Thousands gathered at the North Carolina State Capitol on Monday to join a national movement to protest the Trump administration and its policies. 

A local grassroots and decentralized organization put the event together as a part of the 50501 rally movement whose goal is to conduct 50 protests throughout all 50 states in response to the actions of the current presidential administration. 

Ariel Carlin, one of the main organizers behind the rally, said a small group of people who met online planned the rally. 

“So it just started online, and I guess we all realized that we were in North Carolina and that we needed to get something together that was going to be a consistent, reoccurring thing to continuously draw attention to these issues,” Carlin said. 

Carlin said the group believes the actions of the administration are unlawful and they aim to get the attention of North Carolina representatives in Congress to take action. 

“We feel that what the Trump administration is doing is unconstitutional,” Carlin said. “Our main goal is for our congresspeople to listen to us because that’s who’s making the rules — and just because we didn’t vote for them doesn’t mean they shouldn’t listen to us.”

Cole Hernandez traveled three hours to be present at the Capitol. Hernandez said what brought them to the protest was Trump’s programs that target immigrants, including mass deportations. 

“My mom came here illegally, she gave us the dream,” Hernandez said. “So I just want to be out here and do as much as I can.”  

Haley Royer, a postdoctoral researcher at UNC-Chapel Hill, said the administration’s rhetoric against science and academics is alarming. 

“Back in July, JD Vance had mentioned that academics are specifically enemies of this particular administration and we are seeing that being acted out pretty clearly in the past couple of weeks,” Royer said. “And so the idea that science is the enemy, being educated is the enemy, universities are the enemy — is something that is really impacting us, I lost a job because of the hiring freeze.” 

Royer said she hopes that the protest will draw attention to the freeze on federal funding and promote action within the United States government. 

“In general we would love to see more action taken against the purging of the federal government,” Royer said. “I think especially because a lot of the services that are getting affected most are services that are beneficial to a lot of people, especially minority populations.” 

Vivian Campbell, a student at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health, said the appointment of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Trump’s health secretary worries her.

“Especially with the confirmation of RFK — somebody who doesn’t believe in vaccines, something that has, over and over again, been proven as a life-saving measure for people,” Campbell said. “… I’m just concerned about everyone. Everyone is our neighbor in this country, whether we recognize it on a daily basis or not.” 

Carlin said the movement is there to uphold the Constitution, for all Americans, and is a place for people to come together. 

“I feel like what the Trump administration is doing is attacking a lot of our brothers and sisters from different religions, different races, different ethnicities — and that’s not what America is about,” Carlin said. “‘We the people’ is not we the white people, or we the old people. It’s we all the people.”