WASHINGTON— “I know many here and many viewers are upset by the election, so am I,” Matt Braynard told the crowd at the “Justice for J6″ rally in front of the Capitol building on Saturday, in support of those arrested during the riot. insurrectionary by supporters of Donald Trump that took place on January 6. “But the reaction we saw on January 6: it was stupid. It was wrong.”
It was a strange point: the organizer of the entire protest in defense of those arrested on January 6 described why he thought those who rioted on January 6 were stupid and wrong. Peaceful protests, like this one, Braynard said, were the way to make a real point. “This is what terrified them!”
If I’m honest, it wasn’t a line that made the crowd move a lot, more complaints than cheers were received. Of course, if I’m honest, there weren’t many people there to get going.
Policeman? There were many of those. Lined with riot shields and helmets behind the fences that enclose the Capitol grounds; in long lines of bicycles alongside rows of dump trucks blocking the streets; on motorcycles and helicopters and alongside their parked cruisers that line the blocks around. All of the DC cops were on duty, and the National Guard had troops waiting ready in the armory.
Press? Oh yeah. It is my honest estimate that there was a member of the accredited press there for every protester.
The most representative moment of the morning came perhaps half an hour before the protest officially began: a lone woman stood in front of the Capitol building waving a pole on which an American flag hung upside down. As she stood silently, a true protester at a time when they seemed few and far between all the cordons and shoulder-mounted television cameras, was surrounded by first a handful, then a dozen, then perhaps three dozen. members of the press. take photos and videos.
It’s a fair bet that every person who showed up at the rally with a sign (“Harmless patriots suffer in solitude while riot infiltrators, looters, and arsonists are nationally pleased!” For example, or “Those incarcerated on 6 January they should sue SWAMP ”). It will appear in a newscast or in a newspaper somewhere. At many times, journalists lined up to interview the same people.
The police estimate that the total turnout for the rally, not including its own officers, was 400 to 500 people. Like I said, it seemed like half of them were members of the press. I’d say another 10 percent were tourists wandering around the mall to see what was going on. Another quarter appeared to be counter-protesters, with signs that said things like “Commit the crime, make the time” and “There is no right to insurrection.”
The ratio between those who sought to release the detainees on January 6 and those who argued that they deserved to be locked up ensured many face-to-face discussions between them. Each of these, of course, attracted a wide and dense circle of media watchers.
At one point, two gray-bearded men with anti-insurrection posters confronted a gray-haired man on a bicycle yelling at them that the election had been stolen from Trump.
“They pulled the suitcases out from under the tables after all the votes were supposed to be counted. It was on video. Everybody saw it, “said the guy on the bike, repeating a widely discredited fraud claim.
“The problem is that you don’t want to understand what was really happening in that video. The Governor of the State is a Republican! The Secretary of State is a Republican! There was no fraud, ”said one of the other guys.
“So let’s put it all on the table, let’s do a proper audit like the one we’re doing in Arizona!”
This drew laughter from a nearby crowd more anti-Trump than otherwise.
Suddenly, a guy in a flashy print T-shirt that looked like it might be a Weird Al Yankovic impersonator started yelling, “Look at this! Like 30 reporters surrounding an old argument between two Boomers! It’s Boomer TV, tune in and see why the Boomers are in a bad mood! “
Among those in the crowd who attended to support those arrested on January 6, a variety of other messages stood out. Only a few wore MAGA clothing or carried pro-Trump signs (as the organizers had asked them not to), but more carried signs that said Biden was a traitor and condemned immigration (“Congress has a fence, but Not America “), COVID vaccines, pedophilia, the FBI, communism, and Nancy Pelosi. One of the most popular notions among attendees was that the Black Lives Matter protesters were the real threat to America, and that they had been left easy while they hunted down Trump supporters.
Braynard wore a blue suit with a white shirt and red tie, like the former president whose campaign he worked on. He was flanked all day by an identically dressed security man wearing sunglasses and an iPhone headset in one ear.
Braynard and the other speakers at the rally emphasized their demand that the protesters remain peaceful, berated the crowd for booing mentions of the Democratic police, press or politicians, and repeatedly condemned the violence and destruction of property from the riots. January 6. But they argued that many of the protesters arrested on January 6 simply entered the Capitol building and did not commit violence, and that they were being denied due process and treated poorly in the prison system. Braynard scoffed at the idea that the riot had been an “insurrection” and said the only reason it is characterized that way is because of the political leanings of the attendees.
“God bless you all,” Braynard closed. “America First, America Forever! Now go home please. “And very soon, without much incident, they did.
Reference-www.thestar.com