Massive "No Kings" Protests Happening Across America

Summary

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Bulwark Takes — Episode Summary

Podcast: Bulwark Takes
Episode: Massive "No Kings" Protests Happening Across America
Date: October 18, 2025
Host & Panel: Sam Stein, JVL, Andrew Egger, Will Salatin, Bill Kristol, Joe Peron, Mona (various Bulwark contributors)

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Episode Overview

This episode of Bulwark Takes covers the unprecedented "No Kings" protests breaking out in real time across all 50 states. With tens of thousands mobilized in cities and small towns alike, the panel provides live updates, on-the-ground reporting, and in-depth context on why this moment matters for American democracy. The team analyzes the political climate underpinning these protests against the backdrop of an ongoing federal government shutdown and what they view as escalating authoritarian maneuvers by the Trump administration during his second term.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Scope and Scale of Protests

• Over 2,700 protest events in all 50 states with turnouts in millions—potentially double the first "No Kings" demonstration in June.
• Events notable for their reach: happening not just in big cities but in small towns, rural counties, and even internationally.
• Noted by Bill Kristol, “This event here in McLean was more than five times… the event in June… People think New York could be up into the, you know, high hundreds of thousands or a million.” [18:34]

2. Backdrop: Authoritarian Turn of the Trump Administration

• JVL describes three paths Trump’s second term could have taken—and argues the nation is facing the worst-case scenario.
  • Rise of masked national secret police, legal racial profiling, elimination of checks on executive power, and military purges.
  • Hostile takeover of media and tech by Trump allies.
• “We have a masked national secret police... the Supreme Court has blessed just racially profiling people... people are now carrying documents with them because they are being asked to show their papers.” —JVL [01:57]

3. Motivations for Protesting

• Panel rebuts claims (from Brit Hume and other conservatives) that the protests are undemocratic or ‘hate America’ rallies.
• Key distinction: Protest is not about Trump's election but about his governing style and rejection of constitutional limits.
  • “Once you win an election and... you can do whatever you want. That is democracy, but it is not constitutionalism.” —Andrew Egger [06:10]
• Many participants displayed overt patriotism; flags, constitutions, veterans' paraphernalia were everywhere.
  • “It's hard to get your mind around just how sort of star spangled… deliberately laying claim to America as a concept.” —Will Salatin [09:48]

4. Republican Framing & Criminalization of Dissent

• Discussion about Republican attempts to frame protests as “Antifa” or “terrorist” events.
  • Changes since executive orders label Antifa as domestic terrorists, raising the stakes for labeling dissent.
  • “Saying it is Antifa is a different thing today... the President... declaring that Antifa is a domestic terrorist organization.” —JVL [11:16]
• Concerns raised about using isolated incidents as a pretext for wider crackdowns.

5. On-the-Ground Atmosphere

• Reports from Franconia, Alexandria, McLean (VA), DC, and Denville (NJ) all point to upbeat, patriotic energy.
  • Protests feel more like “parties or picnics” than partisan rallies; focus on the Constitution and foundational American values.
  • Homemade signs, costumes, references to founding fathers and US history. “You have a very serious political movement on your hands when people are dressed up like the founding fathers… I saw a bunch of people in pantaloons and tricorn hats.” —Joe Peron [54:01]
• Concerns about federal employees fearful of attending due to surveillance or employment consequences.

6. Breadth of Participation / Inclusivity

• Massive geographic reach—confirmed protests in small places like Ripley County (IN), Lee Summit (MO), Bismarck (ND), Denville (NJ), and international solidarity events.
• Not a purely left-wing turnout; includes independents, moderate/never-Trump Republicans.
• “This is devoid of all politics except for democracy… There is nothing in here about tariffs… It’s pure. This is democracy.” —JVL [22:25]

7. Contrast with Previous Mass Movements

• Noted similarities to Women’s March and anti-Trump protests, but panel argues No Kings is broader and more strategically disciplined (e.g., de-escalation training, careful avoidance of provocations, patriotic imagery).
• The protest is less about kitchen table issues, more about systemic threats to democracy.
  • “I don’t think you could get a mass protest movement like this based around kitchen table issues.” —JVL [24:38]

8. Future of the Movement

• Skepticism that politicians have yet risen to lead or channel this energy ("no one has taken the reins yet").
• Suggestions that future mass mobilizations and potentially even general strikes could escalate resistance if current trends continue.
  • “Putting 2 million people in the nation's [or business] capital... is a statement that we could do a general strike if we wanted to.” —JVL [28:39]

9. Public Psychology & Need for Outlet

• Protests serve as psychic release and affirmation for those distressed by the state of democracy.
  • “It is very… psychically healthy that people got a chance to make a feel like they're doing something to express that terrible grief and fear about the direction of the country.” —Mona [42:58]
  • Positive camaraderie and humor evident throughout: costumes, creative signs, playful antagonism toward fears of ‘Antifa presence.’

10. Intensity and Commitment

• JVL notes, “Intensity is measured in part by how much time people are willing to invest... all these homemade signs, costumes, time given up on a Saturday.”
  • "I’m pretty impressed by what this turnout here says about the activation level. It’s pretty interesting and hopeful. God help me." —JVL [62:30]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “If you took just a list of bullet points of where we are right now and showed them to somebody on November 6, the day after Trump's election, most people… would have said that that is a worst case scenario… But that is where we are.” —JVL [02:18]
• “The mood was… inspiring... the assault, the attack, [that] antifa, they hate America, terrorist attack in the last week motivated a lot of people to come…” —Bill Kristol [16:54]
• “The position of the Republicans is if you object to the Trump administration’s authoritarian tactics, you hate America. They’re equating Trump with America. Now, that is a monarchic mentality.” —Will Salatin [14:35]
• “You don't have to come up with some fancy seminar language about what that is. It is a seizure of power that is only stopped by other people standing in his way.” —Andrew Egger [32:31]
• “The institutions, the referees don’t exist any longer. The guardrails are gone... the people need to understand that they are the umpires.” —Sam Stein paraphrasing Tim Snyder [30:36]
• “Size really is its own argument in terms of something like this. There is not a left-wing benefactor in the world rich enough to pay however many million people… to come out and do this protest today.” —Andrew Egger (on the ground) [60:39]
• “Sometimes leaders... torque a society in the direction they want and other times the leader sees where the people are and says... I need to get at the head of this parade.” —Mona [58:46]

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Important Timestamps

• [01:57] JVL’s rundown of the administration’s authoritarian developments.
• [06:10] Andrew Egger on the difference between democracy and constitutionalism.
• [09:44] Will Salatin's on-the-ground observations of overt patriotism.
• [11:16] JVL on why Republicans now label dissent as Antifa.
• [16:54] Bill Kristol’s report from McLean, Virginia’s rally.
• [22:25] JVL on the focus being democracy above all.
• [28:39] Discussion of possible general strike as escalation.
• [42:58] Mona on the psychological importance of collective action.
• [54:01] Joe Peron: “...people dressed up like the founding Fathers… pantaloons and tricorn hats.”
• [62:30] JVL reflects on volunteers’ commitment as a measure of hope.

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Tone & Style

The panel maintains the original conversational, witty, and at times sobering tone typical of Bulwark discussions. They combine on-the-ground authenticity with seasoned political analysis and an undercurrent of cautious optimism, frequently acknowledging both the gravity of the moment and the emotional uplift of mass participation.

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Summary Conclusion

This episode captures a major moment in contemporary American protest culture, documenting not only the size and spirit of the "No Kings" mobilization but also the underlying anxieties about democracy under threat. The Bulwark team brings together sharp analysis, real-time reporting, and genuine engagement with the psychological stakes of activism in an era when institutional guardrails feel eroded—and ordinary citizens are increasingly called upon to fill the vacuum.

