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John Ismay

7 Jan, 36 tweets, 11 min read

The videos I shot last night got more attention that I expected. I’ll post more from earlier in the day now, and in chronological order

1:27pm: crowd is leaving the Washington Monument following the president’s address. They’re all headed towards the Capitol. Lots of street preachers and buskers, like this guy, among them

2:02pm: I passed by these on Constitution Ave. Someone went to the trouble of printing actual fake news and left bundles on the street free for people to read

2:09pm: lots to see on Constitution Ave. someone pushing a shopping cart full of flags, including a Confederate battle flag, followed by someone cosplaying as Beetlejuice

2:20pm: these were just some of the many, many people flying South Vietnamese flags on the way to the Capitol. Led by a Trump impersonator

2:25pm: a long line of police vehicles races towards the Capitol

2:28pm: I’m not sure this is what John Philip Sousa had in mind when he wrote “The Stars and Stripes Forever”

2:31: more police stream towards the Capitol. The Trump supporters have not actively turned on them yet, but that comes soon

2:46pm: Trump supporters swarm a police vehicle by the National Gallery of Art and prevent it from continuing towards the Capitol. The driver starts executing a three point turn

2:48pm: Trump supporters cheer as the police car drives away. Then, they continue back towards the Capitol chanting ‘U-S-A, U-S-A’

2:53pm: the crowd is thickening the closer it gets to the Capitol. A man with a megaphone chants ‘1776’

3:10pm: Trump supporter: “I just love everything about it”

3:13pm: More street preachers. The guy wearing the Navy P-3 squadron hat caught my eye

3:14pm: “God is God. All the time”

@Metallica

3:14pm: Man in a camo MAGA hat is doing his best with @Metallica’s ‘Don’t Tread On Me’

3:17pm: Word spreads through the crowd that members of Congress have evacuated. Man here implores followers to remind law enforcement officers that they have sworn an oath to the Constution

3:19pm: Trump supporters cheer when told that the Georgia statehouse has fallen. Man says ‘I’m just relaying the news. I don’t know if it’s accurate’

It’s worth taking a look at who this man believes to be traitors:

3:19pm: lots of spontaneous singing of church hymns, like this

3:21pm: ‘Amazing Grace’ doesn’t get past the first verse though

3:23pm: a ‘Deus Vult’ flag, popular with white supremacists and the anti-Muslim ‘Crusader’ movement, flying on federal land

3:25pm: during a rendition of ‘God Bless America,’ a man in a MAGA hat jumps, misjudges the landing, and knocks over a woman. Both go their separate ways

3:26pm: Pushing further into the crowd. The conversation just off-camera towards the end of this shot is interesting

3:29pm: Waldo makes an appearance during a rendition of the National Anthem. Not seeing much in the way of traditional patriotic gestures of respect for that song in this crowd, though

@TwistedSisterNY

3:31pm: some @TwistedSisterNY fans in the crowd seem to only remember the refrain to ‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’

3:35pm: Chanting ‘fight for Trump, fight for Trump’

3:37pm: chanting ‘we love Trump, we love Trump’

3:41pm: trying to walk far enough away to get a bar or two of signal strength so I can reach my editors. Had to keep walking a lot further than this, though

4:02pm: lots of ambulances on the west side of the Capitol as Trump supporters start to trickle away

4:06pm: Trump supporters queue up at the hot dog stands

4:11pm: still big crowds of Trump supporters at the Capitol. Curfew went into effect less than two hours later

4:47pm: Trump supporters are blocked by a wall of Capitol police in riot gear. Many hurl insults at the police, accusing them of treason. Less than 30 minutes later most have filed away, bitterly grumbling

@AllMattNYT

7:13pm: after taking a break at Union Station to warm up, get a bite to eat, and write feeds for our coverage, @AllMattNYT and I headed back out. Reporters were allowed past curfew; these people were not

7:16pm: well past curfew now. no one seems to think the police will move on them

7:19pm: Cops move in. For Team MAGA, this is when ‘Back the Blue’ turns to shouts of ‘fuck the police’ and death threats

sorry for the typo. meant: more attention *than I expected

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John Ismay

@johnismay

7 Jan

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