No Kings in the Queen City

It was a warm fall day on the Cincinnati riverfront, the kind that makes Cincinnati believe everything is fine. Beneath the blue span of the Roebling Bridge, people gathered at Smale Riverfront Park holding handmade signs that read We Have No Kings. The breeze off the Ohio River carried chants, traffic, and neighbors trading half-jokes about where they’d rather be spending their Saturday, but they were here with their community, “locking it in,” and making their voices heard.

The rally was part of a national day of action, the second wave of No Kings protests held in thousands of locations across all 50 states on October 18, 2025. Organizers called it a reminder that power in America belongs to the people, not the crown. For many, that crown symbolized the current administration’s expanding claims of authority, its assertions of “absolute immunity,” and promises of “retribution.”

According to local volunteers who spoke with Soapbox, the city’s rally was organized by #50501, a civic-action network, alongside participants connected with Faith in Public Life Ohio and Coffee. Compassion. Action! Their goal, they said, was to connect national resistance to local accountability, turning concern into participation. “This was a Herculean effort,” one speaker told the crowd, thanking the dozens of volunteers who managed logistics, sound, and safety throughout the day.

In recent weeks, national leaders had dismissed the demonstrations as “hate rallies.” One attendee stated, “I wasn’t going to come, but when the Speaker called us haters, I figured that was the time to show up.” Another speaker countered that narrative: “I’m here because I love America so much.”

The Cincinnati gathering reflected the movement’s broader reach, diverse in age, background and purpose. Parents, students, faith leaders, and workers stood together. A federal employee who asked to remain anonymous said that major portions of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health have been dismantled since spring. “Our research saves lives, saves jobs, saves people,” she said. “We help businesses protect workers from injuries, diseases, and death.”

Nearby, Marco, a young protester, spoke about fear and responsibility. “I fear for the world I’m going to enter,” he said. “Listen to your citizens.” His friend Eric added simply, “Stop being cruel to people.”

A burst of neon pink caught the afternoon light – a set of posters that first appeared on London’s Brick Lane. The images, titled “The Turd Reich,” were created by Grow Up, a father-and-son street-art duo known for political satire. The work, which depicts global leaders in Nazi uniforms, drew criticism in the U.K. for its use of fascist imagery. In Cincinnati, volunteers with the Northside art collective Chicken Lays an EGG reprinted the designs as a visual reminder of how easily authoritarianism dresses itself in ordinary clothes. The prints, traveling from Berlin to Cincinnati, continued a long tradition of protest art to confront power and provoke reflection.

Speakers cycled through the microphone calling out executive power, the press, reproductive rights, worker protections, and America’s role abroad. Ameer Al-Kayali, a University of Cincinnati student and the child of Palestinian refugees, stated, “There are enough of us here to end our complicity. Elect people who represent us and divest from occupation.”

Then came Christy Pember, a grandmother everyone calls Kiki, founder of Coffee. Compassion. Action! “I started this for my granddaughters,” she told the crowd, “I don’t want them growing up in a fascist police state. I love America. That’s why I’m here.”

If the day had a refrain, it was that democracy is messy by design and that the mess is worth it. “This is what democracy looks like, it’s not a monolith,” an organizer added. “We’ve got to hear each other out. Remember we’re on the same team.”

Police kept their distance as the rally unfolded peacefully. Despite national rhetoric describing the protests as angry or divisive, Cincinnati’s participants showed the opposite. People came in blow-up dinosaur suits and homemade costumes covered in peace symbols.

Strangers offered flowers, hugged, and held signs that read Love Your Neighbor and Country Over King. At Smale Park, it was less outrage than endurance and a visible act of care for democracy and for one another.

People stood in small circles, holding coffee cups and each other’s exhaustion. The message stayed standing that love is the last form of protest they can’t outlaw. You could feel it throughout the park, that ache of a nation talking to itself, still unsure if anyone in power can hear.

What echoed through the park was not hatred, but hunger for justice, for truth, for a government that remembers who it serves. The word that kept surfacing was lawless, a president described as unchecked, a Congress unresponsive, and citizens who feel unheard. What people wanted, they said, wasn’t chaos, it was restoration: a true government of representation.

The message that lingered in Cincinnati wasn’t rebellion, it was no kings, not now, not ever.