From Baltimore to Annapolis, May Day protests expected to draw thousands across Maryland

Thousands of worker-centered demonstrations are popping up across the country for May Day, including nearly two dozen in Maryland, as organizers say cost-of-living concerns mount for working people.

Marylanders are locking arms with many across the nation to protest, among many concerns, rising costs, international conflict and threats to democracy. Organizers with the national coalition May Day Strong say over 3,000 events across the country are planned, double the size of last year’s 1,500 demonstrations.

In 2025, thousands of Baltimoreans converged for May Day upon McKeldin Plaza from marches across the city, amplified by frustrations with university funding cuts and fired federal workers. Larry Stafford, the executive director of Progressive Maryland, a partner of the May Day Strong National coalition, believes increasing cost-of-living concerns are pushing people to protest this year.

“I think people have a very real example to see this May Day exactly how imperialism and those types of conflicts can have a direct effect in their lives,” Stafford said. “Working class people are being squeezed in ways that, you know, many people have not experienced in their lifetimes, and I think that also drives a growing amount of interest in May Day and participation in these types of events.”

This year, some Baltimoreans, led by the People’s Power Assembly, will rally at McKeldin Plaza before marching to Baltimore Police Department headquarters, Baltimore Gas and Electric and the George H. Fallon Federal Building to protest police killings, rising electric costs and immigration detention center conditions.

Protesters are marching to express their frustration with the three police-involved fatalities this year and four in 2025; gas rates tripling and electric rates doubling since 2012; and the alleged maltreatment and poor conditions of an immigration holding room in the Fallon building.

Other Baltimoreans plan to meet at Druid Hill Park. There, people can learn how to get involved with different community organizations, said Alex Sweeney, a steering committee member for the Greater Baltimore Democratic Socialists of America.

May Day events at Druid Hill Park will also include a rally and march. Sweeney said she expects up to 1,000 people to show, many of whom she hopes will walk away feeling empowered following the example the Democratic Socialists of America and other partnering groups have set.

“This May Day event, it’s a bunch of organizations coming together really democratically,” Sweeney said. “So I’d like that to be like a small example that anyone coming to this event can carry forward, that we can all come together around each of our struggles, realize that they’re connected democratically, decide our list of demands, and then make that happen by something like a general strike, which is another seed we want to plant.”

Lindsey Eldridge, a spokesperson for the Baltimore Police Department, said officials are aware of planned protests and are dedicated to protecting people’s right to peacefully assemble.

“The Department is prepared to deploy officers as needed to support peaceful demonstrations, assist with traffic flow, and maintain public safety,” Eldridge said in an email. “BPD has and will continue to work in close coordination with local, state, and federal law enforcement partners to ensure a respectful environment for all.”

History of May Day

May Day stems from workers’ push for an eight-hour workday after the Civil War, according to Bill Barry, a retired director of labor studies at the Community College of Baltimore County in Dundalk.

The state of Illinois passed legislation instituting the eight-hour workday that was meant to take effect on May 1, 1867, prompting workers to celebrate, said Barry, who’s also the creator of the Maryland250 Labor History project and a former union organizer.

However, Barry said, employers failed to honor and enforce the law.

The fight wouldn’t pick up steam again until the 1880s, when the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions called for a national strike to demand an eight-hour workday on May 1, 1886, according to PBS. Barry said it’s estimated 300,000 to 500,000 people across the country went on strike on May 1, around 80,000 of whom were in Chicago.

The strikes took a violent turn in just a couple of days. On May 3, PBS says, two workers were killed at a strike at the McCormick Reaper Works in Chicago after 200 police attacked and shot at them. Workers rallied for those who died on May 4 at Haymarket Square. A bomb was thrown, killing seven police officers and a number of civilians, PBS said. The incident led to four men being executed by hanging.

May Day has been celebrated by people across the globe, with many marking 1886 as the beginning, but Barry said Maryland’s celebrations are fairly new. He thinks they’re driven largely by people’s resistance to President Donald Trump’s administration.

“Conditions have changed so dramatically that people who have never participated before are coming out,” he said.

Barry sees May Day in Baltimore as a chance to get people involved. Noting that unions only make up 10% of the workforce now, Barry said he’s hopeful people will be motivated to organize and unionize more after attending these events.

“I know the opposition to it is very severe,” he said. “People just have to have that attitude that collectively we’re going to do it.”

Unions such as National Nurses United, the Baltimore Teachers Union and Teachers Association of Anne Arundel County, are leading demonstrations across the region on Friday.

