Donald Trump

June 15 (UPI) — Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said Sunday that he is “not an absolute no” on the Trump administration’s House-passed budget reconciliation bill, which threatens cuts to social services and would increase the national spending deficit.

“I talked to the president last evening after the parade, and we’re trying to get to a better place in our conversations,” Paul said on NBC News’ Meet the Press Sunday. “And I’ve let him know that I’m not an absolute no.”

Paul has been a leading critic of the bill in its current form, along with a handful of other Republicans skeptical of the scope of the cuts. A report from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office report that shows that the measure would come at the expense of lower income Americans to benefit higher earners.

“I don’t have as much trouble with the tax cuts,” Paul continued. “I think there should be more spending cuts, but if they want my vote, they’ll have to negotiate,” specifically citing his opposition to raising the debt ceiling by trillions of dollars.

In its current form, the measure would increase the national deficit by $2.4 trillion over 10 years. Lawmakers are trying to pass the bill through a reconciliation process that only requires a simple majority for passage.

Paul said last week that tensions have come to the fore between him and his GOP colleagues, and that he was “uninvited” to a White House picnic that is typically attended by lawmakers and their families.

He called the move “petty vindictiveness,” and said he felt the White House was trying to “punish” him for his opposition to the bill as it stands. President Donald Trump said on his social media platform that “of course” Paul was invited to the picnic.

Republicans can only afford to lose three votes pending a tie breaking vote by Vice President JD Vance. The measure currently awaits action in the Senate, where Republicans hold 53 seats. The body has taken a more conservative approach in the negotiations than the House.

June 15 (UPI) — President Donald Trump departed the White House on Sunday en route to Western Canada for the annual G7 summit, promising to secure trade deals weeks ahead of a tariff hike deadline.

Speaking to reporters ahead of his departure, Trump appeared confident he’ll “have a few new trade deals” during the three-day summit in Kananaskis, Alberta, Newsweek reported.

“Look, we have our trade deals,” he said, according to CNN. “All we have to do is send the letters: ‘This is what you are gonna have to pay.'”

The annual Group of 7 brings together some of the world’s largest economies, including Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United States and the European Union. Several other countries also were invited.

Trump was expected to arrive at the G7 venue in the Canadian Rockies on Sunday evening. He was scheduled to meet privately with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney on Monday morning.

Last month, Trump agreed to delay imposing a 50% tariff on goods from dozens of European countries, allowing them more time for trade negotiations with the United States. He offered no details Sunday about which countries he expects to secure deals with during the summit.

In April, the Trump administration announced plans to have trade deals with 90 countries within 90 days. So far, the United States has secured deals with China and Britain.

Trade isn’t the only topic expected to be on the docket at this year’s G7 summit. The countries are expected express support for Ukraine in its war against Russia; address the Israel-Gaza war; and discuss immigration, security, energy, technology, the environment and job creation.

Israel’s airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities Friday and Tehran’s retaliatory attacks are also likely to be addressed.

Here are the key events on day three of the Israel-Iran conflict.

Here’s where things stand on Sunday, June 15:

Fighting

• Iran fired two separate salvoes of missiles and drones against Israel, including one that struck the Israeli port city of Haifa. At least 15 people were injured.
• Israel also fired a barrage of missiles against Iran, targeting several locations, including the capital Tehran, a Foreign Ministry building there, a military base of the Defence Ministry in Isfahan, and an aerial refuelling aircraft at Mashhad Airport.
• In Israel, rescue workers were searching for survivors in the rubble from the previous night’s wave of Iranian strikes. The hardest hit area was the town of Bat Yam, where dozens of buildings were damaged.

Casualties and disruption

• The Iranian Health Ministry said that at least 224 people were killed and 1,481 were wounded, since Israel attacked Iran.
• Overnight, Iran struck the Israeli port city of Haifa and neighbouring Tamra, where at least four women were killed.
• Since the start of the conflict on Thursday, at least 13 people have been killed and 380 have been wounded in Israel.
• The Israeli Civil Aviation Authority has announced a complete closure of airspace and airports. Iranian airspace is also closed.

Diplomacy

• Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Tehran does not seek to expand the conflict to neighbouring countries unless forced to.
• Araghchi also said Iran has “solid evidence” of the support provided by the United States to Israel’s attacks.
• Iran’s top diplomat later said: “We will prepare the ground for a return to diplomacy and negotiations if the Israeli aggression stops. We hope that tomorrow’s IAEA governors’ meeting will condemn the aggression against our nuclear facilities.”
• Talking to Fox News, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seemed to clearly confirm that, saying he informed US President Donald Trump ahead of launching the attacks.
• Netanyahu also projected that regime change in Iran could be a result of Israel’s attacks.
• Trump warned Tehran not to widen its retaliation to include US targets and didn’t rule out more direct US involvement beyond the vast arsenal and intelligence the US provides to Israel.
• Contrarily, the US president also claimed peace could be reached “soon”, suggesting that many diplomatic meetings were taking place.
• He also said he would be “open” to his Russian counterpart President Vladimir Putin serving as a mediator.
• French President Emmanuel Macron rebuked that idea, saying it would not be a good idea to have Putin, embroiled in his own war in Ukraine, as a mediator in the Israel-Iran conflict.
• European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas has called a videoconference of EU foreign ministers for Tuesday to discuss the Middle East crisis.
• Hopes for a diplomatic solution seem distant for now, though they will no doubt be high on the agenda of the Group of Seven summit beginning Monday in Canada.

June 15 (UPI) — Mayor Karen Bass said Sunday that Los Angeles does not need National Guard troops to bolster city police amid protests against raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, despite the gatherings turning violent in recent days.

“We don’t want them here,” Bass said on CNN’s State of the Union. “They don’t need to be here. Our local law enforcement have complete control of this situation.”

President Donald Trump deployed thousands of U.S. National Guard soldiers to Los Angeles to assist ICE with immigration raids of locations that were suspected of employing or harboring undocumented migrants.

Last week, U.S. District Court Judge Charles Breyer ruled that Trump must return control of the situation to the Los Angeles Police Department, and that Trump’s deployment of the troops was unconstitutional.

But hours later, a federal appeals court panel lifted Breyer’s order, allowing the soldiers to continue to assist in the immigration raids.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has also been critical of Trump’s troop deployment and said the president overstepped his bounds without first seeking input from state or local officials.

