Thousands of people marched through downtown Denver on Saturday to protest actions by the Trump administration, notably his campaign to deport foreign nationals illegally staying in the U.S.

Hours later, after a majority of the protesters had left downtown, another march — the sixth one on Saturday — went westbound on W. Colfax Avenue toward I-25 and engaged with officers, according to the Denver Police Department.

Authorities said officers staged at Osage Street to block this smaller group from accessing the freeway. After warning the protesters that they cannot access the highway, they tried to push through the line of officers and authorities declared an unlawful assembly, the department said.

Officers then deployed pepper balls and smoke — not tear gas, a spokesman emphasized — to disperse the crowd. The police said there were reports of protestors throwing rocks and bottles at officers, as well as graffiti.

Officers arrested five people following the confrontation. A police spokesperson said there had been more arrests but couldn’t yet confirm how many.

Later at night, another confrontation took place between the police and protesters that began near Coors Field in Denver. By 10 p.m., police officers advanced in a straight line on Broadway, heading south. More officers also arrived to back up the police phalanx.

A few minutes earlier, protesters could be seen running away, as sirens blared and smoke billowed from the ground. It’s not immediately clear what the smoke was — at the earlier confrontation, the one that took place around 6:30 p.m., the police said they deployed pepper balls and smoke.  

At the earlier, bigger rallies, which the police described as peaceful and were among the hundreds of “No Kings” rallies nationwide, protesters took over Civic Center for most of the day, with several marches moving outward and taking over some downtown streets. The marchers held signs criticizing government actions, the war in Gaza and the mass deportation of immigrants. The police said officers arrested one person at these rallies.

The crowd waved American, Mexican, Palestinian and LGTBQ+ flags, and some joined in a variety of chants, including “free, free Palestine” and “hey, hey, ho, ho, Donald Trump has got to go.”

Em Whaley, whose mother immigrated to the U.S. from Brazil, said the demonstrations against President Trump’s immigration policies are deeply personal.

“I’m speaking up for my community, my people,” Whaley said. “Immigrants are coming here to have a better life than they had back in their home country.”

Trump had campaigned on the promise of curbing border crossings and deporting people convicted or accused of violent crimes. The White House said in the first 100 days under Trump, daily border encounters went down by 93%, while encounters with “gotaways” — which the administration called the “the top threat to public safety” — dipped by 95%. His administration also reduced immigrant crossings by 99.99%, the White House said.

Saturday’s takeover of several downtown streets by at least three distinct marches, including Broadway and Lincoln Street as far northwest as Union Station, was not a planned part of the organized “No Kings” event, said Morgan Miransky, who works with Solidarity Warriors, a Colorado-based activist group that was supposed to be the lead organizers of the event.

“I can say very emphatically that is not us and not sanctioned by us,” Miransky said, referring to the road takeovers. “We did not plan that; we were not going to do that.”

Some who participated in some aspects of the protest also shared their reservations about some of the messages at the rallies.

Deb Woodward, along with her boyfriend, Grant Curley, did not participate in one of the marches downtown because the leaders were sharing pro-Palestinian messages.

“We’re here against the U.S. government,” Woodward said, holding a sign comparing Trump to Adolf Hitler. “That was a separate issue, and we’re not sure how it got roped into this. It’s not necessarily our focus.”

The protest on the Capitol Hill, Miransky said, was organized by a different group that was not affiliated with the Solidarity Warriors event in Lincoln Memorial Park. Miransky said Solidarity Warriors is committed to nonviolence.

The Solidarity Warriors event mostly consisted of pop-up tents set up by various activist organizations in the park.

“The administration is deploying police, the military and the national guard in the streets,” said a speaker over a bullhorn at the crowd, which was another group that began the march down Lincoln Street.

“Are we going to be silenced?”

“No,” the crowd responded.

At about 3:30 p.m., marchers at the intersection of Wynkoop Street and 19th Street encountered Denver Metro SWAT and police dressed in riot gear, who stopped them from accessing an on-ramp to Interstate 25 northbound. Most protesters turned left onto Wynkoop Street, avoiding the confrontation, but some remained standing in front of the police until the end of the crowd walked by. Nobody was arrested.

The march organizers disbanded for the day at around 5:30 p.m. after concluding a march through the Capitol Hill neighborhood that included a stop outside the Governor’s Residence at the Boettcher Mansion on East 8th Avenue.

“Jared Polis is an example of the corrupt politicians who rule this country,” the speaker said. “It’s not just about Donald Trump; it’s not just about Republicans. There’s just as many complicit Democrats in this.”

Many of the anti-U.S. government messages by the speakers throughout the afternoon received collective cheers, including calls for a revolution.

“This is what community looks like,” one speaker said. “This is what democracy looks like.”