Thousands show up across Colorado to say “Hands Off!” to Trump administration

From Denver to Montrose, Fort Collins to Fairplay and as far south as Trinidad, tens of thousands of people showed up across Colorado on Saturday to protest actions of the Trump administration being felt first hand. They were part of a mass mobilization that led to more than 1,200 “Hands Off!” demonstrations held in all 50 states. 

A crush of 10,000 protesters spilled from the steps of the state Capitol across Lincoln Street and into Veterans Memorial park in Denver. Amid the sea of homemade signs, many focused on Donald Trump, Elon Musk or the Department of Government Efficiency.

Speakers included Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser, who has sued the Trump administration 13 times since January, union organizers, a fired federal employee, representatives from several progressive organizations and a variety of concerned citizens. 

While the locations, and the ages, races, genders and hair colors in the crowds, ranged vastly, one message was clear: Hands off! They railed against three months of administration efforts including some that have hobbled federal agencies, laid off federal employees and targeted transgender people through executive orders. The crowds also protested import tariffs, potential cuts to entitlements, mass deportations and attacks on free speech — and a long list of other issues including public lands, personal data, foreign policy and workers’ rights.

“Food prices are rising, jobs are vanishing, people are scared, and the results have been severe,” American Opposition founder Carlos Álvarez-Aranyos said from the podium. “Since he took office, our markets have lost 10 trillion in value. That money represents our retirement, our call it savings, our collective future, and Donald Trump is destroying it.”

Luna Baez, the daughter of immigrant rights advocate Jeanette Vizguerra, who was picked up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the parking lot of her workplace in March, told the crowd about her mom’s experience. 

“People don’t understand the frustration, the desperation that families have to go through when these things happen, when your parents are kidnapped,” Baez said. “They did not get a deportation order. They did not get any sort of warrants. They were kidnapped from their households and now their families are suffering because of it.”

LEFT: Gloria Holbert, left, holds a sign during a “Hands Off!” protest Saturday outside the Capitol. “When I was 16 years of age I read Orwell and Ray Bradbury. I told myself, ‘this would never happen in my lifetime.’ Now here we are,” she said. RIGHT: Patrice, no last name given, marches with a sign Saturday. “This is my country. This is democracy. The Queen of Hearts says ‘Off with their heads’ and so do I,” she said. (Alyte Katilius, Special to The Colorado Sun)

The main Denver demonstration was organized by Indivisible Colorado, 50501 Movement, Common Ground People’s Collective, People’s March Denver, The Political Revolution, Solidarity Warriors and MoveOn.

A second set of Denver speakers, organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation, spoke from a truck bed on Lincoln Street. Their message primarily focused on the war in Gaza and international students who have had their visas revoked for their activism. In Colorado, at least 10 students have had their visas revoked. 

LEFT: Kyle Spratley, left, and Reid Schumacher, center, bang on drums Saturday outside Capitol . “I’m here for all the seniors, including Reid,” Spratley said. “I like making noise,” Schumacher added. RIGHT: Lida Jones applauds during the protest Saturday. “I was at the first women’s march in Washington,” Jones recalled. “I was raised in Birmingham, Alabama. I had white privilege… I want all people to have the privilege I had as a white woman.” (Alyte Katilius, Special to The Colorado Sun)

One University of Colorado student, who did not give her full name, saying she fears political retaliation, told the crowd “students, especially those of us who speak out for Palestine, are being targeted.” 

“The message they are trying to send us is clear: If you resist, you are a threat. And to that we the students say, ‘Good,’” the student continued.

After marching around downtown Denver, protesters returned to the Capitol steps, where organizers shifted activities toward live music and even had a kids’ “fun zone.” 

In Longmont, demonstrators jammed the sidewalks on both sides of Main Street between Third and Seventh avenues. As they waved signs at passing motorists on the street also known as U.S. 287, U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse made his way through the crowd, thanking people for helping to defend democracy.

Demonstrators crowded Main Street in Longmont from Third to Seventh avenues waving signs at motorists passing through the “Hands Off” “protest Saturday. (Anne Klein, Special to The Colorado Sun)

Around 3,000 people filled Civic Center Park near the Larimer County Courthouse in Fort Collins. Neguse was there, too, offering support for an age-diverse group that contained a strong Colorado State University contingent worried about intrusions on college campuses, cuts to vital research programs and students forced into hiding for fear of political persecution.

Politicians and community activists spoke, including a man who said he was the father of “two super-queer kids.” The family moved to Fort Collins in fear, he said, when the legislature in their home state of South Carolina began passing anti-transgender legislation. He thanked the city for the support they received in Fort Collins, and the crowd roared in support. 

After the speeches, the sign-waving crowd flooded downtown Fort Collins to bring their message to Saturday shoppers. They got many high-fives and horn honks in response.

There did not appear to be counterprotesters in the Fort Collins crowd. 

A small, but determined group of about 60 people held down the intersection of Main Street and Santa Fe Trail in Trinidad as snow piled up on the sidewalk around them. “This the government the founders warned us about,” one sign read. In Montrose, around 1,200 people crowded in near Centennial Plaza, where they were encouraged to stay strong in their defense against threats to democracy as some held signs indicating worry about the U.S. relationship with Canada, Panama, Ukraine and Greenland.

The “Hands Off “protest in Fairplay was strategic, with about 90 people showing up to make their displeasure with the Trump administration’s handling of public lands, Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, personal data and the First Amendment known to motorists driving past the historic Park County Courthouse on Colorado 9. They packed up around 1 p.m. with plans to return later to catch the rush of after-ski traffic rolling through town.

Organizers estimated a crowd of about 1,500 people outside the Historic Lowell School in Grand Junction, though some were unable to hear speakers talking from the steps of the building over a weak sound system. The crowd included a few men in cowboy hats, jeans and work boots who held up signs reading “First Time Protestor.” 

Others in Grand Junction were old hands. 

“I have been resisting every chance I get, starting with Vietnam,” one man said. He melted back into the crowd, a sign reading “Respect our existence or expect our resistance” in hand, before he could give his name.

Colorado Sun journalists Nancy Lofholm, Sue McMillin, Peter Moore, Tracy Wahl and William Woody contributed to this report.