The turnout and character of the weekend’s No Kings demonstrations speak for themselves and at great volume. But I wanted to say something about the naming and the focus of No Kings, which is emerging as something between a protest and a protest movement. It is a great good fortune for the country and the anti-Trump opposition that it has emerged in the way that it has, by which I mean the name itself, a deceptively resonant name and slogan with the deepest possible roots in American history. I also mean its inclusivity, which is tied to the name and the lack of a specific and lengthy set of demands that often characterize and ultimately fracture such movements.
I’ll say a few things here that favorably distinguish No Kings from what we might call “traditional” liberal or left-leaning protests, which includes some of those that featured prominently during the first Trump administration. But I want to be clear that I’m not disparaging those. It’s simply that this is a specific moment in history and requires an especially broad tent. Its purpose and specific character must be different.
