The Trump rally that didn’t happen
“Now is the time to fight violence with violence, to take a stand against the fascists” As those words blasted through the monitors, Emily and I froze. For the first time I feared that I would be caught in the middle of a full-blown riot with thousands of protesters, while we were stuck standing on a trash can.
I’ve never been to any form of a protest before. I’m still not sure what compelled me to want to attend the Donald Trump rally at University of Illinois Chicago’s campus. If I had to guess I would say it was out of straight curiosity of the type of people that would be attending this event.
As Emily (Nielsen, another Decaturian reporter) and I approached the city streets that were guarded by police, we could hear the chanting getting louder and louder. I was not prepared for what I witnessed next.
“NO TRUMP! NO KKK! NO FASCIST USA!”
“WE WILL NOT GIVE OUR CITY TO A MURDERER!”
“AMERICA IS GREAT ALREADY!”
Crowds had gathered from everywhere. People from toddlers to the elderly were there supporting this protest. All political parties; Bernie, Hillary, Cruz and Rubio supports were present.
The plan was to get inside the center to listen to Trump but the press passes we had were given away due to every seat needing to be filled to fix everyone who showed. In total there were about 9,000 seats that were filled inside.
I decided to check out the protest.
There was a small area in the center of the intersection that had 3 or 4 monitors with a microphone for people to come discuss about their experiences. People were chanting and telling their stories of how they came to this country or why Trump’s words were worrying them.
Emily and I had to climb on top of a trashcan, to get on a fence to be able to see just how many protesters there were present. We listened to the different stories that were being told from the center, and while we took a moment to take in the scene.
There were children as young as 1 or 2 dressed in Anti-Trump shirts. Women were wearing hijabs and niqabs, with signs. Mexican flags were all around, and signs in Spanish calling him all sorts of names. Students were sitting in trees, climbing the street light poles, and standing on fences. Posters that said #byeAnita*, #feelthebern, #blacklivesmatter were present as well.
One woman got up on the mic and stated, “Now is the time to fight violence with violence, to take a stand against the fascists”. We both froze, confused on if we had heard the woman correctly but before I could completely process it, the crowd started to boo the lady yelling that this would be a non-violent protest.
Emily and I pushed our way towards the center of the crowd; I briefly spoke to students who had traveled from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville and students from University of Illinois just to join in with the protest.
There were many professors from the University of Illinois Chicago that were protesting for the safety of their students. The professors were standing along with their students, trying to fight for the safety of their minority classmates.
People carried around t-shirts that said No Trump or had him depicted as Hitler with the words Mien Trump. Practically everyone had some kind of anti-Trump poster. Many of the posters depicted Trump as Hitler, which seemed like a bit of a stretch but made sense as well.
The idea in comparing Trump to a modern day Hitler is absolutely terrifying.
The possibility that one man could divide a nation through racism, hate, and religious intolerance once again is something that voters need to seriously take into consideration when they vote in the primaries.
On the way to the center of the group, one of the posters intrigued me. A younger Hispanic man held a sign that read, “Do not disturb the Trump Supporter”, with an arrow that was pointed to a tall white man, about mid 30s in a full cameo outfit. The man in cameo just patiently stood with his hands in his pockets, just listening to the different speakers’ stories.
I had to ask about their story; it was too peculiar to not ask about. The younger Hispanic sign holding man was named Macias. He said that even though the man in cameo, Dan, was a Trump supporter he had just as much of a right to be able to protest peacefully with the rest of the supporters.
Dan explained that he was just standing silently with hands in his pocket when some Anti- Trump protesters started to yell that he had shoved them because he was a Trump fan. It was Macias and a couple other protesters that stepped in between and stopped a possible fight. After that incident, Macias just stood next to Dan with the sign but wouldn’t allow anyone to get violent.
This showmanship of a respectful understanding of differences at such a high-energy protest baffled me. It is possible for two opposing parties to protest peacefully together without violence involved. Imagine a Bernie supporter protecting the rights of a Trump supporter.
At 6:30pm and there was still no sign of Trump.
However, there were plenty of protesters showing up in waves of 50 or 60 at a time to join in on the peace rally.
All of sudden, the crowd roared with singing “Nah Nah Nah Hey Hey Hey Goodbye.” We asked a nearby reporter, who happened to be from Channel 12 Fox News, what was going on. He reported that Trump was not appearing because of security concerns.
The protesters cheered, “We stopped Trump” and celebrated a job well done. The final speaker thanked everyone for coming and reminded everyone to register to vote.
Trump didn’t show? The man who publicly taunted the protesters earlier in the day at the St. Louis rally, didn’t show up to his own rally? This man claims he is going to force Mexico build a wall to keep its citizens out of America but is scared of a crowd of protesters that are outside of his rally?
We watched from our trashcan podium as protesters started to leave.
After watching some of the coverage of the fights later on the news, I was completely surprised. With the protesters I saw so peaceful, I was confused why Donald Trump was blaming the anti-protesters for starting the fights.
I do think that one of the most frustrating parts of the rally was to hear about how scared many of these students were about their futures. Is this the message that the United States want to send to the rest of the world? The idea that we are letting this man come so close to the Presidency is frightening.