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Transcript

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[Sam Stein]

We are live here covering the no Kings protest for the Bulwark. We've been on the ground watching it from afar, reporting on it, observing it, in some cases being there with it. I'm joined by jvl, Andrew Egger, Will Salatin, I'm Sam Stein. We're all with the Bulwark fellas. Thanks for doing this. Really appreciate it. It's 2pm so not all the protests are actually started. They are underway. And what you see on the right side of your screen is a live stream from the DC rally with Bernie Sanders speaking there. Look, we don't have many facts because frankly, they're just pouring in, but what we know is 2,700 protests throughout the day in all 50 states. There are, you know, estimates of tens of thousands of people across the country in various cities. But not just cities, local towns, places like the villages, Boston, Charlotte, Orlando, Seattle, Scottsdale, everywhere. Before we get to this and what we're seeing, I want to start with JVL because look, we're nine, nine and a half, 10 months in to this administration. This is the second no Kings protest. This is objectively going to be bigger than the first. And we're just at this incredibly perilous time for the country. The government is shut down as a backdrop to this. Just give me just, I don't know, step back. For these last eight months, how do you think feel like we've arrived at this point? How perilous is it?

[JVL]

So when Donald Trump was reelected, there were really a couple ways this all could have gone. And one of them was that Trump could have taken office with a very solid Joe Biden economy and he just could have gone golfing. Right? You can be like, look at this, I got, I don't have to go to jail, I'm going to go golfing. I'm going to just relax while they name stuff after me all over the country and just let this stuff go on autopilot. And that would have been basically okay. We would have had a lot of corruption One assumes with it. Another way is that he could have been like, really focused on corruption and using the power of the office to enrich himself and his cronies. And then the third way is that he could have gone full fascist in ways that some of us predicted was likely. And we've, we've got number three. And behind door number three, we are, we are 10 months in and we have a masked national secret police that conducts itself in ways which are unbelievably unprofessional and antagonistic. We, we are at a place where Supreme Court has blessed just racially profiling people and saying that this secret police can detain people just based on how they look or what language they speak. We have a place in which people are now carrying documents with them because they are being detained and asked to show their papers. A place where the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has been fired. The, the JAG Corps has been decimated, and there is a real push to bring the general flag officer corps of the United States military under basically to heal. And at the same time, you've had takeover by Trump cronies of major media institutions and tech platforms in addition to all the corruption. And I just say that if you took just a list of bullet points of where we are right now and showed them to somebody on November 6, the day after Trump's election, most people I think, would have said that that is a worst case scenario, that's a 95th percentile scenario, and that probably won't be there. But that is where we are. And that's why we have this protest movement, because people counterpoint freaked out.

[Sam Stein]

Counterpoint. Yeah, we got one and two as well as three. He's golfing, man. You're not wrong. We got the corruption too.

[JVL]

Yeah. And, and a guy running around again handing out Trump 20, 28 hats. Right. Which is again, a thing that some of us warned about. And you know, like, it is weird that no, nobody in Republican politics is willing to say, of course Donald Trump can't be president again. This would be like the easiest statement in the world. And you cannot find somebody in, in the Republican Party who is willing to say that.

[Sam Stein]

Well, let me, let me kick it to you. I was just following this stuff online and there was this tweet that Brit Hume put up, old Fox, I guess he's currently still Fox said, oh, there's no Kings protests. They're protesting a guy who ran his third presidential campaign, won the majority vote, got elected, isn't overriding Congress because the government has Shut down. And he's not steamrolling anybody. He's just doing things through normal Democratic means and yada, yada, yada. And people were buying it. They're like, yeah, this is, you know, we vote. I mean, the truth is we did vote for him. I'm not going to dispute that. We voted for him already. People did. But what is the no Kings protest about? Why don't you respond to Brit Hume?

[Andrew Egger]

Okay, so first of all, this claim that Trump is like, he's not intervening in the shutdown and letting Congress do its thing. I'm sorry, has anyone heard of Russ Vote? I mean, they literally, the executive branch, in the presence of the shutdown, against the law, has taken over the functions of Congress and is unilaterally deciding to get rid of huge parts of the federal workforce.

[JBL]

Selectively.

[Andrew Egger]

The President of the United States, the king, literally said that he's gonna get rid of Democrat programs, that I'm just gonna decide to do it because Congress isn't doing his job. So Britt's just objectively wrong on that point. Now, they're right. And I saw Mike Lawler was on TV today responding to the no Kings rallies and saying that this isn't a king because we elected him. Exactly the point that Britt made. But the position of these authoritarians is once you win an election, and he did win an election, you can do whatever you want. Now, that is democracy, but it is not constitutionalism, and it is in violation of the American Constitution and it is in violation of. Of the general rule of law. So these people are, what are, you know, you could call it Fareed Zakaria, called it illiberal democracy. You win one election and at that point, you no longer have to respect the will of the people or the law.

[Sam Stein]

Okay, Andrew, I know you got to go soon because you're going to go do something that's totally foreign to you on the ground reporting. Good luck. But you've already been. You've already. Just kidding. Andrew's great. You've already been talking to some folks in Franconia, which, if people don't know Franconia, it's a suburb of D.C. it's got its own Metro stop. It's out there. It's not like bustling, but it's got a lot of people. But I saw your videos and it looked like, you know, first of all, you said, the guy who organized it said 800 people were there, which is a big number. People have to understand that Franconian twice as much as the first time around. Talk to me about what is going on there, what the vibe was like, why they attracted twice as many people and just sort of general observations.

[Will Salatin]

Yeah, sure.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

So yeah, I came from one of these.

[Will Salatin]

Basically what these are is you have.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

All of these little kind of like.

[Will Salatin]

Neighborhood protests sort of dotted all over Northern Virginia. Obviously we've got like the main event, the big tent up on the screen right there in D.C. so a lot of people from all around the greater D.C. area have gone to that one. But there's also been a number of these just sort of like street corner protests. And I talked to one of the organizers at one of these out in Fairfax county at Franconia, and his basic take was first of all about twice as large as their last one back in June. But not just twice as large. About half of their total signups for this protest just came in the last week or so, which is a little bit understandable because it's been so much, there's been so much discourse in the news, sort of like trying to pre define these no Kings protests. And a lot of that has been coming from Republicans. Right? I mean a lot of this talk has been coming from people like House Speaker Mike Johnson or Majority Whip Tom Emmer or John Barrasso and Steve Daines and Ted Cruz in the Senate. And the basic narrative that they have been trying to get take hold is that this is a hate America rally, right? This is a bunch of radical leftists in the Democratic Party who love antifa and love Hamas and love criminals and terrorists and illegal immigrants who are all coming together to really just have a good time commiserating about how much they hate the United States of America. And this has been, I think, a galvanizing thing for a lot of people who, who identify with the basic aims of the protest who might not have come out otherwise but who are like. That doesn't, that doesn't describe me in the slightest, you know, and I talked to a lot of people this morning.

[Sam Stein]

You know how many were antifa?

[Will Salatin]

I bumped into zero antifa people, zero self dispute. But they walk among us. You know, you don't always know, especially in France. I talked to a lot of people who had like pocket constitutions and American flags and you know, like First Amendment swag.

[JVL]

Those are always people who hate America the most.

[Bill Kristol]

Exact.

[Will Salatin]

I mean, yeah, like it's, it's, it's, it's. Unless you're out in it, it is like sort of hard to like get your mind around just how sort of star spangled and, and like sort of deliberately claim like, laying claim to, like, America as a concept as, like, as an inheritance for, for like, you know, that they, they see themselves as sort of like the, the genuine sons and daughters of, of the American project out here. And that's, that's a big part of the programming. It's a big part of what, what they're here to say is especially, it's interesting, like, kind of coming out of, you know, a number of years in which sort of the Republican Party was, was, you know, wrapping itself more and more in the American flag and trying to lay claim to that. And I think it's sort of like, no, no, no, you guys are the ones who are betraying the principles that this flag stands for and that this constitution, you know, put in, codified and everything. And we are the ones who are standing up to say, you know, no, we oppose this not just as Democrats, but as Americans.