Newsom called Trump a “stone cold liar” in response to the president’s comments that he consulted the California governor before deploying the soldiers.

Immigration raids continue. However, Trump has appeared to be moderating on targeting some workplaces, including some farms, meatpacking plants, hotels and restaurants.

Amid the backdrop of the raids and protests, thousands of people rallied in the streets Saturday to protest Trump’s policies that his critics have called authoritarian. The “No Kings” rallies took place in cities across the country at the same time that the U.S. paraded high0end military equipment through the streets of Washington in an event that was estimated to cost as much as $45 million. Saturday was also Trump’s 79th birthday.

United States President Donald Trump promised Americans that his crackdown on immigration would lead to a better life, but “now they’re seeing that isn’t working”, argues Democratic Congressman Rohit Khanna.

Khanna tells host Steve Clemons that the Democratic Party “needs to respect American voters”. Americans “want to have hope again in America … They’re tired of threatening to arrest each other.”

He says Elon Musk could be an asset for Democrats, as he opposes several Trump initiatives, such as banning all international students, gutting scientific research, imposing blanket tariffs, and adding to the US government debt.

The assassination of one Democratic Minnesota state lawmaker and her husband and the shooting of another lawmaker and his wife at their homes are just the latest addition to a long and unsettling roll call of political violence in the United States.

The list, in the last two months alone: the killing of two Israeli Embassy staffers in Washington, D.C.; the firebombing of a Colorado march calling for the release of Israeli hostages; and the firebombing of the official residence of Pennsylvania’s governor — on a Jewish holiday while he and his family were inside.

Here is a sampling of other attacks before that — the assassination of a healthcare executive on the streets of New York City late last year; the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania rally during his presidential campaign last year; the 2022 attack on the husband of then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) by a believer in right-wing conspiracy theories; and the 2017 shooting of Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.) by a gunman at a congressional softball game practice.

“We’ve entered into this especially scary time in the country where it feels the sort of norms and rhetoric and rules that would tamp down on violence have been lifted,” said Matt Dallek, a political scientist at Georgetown University who studies extremism. “A lot of people are receiving signals from the culture.”

Individual shootings and massacres

Politics have also driven large-scale massacres. Gunmen who killed 11 worshipers at a synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018, 23 shoppers at a heavily Latino Walmart in El Paso in 2019 and 10 Black people at a Buffalo, N.Y., grocery store in 2022 each cited the conspiracy theory that a secret cabal of Jews was trying to replace white people with people of color. That has become a staple on parts of the right that support Trump’s push to limit immigration.

The Anti-Defamation League found that from 2022 through 2024, all of the 61 political killings in the United States were committed by right-wing extremists. That changed on the first day of 2025, when a Texas man flying the flag of the Islamic State group killed 14 people by driving his truck through a crowded New Orleans street before being fatally shot by police.

“You’re seeing acts of violence from all different ideologies,” said Jacob Ware, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who researches terrorism. “It feels more random and chaotic and more frequent.”

The United States has a long and grim history of political violence, including presidential assassinations dating to the killing of President Abraham Lincoln, lynchings and other violence aimed at Black people in the South, and the 1954 shooting inside Congress by four Puerto Rican nationalists. Experts say the last few years, however, have reached a level not seen since the tumultuous days of the 1960s and 1970s, when political leaders the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., President Kennedy, Malcolm X and Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated.

Ware noted that the most recent surge comes after the new Trump administration has closed units that focus on investigating white supremacist extremism and pushed federal law enforcement to spend less time on anti-terrorism and more on detaining people who are in the country illegally.

“We’re at the point, after these six weeks, where we have to ask about how effectively the Trump administration is combating terrorism,” Ware said.

One of Trump’s first acts in office was to pardon those involved in the largest act of domestic political violence this century — the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob intended to prevent Congress from certifying Trump’s 2020 election loss.

Those pardons broadcast a signal to would-be extremists on either side of the political debate, Dallek said: “They sent a very strong message that violence, as long as you’re a Trump supporter, will be permitted and may be rewarded.”

Ideologies not always aligned — or coherent

Often, those who engage in political violence don’t have clearly defined ideologies that easily map onto the country’s partisan divides. A man who died after he detonated a car bomb outside a Palm Springs fertility clinic last month left writings urging people not to procreate and expressed what the FBI called “nihilistic ideations.”

But each political attack seems to inspire partisans to find evidence the attacker is on the other side. Little was known about the man police identified as a suspect in the Minnesota attacks, 57-year-old Vance Boelter. Authorities say they found a list of other apparent targets that included other Democratic officials, abortion clinics and abortion rights advocates, as well as fliers for the day’s anti-Trump “No Kings” parades.

Conservatives online seized on the fliers — and the fact that Boelter had apparently once been reappointed to a state workforce development board by Democratic Gov. Tim Walz — to claim the suspect must be a liberal. “The far left is murderously violent,” billionaire Elon Musk posted on his social media site, X.

It was reminiscent of the fallout from the attack on Paul Pelosi, the former House speaker’s then-82-year-old husband, who was seriously injured by a man wielding a hammer. Right-wing figures falsely theorized the assailant was a secret lover rather than what authorities said he was: a believer in pro-Trump conspiracy theories who broke into the Pelosi home echoing Jan. 6 rioters who broke into the Capitol by saying: “Where is Nancy?!”

No prominent Republican ever denounced the Pelosi assault, and GOP leaders including Trump joked about the attack at public events in its aftermath.

On Saturday, Nancy Pelosi posted a statement on X decrying the Minnesota attack. “All of us must remember that it’s not only the act of violence, but also the reaction to it, that can normalize it,” she wrote.

After mocking the Pelosis after the 2022 attack, Trump on Saturday joined in the bipartisan condemnation of the Minnesota shootings, calling them “horrific violence.” The president has, however, consistently broken new ground with his bellicose rhetoric toward his political opponents, whom he routinely calls “sick” and “evil,” and has talked repeatedly about how violence is needed to quell protests.

The Minnesota attack occurred after Trump took the extraordinary step of mobilizing the military to try to control protests against his administration’s immigration operations in Los Angeles during the last week, when he pledged to “HIT” disrespectful protesters and warned of a “migrant invasion” of the city.

Dallek said Trump has been “both a victim and an accelerant” of the charged, dehumanizing political rhetoric that is flooding the country.

“It feels as if the extremists are in the saddle,” he said, “and the extremists are the ones driving our rhetoric and politics.”

