Reclaiming the American Flag
The No Kings protests have given the Star-Spangled Banner a rebirth
The day of the No Kings protests, my son called me from his car.
“Pretty good size crowd out here,” he said. He couldn’t attend the local demonstration due to another commitment, plus he and his wife had worried a bit about taking their three-year-old daughter to a gathering like this, even one of the relatively small ones in their suburban Chicago-area neighborhood. They desperately wanted her to see her rights in action, but the times, well, they remain volatile.
“Both sides of the road,” he continued, driving past the demonstration. “It’s great. And you know what I’ve noticed? Citizens have now taken back the American flag.”
Not long ago, a friend told me about seeing a pick-up truck on the road in his neighborhood and waving from its payload was a very large American flag. Another car passed and from it, the driver yelled, “Go Trump!”
When did the flag become a symbol of Donald Trump?
For several years, I’ve believed this to be the case. Trump, somewhere along the line, stole the American flag. And his supporters, with their flags waving from their front porches, their windows, and their vehicles, embraced the flag as a symbol of Trumpism. And in time, flying the American flag took on another meaning. It latched itself to MAGA. Even though some Trump supporters might have legitimate and worthy intentions when displaying the flag, they unwittingly have given comfort to what has become an offensive connection between Trump and Old Glory.
One year ago, in an opinion piece in the Washington Post, Rick Reilly wrote, “The American flag, once a unifying symbol, now subtly echoes Donald Trump and his supporters for a large portion of the country.”
He was right.
But my son saw it differently this past weekend. No Kings demonstrators waved small handheld flags; they wore flag clothing. And in other protests all over America, thousands and thousands of them, the flag’s meaning was returning to its original symbol—a unifying message. Flags were everywhere. These flags did not scream Trump. These flags instead championed tolerance, inclusion, liberty, and freedom against tyranny. The flag had once again become a symbol of the deep roots of the American experiment and not one of brutish might and righteousness fueled by a bully.
On the same day of the protests, of course, a celebration of the 250th anniversary of the U.S. Army with a large parade in Washington. A worthy celebration, considering the Army’s historic role in fighting for freedom and democracy. Instead, however, the day was turned into a grotesque and vulgar display of military hubris and machismo, and one man’s love of himself, his self-proclaimed mightiness. The flag was certainly present through it all, as it should have been. But in this case, Old Glory and its star-spangled image were misrepresented yet again. It appeared as a symbol of allegiance to authoritarianism, not one of acceptance and American values. “Every other country celebrates their victories,” Trump said at the celebration. “It’s about time America did, too.” Thing is—America’s victories are not all about winning on the battlefield. In fact, many of its best victories, it can be argued, have nothing to do with military might.
And on the very same day of the D.C. parade, all over the nation in many more places than Washington, the American flag waved for far more than Trump, it waved for a far different reason, a different cause, a more just and moral movement. The American flag had returned to its rightful owner. It had returned to Americans who understand democracy is precious and delicate and hangs by a thread.
In a recent guest post to the Living Snoqualmie website, an online news and information portal for a small community in Western Washington state, a reader and local citizen Stephen Matlock wrote, “It is time to remove the American flag as a symbol of repression and hate, destruction and malice, supremacy and fear, and return it to its rightful place as a symbol of hope and unity for a nation that would be as good as the words of the Constitution which governs it.” It is the reason why, Matlock writes, he brings the American flag with him to protests. “This flag reminds us that it is necessary and right to protest and to peacefully assemble—two rights guaranteed by the Constitution—and to demand redress for our complaints against a government that has tattered the Constitution in its pursuit of a white nationalist agenda.”
And on the Facebook page of the 50501 Movement, an organization that discredits Trump policies, this was posted:
“I have never been a flag waver. . . but now is the time to reclaim the flag of the United States.”
As my son left the site of the local protest, he said to me over the phone, “I think the flag might be experiencing a bit of a rebirth.”
And on Flag Day, nonetheless. Maybe he’s right.
David W. Berner is the author of several books of award-winning fiction and memoir. His debut poetry collection, Garden Tools is due out in pre-sales in June and officially released this fall by Finishing Line Press. His novella, American Moon will be published by Regal House Publishing in 2026.
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Jan 1, 2015--Our German foreign exchange "daughter" (student) arrived. 1st thing she did, pointed to the flag on front of our house, she said, "We would never do that." Germans learned a lesson about the conflation of flags and fascism. They have not forgotten. Saturday's protests (I was at one) did not change my view that the flag represents a flag-hugging, Bible-selling, devil.
Thanks for this! I proudly hung my rustic flag piece, crafted from a section of old wooden fencing, on the back of my porch this spring. Over the weekend, my chalkboard had No Kings with the red x across a crown drawn on it.