[JBL]

Just.

[Sam Stein]

So everyone, we have a chat going on with this live feed. I'm trying my best to monitor it. So if you guys have any questions or just want to share some thoughts, please participate in that. Maybe if we get some opportunity, I'll grab one from there and post the panel here. Jbl, like, marinate on what Andrew's talking about with respect to the Republican pushback. Antifa. Pro terrorists.

[Bill Kristol]

Pro.

[Sam Stein]

Hey, I mean, why. They don't need to do that. I actually think it was stupid of them to do that. But why do it? It's just because I know everything looks like a nail when you're a hammer type thing.

[JVL]

I mean, there are, there are a couple possible answers we don't know. The, the one answer is like, it's just stupid, right? They're just trying to reframe things. Another answer is that they are tempting to move the, the window on how dissent can be criminalized. Saying it is Antifa is a different thing today than it was four months ago because today an executive order has been signed by the President of the United States declaring that Antifa is a domestic terrorist organization. So now saying that somebody is Antifa is no longer like, saying, this is a bad person. I don't like. Now it is saying that they are a domestic terrorist, which is that, right? Say they're a criminal. If the people are domestic terrorists, then they should be arrested, right? I mean, if, if these were ISIS protests and they were being organized by ISIS and the leaders of them were members of ISIS, then one would hope that the FBI's counterterrorism units would be on hand at all these protests, resting those members of isis because That's a terrorist organization. They're members of Al Qaeda. Right. And so I, you know, I mean, I'm always the guy looking at tail risk, but I think this is, it is easy for us to say, look how stupid this is now, because everything has gone okay. But if there were to be an incident, either provoked or unprovoked or, I mean, look, you know, 340 million people in this country, they're a bunch of big. There, there are a lot of crazy ass people, right? And it is not impossible that you could wind up with a crazy person doing something violent or terrible at a protest. It's not. It. It is not impossible that the type of law enforcement that we've seen from ICE would not show up and just sort of attack a protest. Right. These. And so I think it looks to me like laying the predicate to eventually attempt to criminalize dissent. That's. That's what I think it is.

[Sam Stein]

I am nervous that one solitary incident will just be a predicate for something pretty harsh from this administrative state. Andrew. I know you got to jump, Bill. Crystals in the wings coming in. Little morning shots. Swap here. Come back when you're done surveying the scene. I want to know what it's like on the ground. But any quick last parting thoughts before we lose you?

[Will Salatin]

Nope.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

I'm gonna head to the Alexandria one.

[Will Salatin]

Now, and I'll see you guys in a little bit.

[Sam Stein]

Love the minivan, buddy. Great choice of vehicle. All right, Bill Kristle is going to join us soon. Will, what do you think of that? I mean, well, actually. Well, let me ask you another question, because back to the old sort of the idea of what we are actually protesting. And obviously there's a whole number of policies that have been authoritarian in nature. But what's been referenced a little bit among the speakers in this chat specifically is ice. And just the way they've gone about immigration enforcement in this country, it's hard to rank, like, what do you think is the worst, most authoritarian, impulsive policy they've pursued, but do you think that's sort of like the main thrust of this, or is there something more to it?

[Andrew Egger]

So I think it's broader than that. And I think the Republicans would like it to just be about ICE because they would like it to be about them, the illegal immigrants. But I think the administration has broadened it because they have, you know, because they're sending the National Guard and backup troops into American cities. And that's a. And there. And explicitly from Trump to deal with domestic crime. Just, just crime in General. So this is against American citizens, American cities. And I think that broadens the context and I think that's helpful in making the case that this is authoritarian. I wanted to pick up on a couple of points. One, sure. From Andrew. About the hate America stuff that we're getting from the House Republicans. It's about hate America. So as, as you guys have discussed, the, all of the imagery from these protests, it's very patriotic. It's just about the authoritarianism. So the position of the Republicans is if you object to the Trump administration's authoritarian tactics, you hate America. They're equating Trump with America. Now, that is a monarchic mentality. Right. It's the old, the old French saying, Trump is the state. If you hate him or if you object to him, you don't like America. So they're kind of copping to the authoritarianism and the king's thing, the whole king's thing. And in fact, we have the Trump war room account today posting not one, but two tweets, just going with the whole monarchy thing, putting Trump in the royal and the crown. And there's a second one where he's like overseeing people. So they're really going with this. They love it, they think it's funny. And I think it's a real contrast between the people who take this seriously and the people who think it's a joke.

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[Sam Stein]

Bill. Good to have you, buddy.

[Bill Kristol]

Good to be with you though. I come on, it's this kind of gloomy, you know, worry.

[JVL]

I'm here, I am moved. And what did you think it was gonna be?

[Bill Kristol]

And I'm putting JVL like thoughts out of my mind for at least half an hour. And I mean she big turn out here.

[Sam Stein]

I'm in this Wait, tell, tell people where you were.

[Bill Kristol]

McLean, Virginia when I went. You know, everyone, Jake's that joke. But you know what? This is like 60, 40, 40% of acclaim is for Trump, 50% for Young. And it's not that. Well, it's Virginia, right? I mean, plenty of concern. Plenty of my neighbors are Trump and a lot of them actually ex Trump Republicans. I posted a sign, I think it's the bulwark thing about I'm an extra. She was a woman who had hosted the. I didn't remember 20 years before at a Republican, Northern Virginia Republican event. She was the chair of the local county organization and now she's showing up at no Kings. But I gotta say the mood was. It was inspiring. And I have one serious point to make, but I'll first just say it really was moving people. Of course, all the anti American stuff's ludicrous. Lots of mixture of, I'd say ages, veterans, people wearing caps, you know, from the VFW kind of caps and so forth and very. And I do think actually the assault, the attack, the antifa. They hate America. Their terrorist attack in the last week motivated a lot of people to come. People just told me that, you know, they were busy and they were gonna. They were taking their kids to a baseball game middle, you know, Little League baseball game. If they wanted to go first to this for half an hour. They were so offended by that. I really do wonder if that backfired. The other thing I was. So anyway, it's very moving. I think the photos are amazing. I'm told by the organizers they're being very cautious. They were last time responsible. I, I think this could be twice the size of the. Of the June event. So it could be more like five.

[Sam Stein]

That was several million people.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, it could be six million people, not three. And even the three some people thought.

[Andrew Egger]

Was a little low.

[Bill Kristol]

So this event here in McLean was more than five times, I'd say five times larger than the event. And we're talking, you know, 150 to 750 place. But. But many events elsewhere in Northern Virginia. Andrew's been driving around to some of those. People think New York could be up into the, you know, high hundreds of thousands or a million. Those photos. I know, I grew up in New York. Those photos are unbelievable. There's. But also in rural areas and Trumpy areas, I think I would say at some point you worry about the incident being used as a provocation and then becoming the main news story. You worry just about the bubbles people are in. Which God knows is true in terms of media and stuff. At some point, I'm sure people have studied this. I really, I haven't. If you get to 5, 6, 7 million people, it gets big enough that it breaks through the bubbles, I should think. I mean, at some point it's people Know people, I mean, your neighbor, you know, wherever you are in the country at some point. Not literally many, many places in the country, not just, you know, here in North America, Virginia or New York, you'll know people. People will run into people who went, people's kids went, people's relatives went, people's, you know, parents of other kids in their school went or at the church. And I do think at that point, if it becomes big enough and I'm testing, like maybe it has, the, the protest becomes genuinely can start changing people's, maybe not their minds entirely, but a little bit their attitude. The notion that, gee, there is something to worry about here and people are not going to flip overnight. I understand 180 degrees politically, but I think this is, this could end up being a pretty important moment, I guess.