Riccardi writes for the Associated Press.

June 15 (UPI) — The search for the man suspected of shooting two Minnesota lawmakers in a “politically motivated” attack continued for the second day Sunday as authorities urged residents to keep their doors locked and cars secured.

State Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, were shot dead Saturday in their Brooklyn Park home, near Minneapolis. Earlier, State Sen. John Hoffman and his wife Yvette were wounded when a gunman shot them “multiple times” in Champlin.

The suspect was later identified as 57-year-old Vance Luther Boelter, who has not been located. Boelter’s roommate told KMSP‑TV that he has multiple vehicles, one of which had been modified to look like a police car and was found outside of Hortman’s house.

In an emergency alert sent out Sunday in nearby Sibley County, authorities said a second vehicle owned by Boelter was found in Faxon Township.

“Keep your doors locked and vehicles secured,” the alert said. “Report suspicious activity to 911.”

Officials also said they would be going door-to-door to ask residents to search their properties for Boelter.

Meanwhile, U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar indicated in an interview Sunday that Boelter may have left the state. Authorities have also put out an alert for him in South Dakota, she revealed on NBC News’ Meet the Press.

Brooklyn Park Police Chief Mark Bruley said Saturday that investigators found a “manifesto” in Boelter’s vehicle that included the names of other possible targets. An official who saw the list told NBC News it included officials who supported reproductive rights.

President Donald Trump on Sunday called Gov. Tim Walz a “terrible governor” and “a grossly incompetent person” in comments to ABC’s Rachel Scott but said he “may call him.”

The Minnesota shootings came ahead of another shooting Saturday at a “No Kings” protest against Trump in Salt Lake City that took place around the country. A protest outside of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Oregon was declared a riot by the Portland Police Bureau on Saturday.

The French president says his US counterpart’s Greenland takeover threats are not something allies do.

French President Emmanuel Macron has arrived in Greenland with a “message of solidarity and friendship” from Europe and castigated United States President Donald Trump’s repeated threats that he intends to take control of the strategic autonomous Danish territory as not “something to be done between allies”.

Macron reiterated his condemnation on Sunday at the Arctic island’s Nuuk airport, where he was greeted by Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenland Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen.

“It’s important to show that Denmark and Europe are committed to this territory, which has very high strategic stakes and whose territorial integrity must be respected,” Macron added.

“It means a lot to me … to convey a message of friendship and solidarity from France and the European Union to help this territory face the different challenges: economic development, education, as well as the consequences of climate change,” he continued.

‘Not for sale’

Since returning to the office in January, Trump has repeatedly said the US needs Greenland, a strategically located territory at the crossroads of the Atlantic and the Arctic, for security reasons and has not ruled out taking the territory by force.

However, Denmark has vehemently stressed that Greenland “is not for sale”.

Macron, who is the first foreign head of state to visit Greenland since Trump’s threats, said in a speech last week at the United Nations Ocean Conference that Greenland and the deep seas were not “up for grabs”.

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth appeared to acknowledge that the Pentagon had developed plans to take over Greenland and Panama by force, if necessary, last week.

The Wall Street Journal reported last month that several high-ranking officials under the director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, had been ordered to investigate Greenland’s independence movement and US resource extraction in the territory.

But in Greenland, polls indicate that the vast majority of the country’s 57,000 inhabitants may want to become independent from Denmark, but they do not want to join the US.

While Greenland is not part of the EU, it is on the bloc’s list of Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs).

During Macron’s six-hour visit before he travels to Canada for a Group of Seven meeting that Trump is also expected to attend, he plans to discuss Arctic security and ways to include Greenland in “European action” to contribute to its development while “respecting its sovereignty”, his office said.

Following talks with Frederiksen and Nielsen, Macron is also set to visit a glacier to witness the effects of global warming.

June 15 (UPI) — A protest outside of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Oregon has been declared a riot by the Portland Police Bureau.

Police said in a statement early Sunday morning that the massive demonstration was attended by some “tens of thousands” of protesters, and described as “peaceful” throughout the afternoon on Saturday.

But shortly before 6 p.m. on Saturday evening, a federal officer was reported to have been injured by the crowd. And around 8 p.m., police arrested 25-year-old Sabian Crisantos for an attempted assault of a public safety officer.

“Throughout the night, PPB observed criminal behavior, which resulted in targeted arrests. Officers on bikes conducted visibility patrols in an attempt to deter crime, but also recognized that at times their presence escalated the crowd,” police said.

“During those times, the decision was made to disengage, but officers remained in the area to respond to any additional criminal activity.”

Portland police said they made a second arrest just before 11 p.m. when a person was observed throwing a rock at a building. The suspect was identified as 20-year-old Tyson Kahnert, who faces a number of charges, including criminal mischief.

And a third man, 38-year-old Cory Oien, was arrested for theft and driving under the influence of intoxicants after he was seen picking up “traffic control devices” in the area and putting them in the bed of his truck around 1 a.m. Sunday morning.

They were all booked into the Multnomah County Detention Center, police said.

The scene was no longer declared a riot by 9:15 p.m.

The news came as at least one person was critically injured Saturday in a shooting at a protest against President Donald Trump in Salt Lake City and hours after two Democratic lawmakers in Minnesota were shot dead by a gunman.

June 15 (UPI) — At least one person was critically injured Saturday in a shooting at a protest against President Donald Trump in Salt Lake City. It came hours after two Democratic lawmakers in Minnesota were shot dead by a gunman.

The “No Kings” protest, one of many that took place across the United States, was attended by some 10,000 people, according to preliminary estimates from the Salt Lake City Police Department.

The shooting happened around 7:56 p.m. when officers heard gunshots in front of a luxury high-rise residential building on State Street, a main thoroughfare through the city leading to the Utah State Capitol in an area with local, state and federal government facilities.

“Officers responded to the scene and found one person with a critical gunshot wound. Those injuries are considered life-threatening,” police said in the news release.

With information provided by witnesses, police tracked “one of the involved parties” and arrested him nearby. His identity was also not provided, but he was said to have been taken to a local hospital to be treated for serious injuries from a gunshot wound and remains under police supervision.

Two other people were also taken into custody later, the Salt Lake Tribune reported. The motives for the shooting are still under investigation and the roles of each of the four people remain unclear, but Salt Lake City Police Chief Brian Redd told KSL.com that it appeared the people were involved “at some level” in the protest.

