Editor’s note: This story updates the size of crowd at Saturday’s Tigard “Hands Off” protest. Tigard police estimate the crowd size to be at least 2,000 people.

“Hands off our public lands.” “Who voted for Elon Musk?” “Rise, Resist and Repeat.”

At least 1,000 protesters carrying signs packed into Tigard’s Universal Plaza on Saturday morning before marching down to Main Street and onward to Highway 99W where they lined both sides of the highway.

The marchers were all part of a nationwide “Hands Off” protest April 5 over the policies of President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk. Organizers say widespread turnout is a signal of growing discontent with Trump’s policies on everything from the federal budget to immigration issues and the controversial Department of Government Efficiency, which is headed by Musk.

More than 800 protests were held across the nation Saturday, with more than 40 of those protests took place in Oregon in urban and rural communities, including Tigard, Beaverton, Forest Grove and North Plains in Washington County alone.

Among those gathered in Tigard were Amy and Jamie Wicks.

Amy Wicks said the couple attending the protest because they were disappointed with what’s happening in Washington, D.C., right now and believe people are losing their civil rights. She said she was also concerned about the “erasure of women and people of color from our federal government databases. It’s fascism.”

Both said they were surprised with the size of the crowd.

“We thought we’d get here and there would be like 100 people,” said Jamie Wicks, who was carrying a poster which included the phrase “Truck Fump.” He also made a point of dispelling the myth by some that the protesters against the current administration are paid to do so with his sign also containing the words “unpaid protester.”

“Our government seems to be for sale,” Jamie Wicks said, emphasizing that he doesn’t believe the administration is interested in those in the lower and middle classes. “All they care about is what corporations and billionaires are interested in.”

Bob Nesler, a Southwest Portland resident, said he was attending the Tigard rally because it was closer to his home and has a friend who is one of the lead organizers of the event.

Nesler said he was impressed with the size of the crowd, calling it “huge.”

“I don’t know how many but … they were estimating 1,000. I bet it’s more than that,” he said.

Others waiting at Universal Plaza for the crowd to start marching were Pat Jacobus and Marge Saker. Jacobus said she was participating in the march to call attention to the rights of transgender people, reproductive rights and free speech.

Another couple waiting for the march to begin were Kent Thompson and Leslie Baird. Thompson held a sign reading “Musk Sucks” while Baird was holding a “Not My President” cardboard sign featuring headshots of Trump and Musk. Thompson said the couple were showing their disapproval with the current administration, pointing out the only way to do that is “through our pocketbook or through protest.”

“So I boycott his products,” Thompson said, adding that he is boycotting anything either person is selling. “They’re not our presidents.”

Both said they once owned stock in Tesla, a company Musk is CEO of, but have since sold it.

Musk’s involvement in the U.S. government has proven to be particularly controversial. The world’s richest person, Musk doesn’t hold elected office and has no formal role in the government, but has been granted extraordinary access and privileges to the government’s inner workings, which has become a flashpoint for demonstrators.

As the crowd began walking up Burnham Street and turned the corner onto Main Street, a bicyclist heading up Burnham in the opposite direction yelled, “Get a fucking life!”

Despite concerns about potential violence, Tigard’s and other Oregon demonstrations appear to remain peaceful. That hasn’t always been the case for protests against Musk and Trump. Since Trump won the presidency, Tesla dealerships have been targeted with shootings and cars vandalized or damaged, including twice in one week in Tigard.

The Trump administration has labeled the attacks acts of “domestic terrorism” and have promised harsh punishments for anyone caught vandalizing Tesla dealerships.

Up along Highway 99W, protesters lined both sides of Highway 99W, stretching from Main Street to Walnut Street.

One of those was Beverly Cook, a Lake Oswego resident, who said she was a lifelong Republican, “although I haven’t been able to vote for any of them in quite a while because they’ve gone mad.”

She added: “I refuse to leave just because they’ve become crazy.”

She said the first Republican she voted for was Richard Nixon in the 1972 presidential election but did not vote for Trump in any of his three election cycles.

Cook said she no longer believes that the Republican party is conservative.

“I’m conservative. I like having a Department of Energy and people who watch out for nuclear bombs …” she said, noting that Nixon is the one who started the Environmental Protection Agency and signed the Endangered Species Act.

She called the current administration part of a “radical fascism.”