[Sam Stein]

I guess I'm, I don't know. I, I guard. I hope that's right. But I, I do wonder and push back on me if you want, like, is this too cloistered?

[JVL]

Is it this?

[Sam Stein]

Are we talking about, like, you know, just kind of urban centers in their, in their suburbs? Right. Like it's New York, Boston. Huge video out of Chicago just came through my feed. You know, yes, I, I know Tim had, Tim Miller had some video from the Villages which looked insane to me, but like, how do you know if it's breaking through?

[Bill Kristol]

So we don't know. They went out of their way. The organizers. This were extremely impressive, I would say, just having watched people try to do these things over the years, decades. They went out of their way to try to have events everywhere in rural communities and Trump states and Trump areas. And we'll see, I mean, we'll start seeing photos of that and we'll see how many are from there. And obviously most of them aren't going to be people. Most of the biggest cities that have these events are going to be presumably not Trump areas. And almost no very big cities are, including red states. But I don't know, I feel like they've tried as hard as they can in terms of both the messaging, the incredible repetition and care they tried to take to prevent, you know, to have de escalating. They trained, 250,000 people were trained or at least to some degree at least alerted to and got information on de escalation tactics in case anything happened. So they really went out of their way to try to not provide grist for the Trump mill. They really went out of their way to encourage everyone to be patriotic, to sing American patriotic songs, to bring, you know, patriotic placards. And so forth. So we'll see how much it penetrates. I agree. It's for Sam.

[Sam Stein]

Well, jvl, I mean, but I've got.

[Bill Kristol]

To say they did everything they could to push against the. It's the left wing bubble now.

[Sam Stein]

Sure.

[Bill Kristol]

Doesn't feel to me like what was the march right at the beginning of Trump one? I mean, the, the, the D.C. march.

[JVL]

Women's March.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, it doesn't feel to me like that.

[JVL]

If I could just.

[Sam Stein]

Let me just quickly ask you. Let me ask you because I guess it gets to the. My concern, I want to say is like, we all care about authoritarianism. We care about the future of our institutions and democracy. We care about the Constitution. Do regular voters care about this stuff? Like, do they? I don't know. I honestly don't know.

[JVL]

Okay, so one thing, just close the loop on this. I mean, most of America lives within 50 miles of a major metropolitan area. To say, like, oh, is this just confined to cities and close in. Well, that's most of the country.

[Sam Stein]

Fair enough that it's.

[JVL]

The vast majority of America lives like within. As an anime. Here's the thing that I find interesting. You have on the one hand this movement, which is a mass movement that is able to bring people out of their, out of their houses on a weekend to gather and you know, in some cases get shouted at by Trump voters as they drive past them or whatnot. And this is devoid of all politics except for democracy. There is nothing in here about tariffs, There is nothing in here about Doge or anything like that. It's pure. This is democracy and there's a tremendous amount of energy. And then at the same time, you have Mikey Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger running the most important gubernatorial races in the country right now. Basically not saying anything about this. Just talk about cost of living. And I, I am interested in that because like, these are not cost of living protests, right? This is, these are not the, no, oh, the rent is too damn high protests. And I, maybe that makes sense. Like maybe, maybe that when you're running to be governor of a state, it's not a national office, it's not really about democracy. You should be focusing on like real things that matter to your voters, I guess. But on the other hand, like Spanberger and Cheryl aren't blowing people out of the water and polling, you know, and like, I'm actually a little bit worried about Mikey Cheryl in Jersey. I think the race is, the race seems to be closer than it should. And you know, I think ultimately she winds up Winning that race, but probably not to the. With the margin she could have. And I don't know, like, it does make. I, I wonder. And I just, I don't understand, like, you know, like, I don't think you could get a mass protest movement like this based around kitchen table issues. And yet the people who are running for office to oppose this stuff seem like very reticent to embrace democracy talk instead. Want to talk about like, well, we gotta get the prices down.

[Will Salatin]

I don't know.

[Sam Stein]

This is the perennial debate, man. This is, this is what, this is what Harris was having to deal with in 2024.

[JBL]

I know and I don't know.

[JVL]

I'm not the smartest guy in the world on this, so I'm not.

[Bill Kristol]

It's hard. I mean, I'm would slightly just prefer a little more. I mean, I think spaghetti gets actually Spamberger does some of that a little more than. Maybe Cheryl doesn't. I don't know. I think Spanberger is going to win easily, but. But it also may be that she's got. They've got all those voters. They're all showing up spontaneously, 6 millions of them to this event. And therefore, you know, that the marginal voters aren't and they're speaking to them. It's not quite to my taste, I guess I would say, but. But I'm open to the proposition that it's a reasonable, you know, tactic and strategy. Maybe overthinking a little bit too. I just come back to the millions. I mean, people don't really. I mean, they do understand, I think. Let's just say it's 6 million. It could be a lot more. Incidentally, that's a lot of people. I don't know how many people are going to vote in an off year. You know, I mean, it's obviously much more, but anyway, it's a big number.

[JVL]

8% of all the people who voted for Kamala Harris. Right?

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. Came out on a Saturday, middle of the day. Let me just give a shout out to Matt in Key west who says Ripley County, Indiana had a couple hundred people he's trying to, you know, push.

[Bill Kristol]

How about the Villages there? Speaking of Key West.

[Sam Stein]

Key west, we taught at the Villages already with Tim. And then JM Flan says. Lee Summit, Missouri, I, you know, I'm a big lease Summit guy. So he said there's good turnout there, so keep, keep the comments coming. Jbl, I know you got to go in five. So just before we, before we lose you, how do you build off this? What do you do to build off this, or can you build off this?

[Bill Kristol]

And one more question for jbl. Was Shohei's performance last night the greatest baseball player at one game?

[JVL]

Yeah. I mean, the greatest performance in a. Certainly in a playoff game ever. Yeah, it was unbelievable. How do you build off this? I mean, the question for me is much more the timing of building off something like this. Because that, I think, is the hard part, right? It is. It would be easy to capitalize on this stuff quickly and to build and peak very fast. But I'm not sure how useful that is. Right. I mean, all of this has to eventually culminate in November of 2026. And so you have to slowly build the case and build the mass of people, and you have to be judicious in how they are mobilized. I think you have to really. I really do believe, and I've written about this, that you have to think about the frame should be as a dissident movement and not as a political movement in the American context, because I don't think we exist in that world anymore. You know, this is not. This is not like building like, you know, the anti Vietnam War or the Tea Party or any other, you know, any other movement that you've ever had in certainly modern American politics. It's much more like color revolutions in, in. In Eastern Europe. And I think that is uncomfortable for Americans to sit with. And maybe it's wrong. I mean, it's. It's also possible I'm just wrong about this. But the way I think of this in then is you've got to sort of gather strength and slowly build to the point where eventually, like in the summer of 2026, you are pushing enormous rallies that are focused on New York and Washington, D.C. where you try to put a million or 2 million people in the streets in Washington or in New York, which makes it a statement that simply can't be ignored.

[Sam Stein]

I forgot who said it, so I apologize for stealing the idea, but someone was saying, you know, this is obviously an act of protest and against Trump, but really what this is today is a prelude to sort of the mass mobilizing shutdown of society that might have to come if this.

[JVL]

General strike.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, general strike.

[JVL]

Because that's what ultimately putting a million or 2 million people in the nation's capital or the business capital of the country. What that really is is a statement that we could do a general strike if we wanted to. Right. And that's. That's the signal that that is supposed to send to all the institutions. But I don't know. I mean, we'll. We'll see. Am I crazy? Is this one. You're like, you're like shaking.

