At 11 a.m. Saturday morning, Denver’s Capitol Hill was beginning to fill with people. Just an hour later, neither the grass nor the pavement of Lincoln Street in front of it were visible through the crowd.

As October gusts lifted swirls of yellow leaves into the air, tens of thousands of people descended upon downtown Denver to take part in the second “No Kings” protest, holding signs and yelling chants criticizing the actions of the Trump administration.

The protest was one of over 50 “No Kings” demonstrations scheduled across Colorado, and one of hundreds taking place across the country on Saturday. It was the second such protest to take place in Denver this year.

The first “No Kings” rally attracted about 10,000 to 20,000 people. Observers who were at both rallies said Saturday’s protest was at least twice as large.

Among those in attendance were members of the Service Employees International Union Colorado, wearing purple shirts with the union’s logo splashed on the front and back. Jerod Truss, a nurse at a Kaiser Permanente medical center and member of the union, said that members were there to protest what he said was Trump’s attack on union rights.

“They’re taking away bargaining rights; he took away the bargaining rights of federal workers, so we just have to stand together and unite,” Truss said. “Working men and woman work hard to survive, and a lot of people are surviving paycheck to paycheck … we just wanted to get out today and support the rally.”

Working on the front lines of medical care, Truss said he’s seen an influx of patients recently who are worried that they may soon lose access to their healthcare.

“We have a lot of people who are just frightened,” Truss said. “They’re overwhelming the system right now just to make sure they’re caught up on everything.”

Medical care was also one of the main reasons why Stacey Everson decided to participate both in the protest and the ensuing march downtown.

“My dad’s a disabled vet, all my family fought in the military. Just recently I was disabled from a pedestrian car accident and now I can’t get any help because the government’s shut down,” Everson said. “I’ve only got two weeks left to sign up for for Medicare before I get penalized, and I’m dirt poor.”

Everson, walking down 15th Street with a noticeable limp, added that she needs a knee replacement due to the crash, but she was not going to let that stop her from taking part in Saturday’s rally.

“We live in the best country in the world, and we’re going to fight to keep it that way,” Everson said, wiping away tears.

After gathering at the Capitol and listening to a few speakers associated with the event’s local organizers, the crowd began marching into downtown. When the front turned right to walk down Lawrence Street — over 10 blocks into the march — the rear had yet to leave the Capitol lawn.

The increase in attendance was not a surprise to organizers. Morgan Miransky, a member of Colorado-based activist group Solidarity Warriors, which was the lead organizer of the Denver event, said Friday morning that they had worked with nearly twice as many activist groups in preparation for Saturday’s protest and that he anticipated it to be far larger than June’s.

“There’s been a growing feeling of discontent with what is going on, and this is all about we the people saying we don’t want a king, we don’t want a dictator, and that has been in the DNA of this country since the very beginning,” Miransky said. “This is the people standing up and saying, ‘This is what we want, and we’re not getting it.'”

After circling downtown, the march moved back in the direction of the Capitol, where it again stopped around 2 p.m. The back of the crowd caught up to the front nearly an hour later.

The protest was one of several “No Kings” rallies in the Denver area and along the Front Range. In Broomfield, hundreds of protesters waving signs and flags were spread out for several blocks along both sides of 120th Avenue and Sheridan Boulevard at 11:30 a.m. Many of the drivers passing by honked their horns to the cheers of the protesters.

For 82-year-old Judy Bauer, who was pushing a walker along Lincoln Street with two bubble guns resting on the top seat, the day was a reminder that any change will only come as a result of action.

“We’ve all got to say something, we’ve all got to do something,” Bauer said, placing a sign that read “I am antifa/anti-fascist” onto a small clip attached to the walker. “We can’t just stay home and twiddle our thumbs.”