It was also not clear what charges the three people who were detained might face.

“I want to urge everyone in the public to be calm, to give one another grace and to look out for one another tonight and in the coming days,” Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall said, as reported by KUER, calling the violence “horrific.”

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, called the shooting “a deeply troubling act of violence that has no place in our public square.”

A massive military parade in Washington DC to mark 250 years since the founding of the US Army coincided with Donald Trump’s 79th birthday. At the same time, protesters in thousands of cities rallied with the message that Americans want ‘No Kings’.

The grand military parade that United States President Donald Trump had been wanting for years barrelled down Washington, DC’s Constitution Avenue, with tanks, troops and a 21-gun salute, the spectacle played out against a counterpoint of protests around the country by those who decried the Republican leader as a “dictator” and “would-be king”.

Trump, also celebrating his 79th birthday, sat on a special viewing stand south of the White House to watch the display of US military might, which began early on Saturday and moved swiftly as light rain fell and clouds shrouded the Washington Monument.

The procession, with more than 6,000 soldiers and 128 tanks, was one Trump tried to hold in his first term after seeing such an event in Paris in 2017, but the plan never came together until the parade was added to an event recognising the US Army’s 250th anniversary.

As armoured vehicles rolled down the street in front of the president, millions of people packed into streets, parks and plazas across the US as part of the so-called “No Kings” protests, marching through city centres and small towns, blaring anti-authoritarian chants mixed with support for protecting democracy and immigrant rights.

Authorities across the US urged calm and promised no tolerance for violence, while some governors mobilised the National Guard ahead of the demonstrations.

Police in Los Angeles, where protests over federal immigration enforcement raids erupted a week ago, used tear gas and crowd-control munitions to clear out protesters after the formal event ended. Officers in Portland city also fired tear gas and projectiles to disperse a crowd that protested in front of a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) building well into Saturday evening.

Huge, boisterous crowds marched, danced, drummed and chanted shoulder-to-shoulder in New York City, Denver, Chicago, Austin and Los Angeles, some behind “No Kings” banners. Atlanta’s 5,000-capacity event quickly reached its limit, with thousands more gathered outside barriers to hear speakers in front of the state Capitol. Officials in Seattle estimated that more than 70,000 people attended the city’s largest rally in the city centre, the Seattle Times reported.

The demonstrations came on the heels of protests over the federal ICE raids which began last week, and Trump’s order for the US National Guard and Marines to be deployed to Los Angeles, where protesters blocked a motorway and set cars on fire.

“Today, across red states and blue, rural towns and major cities, Americans stood in peaceful unity and made it clear: we don’t do kings,” the No Kings Coalition said in a statement on Saturday.

Washington, DC – It was the 250th birthday of the United States Army, and Trump’s 79th.

Tanks and other armoured military vehicles rumbled down the streets of Washington, DC, on Saturday, in what Trump had teased as an “unforgettable” event and critics had called a pricey tribute to the “egoist-in-chief”.

Speaking after the hour-long procession, which cut through a balmy evening dotted with raindrops, Trump framed the spectacle as a long time coming.

“Every other country celebrates their victories. It’s about time America did, too,” he told the crowd, which sprawled sparsely across the National Mall.

“That’s what we’re doing tonight,” he said.

Vice President JD Vance, who introduced the president at the end of the parade, was the only official to acknowledge the dual birthdays.

“June 14th is, of course, the birthday of the army. It is, of course, the birthday of the president of the United States,” he said. “Happy birthday, Mr President.”

For critics, the overlapping dates sent a disconcerting message.

Away from the celebrations, among about 100 protesters at Logan Circle in Washington, DC, Terry Mahoney, a 55-year-old Marine veteran, described the parade as “dictator behaviour”.

“If you take everything else he’s done, stomping on the US Constitution, this parade may just be window dressing,” he told Al Jazeera.

“But it’s the worst kind of window dressing,” said Mahoney, who was among the tens of thousands of protests who took to the streets nationally to oppose Trump’s leadership on Saturday. “So I wanted to make sure that my voice was represented today.”

But blocks away, near the entrance to the heavily fortified parade route, Taras Voronyy, who travelled from South Carolina, was less concerned about the blurred lines of the parade than the soldiers it was honouring.

“It’s a chance to celebrate the military, and also, Trump will be here,” he told Al Jazeera.

“I was actually a little confused if it was supposed to be for the Army’s 250th anniversary or for Trump’s birthday,” he said. “So I guess it’s a twofer.”

A birthday celebration 

Trump had sought a massive military parade ever since attending a Bastille Day celebration in Paris in 2017, but faced pushback from defence officials during his first term.

This time around, he sent 28 Abrams tanks, a horde of armoured vehicles, cavalry, military planes and helicopters, both modern and antique, to the US capital, in a show of military hardware without comparison since 1991, when the US marked the end of the Gulf War.

Spectators gathered along Constitution Avenue – a thoroughfare that connects the White House to the US Capitol – for a pageant that stretched from the Army’s 1775 birth, through World War II, the Vietnam War, and the so-called “war on terror”.

Trump’s arrival prompted cheers, and a handful of jeers, from the crowd, which was dotted with red Make America Great Again (MAGA) hats. Attendance appeared to be less than the military’s prediction of about 200,000 people.

For Freddie Delacruz, a 63-year-old US Army veteran who travelled from North Carolina for the parade, Trump’s birthday and the Army celebration were distinct phenomena.

“It’s a coincidence,” he said. “I got married on June 6, which is the anniversary of D-day [the landing of allied forces on the beaches of Normandy, France].”

“So these things happen,” he said. “But we’re here to support the army. I spent 32 years in the army – I want to see the tanks, the planes, the helicopters flying around.”

Delacruz also did not see much significance in Trump’s deployment earlier this week of the US National Guard to California to respond to protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids in Los Angeles and other cities.

Local officials and rights advocates have said the deployment, which was soon followed by Trump sending Marines to protect federal property and personnel, represented a major escalation and overreach of presidential power.

A judge on Thursday sided with a lawsuit filed by California Governor Gavin Newsom, ruling that Trump’s deployment without the governor’s approval was unlawful. However, an appeals court paused the ruling just hours later, allowing the deployment to temporarily continue.

Delacruz acknowledged that Trump has “got a lot of power… I mean, he’s got the Department of Defense, he’s got the Department of Department of State and now, all the Cabinet members are supporting him 100 percent”.