[Bill Kristol]

Hop to it. I see Joe's in there. So you can get him on. And I would say one thing that struck me at this thing with this just chatting with neighbors, some of whom I knew, some of whom I didn't really, and is they are where the bulwark is, if I can put it that way. They are where we are on degree of alarm. This was not a kind of. This is going to turn it around, this protest. It's now we've shown and they're going to change their ways. This was sort of a. They are using the levers of power. They're going to keep using them. It's going to get worse before it gets better. This is only one step. I was a pretty. It was, it was high spirited because there were lots of funny signs and people, you know, were happy to see each other and it was a nice day here in Northern Virginia. But there was a real sobriety about the moment that I thought was, you know, wasn't, was was appropriate.

[Sam Stein]

Jbl, good luck. Hey, have fun out there. Stay safe out there. Report back to us.

[JVL]

Okay, I will. Thanks, guys.

[Sam Stein]

All right, we're going to bring in Joe Peron soon, but Will, we haven't heard from you in a little bit. I want to talk about this because Timothy Snyder and there's JoJo. We'll get to you in a second. Joe's live in the capital, but Timothy Snyder, the American historian. Bill had a nice conversation with him. I want to call it nice, actually pretty dark. It was very dark. But to borrow, because we mentioned Shohei Ohtani, Bill and Timothy were tiny. Timothy Snyder said something that kind of stuck with me, which is like we tend to view these things as a baseball game in which there's two teams and then when one side is just breaking the rules, one team is saying, why aren't the umpires calling the strikes? Why aren't they calling them out? Why are the umpires not doing their job? And Snyder's point was the people of the umpires, they have to get their head around the idea that the institutions, the referees don't exist any longer. The guardrails are gone. The courts aren't going to do the job they're supposed to do. There aren't the guardrails in Congress. There's little opposition, but the people need to understand that they are the umpires in this kind of hackneyed metaphor. But it kind of did resonate with me, I have to say, in that this is one of the few remaining guardrails that the administration might have to respect.

[Andrew Egger]

Yeah. I mean, the institutions that we, the passive citizenry, expect to step in haven't stepped in. And so we have to step in. There's the live question of how much we care about this stuff. I think part of the function of these rallies is to just put together the picture. I don't begrudge just responding to what JBL said. I don't begrudge Sherrill and Spanberger and other Democratic candidates focusing on kitchen table issues. And I believe that the Democrats were right to make the shutdown about a kitchen table issue about healthcare. It's not either or. We're doing both. And these rallies are about the other part of the picture, the authoritarianism. And what we're doing is we're pulling together stuff that ordinary people in their daily lives, they hear about it, but they don't really put it together. The corrupt prosecutions, the firing of prosecutors who don't prosecute the president's enemies, the corrupt pardons of the president's friends. We just had another one, George Santos. The sending troops into American cities, the defying of courts, the usurpation by the executive of congressional authority, all this stuff. These are all process things. And part of our job is to put it together in this picture of monarchy, authoritarianism. It is what is happening. And it is as simple, Sam, as what you just said. There is a man at the center of this who will take. Who is taking as much power as he can take from other people until he is stopped and no one is stopping him. You don't have to come up with some fancy seminar language about what that is. It is a seizure of power that is only stopped by other people standing in his way. And so this is an attempt by the citizenry to begin to stand up. We had a lot of people stand up in the last. No kings more this time. If we get to Bill's point about, you know, the. How many people show up? Millions and millions. There will be. I'm sure there already are on Fox News and Newsmax. And the House Republicans will have video of this. There will be some crackpots out there, some antifa types. There will be somebody with some Hamas type of stuff. And the right will try to make that the story. And part of our job is to overwhelm that little tiny numerator that the right wants to focus on with the massive denominator of ordinary people, patriots who are showing up at these rallies.

[Sam Stein]

Joe, what's the situation on the Hill? Why the hell are you there?

[Joe Peron]

So I came up.

[Sam Stein]

They're not there.

[Joe Peron]

I came up here because it's my home away from home, and the WI fi is better, and it's just up the Hill from the actual protest. But I spent the whole week and a half listening to speaker of the House Republican Senators say that this was going to be pro terrorism, pro Hamas, hate America rally. And I saw more babies in strollers than I did Palestinian flags. Lots of people of all ages. And it was just tons and tons of people, clearly from the area, a lot from maybe outside the area, attending the satellite rallies that we've seen everywhere else. But it was really massive. I don't think I've ever seen a protest this big here. And I've seen the 2020 summer protests that turned into riots.

[Sam Stein]

Can't be bigger than the Women's March. That was massive.

[Joe Peron]

That was really big. But this is pretty. This is pretty close. And the fact that they figured out their location better. The Women's March was like. Everyone kind of swarmed in this. I got up on the press riser, and I could not see the end of it.

[Bill Kristol]

Where were you, Joe? You were at one end of the mall. Just.

[Joe Peron]

I was like, right at the stage, so right by the Capitol. And then you could see, like, all the way down to what used to be called the Newseum.

[Sam Stein]

Just so people are aware. Just so the MAGA folks who are watching this are aware. That's the part you guys stormed on January 6th. That's the one where you were climbing on and then you knocked on the windows just to get your bearings.

[Joe Peron]

I haven't seen any counter protesters either, which I was sort of half expecting. In addition to that, the security has been very chill. Lots of free movement everywhere. Capitol Police, many of them who are not supposed to be working this weekend, aren't being paid because of the shutdown, are out there. And they're just kind of chill. Like they. I think they understood it in the ways that the speaker said this could be violent. Capitol Police didn't buy that. And you can tell by their demeanor because they've seen violent rallies like January 6th, and so they're all just chill leaning.

[Sam Stein]

What about the lawmakers? What about who? Like, yeah, what elected officials are there? I want to get on that for a second.

[Joe Peron]

Chris Murphy was one of the first speakers. Talked to him for a bit, and then Adam Schiff was down there, but I don't think he was speaking he was doing some crowd work and some YouTube, Stu himself and some random creators. And then Bernie was the final one in between. That, though this was somewhat surprising, if I can be critical, is that there was a lot of talk post 2024 of not listening to the groups. And every single person up there is like a part of some group. And so there's kind of had that classic Democratic organizing feel to it, but amongst the crowd, it is not that. It is.

[Bill Kristol]

If I could just add one point to what Joe said. In the, I think the five or six biggest rallies, they felt they had to have speakers and stages. So they had to, as you say. And I do think that always falls into the trap of, well, you gotta have this person. And then it looks more like a Democratic convention sort of outdoors or something like Democratic National Convention. They made a conscious decision that almost all the others, though, including here, for example, not to have speakers. So it was all people standing at this big intersection, bigish intersection, in this case, Dolly, Madison and Old Dominion, waving signs, milling around Chad people honking at the people. People then from got bigger. So people on both sides of the street and then spilling, you know, further. And it was really that feeling of a party or picnic or whatever you want to say, not listening to speeches. And I asked one of the people involved in the organizing. Well, and of course, we had an ex, Barbara Comstock, an ex Republican member of Congress who is now never Trump. There were other people here who were, you know, recognizable types and people from groups and you could have had a roster of speakers. So they purposely chose not to. So I think for, at least at.

[Sam Stein]

The time, some speakers. Murphy was there.

[Joe Peron]

Yeah, wellness.

[Bill Kristol]

I think D.C. and New York and Boston had that kind of, you know, yeah, big rally speaker feel. But I give them credit for not doing that.

[Sam Stein]

You know what they should have done? You know who they should have had speak? Marjorie Taylor Greene. She's got her whole turn.

[Joe Peron]

I overheard some.

[Sam Stein]

I heard, overheard some.

[Bill Kristol]

Goodbye.

[Sam Stein]

That would be great.

