Activists and demonstrators gathered Sunday for a second day of Women’s Marches, reaffirming their criticism of President Donald Trump and his administration while celebrating each other and the #MeToo movement.
Sunday’s marches were held one year from the day hundreds of thousands of women, donning pink hats, took to the streets of Washington in a stunning display of resistance to Trump’s presidency. Marches were scheduled to take place in Las Vegas, Seattle, Miami, Phoenix and many other cities across the country and around the world.
On Saturday, hundreds of thousands of men, women and children took to the streets in Washington, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles and other cities on the one-year anniversary of Trump’s inauguration.
This year, attendees marched to rally supporters ahead of this year’s midterm elections, hoping their voices could be turned into concrete action at the ballot box.
“Before Trump, I was content to sit back and watch the government just go by me,” Heather Tucci from Harford County, Maryland, told CNN on Saturday. “Now I’m not.”
Kelley Robinson, Planned Parenthood’s national organizing director, told CNN that many of the women who marched last year have been inspired to run for office themselves.
“It’s a time where we’re not just showing up — folks are saying that, ‘Hey, we actually need to be sitting in those chairs,'” Robinson said. “You know, so everyone who was out in the airports rallying last year and marching in the streets, many of them are now sitting in state legislatures across the country.
“It’s a powerful moment that we’re in.”
But electoral politics were not the only thing on demonstrators’ minds.
The marches also coincided with the recent #MeToo and Time’s Up movements against sexual assault and harassment. Demonstrators, equipped with signs, voiced their support for women’s rights and equality and the cultural shift that has rocked numerous industries and communities in the past few months.
“Witnessing the recent rise of the Time’s Up movement has been profoundly inspiring,” said the actress Olivia Wilde at the Los Angeles march on Saturday. “We have shown them that hell hath no fury like a woman underestimated. We have shown them that we are linked, not ranked, and we have shown them that this is just the beginning.”