State Sen. Karina Villa, D-West Chicago, speaks to the crowd Sunday at the Hands Across Chicagoland protest on Ogden Avenue at Yender Avenue in Lisle. (Photos by Bill Dwyer/for Chronicle Media)

Throughout this spring in Chicago and across the country there have been marches and rallies protesting the authoritarian policies and actions of the Trump administration.  

If a theme has developed in that time, it is that this is a moment that calls for all who are concerned to get involved in ongoing, persistent resistance.  

On Sunday, local officials in DuPage and Cook counties held a “protest stand up” from far western Aurora in DuPage County to the southwest side Little Village neighborhood in Chicago. Between noon and 2 p.m., an estimated 18,000 people stood in groups ranging from 100-plus to a dozen or fewer, along a 30-mile route along Ogden Avenue. 

The sprawling and loud, but peaceful event was in response to what organizers call the Trump administration’s undemocratic and often unconstitutional behavior.  

“We’ve watched as they’ve cracked down on free speech, detained people for their political views, threatened to deport American citizens, and defied the courts,” said DuPage County Democratic Party chair Reid McCollum, who helped organize the event. 

Unlike with the massive, but largely one-off nature of the nationwide Women’s Marches in 2017, the 2025 anti-Trump protests have gone on for weeks, starting in late February.  

More than 100 people who showed up Sunday at Ogden and Yender avenues in Lisle were among the estimated 18,000 people who participated in the Hands Across Chicagoland protest against authoritarianism.

“What I’m seeing in Illinois is that people understand that if we organize and fight back, that’s the best way to stop (Trumpism),” McCollum said. 

Chronicle Media observed an estimated 3,000 to 4,000 people during a drive along the six-mile route from Yender Avenue in Lisle east through Downers Grove to Cass Avenue in Westmont. 

Congresswoman Robin Kelly, D-2nd, who is running for U.S. Senate, made an appearance in Lisle. She said Democrats, though in the minority, are fighting back.  

“People have heard me say many times, as Democrats in D.C., we’re fighting with one arm, maybe two, tied behind our backs.”  

Kelly said she intended to “fight until the other arm falls off and then start kicking.” But any fight, she said, requires having people stand with you. 

“We need the public to come out,” she said. “This is no time to stand on the sidelines. Everyone has to make their contribution.”  

Kelly, who said she’s conducted tele-town meetings “with 13,000 people,” stressed that opposing Trump’s political agenda is not solely about Democrats.  

“This is about everybody,” Kelly said. “This is about Republicans, Democrats, independents, whether you voted or not. That (Musk and DOGE) chainsaw didn’t just (impact) Democrats.”  

Illinois congressional representatives Bill Foster, D-11th; and Robin Kelly, D-2nd, wave to passing motorists at the Hands Across Chicagoland protest on Ogden Avenue.

Taking her turn with the bullhorn, Kelly told the crowd, “Give yourself a round of applause for showing up on a Sunday.” Repeating her “start kicking” sentiment, she told her audience, “We need you to kick with us.”  

Congressman Bill Foster, D-11th, called the current political environment an “all hands on deck moment,” and underscored the need for resistance by the public and elected officials. 

“This is part of an effort that’s going to have to go on for the next four years,” said Foster. “We have to respond to all of the corruption and all of the outrages on different time scales.”  

“The thing we’re doing most immediately is (in) the courts, and we’re doing pretty well in the lower courts,” Foster said.  “And (we’re) very interested in what will happen when a lot of these cases get to the Supreme Court.”  

Besides fluctuations in the stock market, Foster said, Trump pays attention when “Democratic and Republican lower (level) elected officials hear this sort of protest.” 

Foster pointed to the recent April 1 off-year local elections that saw sweeping Democratic gains at the township and municipal levels in DuPage County and elsewhere in northeastern Illinois.  

“Where there were 39 contested seats and Democrats won every one,” he said. “That was a statement against, really, any elected official who would not stand up and make himself or herself clear about whether they approved of Donald Trump and what he’s doing to our country.”  

Participants hold up their messages at the Hands Across Chicagoland protest on Ogden Avenue.

Foster told the crowd their voices are in fact being heard by politicians in Washington, D.C. “With events like this, that drum beat will be something that everyone will listen to, every time we come out,” he said. “The Republicans are not comfortable with what they’re seeing on the streets of the United States. Don’t let yourself think they’re not listening. Because it’s a big deal. 

“Any elected official who’s not willing to stand up in this time of crisis in our country and yell “b.s.” at what the Trump administration is doing, does not deserve to be in office at any level in our government.”  

At one point in Lisle, a contingent of six or eight vehicles waving oversized Trump flags and honking horns and blaring an air horn passed by eastbound, briefly drowning out one speaker’s voice. 

Greg Reasor, of Westmont, stood with his wife and other friends on the parkway on Ogden. Amidst the steady din of passing car horns sounding mere feet away, he explained his purpose in being there. 

“We don’t like the executive action taken by the Trump administration. I don’t like the cutting of (funding to) USAID, the staff of the national parks, Medicare, Medicaid, and possible cuts to other programs that affect us,” he said.  

Reasor echoed the thinking of Foster and others, saying, “I think it’s gonna take consistent protests. This is our ninth protest for us here in Westmont and Downers Grove, since they started the Tesla protests in March of this year.” 

Average people have to be engaged, Reasor said, because “Democracy dies in darkness.”  

The protests don’t appear to be letting up. On June 14, Trump’s birthday, there will be a “No Kings” Rally and March in downtown Chicago.  

Indivisible, which is organizing events across the country to coincide with the planned day of military parades to celebrate Trump, calls it a “national day of action and mass mobilization organized to … respond to the increasing authoritarian excesses and corruption from Trump and his allies.”