page_title: Protests against Executive Order 13769
section_title: United Kingdom
hierarchical_section_title: Protests against Executive Order 13769 / Protests / United Kingdom
caption_attribution_description: On Thursday 12 July 2018, US president Donald Trump, the most dangerous man in the world, was welcomed to the United Kingdom by the British prime minister Theresa May. The following day the streets of London witnessed the biggest protest for over a decade as thousands marched on Trafalgar Square to express their anger at the British government extending a red carpet welcome for Trump. Protesters pointed out the extreme threat to democracy, human dignity and even the survival of humankind which Trump presents. Such assertions might seem extreme, but they are unfortunately fully justifiable. As the most powerful authority of what is by far the richest and most powerful country on earth, Trump has dedicated his presidency to accelerating the US addiction to fossil fuels and agribusiness, dismantling the Environmental Protection Agency and withdrawing America from the Paris Climate Accords, thereby accelerating global warming and climate change and presenting a huge threat to the continued existence of humankind. Trump's presidency also marks another dangerous step in the erosion of democracy in the United States. Far from &quot;draining the swamp&quot; as he promised, Trump has surrounded himself with powerful figures from big business, especially major financial institutions such as Goldman Sachs, as well as his friends in the fossil fuel and defence industires. Government policy, more and more, reflects the direct interests of concentrated private power with the public having less and less influence. At the same time the Trump presidency has allied itself with some of the most ruthless regimes in the world and is profiting from Saudi Arabia's illegal war of agression in Yemen which has created the world's worst humanitarian crisis. A serious war crime in which Donald Trump and Theresa May are both complicit. Trump has also been keen to patronise the extreme nationalist constituency in the United States and through preaching a propaganda of fear his presidency has managed to oversee some of the most racist immigration policies ever to be implemented in the United States, targeted almost exclusively at Muslim countries - Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen. Ironicallly, all of them have been massively destabilized and impoverished by US foriegn policy. He is also responsible for the ruthless decision to separate children from their parents as they cross into the United States from Mexico, in his determination to block immigration from central America, where decades of US illegal intervention, including the CIA funded Contra terror operations in Nicaragua and enforced free trade (under NAFTA or IMF rules) have devestated the region and merely ehanced the power of corrupt corporate elites and drug cartels. As if this was not enough to worry about, Trump has also authorized a huge increase in both US defence spending and in the US nuclear arsenal, and changed the strategic posture of the US so that nuclear weapons can be used even for offensive operations even if they are not required to preempt a nuclear strike by an enemy power. As any historian of conflict since the Second World War knows, it is only by a miracle that humankind has survived since 1945 without a nuclear war. Now the situation is more dangerous than ever before. Not only are we are now dependent on Trump's extremely unpredictable temprement but also increasingly on automated systems which can easily malfunction. Trump and Republicans maintain they need to spend heavily on military equipment in order to counter the supposed Russian threat. However they seldom remind the public that the United States already spends almost as much as the rest of the world combined on defence and that Russia's expenditure is far behind both that of the United States and only on about the same level of Saudi Arabia, and spends only 10% of what NATO spends. It has also to be remembered that it NATO and US forces which are operating right on the Russian border, not Russian forces on the American border. Russia's defence spending is clearly recognised by academics to be primarily defensive and responsive to US spending. What is desperately needed is a serious international dialogue at the highest level to decrease that danger and begin a process of multilateral disarmament. Demonstrations and protests against the presidency of Donald Trump in London
context_page_description: In January and February 2017, during protests against Executive Order 13769, thousands of people gathered at various airports in the United States and around the world to prevent the returning of refugees and other visitors from seven countries considered unsafe. According to various sources, more than two thousand people were at the protest at John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens, New York City with other protests appearing at significant international airports and other important sites around the United States. Protests continued daily and internationally through February 6. Protests also continued after a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order against parts of the travel ban.
context_section_description: A mass protest in London was scheduled for Monday evening, with nine thousand people registering on Facebook and another sixteen thousand stating they were interested in attending. Owen Jones was one of the organizers of the event which protested the executive order. Protesters also asked that a recent invitation to President Trump to visit the UK be rescinded. The march towards Downing Street began around 6 p.m. The march packed Westminster station and brought Whitehall to a "standstill." Thousands of protesters joined the demonstration.
  About three thousand people attended the Manchester demonstration. Crowds also attended protests in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Cardiff, Newcastle, Sheffield, Oxford, Cambridge, Brighton, Gloucester, Leeds, York, Liverpool, Leicester, where Yasmin Surti said, "This sends out a powerful message to Mr. Trump that people of all colours and creeds are as one in Leicester."
  A group of around 300 people gathered to protest in January in Hastings. One speaker, Dominic Buxton, said that "we will not let Trump divide us".
  On February 4, 2017, about ten thousand people protested in London against May's support of Trump.
  United Kingdom has been active on protesting against the travel ban also known as the Executive Order 13769. At least 30 rallies have occurred in the UK since the travel ban went into effect and the protests have been .
  On July 13, 2018 President Trump visited London and faced protests by thousands at Trafalgar Square in London and Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire. Protesters carried various banners that criticized President Trump's policies with some saying "Trump Not Welcome", "Together Against Trump", "No to Racism, No to Trump", "Dump Trump" and "World's #1 racist". Another demonstration was led by Amnesty International activists where they unfurled a banner on Vauxhall Bridge in Central London that said "Human Rights Nightmare" and had Trump's portrait on it.
caption: Protester on 13 July 2017 at Trafalgar Square, London. The sign refers to online protests, i.e. hashtags.
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