[Joe Peron]

Taylor Green conversations. There were a handful of people, like, they were just like, have you. Have you seen what she's been up to? And they were like, I don't really trust it, but I like it. I was just like, that's very funny. That's a good anecdote. But for example, like, yes, there's a stage down here. Yes, there are speakers, but that's actually the least kind of attended zone, right? There are all of these little satellite speaking of like random people, people dancing. And so people have their own setups. It's just Kind of this giant area. And obviously the stage is the focal point, but there are people, you know, it's like an ocean of people. And so it's very different. And I'm like, like I said, members of Congress telling me that it was going to be this, you know, pro Hamas hate rally. And it's like everybody there is either a family or an old person. I saw like 30 different types of dogs, Corgis, greyhounds, you name it. Not George's corgi, another one. And so, like, it, it had the real feel of like when you guys were talking about kitchen table issues. Like, these are normal people who would normally care about kitchen table issues, but we're showing up for this kind of thing.

[Sam Stein]

Well, I'm gonna let you go in a second, cause Mona's coming on, but I wanna noodle on this a little bit about, you know, how elected officials should be leaning into this or who's doing a good job handling this. Kinda curious for your thoughts on that.

[Andrew Egger]

You know, I think everyone is spooked by the fact that Kamala Harris, in the last two weeks of the presidential campaign tried. There was the whole tour with Liz Cheney. There was the whole, you know, this is about authoritarian. There is the speech on the, the mall and, and it didn't work, you know, and. And I think a lot of people just feel like there isn't. I think there is a legitimate concern that authoritarianism starts out as a process concern. It's like, well, what does that mean to me? Donald Trump is offering to control crime. And, you know, Trump's whole message is, I got people in Chicago who don't care who does it. They don't care if it's the troops, they don't care if it's the cops, they don't care if it's the president. They just want to control crime. So his bet is Americans don't care about process, about that kind of thing. And it is a challenge to make people understand that this is a material thing to them. But I think, to go back to a point that I think Bill and JBL made, what ultimately makes the sale is the administration itself. It is their steady encroachment to the point where people feel it. They start out with, it's just ice. It's just illegal aliens. You Mr. And Mrs. America don't need to worry about it. And pretty soon it's federal troops in your streets policing you. They're in your life. And that's kind of the message.

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[Sam Stein]

Bill, do you have any final thoughts while we bring.

[Bill Kristol]

I think, and this is Joe's point too, I don't know what it was like at all. I talked to Texas with someone at the New York City stuff and there's a couple of speakers, but it's so massive you can't hear them most places and people are. It's more like a party than a convention, than a political convention, I'd say. Certainly out here and there as people are chatting about kids and grandchildren and dogs, all this stuff, they're not like obsessively focused on their occasional chance. There's a lot of sign waving, a lot of honking from people. So I feel like that for me makes it more impressive and maybe more meaningful, actually something that people will enjoy, have enjoyed being at. It wasn't. I say most people here probably came out of a sense of duty, but I think when they were there felt a sense of really enjoyment and satisfaction at being there. So I thought that was nice.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, no, I think that's right. I think people just really want to release, honestly. I think people are just like freaked out, fed up, anxious and there's not been much by the way of collective positivity. And this is why I was kind of asking Will and maybe Joe, you can pick this up while we swap in. Hopefully Mona's audio is finished. I just don't think anyone's been able to channel that kind of positive agenda or at least a reason for people to get up and excited. And so that's why these sporadic events like this do have. I don't know, they get people out in the streets. It's helpful.

[JBL]

Bill, we'll go.

[Sam Stein]

We'll see you later, man. Thank you. We're going to talk to Andrew Egger. Thanks for Mona. I don't know if your volume is working.

[Mona]

How's now? Can you hear me?

[Sam Stein]

Perfect.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

Yes.

[Sam Stein]

Where were you?

[Mona]

I was in D.C. at the big one. So I was at close to where the stage was but too far away to actually hear the speakers. The very first thing that happened was my husband and I Were walking to the rally and my husband was wearing Bulwark T shirt and a lovely couple said, you're from the Bulwark, you know, and they gave us big high five. So that was like our first introduction to the. The no kid.

[Sam Stein]

That's awesome.

[Mona]

That was great. And the. Okay, so I didn't hear everything that everyone else has said, but I'll just report that the. You know, there is this sense in the country that so many people feel and that we hear I think a lot from our audience at the board too, which is what can we do? We are beside ourselves. What can an individual do? And I've got to tell you, there are millions of those people who now feel like they are at least being heard that this is something to do in this moment and you know, where it goes from here, I don't know, but it is very just psychically healthy that people got a chance to make a feel like they're doing something to express that terrible grief and fear that they have about the direction of the country.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, that's what I was just saying. I feel like there is a collective desire for just some constructive outlet. Right?

[Mona]

Yeah.

[Sam Stein]

Can bang your head. You can bang your head all day, you can doom scroll all night and just feels like there's not much to be happy about. And when you have an event like this, it at least allows you to channel that.

[Mona]

Well.

[Sam Stein]

We got undercover antifa agent himself, Andrew Egger. Are you still in Franconia or are you somewhere else now?

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

I'm in Old Town Alexandria now where there's, as you can tell, they've kind of just gotten some programming going behind me here in the last few minutes. I'm trying not to be like, you know, rude hollering over it all but. But yeah, I don't know how well you can even see the crowd behind me. It's a good turnout here. It looks like about a. I mean I've always been horrible at estimating crowd sizes. Looks like north of a thousand people would be my guess.

[Will Salatin]

But.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

But you know, it's all in this. This, you know, this park downtown in Old Town and, and like I said, people are. It just kicked off here about 15 minutes ago, so people are still sort of streaming in.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, we've been getting in the. In the comments section. It's just kind of remarkable how many separate towns are each having their own satellite protest. So like woman from Bismarck said there were 600 or so in Bismarck, North Dakota. We have Dayton, Ohio, Bend, Oregon. I'm just David City, Nebraska. Never heard of the place. Brighton, Michigan. Wow. I mean, there's places all over the country. I gotta admit, I was a little bit anxious and skeptical that this was gonna be. I knew there's a lot of anticipation for this. I was a little anxious and skeptical it was gonna be a big deal. But to me, at least at this point, 2:45pm it seems like huge turnouts across the country. Joe, let me just go quickly back to you because Mona raised a logical follow up question which is okay, well, people need an outlet. People want to savor something positive. Tomorrow they're going to wake up. The government's still going to be shut down. Democrats are still going to have to figure out what to do around that. They're still going to be pushing for the Obamacare subsidies, things like that. You know, you talk to these people all day long. What do they take from demonstrations like this?

[Joe Peron]

I think Democrats are obviously still dealing with a big brand problem electorally, but I think they're gonna be very heartened by what they've seen because you know, seeing a mass opposition can indicate and a lot, and like we said, a lot of these people may not be your typical reliable blue voter. That can be really inspiring for them as they head into the midterm elections. But as far as like Mike Johnson can expect, like why weren't these violent? And I haven't really seen much chatter about like little dust ups because there can always be dust ups at any protest. But you know, the idea that they were branding this as, you know, this could be, you know, the Liberal version of January 6th and it just hasn't been that.

[Sam Stein]

And it ends well. Let's go, let's get some photos here because I, I have to, I have to push back. We have some photos of violent demonstration and at least one antifa member if you can see. Oh, there's the violent demonstration there. A lot of inflatable people, a lot of inflatable. And we have one of a, you know, can we get the antifa. The actual antifa. We did find someone. There it is. Look, it's the shirt he says I am in. What is he doing with the bit? The shirt's fine. That's one thing. Put the bandana around the neck.

[Mona]

There was something about you should wear yellow to the protest to identify with other global protests around the world against autocracy.

