About 800 people filled the grassy triangle under the flagpole east of Safeway and the surrounding sidewalks in Forest Grove on Oct. 18 to protest President Donald Trump's administration.
The protest, part of the nationwide "No Kings 2" protests, is the largest organized by the group to date. A previous Forest Grove protest was counted at about 600.
"An estimated seven million people in over 2,700 cities and small towns across America turned out to peacefully defend their freedom from an increasingly dictatorial president," Indivisible Forest Grove said in a press release. "Oregon alone had over 70 events," the group added.
One protester, who asked only to be identified by her initials, said she was there for her son, who is disabled.
"There's just so many things I'm pissed about," LWH said. "But I'm doing it for my son, mostly because I'm really concerned that he might not have Medicaid to support where he lives, support his work, to support his day program," she said. "I'm just concerned for his future," LWH said.
"Right now, he's living independently from us, and he has a job, and he goes to a day program, which is all supported by Medicaid," she said.
Lois Martz, 95, was protesting because she wants to see things get better in her lifetime.
In a later phone call with News in the Grove, Martz said she is the descendant of American Revolutionary War veterans.
"My heart is breaking for this country," she said. "I cry a lot," she added.
"We've just got to see the end of this, and I want to see it in my lifetime," she said.
Martz later called News in the Grove to add that her family had fought in the American Revolutionary War.
"I just had to be here," she said.
Many came in costumes to the protest in Forest Grove on Oct. 18, 2025. Photos: Chas Hundley
Others were experiencing a protest for the first time.
Cosima Snow, 10, said the protest was her first.
The Gales Creek resident said it was pretty loud due to honking from passing cars.
"I like to see all of the signs," she said.
Pete Truax, a Forest Grove School Board member and former Forest Grove Mayor was present at the protest, and had previously given his remarks, a story about the origins of the U.S. Constitution, the rights to free speech, and how he remains friends with a man he disagrees with.
(Truax gave nearly identical remarks at a recent Forest Grove School Board meeting, which we have linked here, as the audio is better than a loud protest).
Speaking to News in the Grove, Truax said he was there because he'd been asked to show up, and that he felt it was his responsibility as an elected official to be present.
"I do think that elected officials need to show the public where they stand and why they take the stands they do," he said.
"I think it's important in my particular philosophy that we also show those other elected officials how they ought to do their job," he said.
"We also need to show those officials above us, particularly our Congressional delegation in Washington, D.C., that we have their back. If they're going to say the things that they say in the well of the House and in the well of the Senate, they ought to know that when they go to make those conversations that there are any number of people in the state of Oregon that fully support them," he said.
There were many dogs at the protest. Photo: Chas Hundley
