Anti-Trump “Hands Off” protesters pack Downtown Oak Park 

A protest against President Donald Trump’s administration took over Oak Park’s  downtown Saturday afternoon.  

More than 1,000 people gathered to march in a loop along Lake Street from Scoville Park to Harlem Avenue and back for the “Hands Off! Oak Park” protest, one of more than 1,200 such rallies held in communities around the country as citizens took to the streets to demonstrate against the president’s policies. Oak Park protesters expressed outrage about White House executive orders cutting support to public schools, libraries, health programs and other institutions as well as Trump’s agenda for the economy, immigration and diplomatic relations.  

Oak Park voted overwhelmingly against Trump last November, with just over 90% of voters in the village casting ballots for Democrat Kamala Harris, according to Cook County records.  

Protesters carried signs lampooning Trump, along with world’s-richest-man and Department of Government Efficiency head Elon Musk and other conservative figures, while also using megaphones and playing musical instruments as motorists rolled down Lake Street honking their horns and revving their engines.     

Many protesters marched alongside their family members, like Susan Doyle who walked with her daughter Jennifer and granddaughter Zoe.  

“We’re here to protect democracy, everything that’s happening is destroying our country,” Susan Doyle said.  

Anna Fink, an Oak Parker who serves as principal at Carlos Fuentes Elementary in Chicago, marched with her son, Max, to protest Trump’s education policies, which include a full-on dismantling of the U.S. Department of Education.  

“I’m an educator and I want my children’s futures to be amazing, and it’s not going to be from what I can see,” Fink said. “I’m afraid that my students will lose vital funding. I worry about my students, my teachers and my children. I think in Oak Park we may live in this bubble, but we need to be outspoken and I’m so proud of our community today.”  

Stephanie Dwyer brought her dog Mavis, who was outfitted with a “Beware of DOGE” bib.  

“I’m most worried about services for people, I’m really scared about people, particularly veterans, losing out,” Dwyer said. “It’s so many things that are bothering me.”    

Roger Botner, a deacon at Oak Park’s Grace Episcopal Church, said he felt the protest was an excellent display of Oak Park values.  

“I rise up with righteous anger against all of the injustice that’s going on in this country not only as a Christian but as a citizen, I’m tired of having my intelligence insulted by this administration,” Botner said. “I’m heartened to see that so many people of all colors and all stripes are out here in solidarity as a community because that’s what America needs to get back to. Get back to being with one another, not against one another.”  

Debbi Heer, a retired Oak Park and River Forest High School Spanish teacher, spends her time volunteering to help immigrants with their asylum applications through the Migrant Ministry, which is housed at Centro San Edmundo, the former St. Edmund Catholic School on Oak Park Avenue. She said that Latin American immigrants have been recklessly vilified by Trump.  

“I hear their stories, and they are just so awful,” she said. “The people who come here from Venezuela, they’re the victims of the gangs.”  

The protest came on the heels of one of the largest stock market falls in decades, as the American stock market lost roughly $5 trillion in value in response to the president’s “Liberation Day” order to raise U.S. tariff barriers to their highest point in over a century, according to The Economic Times.   

Protestor Jim Farrell said he fears the move will send the United States into an economic spiral.  

“The markets have spoken and a lot of people are being hurt by this already, I’m an economist and that’s the dumbest economic move I’ve seen in my life,” Farrell said. “It’s Econ 101, Adam Smith and all those guys were all about ‘no tariffs.’ They didn’t make sense 200 years ago and they still don’t make sense. They just destroy value around the world.”  

Many protestors, like recent Dominican University graduate Jessica Guzman, said they weren’t moved to demonstrate by any one Trump policy, but by what felt to them like countless different ways they feared their town could be hurt by the president’s new policies.  

“I feel like you could pick anything he’s done out of a hat and there’s someone here in Oak Park who’s been effected,” she said. “Not every issue might impact you directly, but it impacts someone you know, someone you love, your community members.  

The Oak Park protest was just one of many in the Chicagoland area, the largest of which was held outside the Daley Center in Downtown Chicago. River Forest resident Alyse, who did not want their full name published, was originally going to go to the Chicago Loop rally to protest against anti-DEI legislation and U.S. support for Israel’s actions in its war against Hamas but opted to make her voice heard closer to home.  

“I thought it was important to make a local demonstration of noncompliance,” she said. “Oak Park is a diverse community, and we need to keep it that way. DEI cuts and funding cuts threaten that.”  

“There’s a lot of money in Oak Park, but it’s great to see that people are coming out to fight oligarchy.”    

Several local elected officials also participated in the protest, including recently reelected Village Trustee Enyia. He said that federal cuts are forcing the village government to answer many tough questions.  

As Enyia spoke with Wednesday Journal, newly reelected Village President Vicki Scaman walked by and gave him a hug.