“But he’s still just the president, and he can’t control Congress,” he added. “This is what the people voted for.”

Aaron M, a 57-year-old Army veteran from Miami, Florida, also said he did not see an issue with how Trump has used federal forces in local law enforcement.

Trump’s decision was the first time since 1965 that a president had activated the National Guard without a governor’s consent. Both Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have indicated that the approach could be replicated across the country.

In recent days, Trump has also floated invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807, which would allow US troops to take part in domestic law enforcement, in what critics call a step towards martial law, but has not yet done so.

“If governors can’t get their states under control, then Trump should send [the National Guard] in,” said Aaron, who declined to give his last name.

“Look, I was born in Nicaragua. I came here when I was 12,” Aaron added.

“I know what a dictator is. This is not a dictator,” he said, motioning to the grandstand from where Trump watched the parade.

‘Protesting is patriotic’

For Anahi Rivas-Rodriguez, a 24-year-old from McAllen, Texas, the military pageantry underscored a more troubling turn, which she said included Trump’s hardline immigration policies melding with the country’s military might.

“I have a lot of people in my life who are scared. We do not belong in a fear in America,” said Rivas-Rodriguez, who joined a group of protesters marching in front of the White House.

“I do not stand by an America that tears families apart and targets people because they look brown and they look Mexican,” she said, her eyes welling up, “because they look like me”.

Trump earlier this week described the protesters as “people who hate the country”,  adding that those who came out on Saturday would be “met with very big force”.

Rivas-Rodriguez bristled.

“Protesting is patriotic, and I am here for my country because I care about America,” she said. “Maybe I’m a little intimidated [by Trump], but I am not scared because I am still here.”

About 60 arrests were made in a protest at the US Capitol late on Friday, but no major incidents were reported in the US capital on Saturday, with many groups choosing to hold protests elsewhere.

The organisers of the national “No Kings” protests held no official event in DC, despite hosting demonstrations in about 2,000 cities across the country.

In a statement, the group said they did so to avoid “allowing this birthday parade to be the center of gravity”.

Still, Roland Roebuck, a 77-year-old Vietnam War veteran from Puerto Rico, said he wanted to attend the parade in protest to send a message.

“Trump has been allergic to military service and deeply disrespectful of the military,” he said, pointing to Trump’s medical exemption from serving in Vietnam due to “bone spurs”, in what critics have said amounted to draft dodging.

Roebuck said the parade – with a price tag of between $25m and $45m – rings tone deaf at a time when Trump has been rolling back federal services, including those that affect veterans.

He also accused Trump of “erasing” the contributions of Black soldiers like himself through his administration’s anti-Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) campaign at the Pentagon.

“Many of the people that are here are very confused with respect to what this parade represents,” Roebuck said.

“This represents a farce.”

June 14 (UPI) — President Donald Trump issued an executive order on Friday officially giving the green light to Nippon Steel Corporation’s multi-billion-dollar purchase of U.S. Steel Corporation.

Trump’s executive order rescinds a directive issued by former President Joe Biden that blocked the Tokyo-based steel producer’s $14.9 billion purchase on national security grounds.

The president had been signaling he would approve such a move, stating in May that the two steel giants would form a “planned partnership.”

Trump previously ordered a review of the transaction by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.

“Based on the recommendation of and my review of the materials provided by CFIUS, including re-review of the prior assessment of risk, I additionally find that the threatened impairment to the national security of the United States arising as a result of the Proposed Transaction can be adequately mitigated if the conditions set forth in section 3 of this order are met,” Trump wrote in the executive order.

“President Trump has approved the Companies’ historic partnership that will unleash unprecedented investments in steelmaking in the United States, protecting and creating more than 100,000 jobs,” Pennsylvania-based U.S. Steel said in a release jointly issued with Nippon Steel.

“We thank President Trump and his Administration for their bold leadership and strong support for our historic partnership. This partnership will bring a massive investment that will support our communities and families for generations to come. We look forward to putting our commitments into action to make American steelmaking and manufacturing great again.”

Trump’s executive order requires both companies to enter into a National Security Agreement, which stipulates $11 billion in new investments must be made in the United States by 2028. That includes an already-underway project not scheduled for completion until after 2028.

The United States government will also be issued a golden share as part of the NSA, giving it unique voting rights.

“President Trump promised to protect American Steel and American Jobs — and he has delivered on that promise,” White House spokesperson Kush Desai told CNN in a statement.

“Today’s executive order ensures US Steel will remain in the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and be safeguarded as a critical element of America’s national and economic security.”

Confirmation of the deal comes just over a week after 50% tariffs took effect on metals imported into the United States from nearly all countries.

The tariffs were enacted a day after Trump signed an executive order doubling the duties on almost all imported aluminum and steel.

June 14 (UPI) — Russia and Ukraine exchanged an unreported number of prisoners of war on Saturday during the fourth such exchange during the week.

Ukraine also received the bodies of 1,200 dead civilians and military personnel from Russia.

The bodies are in addition to 2,412 that were sent to Ukraine on Wednesday and Friday and are being released per agreements reached during recent negotiations in Istanbul, the Kyiv Independent reported.

“The remains will now undergo forensic examination and identification procedures conducted by law enforcement investigators in cooperation with expert institutions under the [Ukrainian] Interior Ministry,” officials for the Coordination Headquarters Prisoners of War said in a prepared statement.

Identifying the bodies enables respective Ukrainian families to recover them for burial.

Ukrainian and Russian officials agreed to exchange the bodies of 6,000 soldiers and civilians for each side for a total exchange of 12,000 bodies.

Although the two nations agreed to exchange bodies, Russian officials said Ukraine did not return 1,200 bodies during Saturday’s exchange.

Russia and Ukraine are also exchanging prisoners of war who need medical care.

Ukraine has transferred wounded Russian soldiers who have been captured, including many who were transferred directly from the frontlines.

As cease-fire negotiations continue to end the war that began when Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Russia has continued to strike Ukraine with drone attacks.

Russia is on pace to strike Ukraine with nearly 7,000 drones, which would exceed the record number of 4,198 drones launched against Ukrainian military and civilian targets in March.

“This is terrorism against the civilian population aimed to create a series of doom, war-weariness and to put pressure on the [Ukrainian] authorities,” Liveuamap co-founder Rodion Rozhkovskiy told the Kyiv Independent.

