Activists are staging more than 1,600 "Good Trouble Lives On" rallies across the United States on Thursday, the fifth anniversary of the death of civil-rights leader and long-time congressman John Lewis. Organisers say at least 56,000 people have registered to join demonstrations scheduled in every state, with events ranging from small vigils to mass marches. Chicago is serving as the flagship site, with protesters set to march from Federal Plaza to Daley Plaza from about 4:30 p.m. Mayor Brandon Johnson, Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates and other local officials are expected to attend. Parallel gatherings are planned in Atlanta, Phoenix, Jacksonville, the San Francisco Bay Area and dozens of smaller communities. The coalition of civil-rights, labour and progressive groups behind the action says it is responding to President Donald Trump’s second-term agenda, including stepped-up deportations, proposed Medicaid cuts and tighter voting and protest rules. “We are navigating one of the most terrifying moments in our nation’s history … as the rights, freedoms and expectations of our very democracy are being challenged,” Public Citizen co-president Lisa Gilbert said in a briefing ahead of the protests. Organisers have asked participants to adhere strictly to non-violence. Thursday’s events invoke Lewis’s call to make “good trouble, necessary trouble” in pursuit of justice. Lewis, who helped lead the 1965 Bloody Sunday voting-rights march in Selma and later represented Atlanta in Congress for more than three decades, died of pancreatic cancer on 17 July 2020. Protest leaders say the nationwide day of action is intended both to honour his legacy and to pressure policymakers to reverse what they view as the most sweeping rollback of civil rights in generations.