British activists upset about President Trump’s state visit this week protested his arrival by projecting a picture of Mr. Trump with Jeffrey Epstein on the walls of Windsor Castle and unrolling a massive banner of the picture on the castle’s grassy lawn.
The president and Melania Trump, the first lady, arrived in London on Tuesday night. They are scheduled to spend Wednesday at Windsor Castle, hosted by King Charles III and Queen Camilla. Mr. Trump will also meet Prime Minister Keir Starmer at his country residence, Chequers, on Thursday.
Police intervened to stop both political stunts quickly and made arrests over the projection. Representatives of the group behind the banner said they had achieved their goal of seeking to embarrass the president by noting his one-time friendship with the convicted sex trafficker.
The banner was created by the group Everyone Hates Elon, which was behind similar protests in Britain against Elon Musk, the billionaire tech mogul.
Mr. Trump’s trip this week to Britain, where he is broadly unpopular, has also spurred a television special by Channel 4, a public broadcaster, aimed at fact-checking questionable claims that he made as president, as well as a planned demonstration in the streets of London on Wednesday.
His first state visit in 2019 drew large crowds of protesters offering a similar sentiment: He is unwelcome in Britain.
Mr. Trump has in recent months struggled to evade the public’s scrutiny over his ties to Mr. Epstein, who was arrested on charges of sex trafficking in 2019 before dying in prison. Lawmakers recently released documents showing the financier’s association to Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly referred to the Epstein case as a “hoax.”
The banner rolled out by Everyone Hates Elon was about 65 feet long and 65 feet wide. It was paid for by about 2,000 crowdsourced donors, the spokeswoman said.
The images of Mr. Trump and Mr. Epstein were apparently projected onto the towers of Windsor Castle by a different group called Led By Donkeys, who have performed similar stunts in the past. The images were also posted to the group’s Instagram account.
Felicity Parker, the chief superintendent of the Thames Valley Police, said in a statement that officers had “responded swiftly to stop the projection” and arrested four people on suspicion of malicious communications, a low-level offense.
On the first day of Mr. Trump’s state visit on Wednesday, protesters were expected to gather in London and march to Parliament Square.
On Wednesday night, Channel 4 was scheduled to air over several hours a reel of what it called the “untruths, falsehoods and distortions” that Mr. Trump has spoken since January, punctuated by fact checks.
“We hope it will remind viewers how disorientating and dangerous the world becomes when the most powerful man on earth shows little regard for the truth,” Ian Katz, Channel 4’s chief content officer, said in a statement.
John Yoon is a Times reporter based in Seoul who covers breaking and trending news.
Michael D. Shear is a senior Times correspondent covering British politics and culture, and diplomacy around the world.
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