A journalist attended one of Donald Trump’s political rallies to get an inside look at the GOP presumptive nominee, live tweeting what he later dubbed a “homophobic, misogynistic, racist nightmare.” The series of live tweets paint a chilling picture of a gathering marked with violence, bigotry, and a group of people united with a “palpable” anger. New Republic writer Jared Yates Sexton would later title his full report on the Greensboro rally “American Horror Story,” but unlike the fictional TV series, this story is all too real.
While violence and controversy have followed many Trump rallies, Sexton’s up-close look at the people attending this political function is every bit as shocking as some of the words uttered by Trump himself, with Mother Jones calling his tweets “frightening.” One of the first things that Sexton noted was that there seemed to be a large number of people at the rally who appeared inebriated. He also reported that he saw one woman denied entry because she was too “alternative.”
Suv blaring I Am A Real American, waving Trump hats and flipping off homeless and car with Mexican flag. What reality is this
— Jared Yates Sexton (@JYSexton) June 15, 2016
Merchandise sold at the rally included T-shirts with the slogan “Trump that B*tch,” referring to Hillary Clinton, and according to Sexton, every time she was mentioned, the crowd responded by referring to the Democratic candidate using the misogynistic term. This behavior might not be shocking to many people, but some of Sexton’s tweets as the Trump rally went on became more and more offensive and frightening.
Sexton stated that many members of the crowd were trying to figure out who the protesters were, and he later tweeted that one protester near him was “scared to death.” As another protester was removed from the rally by security, Trump chimed in to “take care of our protestor, don’t huuuurt him, take him home to mommy,” but the crowd started chanting “hurt him, hurt him…” Sexton also observed many fights and shoving matches regularly throughout the entire Trump rally.
In his full article, Sexton makes the case that journalists need to get into the crowd to really see what’s going on, rather than standing in the media pit up front. While Trump has made many statements that are offensive to different ethnic and religious groups, Sexton overheard far worse from Trump’s supporters while standing in the crowd.
Just overheard: “you can’t trust Latinos. Some maybe but not most”
— Jared Yates Sexton (@JYSexton) June 14, 2016
Overheard: immigrants aren’t people, honey
— Jared Yates Sexton (@JYSexton) June 14, 2016
Overheard: Muslim ban “good for Muslims” let’s them “sit and think about what they’ve done”
— Jared Yates Sexton (@JYSexton) June 15, 2016
Father explaining Clinton let her husband have “all kinds of oral sex” to his ten year old
— Jared Yates Sexton (@JYSexton) June 14, 2016
But things got even uglier with many calls for violence and justifying it, including the recent massacre in Orlando where 49 people were killed and many others wounded at a gay nightclub. When Trump was talking about the LGBT community and that fresh tragedy, he told the crowd that Clinton is “no friend of LGBT Americans.” They even refused to clap for a call for unity with the LGBT community, and a man near Sexton shouted “The gays had it coming!”
When Trump started bragging about taking press credentials away from the Washington Post, the crowd was whipped into a frenzy and started yelling, “Kill them all!,” according to Sexton. He detailed many more horrifying moments witnessed before, during, and after the rally, and wrapped up the event in a full-length storysummarizing his thoughts after the fact.
Upon reading some of Sexton’s tweets, a couple in particular bear an eerie resemblance to a video from Pink Floyd’s fictional film “The Wall.” In the clip, Bob Geldof portrays a very Hitler-esque leader at a rally, calling out various people in the crowd who “don’t look right” and ordering security to “get them up against the Wall!” He also points out someone who looks Jewish and an African American and tells the crowd, “If I had my way, I’d have all of you shot!”
Fiction? At the time it was filmed, it was, but according to Sexton, it sounds like life may be imitating art a little too closely. Watch the video for yourself and see what you think.
Crowd chanting BUILD THAT WALL BUILD THAT WALL over operatic music.
— Jared Yates Sexton (@JYSexton) June 14, 2016
Just got told I don’t “look right.”
— Jared Yates Sexton (@JYSexton) June 14, 2016
[Photo by Jeff Swensen/Getty Images]
