Copyright The Austin Chronicle
On Saturday, October 18, on the steps of the state Capitol, speakers including Rep. Lloyd Doggett, Rep. Greg Casar, and Rep. Gina Hinojosa looked out into a crowd of tens of thousands of Texans, raising thousands of handmade signs, gathered for the second No Kings rally in Austin. “You should see this crowd from here,” Hinojosa said. There were more than 2,700 No Kings events held across the country on Saturday, with organizers estimating nearly 7 million in attendance nationwide and over 20,000 in Austin. Locally, the sea of posters directly confronted Donald Trump’s administration as a threat to democracy and spoke to this deeply disturbing moment in American politics. “Stop pretending your racism is patriotism.” “Imagine hating an immigrant more than a pedophile.” “Release the Trumpstein Files.” “Anti-Fascist Grandma.” Several attendees held up campaign signs for Rep. James Talarico, now running for the U.S. Senate, and Hinojosa, who announced her run for governor against Gov. Greg Abbott last Wednesday. “We’re marching for the immigrants who built this country, and children who should feel safe in their schools,” Sophia Mirto, president of Hands Off Central Texas, said into the megaphone. “We’re marching for ourselves and our neighbors.” Above the speakers, soldiers in green scanned the crowd through binoculars. Gov. Greg Abbott announced on Thursday that he would deploy state troopers and National Guard soldiers to Austin for the “antifa-linked demonstration,” though No Kings was organized by nonpartisan nonprofits like Hands Off Central Texas. Mayor Kirk Watson made a statement before the event, saying, “We are told that the Guard will not be on the streets of Austin unless there is a determination that there is an emergency need.” The Austin Police Department later tweeted that the rally had been entirely peaceful with zero reported arrests. The mass began marching down Congress Avenue toward Auditorium Shores, chanting “Fuck Trump” and “Immigrants built this nation.” Clad in red, white, and blue, David Barrow, in his 70s, had driven into Austin from Georgetown to march alongside his wife. “We’re out here walking for our grandchildren,” Barrow said. “The corruption and the hatred coming from the MAGA movement … My father fought in World War II. Our parents fought fascism, and you know, I guess it’s our turn.” Emily Salazar has admired Hinojosa’s father, Gilberto, for years as a representative of her community, and marched holding his daughter’s campaign sign. “My family comes from Mexico, they were migrant farm workers,” Salazar said. “It’s for my family, all immigrants, all young people.” At Auditorium Shores, organizations like Mothers Against Gun Violence, the Sierra Club, and Save Our Springs tabled for new volunteers and had speakers onstage. UT-Austin students handed out protest flyers against the university, which is poised to sign the White House’s “compact,” an agreement to protect “conservative ideas” in exchange for funding that could threaten women’s and ethnic studies and further eliminate use of gender and race in admissions. Greg Stoker, an Austinite detained last month by the Israeli military alongside other activists while attempting to deliver humanitarian aid into Gaza, stepped up to the microphone to emphasize that while the highly organized No Kings rally served as a powerful community-building event, Americans should do more than simply march once in neatly permitted zones. “Our safety does not come from submission. It comes from solidarity,” Stoker said. “This violence started long before [Trump] and will continue long after he’s gone … After today, we’ll start doing the real work.” See photo gallery for more images from Saturday’s No Kings rally. This article appears in October 24 • 2025.
