NEW YORK — Demonstrators took to the streets in San Francisco and gathered in a New York City park Thursday to express their outrage over Donald Trump’s unexpected presidential win while Trump supporters took to social media and denounced demonstrators as hypocrites or worse for not accepting defeat in a democratic process.
High-spirited high school students marched through San Francisco’s downtown, chanting “not my president” and holding signs urging a Donald Trump eviction. They waved rainbow banners and Mexican flags, as bystanders in the heavily Democratic city high-fived the marchers from the sidelines.
“As a white, queer person, we need unity with people of color, we need to stand up,” said Claire Bye, a 15-year-old sophomore at Academy High School. “I’m fighting for my rights as an LGBTQ person. I’m fighting for the rights of brown people, black people, Muslim people.”
In New York City, about a hundred protesters gathered at Union Square in Manhattan to protest a Trump presidency. They held signs that read “Divided States of America” and “Not My President” and “Let the New Generation Speak!!”
At a subway station along 14th Street, New Yorkers expressed their thoughts — “Time to Fight Back” and “Keep the Faith! Our work is just beginning!” — along the walls of a walkway using sticky notes.
On Twitter, Trump supporters accused protesters of not respecting the process because it didn’t work out in their favor.
“You’re literally protesting against free democratic elections. Go live in North Korea, you absolute trash,” one said. “They’re not protesting Trump, they’re protesting democracy and the right to disagree with them. Isn’t that fascism,” said another.
Thousands demonstrated Wednesday around the country, from New England to Kansas City to the West Coast. Flames lit up the night sky in California cities as protesters burned a giant papier-mache Trump head in Los Angeles and started fires in Oakland intersections.
In Chicago, where thousands had recently poured into the streets to celebrate the Chicago Cubs’ first World Series victory in over a century, several thousand people marched through the Loop. They gathered outside Trump Tower, chanting “Not my president!”
Since Tuesday night, protesters have marched in the Midwest, including St. Paul, Minnesota, Omaha, Nebraska, and Kansas City, Missouri. Marchers protesting Trump’s election chanted and carried signs in front of the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C.
