Led By Donkeys launched an art-activist protest during Donald Trump's second state visit to Windsor Castle, projecting a nine-minute film detailing his alleged relationship with Jeffrey Epstein onto the castle walls. The event, which garnered significant media attention, led to a confrontation with police and the arrest of several group members, though all charges were subsequently dropped.
When Donald Trump’s second state visit was announced, and when the finer details for the Windsor banquet on 17 September 2025 became known, there was no way Led By Donkeys was going to let that pass unprotested. It was just so craven, rolling out the red carpet for Trump. Their next art-activist event unfolded like clockwork. Led By Donkeys made a nine-minute film about Trump’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein which ended: “The president of the United States was a long-time close friend of America’s most notorious child sex trafficker. He’s alleged to be mentioned, numerous times, in the files arising from the investigation into that child sex trafficker … Now that president, Donald Trump, is sleeping here, in Windsor Castle.” (Trump says that he fell out with Epstein years before Epstein was first arrested, and has consistently denied any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein.) The group had booked rooms in the Harte and Garter hotel, which handily tags them “castle view” and “even more helpfully”, says Ben Stewart, a Led By Donkeys founder, “castle view superior”. They had a massive 32,000-lumen projector and, for the soundtrack, Stewart went outside and put a Bluetooth speaker, hidden in a box of Kellogg’s Fruit ’n Fibre, on top of a rubbish bin. The world’s media were amassed, staring at the castle, but they were bored because Trump hadn’t yet arrived. This film went everywhere. “Although the still pictures of Epstein and Trump went crazy online,” Stewart says, “I’m not sure that persuades anyone of anything – it just makes Trump uncomfortable. The film we made gives people a social object to share, saying: ‘There’s something really serious to look at here.’ We took a piece of guerrilla journalism about Trump and Epstein, and it was viewed 20m times.” The film started with the Windsor Castle logo. “It requires a little bit of mapping to project on to a cylindrical building,” Stewart says. “So there’s this royal crest of arms. The police are thinking: ‘Ah, that’s nice – the royal family,’ and suddenly a great big picture of Jeffrey Epstein comes up. This electric jolt goes through the fluoro [fluorescent jackets of the police] around me, and the police all pile into the hotel.” It wasn’t the group’s first rodeo, of course; it wasn’t even their first action against Trump. Back in 2018, while working for Greenpeace, Stewart flew a paraglider over the hotel where the president was staying when he visited Turnberry, in South Ayrshire; the next year, Stewart got a visit from the police, who told him that if he tried that again, they couldn’t be responsible for what would happen. But none of the Led By Donkeys creators were especially worried about getting arrested. “All my anxiety is channelled into wanting the action to succeed,” says Oliver Knowles, another co-founder of the group. “By the time the police make the intervention, the die is cast.” Well, sort of – the police moved fast and were in the lobby within three minutes, “really pumped up”, Knowles remembers. “They were in jumpsuits and baseball caps. They’d finally found some protesters. They came roaring up the stairs; they were briefed; they were on a mission to protect the president. Thankfully, no guns. But they were very adrenalised when they came into the room. I had to say to them: ‘Let’s keep this really calm.’” Six minutes is a long time to stall a large number of police officers. They didn’t know what law they were planning to make any arrests under, so that helped. When the police finally got into the room, “one officer started reading a section of the Town and Country Planning Act, which another officer asked him to stop reading because it wasn’t right.” Knowles and three other team members were then arrested for malicious communication, which is a stalking law, “and it’s very specific: it’s designed to deal with a really concerning offence. To throw it at a piece of journalism, projected on to a wall, to protect the reputation of the president, seemed against the spirit of the legislation,” Stewart says archly. While the others were getting arrested, he was melting into the crowd, then soon after was on the train out of Windsor, calling lawyers. Led By Donkeys attacks ‘Orwellian’ arrests after Trump Windsor projections Read more Some time in the middle of the night, when the activists were in the cells of Maidenhead police station, officers came in and arrested them again, this time for public nuisance, having decided that was more likely to succeed in court. When they came to be questioned, the only officers available were from the child protection squad – and the irony of child protection officers questioning Led By Donkeys over the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein because all the regular police were busy protecting Donald Trump … well, it was striking. Knowles and his associates just answered every question: “No comment.” A few minutes into the interview, the officers slid over a photograph: “‘Mr Knowles, did you remove the drawer from this bedside table?’ ‘No comment.’ ‘Mr Knowles, do you know anybody else who may have had reason to remove the drawer?’ ‘No comment.’ I knew what was coming: a picture of a giant projector, ratchet-strapped to four drawers. At that point the detectives were finding it hard to keep a straight face.” Just over a month later, all charges were dropped.