[Joe Peron]

They explained that at the beginning that at the press tent, yellow is the color of the rally. It's considered a peaceful color. That's why the press badges had yellow on them.

[JVL]

Got it.

[Sam Stein]

Gotcha. Well, you know, George's shirt is, is a choice. And.

[Will Salatin]

I talked to one.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

Sorry, I talked to one older lady at the protest here in Old Town just now who was carrying a, a sign with a frog on it that said Amphiba. And she told me it was in solidarity with all of the inflatable costume, you know, rebel rousers up in Portland.

[Will Salatin]

I mean, like, the, the, the, the.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

Goofiness is like a real thing, right? I mean, like, like I've seen a number of people in those same sorts of like, inflatable whole body, you know, cartoon character costumes and things like that. And it is very much like, like they're all kind of just clowning on the notion that, you know, they're, they're sort of violent gang members in any respect. But also, but also, you know, like, it's, it. We shouldn't just clown on George. Right? It, like it takes a certain amount of chutzpah to wear that shirt to this protest when, when, you know, they are actively being termed a domestic terrorist organization by. I mean, that's not, that's not nothing. Right. One other thing on that front is.

[Will Salatin]

Like, I've talked to a couple of.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

Federal employees out here who are a little skittish to be on video. You know what I mean? Like, they were like, I don't really want my face, like, out there because I'm worried I'd be fired from my job just for attending this protest. And I mean, like, that's just a striking sort of indicator of where we.

[Will Salatin]

Are as well at this point.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

I mean, like, the chilling effect has been real and it's, it's, it's striking that the, that the protests are again, just sort of this dramatically well attended, even given sort of that, that chilling effect and that, that fear that's out there. I think it really is sort of a blowback against that, that culture of fear that they're trying to instill.

[Sam Stein]

Mona, go ahead. You were, you're trying to get it.

[JVL]

Yeah.

[Mona]

The people that, that we encountered today, everyone was incredibly upbeat. Everybody was happy to see what a huge turnout. I mean, it was, it was. We were packed in like sardines on Pennsylvania Avenue. And. But I, you know, it was an unbelievably friendly and clever crowd, I have to say. I took photos of a bunch of signs that I thought were great. Like some, you know, these just little homemade signs. Remember, they said that all the signs were going to be like, industrial, you know, produced and all that.

[Sam Stein]

Hold on one second.

[Will Salatin]

Yes.

[Sam Stein]

You didn't George Source didn't give you your individual sign? Because I got.

[Mona]

He did and I forgot. Yeah, yeah, but, but, you know, I interrupted your thought.

[Andrew Egger]

No, it's okay.

[Sam Stein]

This idea that George Soros is out there handing out signs to everybody, it was.

[Mona]

But my favorite sign was a gal who put a picture of Trump and it said, does this ass make my country look small? Which is really good. But in any event, I, I do think, look, you can't talk about these rallies, though, without acknowledging that because it's an anti Trump rally. It also brought in a lot of left wing activists. There were a lot of Palestinian flags. There were a lot of, you know, keffiyehs being worn at where I was. Anyway, I, I believe that in these protests, you really shouldn't have any flag except US Flag or anti Trump flags or whatever. But. So I think that detracts and it's not great. But. And there were really a lot of Palestinian flags. But that much having been said, I think that was definitely a minority. People were from every different age group, every different demographic group, and there was a real feeling of solidarity. Was the most cheerful day that I've had in quite a long time.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, no, and I think that's what happens. You know, it's one thing to have a demonstration when Trump is not in power and the diversity of the coalition can become hard to manage, but when Trump is in power, you're going to have a lot of people come together under that umbrella of, we don't want to deal with this. We don't want to have to deal with this. I'm just going to give a shout out to people who've been chiming in, in our chats quickly saying they've attended a variety of different protests. Rio Rancho, New Mexico, Carrollton, Texas. Right. In California, Booneville, Indiana. Birmingham, Alabama. Littleton, Colorado. I mean, God, there are protests like all across the country. It is incredible. Incredible.

[Mona]

Can I say one other thing?

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, of course, that.

[Mona]

So, you know, I mentioned there were maybe too many Palestinian flags for my liking, but there were also like unbelievable numbers of people dressed in patriotic costumes, dressed as the Statue of Liberty, dressed as Uncle Sam, all of that. There was one guy who had a huge placard that was a Lincoln quote. I took a photo of that. You know, that it is, it was a sort of reassuring display of traditional American patriotism. There were a lot. There were people handing out pocket constitutions. You know, it was, it was. There were a lot of signs about, you know, the. That this is lawless, that this is what he's doing is un American. So it was, there was, there was, there were jokes, of course, and there were bad, you know, and you know, hilarious things. But they were also, there was a serious, really sort of sober recognition of the moment in a lot of those signs, I would say.

[Sam Stein]

Joe, I'm gonna let you go in a second. Cause I want you to head back out and talk to some folks there. But final thoughts from the Capitol. What's it like there?

[Joe Peron]

I mean, it's just massive. And one thing I've noticed that Mona made me think of in describing the costumes is that like, you know, you have a very serious political movement on your hands. When people are dressed up like the founding Fathers, it only happens like once a decade. And I saw a bunch of people in pantaloons and tricorn hats.

[Sam Stein]

Pantaloons.

[Joe Peron]

And you know, that's, that's what indicates it. So.

[Mona]

Yeah.

[Sam Stein]

Are you wearing pantaloons right now? We just, we can only see from.

[Joe Peron]

I'm wearing some World War II military chinos.

[Sam Stein]

You're gonna go back out there. Good. Good for you. All right, Joe, thanks a bunch, man. Looking forward to seeing what you got in his go to newsletter. Press pass. Everyone should be, you know, I should have mentioned this. Why didn't I mention this? Joe, you can head out. Subscribe to the Bulwark folks. I just want to give a plug while we get JVL back in. Subscribe to the Bulwark because we're doing stuff like this. We're sending people out to the rallies, we're doing reporting, we're doing analysis, we're doing it on YouTube, we're doing it on substack, we're doing it on podcasts, we're doing it on video, we are writing newsletters for you. It's incredible fun, informative, important work. And it really depends on people like you to help us sustain this mission. So if you get the chance, if you have it in you, if you want to support a democracy oriented institution of independent journalism, do subscribe to the book. We genuinely appreciate it. All right, jvl, give us a little. Where are you?

[JBL]

So I'm in Denville, New Jersey and this is a very, very small town in suburban North Jersey. I expected it's one of these places with a little two block Main street and an ice cream shop and all that. I, I frankly expected this to be like 25 people. And this is not even like the most prominent place in town. Instead of being on Main street, it's like tucked away off of Main street by the library. And I thought there was gonna be 20 people. There's got to be a thousand people. I am. I am what's done New Jersey. And they are. I don't know if you can hear because the mic is using my AirPod mic, but it's just cowbells and shouting and chanting and all the cars that drive past honking. And I, again, I just couldn't be more surprised. I thought I was gonna, you know, I was on the show with you guys for 30 minutes. I thought come down here, hang for 15 minutes, and then come back again. Just. Just gobsmacked. Never imagined you would get this many people in a town this small in a place which is, frankly, not very democratic. Like, this is a. This is kind of a red spot in. In New Jersey. So it's. It's wild. I mean, not super red. I don't want to give it the wrong. Wrong impression, but this is a Just, you know, I would say probably a 50, 50 town split wise.

[Sam Stein]

And have you talked to anyone. Have you talked to anyone about why they came out talking to people?

[JBL]

No, I haven't done that, Sam. I'm sorry. You're misunderstanding my role. That's not what I do.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

No, I. I was.

[JBL]

I was here for like 5.5minutes, and I had one guy come up to me like, hey, jbl, how are you?

[Sam Stein]

You are wearing the hat, man. You got the hat, the blaring blue.

