No Kings Day or Hate America Day? Mike Johnson’s Cynical Branding Is Unpatriotic

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) took to the podium Friday morning and proved the point before the first protest sign was even printed. “Tomorrow,” he said, “Democrat leaders are going to descend on our capital for their much-anticipated so-called ‘No Kings’ rally. We refer to it by its more accurate description — the Hate America Rally.”

The Speaker wasn’t responding to the protest. He was preemptively defining it — and by extension, defining patriotism itself.

On Saturday, thousands of people are expected to gather across the nation under the banner of “No Kings Day. Demonstrators are rallying against what they characterize as systemic corruption—conflicts of interest between the business holdings of President Donald Trump and policy decisions, the deployment of federal forces in American cities without local consent, and the bypassing of congressional oversight through emergency declarations. Whether you agree with these grievances or not, they represent constitutional questions, not cultural vandalism.

But Johnson’s framing left no room for nuance. “You’re going to bring together the Marxists, the socialists, the Antifa advocates, the anarchists, and the pro-Hamas wing of the far-left Democrat Party,” he said, adding that protesters “hate capitalism, they hate our free enterprise system, they hate our principles, they hate the rule of law.”

In one breath, Johnson turned a protest about power into a morality play about allegiance — collapsing democratic disagreement into disloyalty. The “Hate America Rally,” as he branded it, isn’t an event anymore; it’s a storyline. And that’s the point.

The reaction reveals a deeper truth about the modern political marketplace: America hasn’t just branded patriotism — it’s confused branding for patriotism. The symbols have swallowed the substance. Love of country now operates like a trademarked asset, and politicians like Johnson have made themselves the rights-holders. In this version of America, waving a flag is proof of purity, but questioning power is infringement.

We must recognize this reflex — an impulse to control narrative terrain before facts interfere. It’s not ideology; it’s asset protection. The goal isn’t to win an argument about democracy or executive overreach. It’s to maintain exclusive distribution rights over the word America.

“No Kings Day” is a direct challenge to that monopoly. Its name alone reclaims something sacred — the founding rejection of inherited power. The protesters aren’t attacking the nation; they’re refusing the licensing agreement that says you need permission to love it. They’re attempting what you might call unauthorized patriotism — fidelity without franchise.

That’s what rattles Johnson and fellow Trump surrogates. “This rally is not about freedom,” he declared. “It’s about the opposite.” But the opposite of freedom isn’t protest — it’s preemption. It’s the assumption that certain citizens no longer get to speak for the flag.

Tomorrow’s rally will be covered like any other political spectacle: live shots, soundbites, counterprotests. But the real story is already unfolding — in the Speaker’s attempt to write the ending before the cameras roll. His words mark a broader media phenomenon: the preemptive dismissal and denigration of dissent through patriotic branding.

Because when patriotism becomes intellectual property, only those with the license can claim to love their country out loud. Everyone else is trespassing.

America is not fragile enough to be wounded by protest. But the political media ecosystem — which has turned national identity into a subscription model — might be. The subversive act isn’t waving the flag or burning it.

It’s remembering that it never belonged to anyone in the first place.

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.