While the war in Ukraine and related negotiations continue in Istanbul, Russian President Vladimir Putin called President Donald Trump on Saturday to wish him a happy birthday and discuss matters in Iran during the one-hour call.

“We talked at length,” Trump said in a White House statement issued after the phone call ended.

“Much less time was spent talking about Russia/Ukraine, but that will be for next week,” Trump said.

He said Putin knows Iran “very well” and agreed the war between Israel and Iran should end.

Trump said he told Putin, “his war should also end” in Ukraine.

The president did not offer more details on his conversation with Putin.

Russian forces on Friday captured the Ukrainian village of Yablunivka, which is located in northeastern Ukraine and about 5 miles from the border between the two nations, Russian officials announced on Saturday.

Russian forces also reportedly captured the villages of Koptevo and Komar in the eastern Donetsk region in Ukraine and six in total over the past week.

Iran’s official news agency IRNA says Iranian forces are carrying out a hybrid attack with drones accompanying the missiles targeting Israeli cities, with explosions heard in Israeli cities.

Israel’s Channel 13 cites “initial reports” late Saturday that Iranian missiles have hit the northern coastal city of Haifa and neighbouring town of Tamra. Videos posted to social media, and verified by Al Jazeera’s Sanad, showed Iranian cruise missiles in the skies of northern Israel.

The Israeli military, in the meantime, says it is now attacking military targets in Iran’s capital, Tehran.

Earlier on Saturday, Iran said that Israel intensified its military campaign against it for a second consecutive day, targeting key infrastructure and dealing another blow to the country’s struggling economy, as the conflict spirals towards a potential sustained all-out war.

Iranian officials confirmed that a blaze had erupted at the South Pars gas field – one of the country’s most vital energy sources – after it was struck by Israeli forces on Saturday.

Production from part of the field has been suspended, with state-affiliated media reporting that 12 million cubic metres (423 million cubic feet) of gas from Phase 14 have been temporarily halted. Though Iranian authorities later said the fire had been extinguished, the scale of the disruption remains unclear.

An Israeli official stated the strike was intended as a direct warning to Tehran. The message appears to be part of a broader strategy to cripple Iran’s economic and military capabilities, according to Fox News. The Israeli Broadcasting Authority cited an official as saying, “We attacked another Iranian gas field after Bushehr, and national infrastructure is on the list.”

Energy expert Manouchehr Takin told Al Jazeera that targeting South Pars – crucial for domestic consumption and commercial use – would deepen Iran’s internal energy crisis. “This is an attempt to paralyse Iran’s economy,” Takin said. “The domestic gas network was already under pressure due to sanctions and mismanagement.”

Al Jazeera’s Nour Odeh, reporting from Amman, said the move marked a shift in strategy. “Israel has previously targeted Iran’s military infrastructure, nuclear scientists and missile facilities. Now it’s going after civilian economic assets,” she said, warning that the economic impact could be severe if damage is extensive.

Iran reels from civilian toll and pledges retaliation

Tehran reported at least 80 people killed and more than 320 injured, including women and children, following Israeli strikes on both military and residential sites across the capital.

Among the dead are reportedly nine nuclear scientists. Iran hit back with a barrage of missiles that penetrated Israel’s high-tech missile defence system, with at least four deaths and more than 200 injuries recorded in Israel since Friday.

Iranian state media also claimed the downing of an Israeli F-35 fighter jet, one of the most advanced aircraft in Israel’s arsenal. While several Iranian news outlets have cited a military statement confirming the incident, there is no official footage or visual evidence, and Israeli officials have dismissed the reports as fabricated.

Reporting from Tehran, Al Jazeera’s Tohid Asadi noted growing public anger. “Many Iranians are frustrated that non-military targets were hit,” he said. “There had been hope weeks ago with talks on the table. Now, there’s only uncertainty and fear of escalation.”

The cancelled talks were originally set to take place in Oman on Sunday.

US President Donald Trump had tied the diplomatic effort to Iran’s agreement to roll back its nuclear programme. But Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said negotiations were off the table while “barbarous” Israeli attacks continued.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military claimed to have struck more than 150 Iranian targets and warned its operation could continue for weeks. Defence Minister Israel Katz issued a stark warning: “If Khamenei continues to fire missiles at the Israeli home front, Tehran will burn.”

Global leaders alarmed as fears of wider war grow

The prospect of full-scale regional war loomed large, as global leaders issued warnings.

Iran hinted at a potential closure of the Strait of Hormuz – a crucial oil shipping lane – should the conflict deepen. Tehran also warned that any foreign military bases aiding Israel could face retaliatory strikes.

Iran’s capacity for external retaliation, however, has weakened. After nearly two years of war in Gaza and last year’s conflict in Lebanon, its key regional allies – Hamas and Hezbollah – are significantly depleted, narrowing Iran’s military options.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke by phone with both Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian. In both calls, Erdogan blamed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for fuelling the crisis.

According to a statement from Erdogan’s office, he told bin Salman that Israel poses the greatest threat to regional stability and urged an immediate halt to its actions. “The only way to resolve the nuclear dispute is through negotiations,” Erdogan said, warning of a potential refugee crisis if the situation spirals further.

The Turkish president also accused Israel of using attacks on Iran to distract from what he labelled a genocide in Gaza. “Netanyahu is trying to set the region on fire and sabotage diplomatic efforts,” Erdogan said, according to the statement.

As international concern mounts, US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin held a 50-minute call on Saturday.

While Trump praised Israel’s strikes and warned Iran of harsher consequences, Putin expressed grave concern and called for a halt to the military campaign. Both leaders, however, left the door open to a possible return to nuclear talks.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi spoke to his Iranian and Israeli counterparts and made clear Beijing’s support for Tehran.

Wang told Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi that Beijing “supports Iran in safeguarding its national sovereignty, defending its legitimate rights and interests, and ensuring the safety of its people”, according to a statement by the foreign ministry.

June 14 (UPI) — Rain may dampen President Donald Trump‘s plans Saturday night to celebrate the U.S. Army’s 250th birthday with thousands of troops, 150 vehicles and 50 aircraft.

The event also coincides with Trump’s 79th birthday and Flag Day.

A flood watch was in effect for the entire region starting at 2 p.m. and is expected to last until 11 p.m. Highs will be well into the 80s and it will be humid during daytime festivities on the National Mall, WRC-TV reported, while forecasts show showers and thunderstorms starting around 3 to 4 p.m.

