Thousands take part in 'No Kings' protests in Tucson

She said she encounters pain and fear every day in her work as a school counselor at Lauffer Middle School due to the Trump administration's immigration enforcement.

“I’m so worried about the kids right now. They’re being targeted in so many ways. I’m so worried about the ramifications, their mental health for the rest of their lives. As adults we have to stand up and do something about it," Al-Osaini said. "My kids are worried. They’re worried about their friends being taken."

She said the sense of community she finds at the "No Kings" protests keeps her coming back to them. Speaking of the Trump administration, she said, "They want us to be isolated, they want us to be pissed off inside and demoralized to the point that we don't do anything. And I refuse to let that happen."

Al-Osaini said she hopes politicians in Washington see how upset their constituents are and realize they need to step up “and start doing something, too. It’s about time they got a backbone, I don’t know what they’re waiting for."

She was part of the crowd at the Reid Park rally Saturday, which started to gather early. By 10:30 a.m., about 30 minutes before it was set to start, well over a thousand people were there. That soon doubled and kept growing.

A line of people carrying an assortment of signs stretched up South Country Club Road from East 22nd Street, and along the 22nd Street pathway on the southern edge of the park. A mixture of music and honking horns could be heard from cars passing along 22nd Street.

A passenger of one car, which had protest signs taped to its doors, tossed handfuls of Tootsie Rolls and other small candies to people lined up on the sidewalk.

Bill Buckles, who came to the Reid Park protest with his Trump piñata wearing a "Dunce" hat, the “only crown he's ever deserved,” said he wouldn't be letting anyone beat it open.

“We don't know what's inside it, but we know it's vile, whatever it is,” Buckles said. “We don't want to expose the entire community to his vile sh--.”

Buckles said it isn't a singular issue that brought him to the protest Saturday, or the five protests he's been to since President Donald Trump was elected for a second time, “it's everything he does.”

“I don't like any of his policies. He tried to steal an election five years ago now, how could anybody vote for him again? I'm perturbed by that. I'm disturbed by it. I'm angry about it. I'm fed up. And so (I’ll take) any opportunity to come out and let people know that I'm not happy.”

He said he hopes the "No Kings" rallies will compel members of Congress to listen, as Buckles said the protests are getting harder for them to ignore. He said he hopes protests like those Saturday will get people to oust Republicans in November's midterm elections, specifically mentioning Rep. Juan Ciscomani. 

“I hope that that people like Juan Ciscomani go, ‘oh, maybe, maybe I should take a different tack,’” he said. “I don't think he’s going to, personally, so (Joanna) Mendoza is going to be the next congressperson for that district.”

Melonie Nicols said she's also gone to multiple protests and other rallies since Trump was elected and will keep going. 

“The administration is horrible, and we're in a war that we should not be in, and there's no plan. We're rounding up our community members and putting them in camps. And it's horrifying that it's happening, that it's allowed to happen, that the Trump family is making money off of the degradation," Nicols said.

Part of being at a protest like Reid Park's, she said, "is to be around other people who are pissed off and to not feel like you're alone in the world. It feels good to be around other people who also feel the same thing and are fighting for the same things.”

Nicols said she hopes Trump will eventually be impeached. But for now, she hopes Saturday's protests and the community activists who attended will inform the general public about what people can do to fight back.

“What really needs to happen is like a full on, actual strike. If there was a general strike, that is what would get attention. And I don't know that that is going to happen, but that is what needs to happen. The hard part is that there's a lot of people who can't do that. If you're working two or three jobs ... you need to provide for yourself, provide for your family. Honestly, it's rich people who need to ----ing cough up," Nicols said. 

Tucson Democratic U.S. Rep. Adelita Grijalva told the crowd she got off a plane Saturday and headed straight to Reid Park “because what we are doing today is fighting fascism. We’re fighting an authoritarian regime.”

Grijalva spoke of “La Abuela,” asylum seeker Julia Benitez, the 79-year-old Cuban grandmother with dementia who was released from ICE custody following an Arizona Daily Star investigation last month. While Benitez was able to return to Florida to live with family after nine months in ICE custody in Eloy, “it breaks my heart to think about how many thousands of other people are in that same situation," Grijalva said. "And it begs the question, how many others like them are going to remain behind bars, silenced by an uncaring system?"

"At the same time that all of this is happening around us, families are struggling to put food on the table, pay for health care, fill their gas tanks, get their prescriptions,” Grijalva said. “More than 60% of families in this country are living paycheck to paycheck, and yet there is always money for endless war, but never enough money for the urgent needs of everyday people. … Working people deserve relief. They deserve health care they can afford, and a government that invests in people, not in endless conflicts and killing innocent, poor people all over the world.”

The rally at Reid Park was part of the fourth nationwide "No Kings" protest against Trump and his policies during his second term in office.

National organizers said more than 3,100 events were registered in all 50 states and several other countries. Organizers estimated 8 million people turned out. 

There were about 79 rallies planned across Arizona.

Indivisible Tucson Action Alliance's protest began at 9 a.m. on six corners along North Oracle Road, with a plan to stretch demonstrators from Wetmore Road north to First Avenue in Oro Valley.

The Reid Park gathering organized by Mobilize Tucson, Tucson Safety Team and other groups was held at the DeMeester Outdoor Performance Center until 3 p.m.

Among the signs at the Reid Park rally: “Radicalized By Human Decency;” “You Can't Bomb Your Way Out Of The Epstein Files;” and “Not Paid Just Pissed.”

GOP official calls events 'Hate America Rallies'

The White House dismissed the rallies. Spokesperson Abigail Jackson described the protests as the product of “leftist funding networks” with little real public support, the Associated Press reported.

Jackson said in a statement that the “only people who care about these Trump Derangement Therapy Sessions are the reporters who are paid to cover them.”

The National Republican Congressional Committee was also sharply critical.

“These Hate America Rallies are where the far-left’s most violent, deranged fantasies get a microphone," said Maureen O'Toole, spokesperson for the NRCC.