NORTH Ayrshire residents took a trip down south to protest Donald Trump’s first official visit as US President last week.

People from across the area travelled to Turnberry to protest Ayrshire’s most controversial hotelier’s first Presidential visit – with the leader of North Ayrshire Council also joining demonstrators in Glasgow.

A demonstration led by North Ayrshire Green party members took place by the police barricade outside the resort.

Further demonstrators were positioned at the south side of the luxury resort, with most protesters later moving onto Turnberry Beach managing get within ear shot of the President as he played a round of golf.

Kilwinning resident and Green Party organiser Yvonne McLellan said: “We all took to the beach in a show of unity and support for those who are mistreated and oppressed.

“He thinks it’s okay to mock disabled people, brag about sexually assaulting women and marginalisin g t h e L GB T community. America’s abortion rights are under threat and he has branded whole countries as ‘rapists’ and ’s********’. Backing out of the Paris Climate Agreement is a huge concern and he’s now interfering with Brexit and has backed his ‘friend’ Boris Johnson as the next PM.”

Labour Cllr Joe Cullinane said: “Trump’s misogyny, racism, homophobia being promoted from the office of the US President is giving rise to a new fascism across the globe. I therefore thought it important to join protests against his visit, not only to stand in solidarity with those who have been on the receiving end of Trump’s attacks, including those families separated with children held in cages, but to challenge his politics in general, a politics which have saw fascists on the streets of Br itain defending the racist Tommy Robinson and the fascists who tried to cause trouble at the Durham Miners Gala. We have to take a stand against this hatred and promote a politics of love, hope and solidarity.”

Nairn McDonald, who also travelled down from Kilwinning, said they wanted to send a message to Trump that his misogyny, xenophobia and Islamophobia was unacceptable.

He said: “With his policies on caging children, policies about banning Muslims and the fact he brags about sexual assault, it’s about us showing the people of Scotland and the UK are just not having it.

“They say he brings investment, but for what it costs to play a round of golf at Trump Turnberry the average worker would have to work something like 44 hours just to afford it, he’s mostly benefitting his own elite group.

West of Scotland Gr een MSP Ross Greer said: “From a hundred feet away we told this famously thin-skinned bigot that his hatred isn’t welcome. A man who brags of sexually assaulting women, who throws refugee children into cages separated from their par ents and who victimises everyone from American Muslims to disabled people should be resisted wherever he goes.

“People from across Ayrshire and even a couple of visiting Americans came together to show Trump Scotland is no place for a man so devoid of common decency.”