Guest entry for the military parade began at 2 p.m.

The one-hour parade, which is expected to draw several hundred thousand people, is scheduled to start moving down Constitution Avenue at 6:30 p.m. near the Lincoln Memorial and then proceed past the White House.

The parade, which saw people assemble along the mile-long route early Saturday morning, will end alongside the National Mall, near the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the Washington Monument.

The parade was originally planned to be smaller, but had been set to start outside the Pentagon and go 2.2 miles.

Trump posted Saturday morning on Truth Social: “OUR GREAT MILITARY PARADE IS ON, RAIN OR SHINE. REMEMBER, A RAINY DAY PARADE BRINGS GOOD LUCK. I’LL SEE YOU ALL IN D.C.”

Trump is scheduled to speak during the parade.

“For two and a half centuries, the men and women of America’s Army have dominated our enemies and protected our freedom at home,” Trump said in a video posted to Truth Social in early June. “This parade salutes our soldiers’ remarkable strength and unbeatable spirit. You won’t want to miss it. Just don’t miss this one. It’s going to be good.”

The parade will be followed by the Army Golden Knights’ parachute demonstration and a concert at the Ellipse. A fireworks show will occur at 9:45 p.m., the U.S. Army said.

Earlier in the day, a birthday wreath was laid at Arlington National Cemetery and there was a fitness event at the National Mall. The Birthday Festival there will include opportunities to meet with Medal of Honor recipients, astronauts and soldiers.

All of the activities are free and there is tight security.

Matt McCool, the U.S. Secret Service agent in charge of the Washington field office, said “thousands of agents, officers and specialists from across the country” are deployed. People attending the parade or a related festival will be required to go through checkpoints with magnetometers.

The big show will be the military equipment during the parade, officials have said, which includes 140,000-pound Abrams tanks, as well as 6,600 soldiers wearing uniforms representing every U.S. conflict dating back to the Revolutionary War and aircraft flying overhead

About 1,800 Soldiers from III Armored Corps in Fort Cavazos will participate.

“The Army’s 250th birthday is a once-in-a-lifetime event,” Col. Kamil Sztalkoper, a spokesperson for the III Armored Corps, said earlier this week as a train carrying tanks left Fort Cavazos, Texas.

“This is a chance to see our soldiers, our leaders and the world-class force on full display in our nation’s capital. We look forward to being a part of history,” he said.

On June 14, 1775, the Second Continental Congress voted to establish the Continental Army, more than a year before the Declaration of Independence.

D.C. officials have expressed concern about potential road damage from the vehicles, including 60-ton tanks. While the Army has installed thick steel plates at key turns, the straightaway on Constitution Avenue remains unprotected.

Road closures and security measures will make it difficult to drive around the area, and Mayor Muriel Bowser said potential damage could cost millions but the Army has pledged to cover the costs.

The Federal Aviation Administration is also clearing the airspace in the area, preventing all arrivals and departures at Reagan National Airport “during the peak of the celebration,” the agency said. The stoppage is expected affect about 116 flights, a senior government official told NBC News.

The last major military parade, the National Victory Celebration, was on June 8, 1991, to celebrate the end of the Gulf War, though Trump has noted that other countries regularly celebrate the end of World War II.

“We won the war, and we’re the only country that didn’t celebrate it, and we’re going to be celebrating big on Saturday,” he said.

Trump said he came up with the idea after watching the French Bastille Day military parade in France in 2017.

Pentagon personnel at the time convinced him not to move forward with the plan and, instead, in 2019, he celebrated Independence Day with a speech at the Lincoln Memorial with military aircraft flyovers and Bradley tanks stationed near the Lincoln Memorial.

“Humans are drawn to pageantry,” Barbara Perry, a presidential historian at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center, told NBC News.

“It’s usually about the personnel. Now we know that this president has political issues all around the world, and wanting to show off the might. And if he views it, as in his first term, ‘his generals,’ and, if he views it as ‘his military,’ then you tie it to your personal special day of your birthday- – that’s what’s different.”

On Friday night, U.S. Capitol Police arrested 60 people for unlawful demonstration, the agency said.

Military veterans and their families had gathered in front of the Supreme Court, demanding that taxpayer dollars for Saturday’s military parade and for troops in Los Angeles should be used for housing, healthcare and food.

“If there’s any protester that wants to come out, they will be met with very big force. I haven’t even heard about a protest, but you know, this is people that hate our country, but they will be met with very heavy force,” Trump told reporters earlier this week.

“It will be a parade like we haven’t had in many, many decades here,” he said. “And it’s a celebration of our country. It’s a celebration of the Army, actually.”

About 2,000 protests are planned nationwide against Trump spending millions on the parade, as well as his policies. No organized “No King” protests are planned in the nation’s capital.

But there was an event demonstrating against the military events by RefuseFascism on Saturday afternoon. They led a rally and marched outside the White House.

Trump “is forging and putting on display today a military loyal, not to the Constitution, not to the rule of law, but to Trump personally with all the White supremacy,” one of the chief organizers, Sunsara Taylor, told CNN.

A 20-year Navy veteran also told CNN: “The parade don’t belong here – you see that in dictatorships, okay? You see that in North Korea, you see that in China, you see that in Russia. This is we the people of the United States of America,”

EXPLAINER

Iranian lawmaker says Tehran considering closing waterway, described as ‘world’s most important oil transit chokepoint’.

Iran is considering closing the Strait of Hormuz, Iranian news agency IRINN has reported, citing key conservative lawmaker Esmail Kosari, as the conflict with Israel intensifies.

The move would send oil prices soaring and risk expanding the war. So what is the strategic waterway and why is it vital to global trade?

Hormuz is the only marine entryway into the Persian Gulf. It splits Iran on one side and Oman and the United Arab Emirates on the other, and it links the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea in the Indian Ocean.

According to the US Energy Information Administration, about 20 percent of global oil consumption flows through the strait, which the agency describes as the “world’s most important oil transit chokepoint”. At its narrowest point, it is 33km (21 miles) wide, but shipping lanes in the waterway are even narrower, making them vulnerable to attacks and threats of being shut down.

During the Iran-Iraq conflict between 1980 and 1988, which killed hundreds of thousands on both sides, both countries targeted commercial vessels in the Gulf in what became known as the Tanker War, but Hormuz was never completely closed.

