Protests await Trump in UK
US president faces ‘carnival of protest’ on upcoming trip
A barrage of nationwide protests will greet US President Donald Trump’s four-day trip to Britain from Thursday, with organizers hoping to stage one of the country’s biggest demonstrations in decades following a series of diplomatic spats.
The divisive American leader, arriving after a NATO summit in Brussels, will be largely away from London during a tour expected to bring at least tens of thousands of people onto British streets.
“We are confident that there will be huge demonstrations against Trump wherever he visits,” said Chris Nineham, of the Stop the War Coalition, which is helping to stage the so-called “carnival of protest.”
“The protest against Trump will be a real celebration of the diversity that we love in the UK – and will give a strong signal that his message of hate and division is not welcome in this country.”
The US president appears unpopular in Britain, where his brash style and hardline “America First” policies have caused consternation across the political spectrum and society.
He was severely criticized last November, including by Prime Minister Theresa May, after sharing three inflammatory anti-Muslim videos posted by far-right group Britain First.
Opposition lawmakers, backed by an online petition signed by nearly 1.9 million people, called on May to cancel the state visit offered when she met Trump in Washington after his inauguration in January last year.
Following the incident and several other diplomatic spats, his first trip to Britain since taking power was repeatedly delayed and scaled back, with speculation it has now been designed to avoid the demonstrations.
The US ambassador in London told reporters Friday that Trump was “aware” of the planned protests but “is not avoiding anything.”
“The president is simply trying to get as impactful a trip as he can get in a 24-hour period,” Woody Johnson said.
The centrepiece of the organized opposition will be a march through central London ending in a rally on Trafalgar Square.
Organizers are laying on buses from more than a dozen British cities to the protest, urging attendees to “bring banners, loudhailers, sound systems and everything you need to kickstart the revolution.”
A giant inflatable “Baby Trump” balloon will be flown near the Houses of Parliament ahead of the protest. The blimp will then be used at a protest planned in Scotland, his mother’s homeland, when Trump goes there for the weekend.