Demonstrators gathered outside City Hall in Colorado Springs Wednesday to protest an array of early actions by the Trump administration, echoing criticisms shared the same day in Denver and cities across the United States.

Demonstrators shared displeasure over the crackdown on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives by President Donald Trump, immigration raids and deportations, the rollback of transgender rights, billionaire Elon Musk’s new Department of Government Efficiency, the threatened elimination of the Department of Education and a proposal to forcibly transfer Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.

Thousands gather at Colorado capitol to protest ICE and DEA raids, Trump’s orders

About 50 protesters, sporting signs that expressed their frustration with Trump’s actions since the Jan. 20 inauguration, marched from City Hall to nearby Acacia Park.

“Some people may say what’s standing on a corner going to do,” protester Anne Mayrose said in Colorado Springs. “But to me, that’s everything when you have people coming together when we talk about what it means to work together to fight against fascism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, misogyny and xenophobia. When we stand together our voices can’t be ignored.”

Demonstrators said no one in particular organized the Colorado Springs protest. Instead, people responded to social media posts organized online under the hashtags #buildtheresistance and #50501, which stands for 50 protests, 50 states, one day. 

Websites and accounts across social media issued calls for action, with messages such as “defend our democracy” and “reject fascism.”

“It’s all come together through word of mouth and social media,” Mayrose said. “I just saw it online and apparently dozens of other people did too which is pretty cool.”

A post on the social media site Reddit included talk of using the Colorado Springs protest as an alternative for those who could not make the journey to Denver. 

Thousands gathered in front of the Colorado state Capitol in Denver on Wednesday afternoon in the wake of immigration raids in Aurora and Denver just hours earlier.

The crowd shut down traffic coming northbound on Lincoln Street for a couple of minutes, before moving to the west steps of the Capitol building.

While the protest in Denver appeared more geared to opposition to Trump’s immigration policy, which had led to recent immigration enforcement raids in Denver and Aurora.

Among several topics of concern for Colorado Springs protester Michael French was the Department of Education.

“The people who are supposed to be supported by it are targeted by it and a lot of us have children that are neurodivergent,” French said. “If that goes down they’re going to lose their IEPs (individualized education program) and all their protections in schools for what they need to receive a good education. All of us decided we can’t just sit back and watch.”

Some Colorado Springs protesters cited what they described as the fascism and racism amid deportations brought on by a flurry of executive orders from the Trump administration.

“We’re just here to show that not everybody is calling for mass deportations. Not everybody is calling to hate our neighbors,” Mayrose said. “We just are standing together in unity to show those around us who may not feel safe to come out, that we will continue to fight. We’re here and we’re not going away.”

Loring Wirbel, chair of the Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission, said people are fed up.

“Congress was real slow to respond to everything and so were a lot of the Washington nonprofits,” Wirbel said. “The nonprofits have been told that they’ll be defunded and delisted if they do any sort of anti-Trump work so a lot of them are frightened. So these things have to be generated spontaneously and I think that’s great.”

Wirbel also spoke about the power of grassroots community and how he hopes spontaneous gatherings can continue.