While Baltimore City Public School students are home for the day, union members will host “walk-ins,” 10- to 15-minute rallies outside schools and other work sites across in the area.

When Anne Arundel Public Schools let out on Friday afternoon, union members have organized end-of-day walkouts at 40 schools to advocate for investment in public education, Kristina Korona, the president of the Teachers Association of Anne Arundel County, said in a statement.

Friday is also the day Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman presents the county’s budget for fiscal year 2027, which teachers are monitoring closely for increased staffing and educator salaries. Korona said the budget “will let us know whether or not Anne Arundel County will continue to make the necessary investments in our public schools that are needed to move them from good to great.”

“Budgets are moral documents that show the priorities of a community,” Korona said. “When billionaires aren’t required to pay their fair share in taxes, local communities are forced to make tough choices about which public services and community projects will get funded and which will not.”

Justin Mulachy, a spokesperson for the Anne Arundel County Police Department, said in an email that officers are monitoring May Day demonstrations and are prepared to allocate public safety resources, while also protecting people’s right to peacefully assemble. They don’t anticipate road closures or traffic disruptions, but will post on their social media platforms should anything change, he said.

Some people are also taking a less conventional approach to protest on May Day. Baltimore To Palestine, a group that hosts weekly vigils at Lake Montebello, is hosting a two-day festival of resistance that’ll feature an art show, film screening, poetry slam, labor panel and other workshops.

“After all the protesting and going out there marching, I think it’s a really great way to close the evening in community,” said Evelyn Codero, one of the organizers.

In addition to marches and rallies, protesters will be waving signs along streets and even major highway overpasses across Maryland. Here are some of the demonstrations happening across Maryland on Friday.

Anne Arundel County

• Annapolis May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m., Bestgate Road and Generals Highway
• Broadneck May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m., College Parkway and Green Holly Drive
• Crofton May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m., 2291 Davidsonville Road (along Route 425 in front of Crofton High School)
• Edgewater May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m. Maryland Route 2 and Lee Airpark Drive
• Hanover May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m., Arundel Mills Boulevard and Arundel Mills Drive
• Millersville/Severn May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m., Quarterfield Road and George Clauss Boulevard
• Odenton May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m., 1151 Annapolis Road (in front of Popeye’s)
• Pasadena May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m., 7750 Edwin Raynor Blvd. (sidewalks of park)
• Severna Park May Day 2026: 3:30 p.m., Ritchie Highway and West McKinsey Road

Baltimore City

• National Nurses Unit St. Agnes Nurses Picket: 9 a.m., 900 South Caton Avenue
• May Day Play Day: 10 a.m., 625 N. Carey Street
• Lauraville Neighborhood Strike Party: 12 p.m., 4500 Harford Road
• Baltimore May Day 2026: End the Wars, Stop ICE: 2:30 p.m., Swann Drive and Druid Hill Lake Drive
• Baltimore: General Strike May Day 2026: 3 p.m., McKeldin Plaza
• Brooklyn Park May Day 2026: Workers Over Billionaires: 3:30 p.m., Hammonds Lane and Ritchie Highway
• Workers Over Billionaires May Day Dance Party: 5:30 p.m., 1500 N. Charles St.
• Baltimore Festival of Resistance: 6 p.m.-10 p.m. Friday; noon-3 a.m. Saturday, 2239 Kirk Ave.

Baltimore County

• Pikesville May Day 2026, 4 p.m., Pedestrian Bridge over Rt-50

Howard County

• Resist - Silence Gives Consent, 4 p.m., 9706 Gorman Road

Montgomery County

• Watkins Mill Overpass Gaithersburg May Day 2026: 8 a.m., Watkins Mill Overpass Exit 12/Watkins Mill Rd/N, Interstate 270, 565 Watkins Mill Road
• Rockville (King Farm) May Day, 9 a.m., Maryland 355 and Redland Boulevard
• Rockville May Day 2026, 10 a.m., 1300 Rockville Pike
• First Amendment Rally, 4 p.m., Georgia Avenue and Arcola Avenue (curb and sidewalk outside of Wheaton Library)
• Silver Spring May Day 2026, 4 p.m., Forest Glen Road and Georgia Avenue (Forest Glen Metro)
• Students Rise Up On May Day Blue Mountain High School, 4 p.m., Market Street East and Center Point Way
• Enough Is Enough, 5 p.m., east side of 16th St between Second Avenue and Grace Church Road
• Olney May Day 2026, 6 p.m., 16601 Georgia Ave.

Prince George’s County

• Bowie May Day, 4 p.m., 15202 Major Lansdale Boulevard (Pedestrian Bridge over Rt-50)