CHRISTIANSBURG, Va. – A crowd of hundreds gathered in Christiansburg Saturday afternoon with a resounding message: There are no kings in America.
Chants, signs, and honking car horns filled the air as demonstrators joined a national day of action known as the “No Kings” protest, aimed at what organizers describe as the creeping shadow of authoritarianism in American governance.
“Trump has essentially been ruling by decree. The courts have not been effective in stopping him,” said Dale Wimberley, a local organizer with NRV Indivisible. “And that’s not American. We don’t do kings here. They’ve been illegal since 1776. So, we are here to speak out against that and to claim our democracy and demand we get it back.”
The rally in Christiansburg was one of many across the country on Saturday, with demonstrators demanding the restoration of democratic norms, greater protections for marginalized communities, and a rethinking of national priorities—from immigration enforcement to healthcare spending.
For Luci Merlo, a retired nurse and local protester, the issue is deeply felt.
“I’m a retired nurse, and I know how scarce health care resources are. I am concerned for the health of our country, literally the health and also the health of our institutions,” she said.
Merlo criticized what she sees as a misallocation of federal funds.
“Everyone participates in the economy as a whole, and we need to get that distributed properly. The money that goes to the crackdown on so-called illegal immigrants, is real money getting spent there, and the results are questionable.”
That criticism was echoed by Wimberley, who focused his remarks on immigration enforcement and due process. He took aim at common misconceptions about immigrants and criminality.
“It’s a lie that immigrants as a whole are more criminal than other people. They’re just ordinary people who are here trying to make a living and who our economy depends on,” he said.
But Wimberley didn’t shy away from nuance either.
“I can understand if people feel like they are criminals, and like any group of people, some of them are, but that is not generally true of immigrants.”
10 News also asked a nearby Trump supporter for her thoughts on the protest, but she declined to comment.