With signs, speakers, and the occasional megaphone, a few hundred people took to the sidewalks in Newburgh to protest the Trump Administration’s policies. Starting at Montgomery Street, the crowd snaked through the sidewalks by the Newburgh waterfront in a nearly single-file line.
Resident Terry Demeo came out to protest the efforts by Immigration & Customs Enforcement to ramp up deportations nationwide.
“They’re leading with hate, they’re leading with divisiveness," she says. "The level of inhumanity that is around us — how do [supporters of Trump] not see what’s going on? How do they accept? [Immigrants] are all human beings. We're all freaking human beings.”
The Newburgh event was one of more than 2,000 protests nationwide, and at its core, it was not much different from other protests that have occurred locally since Trump’s inauguration. This time, marchers aimed to counter the president’s 79th birthday and an up to $45 million military parade his administration threw in Washington, D.C.
“It’s a waste of money," says one protester. "We always appreciate our military, there’s no need for a parade.”
“I think it’s important for us to show that there are people who don’t believe in what’s going on," adds another. "And we’ll continue to march until we see change.”
While marchers turned out in droves, events throughout the WAMC listening area were mostly peaceful. Multiple sheriffs said protests in their jurisdictions this weekend were peaceful, with no arrests. Ulster County Sheriff Juan Figueroa says there were multiple “No Kings” rallies in the county this weekend, including in New Paltz, Gardiner, Woodstock and Kingston. He says roughly 4,000 people came to the Kingston protest, and everything went smoothly.
“I think there was one individual in the City of Kingston who tried to sit in the middle of Albany Avenue to try to stop traffic. But when he was asked to get up and leave, he did,' says Figueroa. "So we had, to my knowledge, no incidents in any of the demonstrations this weekend.”
There was one incident in the North Country, in which a protester from New Hampshire allegedly struck and bit a Trump supporter in Warrensburg, New York. Thirty-two-year-old Catherine Benincasa is charged with misdemeanor assault, menacing, and criminal possession of a weapon.
There were no arrests in Newburgh, and aside from a random outburst shouted from a nearby apartment building, protesters didn’t encounter much opposition.
Some protesters who spoke with WAMC declined to give their full names, as some protests have gotten tense in recent weeks. President Trump deployed the National Guard and Marines to California earlier this month to confront residents protesting ICE there. He’s described the protests as “riots.” Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, meanwhile, promised to crack down on protesters, and even suggested last week that drivers in his state had a right to hit protesters with their cars if they felt threatened. And one person was killed amid gunfire at a “No Kings” protest in Salt Lake City, Utah.
On Saturday in Newburgh, some marchers chanted calls like, “No justice, no peace!” but many walked in silence, with signs declaring: “Defend the Constitution,” “Impeach Trump,” or, “If there’s money for a parade, there’s money for Medicaid” — a point to Trump’s “Big, Beautiful,” budget bill in Congress, which would slash spending for the program.
Steve Urbanowicz, who came across the river from Beacon, says he feels as if he has no choice but to protest.
“This is not normal. This is not OK," he says. "We don’t know what to expect anymore — this is day to day. Like our tariffs now, our economy is up and down. You have a retirement portfolio and you’re sweating it out. Who knows? That could all be gone, who knows.”
