercy and "others."
Other likely groups include the NC Democratic Party, and likely the Durham and Wake County Democratic Parties, which have been behind protests at a Raleigh Tesla dealership.
An NC Newsline reporter who was on the ground at the protest estimated around 4,500 attendees.
NC Newsline is not a conservative outlet either, it's a notably left-leaning and politically hyper-partisan website. A dark money funded news group called States Newsroom renamed and relaunched NC Policy Watch as NC Newsline in 2023. In April 2023, I wrote about States Newsroom and its financial ties to the dark money-pass through Arabella Advisors.
In addition to Raleigh, there were also protests in Asheville, Chapel Hill, Durham, Morrisville, and Pittsboro. Again, very blue areas.
In Asheville, the protest felt more like a Moral Monday throwback, with attendees singing the gospel song, "we shall overcome." There were more Nazi themed signs and western NC's Matt Van Swol observed the "majority of protestors seem to be over 50 years old."
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