Commentary
No Kings: The threat is global, and so is the response
It was the necessary response to the globalization of the kamikaze attack launched by eugenicist, post-constitutional right-wing forces against democratic systems and international law.
“No Kings, No ICE, No War.” These slogans brought together thousands of demonstrations against the authoritarianism, supremacism and militaristic hegemony that the MAGA movement has unleashed on the US and the world.
The third “No Kings” protest – following those in February 2025 and last June – was the most global. It was the necessary response to the globalization of the kamikaze attack launched by eugenicist, post-constitutional right-wing forces against democratic systems and international law. Set against the backdrop of a war even more blatantly illegal than the invasion of Iraq, the hundreds of thousands of people in the streets at times evoked that “second superpower” that took to the world's squares in 2003 against George W. Bush's war.
The comparison is likely ill-fitting given the profound changes of the last two decades in how “national-populist” support is devised and manipulated, and how power is imposed when those movements morph into regimes. But what Saturday clearly expressed was the sheer will to react to a global threat on a global scale.
The decentralized, horizontal movement given a voice by the Indivisible coalition has once again proven its ability to channel the widespread – and now majority – opposition to the chaotic escalation of Donald Trump's regime. At the same time, “strategic” chaos increasingly appears to be the natural state of Trumpism, which, beyond serving the interests of a predatory oligarchy, is inexorably tied to the personality and pathologies of its leader.
While the Middle Eastern powder keg – to which the American sovereign and his Israeli partner casually set fire – continues to blaze, the “king” himself is going back and forth between delusional rants (such as debating the merits of his favorite brands of markers to sign documents) and cosmetic tweaks to his empire. In recent days, Trump visited Graceland, Elvis Presley's mansion in Memphis, while simultaneously starting new renovation works at the White House. In addition to a ballroom and no shortage of gold leaf, it will now feature black granite floors and Corinthian capitals, presumably to more closely resemble the kitschy mini-palace of the King of Rock’n Roll. And after the gold medal bearing his likeness, dollar bills will now bear his personal signature.
On Friday, March 27, the presidential schedule included a speech to farmers whose industry is mired in a crisis exacerbated by Trump's tariffs and, now, by war-related disruptions to the fertilizer supply chain. The president promised them further public subsidies but, above all, went on at length praising the beauty of the gold-painted tractor his staff installed in front of the White House like a golden calf.
In these daily theatrical performances, the dizzying mix of the ridiculous and the criminal paints the picture of a ruler gone off the rails, while the war – with its catastrophic fallout which only grows increasingly more likely – encapsulates the danger he poses to the entire world.
While the urgency of the moment took concrete form in the “No Kings” marches, CPAC – the annual festival and rally of the MAGA universe – was broadcast from the outskirts of Dallas with its predictable whirlwind of red hats, sequins and flags. Also numerous this year were flags bearing the emblem of Shah Reza Pahlavi, supported by pro-war factions of the Iranian diaspora. Alongside them, however, there were signs of unusually public dissent from the isolationist wing of the MAGA movement, which abhors the war. Nor did this year’s edition feature the customary speeches by Trump and his vice president, JD Vance.
These internal fractures, together with polls confirming a majority of the public is opposed to the war (55 percent), are harbingers of a crisis. But more than anything else, the inexorably approaching economic tsunami portends an equally inevitable further erosion of support, reinforcing the sense that the regime is on a downward trajectory, although for how long and to what point remains unknown.
Accompanying this sense of instability is the feeling that the regime is shifting from managing public support to neutralizing dissent. And to do so, it is relying on a state of permanent conflict. How else can one interpret the presidential veto of the compromise reached in the Senate to end the government shutdown and the ensuing security chaos at airports? Trump ordered House MAGA Republicans to reject the agreement unless it included an electoral “reform” – justified by nonexistent “massive fraud” – drafted specifically to sabotage his opponents (if it passes, he has said, they “probably won’t win an election for 50 years”).
The same mechanism of an artificially generated emergency used to impose a unilateral solution seems to have been envisioned for the war, pursued and triggered after tearing up the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action of 2015, a pact that had established a multilateral, verifiable and genuinely stabilizing agreement on Iran's nuclear program.
Trump finally managed to replace that treaty with an uncontrollable war – one that embodies his own model and that of the other men who would like to be kings of our world.
It was to them in particular that Saturday's crowds responded: “No Kings!”
Originally published at https://ilmanifesto.it/la-minaccia-e-globale-la-risposta-anche on 2026-03-29