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The protests, operating under the banner
"Nobody is Above the Law" and led by the activist group MoveOn,
called for people to gather in cities at 5 p.m. on Thursday in
an effort to protect the investigation led by Special Counsel
Robert Mueller.
The action was spurred by Trump's move on Wednesday to replace
Attorney General Jeff Sessions with Sessions' chief of staff,
Matthew Whitaker, as acting attorney general. Sessions had
recused himself from overseeing the Russia investigation, while
Whitaker has called for it to be scaled down.
Trump announced the move the day after a Congressional election
that saw his Republicans lose control of the House of
Representatives but gain seats in the Senate.
"Donald Trump has installed a crony to oversee the special
counsel's Trump-Russia investigation," MoveOn said on its
website. It pledged that at least one rally would be held in
each state.
Mueller has indicted a number of Russian individuals and firms
for meddling in the election to help Trump win, and is
investigating whether anyone on the Trump campaign collaborated
with them. Trump denies collusion and calls the investigation a
partisan witch hunt.
The Justice Department is separately investigating payments that
were made during the campaign to women who said they had affairs
with Trump to bar them from speaking.
Sessions has long drawn Trump's ire for recusing himself from
the Russia investigation.
(Reporting by Rich McKay in Atlanta; Editing by Peter Graff)
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