[JBL]

Yeah, yeah. Wear my blue ball workout, which everybody loves.

[Sam Stein]

I love it.

[JBL]

Yeah. Can you guys hear the. The audio from behind me, or.

[Sam Stein]

No, no, we can just hear you.

[JBL]

It's nuts. I mean, it really. It sounds like you're at a sporting event or something. Just constant honking, people yelling, the cowbells. It's wild. Yeah, it's wild. Yeah.

[Sam Stein]

Incredible. You know, it's really heartening to see this, honestly. Again, it's funny. My whole disposition has kind of changed from the beginning of this live stream to now where I signed on. I was like, okay, this is nice. Like, I'm glad people are coming out, but everything seems so damn hopeless and like, you know, but now as I. I'm watching this channel, I mean, again, I'm just going through names. People are dropping their location in our channel. Monticello, Arkansas. I never heard of Monticello. Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Toledo, Ohio. West Brookhead, Massachusetts. I mean, they're all over the country. Palm Springs, Palm Desert. It is unreal how many locations are.

[JBL]

And it is actually some of there. There were protests over in Europe.

[Mona]

Yes.

[JBL]

Early morning times, right?

[Mona]

Yeah, I mean in Nice, France.

[Will Salatin]

Yeah.

[Sam Stein]

Amazing, amazing.

[Mona]

As if they don't even have their own troubles.

[Sam Stein]

But anyway, yeah, there's a lot of Canadians in our chat. I, I love you, Canada. Just gonna apologize again, but they seem to be sending mostly we're so sorry this is happening to you responses but I appreciate it. Trinity, Florida. Torrance, California. Monterey, California. Lincoln, Nebraska. Raleigh, Heathsville. Geez. Lake Oswego, Oregon. There's just constant, constant, constant stream of places. Go ahead, Mona.

[Mona]

At the risk of getting carried away with optimism and ABL is right there so he'll rein me in in two seconds if I get too optimistic here. But, but you know, sometimes leaders come along because, you know, and torque a society in a direction they want and other times the leader sees where the people are and says there go my people. I need to get at the head of this parade because it's out there and I am wondering if one of the effects of what we're seeing today is that some up and coming leader is going to say, you know what, it's, this country is not inert. The people are not, you know, hopeless. And they. There's an appetite for a different kind of leadership in a different direction. And I'm going to get, I'm going to get ahead of this. I'm going to lead it.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, I hope you're right. I honestly hope you're right. I'm not. I haven't seen anyone take the reins yet, honestly.

[Mona]

No, that's true. But the opportunity is sitting there.

[Sam Stein]

The opportunity is sitting there. Andre is back with us. Andrew, where'd you go, buddy?

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

I wasn't sure whether you guys still wanted me and people were starting to give me some dirty looks in terms of having like my phone on talking a lot while there's programming happening and everything. So I, I moved a little bit away. We'll see whether, we'll see whether I am. I'm still committing a social faux pas of some kind.

[Sam Stein]

Not at all. Well, we're so we're, we're actually going to be closing up this live stream in a little bit. Just a few minutes because we've hit an hour. I'm not gonna foreclose the possibility of doing more video today. Let's see what happens. But Andrew, just give us your last thoughts from being on the ground and then jvl, same to you after he's done.

[Andrew Egger (on the ground)]

Yeah, I mean I've just been, I've just been struck by the size and I think that has been the most important thing about today. Obviously you Know, today ends and everybody goes home and Trump and the Republicans still have all the power and nothing has like materially changed. Right. But I mean, size really is its own argument in terms of something like this. Right. And there have been a lot of attempts to sort of diminish this, to say all these people are, you know, paid agitators and, you know, belong to different organizations. Like, there is not a, like left wing benefactor in the world rich enough to pay however many million people all across America, you know, day laborer wages to come out and do this protest today. And I think that that's what we're seeing in again, all over the DC area, but not just all over the DC area, all over the country. And it's been a really interesting and.

[Will Salatin]

Remarkable thing to see.

[Sam Stein]

Excellent. All right, jvl, give us some closing thoughts. Hopefully not just, you know, hopefully there's some, a little, some optimism in there. Hopefully.

[JBL]

I mean, I'll give you this, what I'm seeing here is a lot of people who on a Saturday afternoon, look, everybody's got yard work to do, they've got shopping to do, they've got their kids, sports ball games and whatnot. These people showed up, they took time, they took, you know, what will wind up being basically half of a quarter of their weekend. Right. To do this. When you put it all together at the time. But then I'm looking at all the signs and like I would say probably half the people here have signs with them. And the signs are overwhelmingly handmade. And that is another piece of time that goes into it. Like to make a sign, you gotta go to Michael's, you gotta get the poster board, you gotta sit down with your markers. Right?

[JVL]

I mean.

[JBL]

If you're looking at intensity, one of the metrics for intensity is how much of people's time are they willing to give to something. And between the signs and the costumes and again, I mean, this sounds like this is a very gauzy, touchy feely stuff. But if you're trying to gauge what is that minimum of effort needed to get somebody into being engaged and active, right. Go into a protest like this, hanking, a sign, having a costume, those things are all investments of time and energy that are required. And I'm pretty impressed by what this turnout here says about the activation level. It's pretty interesting and hopeful. God help me. God help me for being helpful. Sam, look what you did.

[Sam Stein]

Oh my God. This is insane.

[JBL]

Look what you made me do.

[Sam Stein]

I made JVL hopefully crazy. Never thought I'd see the Day. All right, Mona, what are your last thoughts? And then I'm going to close the show with my last thoughts.

[Mona]

You know what my last thought is? My last thought is that jbl, who says he doesn't like to interact with people, and he's basically shy and all that, every time he goes to an event where there are a lot of people, he comes back unbelievably energized, less pessimistic, you know, feeling better, feeling hopeful. It never fails. Just wanted to say more people, jbl.

[Sam Stein]

More people, more people.

[JBL]

I'll take it under advisement.

[Sam Stein]

All right, this is what I'm going to do to close this out. Five minutes ago, I was commenting on how amazed I was at how widespread these protests seem to be. And I was just listing a few locations. As I was doing that, I was watching our chat and it went absolutely ballistic with locations. Arlington, Texas. Lincoln, Nebraska. Washington, Pennsylvania. New Zealand. Wow. Okay. New Orleans, obviously. San Jose. Great Falls, Montana. Pottstown, Pennsylvania. About a thousand folks says Terry Sturgis came out in a small town, Denville. We just talked about Denville. Jvl. Woodstock, Georgia. Shores, Wood, Wisconsin. Round Rock, Texas. I don't know if these places are made up. It's possible. Toledo, Las Vegas. San Francisco, Canada. Canada. Canada. Vancouver Island. Tacoma, Washington. Arvado, Colorado. Harrisonburg, Virginia. I could go on and on and on. Two things. One, it does get to how incredible the protests are today. But two is it gets to how incredible our community is that people from all over the country and the globe are tuning into this little live stream with us on the ground and in our living rooms, watching collectively this protest and trying to find some sort of commonality and a little bit of thread of optimism in what is a remarkably distressing time. And I said it earlier, but I'll say it again. One of the great benefits I've had in my career is getting JVL to hire me and latching onto this community so I can be part of this journey to, with everyone from all those towns that I just read and that I can do things like this that are meaningful and that matter. And so I hope as you watch this and as you listen to jvl, Andrew, Mona, and everyone else who joined the livestream, that you find this helpful, that you find this important, and that you become a subscriber to this mission. And it is a mission. It's not just journalism. It's a mission. So, jvl, Mona, Andrew, thank you guys for doing this. Really appreciate it. To everyone who is watching who's commenting. Thank you for doing that too. We genuinely appreciate it. We love our community. Subscribe to the Bulwark and we'll be in touch. Thanks.