About 400 people rallied at Mayor Beth Finch Park on Saturday in a protest against President Donald Trump and his administration’s policies, joining a nationwide “No Kings” Day of Action.
The Fayetteville Resistance Coalition organized the local event, which ran from 10 a.m. to noon.
For the first hour, roughly 50 participants lined the sidewalk along Green Street—a few blocks from Market House—holding signs with messages like “No War for Oil” and “Elect a Clown, Expect a Circus.” Passing drivers honked and raised fists in support.
By the end of the speeches, the crowd had grown into the hundreds, spilling into a march along Hay Street to Ray Avenue and back toward the park.
The rally took place across from the district office shared by U.S. Reps. Richard Hudson and David Rouzer. Both Republicans, Hudson represents the 9th Congressional District, while Rouzer holds the 7th Congressional District seat. For months, FRC has delivered impeachment papers and petitions to the office as part of its campaign urging Congress to impeach President Donald Trump and senior administration officials.
“They don’t care about any of us and are too busy in D.C. boot‑licking and enacting the Trump agenda,” said FRC founder Pat Wiley.
Candidates Take the Stage
Two Democratic congressional candidates—Kimberly Hardy and Richard Ojeda, a retired U.S. Army major—delivered keynote speeches tying the “No Kings” theme to democratic accountability, foreign policy, and economic justice.
Ojeda, who is challenging Hudson in the November election, condemned political and economic elites for sending “your sons and daughters into harm’s way” while “gutting the Veterans Administration.” He framed current conflicts as “illegal war” that “only benefit the rich,” arguing that if ordinary people’s votes “didn’t have power, they wouldn’t work so damn hard to take it from you.”
“We do not bow down. We do not kneel. And we damn sure do not crown our politicians,” he said, adding that “the power belongs to the people, and it’s about damn time we take it back.”
Hardy, who is running against Rouzer, focused on concentrated political and corporate power. “We were never meant to have kings in corporations and not kings in politics,” she said, criticizing leaders “who act like everybody else has to be accountable except them.”
Calling for a living wage, fully funded public schools, and healthcare as a right, Hardy urged voters to see economic justice as inseparable from democratic power. “We the people are the ones who decide what happens in this country,” she said, encouraging attendees to organize, vote, and “put people in office who are actually going to show up for you.”
A Call for Unity, Not Division
After the speeches concluded, a protester named Sierra took the microphone and criticized organizers for not allowing them to speak. Sierra denounced both Democratic congressional candidates for what they described as insufficient opposition to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, calling instead for the agency’s complete abolition.
The crowd booed in response, with several attendees shouting back that the moment called for unity rather than division. Wiley told CityView that Sierra had never asked to be added to the program, while Sierra said they had asked a member of the FRC but had not approached Wiley directly.
FRC also organized the local “No Kings” protest in October, which several hundred people attended. Nearly 500 people attended the “No Kings” rally in June. Ojeda also spoke at that event.
Government reporter Rachel Heimann Mercader can be reached at rheimann@cityviewnc.com or 910-988-8045.