More recently, in 2019, four ships were attacked near the strait off the coast of Fujairah, UAE, amid heightened tensions between Iran and the United States during Donald Trump’s first presidency. Washington blamed Tehran for the incident, but Iran denied the allegations.

Attacking shipping lanes has long been used to apply pressure amid conflict. Since the outbreak of the war in Gaza, the Houthis in Yemen have been attacking ships around Bab al-Mandeb Strait, the entryway into the Red Sea on the other side of the Arabian Peninsula.

While the Houthi campaign has affected global commerce, ships can avoid the Red Sea by sailing around Africa – a longer but safer journey. However, there is no way to ship anything by sea out of the Gulf without going through Hormuz.

Even countries that do not import petrol from Gulf countries would be affected if the strait were to be closed because a major drop in supply would spike the price per barrel on the global market.

Despite the Iranian lawmaker’s threat, it is unclear whether Iran has the ability or willingness to shut down the strait.

Such a move would almost certainly invoke retaliation from the US, which has naval military assets in the region.

After Israel launched a wave of attacks across Iran early on Friday, targeting military leaders, residential buildings, army bases and nuclear sites, Iran responded with hundreds of ballistic missiles.

Although the US helped shoot down the Iranian missiles, Washington has not directly attacked Iran. US officials have stressed that Washington was not involved in the Israeli strikes.

Tehran has not targeted US troops or interests in the region, either.

Closing Hormuz, however, would hit Americans in the wallet and could spark a military response from Trump.

While an Iranian move against the strait may not be imminent, Kosari’s comments underscore that attacking shipping lanes is a card that Tehran may play amid the hostilities.

In April 2024, Iranian armed forces seized a container ship near the Strait of Hormuz amid rising tensions across the region after a deadly Israeli attack on Iran’s consulate in Damascus, Syria. A limited Iranian strike on Israel in response was followed by an Israeli one on Iran. At the time, they were the most serious direct military exchanges between the two foes.

June 14 (UPI) — U.S. Marines deployed to Los Angeles to help temper unrest in that city, stopped and detained an American citizen trying to enter a federal building.

The man was trying to enter a Veterans Affairs office inside the Wilshire Federal Building in the city’s Sawtelle neighborhood when he was stopped earlier this week by Marines sent to protect the property amid protests over immigration raids.

This marks the first time during the current unrest that military troops have detained a U.S citizen.

The 27-year-old U.S. Army veteran was released after a short time.

“They treated me very fairly,” Marcos Leao told the New York Times following the incident, adding headphones at first prohibited him from hearing the Marines giving him verbal commands to stop.

U.S. Northern Command confirmed to The Hill, the Marines “temporarily detained a civilian earlier today” under Title 10 of the United States Code governing detention by the armed forces.

Around 200 Marines moved into Los Angeles on Friday, joining thousands of California National Guard troops to help protect federal assets and agents sent to the city to carry out arrests on behalf of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

President Donald Trump sent around 700 Marines to the area Monday, but they have thus far been staged outside the city. Gov. Gavin Newsom, D-Calif., has opposed the move.

On Friday, Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., sent a written letter to Trump, signed by all U.S. Senate Democrats demanding the president remove military troops from Los Angeles.

A U.S. District Court Judge in San Francisco on Thursday ruled the president’s National Guard troop deployment was illegal. An appeals court later reversed that decision.

Los Angeles officials on Tuesday instituted a local curfew in parts of the city, following over 100 arrests that day amid protesters clashing with police.

On Saturday, millions of people are expected to take part in at least 1,500 protests across the United States. The “No Kings” demonstrations are scheduled to coincide with a major Flag Day military parade in Washington, D.C. and Trump’s 70th birthday.

The movement describes itself as “rejecting authoritarianism, billionaire-first politics, and the militarization of our democracy.”

June 14 (UPI) — At least 1,500 “No Kings” protests nationwide are planned Saturday on the same day President Donald Trump scheduled a large-scale military parade in Washington, D.C. on Flag Day and his 79th birthday.

Millions of people are expected to participate in protests in all 50 states and commonwealths in the “largest single-day mobilization since President Trump returned to office — a mass, nationwide protest rejecting authoritarianism, billionaire-first politics, and the militarization of our democracy,” according to the organizers’ website.

The 50501 Movement — 50 protests, 50 states, one movement — is one of the main organizers of the demonstrations.

A map shows where the events are planned, including rallies in New York City at Bryant Park on Fifth Avenue and in Chicago at Daley Plaza.

“We’re showing up everywhere he isn’t — to say no thrones, no crowns, no kings,” the website reads. Trump on Thursday told reporters that, despite the protests’ title, “I don’t feel like a king. I have to go through hell to get stuff approved.”

The protests, large and small, will take place everywhere except the nation’s capital “to draw a clear contrast between our people-powered movement and the costly, wasteful, and un-American birthday parade in Washington.”

D.C. residents are encouraged to go to a demonstration in Philadelphia, which is America’s first capital and the birthplace of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. They will march from Love Park to the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

“The ‘No Kings’ mobilization is a direct response to Donald Trump’s self-aggrandizing $100 million military parade and birthday celebration, an event funded by taxpayers while millions are told there’s no money for Social Security, SNAP, Medicaid, or public schools,” according to the website.

The parade is officially celebrating the 250th anniversary of the United States Army and has been planned for well over a year, although it has been expanded to meet Trump’s requests since he retook office.

The protests were organized by a coalition of more than 200 organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, American Federation of Teachers and the Communications Workers of America.

Protests nationwide began after Trump’s inauguration for his second presidency on Jan. 20 over several of the Trump administration’s moves, including its crackdown on immigrants and cuts to the federal workforce and services.

In a guidance document for participants and organizers, “No Kings” said participants should practice nonviolence and de-escalate any conflicts with outside parties.

“By the way, for those people that want to protest, they’re going to be met with very big force. And I haven’t even heard about a protest, but you know, this is people that hate our country,” Trump said Tuesday about rallies that may occur in Washington, D.C.

Protests against immigration arrests have been going on for a week in downtown Los Angeles.

A nightly curfew that began Tuesday will remain in effect through the weekend, LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell said at a news conference Friday.

L.A. County Sheriff Robert Luna said local authorities were aware of at least 30 demonstrations planned that could require law enforcement resources.

Trump has nationalized California’s National Guard at the opposition of Gov. Gavin Newsom. There are 4,000 National Guard members and 700 Marines.