Monday, March 30, 2026 • Very warm and windy. Mid-80s. 💨

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By Oklahoma Voice Staff
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OKLAHOMA CITY — Thousands of Oklahomans across the state rallied at No Kings demonstrations, pushing back against what they view as an attempt by President Donald Trump to expand his power.

Some Oklahoma protests in outlying cities drew only a few dozen participants while the one in Oklahoma’s capital city near Oklahoma City Hall drew over 1,000.

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👀 See Also:
• Hundreds of Tulsans join nationwide ‘No Kings’ protests against Trump administration (Tulsa Flyer)

• Largest ‘No Kings’ protest yet sees thousands march through Downtown (Oklahoma City Free Press)

• Protestors fill Shepler Park for third ‘No Kings’ demonstration (KSWO)

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A hand-curated list of the best journalism from across the state:

• AWACS from Tinker destroyed in Iranian strike overseas (The Oklahoman)*

• Oklahoma lawmakers want free speech training after OU essay case (The Oklahoman)*

• Custer City man charged in connection to Oklahoma wildfires (News 9)

• OHP: 28-year-old Guthrie man killed in single-vehicle crash on I-40 near Newalla (KOCO)

• OHP: Person dead after crash involving ATVs in Pottawatomie County (KOCO)

• McAlester voters to decide one-cent sales tax hike for streets, charter updates (NonDoc)

• Cherokee Nation distributes $7.26 million to public schools through tag sales (Cherokee Phoenix)

• OKCPS District 7: Gen Z candidates Natalie Roman, Galilea Martinez face off (NonDoc)

• ‘Disappointed’: OHFA suspends HOME program as Legislature considers reducing restrictions (NonDoc)

• Give your garden a drink and your water bill a break with Tulsa’s rain barrel program (Tulsa Flyer)

• ‘TAKE A TREASURE’: Tulsa teacher builds Oklahoma’s first Little Free Box of Happy (2 News Oklahoma)

• Walmart near Woodland Hills Mall undergoing major renovations | Commercial building permits (Tulsa World)*

• Durant High School’s ‘Aero Day’ inspires hundreds of students to explore aviation careers (KXII)

By Keaton Ross, Oklahoma Watch
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In early October, an unusual ad began airing on television in Oklahoma. It opened with Charles McCall, the former speaker of the Oklahoma House of Representatives and current candidate for governor, wielding a butcher knife over a banana in a kitchen. Looking into the camera, McCall said, “Let me be perfectly clear: Cutting this banana” — dramatic chop — “does not make it an orange.” The ad went on to tout McCall’s opposition to transgender rights, then concluded with McCall looking into the camera again. “I have a simple message for any lunatic pushing sex change for kids,” he said. Another chop. “You first.”

If you wanted a 30-second summary of McCall’s strategy in the upcoming GOP gubernatorial primary, this ad was it: a maximal serving of culture-war politics. More recently, he produced an ad vowing to stand with President Donald Trump to “crush the threat of radical Islam” and has said that one of his opponents “let Radical Muslims infiltrate the OK State Capitol.”

When I interviewed McCall in late January, I asked him about the banana ad. A law enacted in 2023, when McCall was House speaker, expressly prohibits gender-transition procedures for minors. Was there an effort underway to roll back the bill? Did the state need to pass an even more stringent prohibition? “There are a lot of people in the state of Oklahoma that are concerned about those value issues,” he responded. “They want to know where you stand on them. It’s not the only thing we are talking about and have been talking about, but that’s important to the Republican electorate.” 

Polling suggests he isn’t exactly wrong. In a January survey conducted by Oklahoma pollster Cole Hargrave Snodgrass and Associates, 53% of likely Republican primary voters said cultural issues such as banning Sharia law and transgender surgeries for youth would be vital when deciding which candidate to support. Just 39% said those topics were less important than day-to-day government functions, namely public education, tax policy and infrastructure.

And yet the favorite in the Republican primary, Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond, is taking a different tack. To be clear, Drummond is no centrist. He has frequently voiced support for the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts and criticized the current governor, Kevin Stitt — who is barred by term limits from running again — for collaborating with the Biden administration to resettle hundreds of Afghan refugees in 2021.

But Drummond also believes McCall has overestimated voters’ appetite for culture-war issues. The electorate, he maintains, is more interested in quality-of-life questions, like improving the state’s abysmal public education rankings and reining in soaring homeowner-insurance rates. “Right now in Oklahoma, you cannot wake up a male yesterday and wake up a female today and compete in sports,” Drummond told me in February. “It’s not permissible today to chop your banana in two as a minor. Now, if you want to have gender-altering surgery as an 18-year-old, knock yourself out. I don’t think it’s a good idea, but these issues that one candidate is promoting are really solved issues.” 

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A daily briefing connecting Oklahomans to the state’s best journalism — and original content from Oklahoma Memo. Got a news tip? Somebody I need to interview? Message me at [email protected].