Home from the rally! Inside the rally was SO MUCH FUN. If he does rallies around the country during the general, and you haven’t gone, do go. It’s a wonder for the soul to be in a space filled with thousands of people who get it, who feel like you do. Everyone I spoke to was like an old friend.
It was incredible waiting in line, seeing all the people in their Trump gear. Some amazing shirts, funny. Lots of anti-Hillary shirts. I like the one written in her special arrow font, saying BENGHAZI, and under neath saying that the H (in the Hillary font) is silent. Everyone was upbeat. People from all walks of life, all races, lots of older kids, seniors with walkers, people in wheelchairs.
TSA screened us, along with the Secret Service and the Bomb Squad plus their bomb dogs, which were gorgeous. Like Donald says, the safest place in the country is INSIDE a Trump rally.
One thing they may not have shown on tv is the sheer quantity of the Stolen Lives banners. There were about 40 different faces represented, and I assume the wonderful people carrying and holding them were their bereaved loved ones. All of these photos were of course people whose lives were cut short by illegal aliens. One sign said “Why import extra criminals?”
All around me were great, interesting people. I sat next to an Army guy who is hoping to get a civilian security job. We were both admiring the SS guys and how seriously they were working, scanning the crowds. He had quite a rough stutter, but when this army guy sang the national anthem, he sounded beautiful. Another guy was young of Indian ancestry and so smart. There was nothing about Hillary or Trump he didn’t know. I want the future to belong to kids like that.
I did have one strange guy sit next to me on the other side for a bit. He was EXTREMELY friendly with many cameras on him. He had a striking accent, I’m not sure where from, maybe Ireland? But he wouldn’t admit to it, said he’d always lived in Orange County. That made me uneasy even though he was very friendly and boisterous. I kept asking myself, was I imagining that accent? But it was quite noticeable and I have a good ear. I felt he was “lying” and it bothered me. He got up a lot to wander in the crowd.
When Trump came out, to thunderous cheering, the first thing he did was tell the story of the national anthem — that the singer told him they wouldn’t let her sing it because there wasn’t time. So he insisted we have to have the anthem, brought her up, and she got to sing it with him standing there. Did I say SHE sang it?? We ALL sang it. A room filled to the rafters with patriots singing our beloved anthem. Sure, she had a good voice. But we, all together? That was something.
You saw the rally. You know Trump was great, had such energy. He is a wonderful story teller. He definitely interacts with us, he feels us, he hears us (literally - he responds both to the hecklers and the “I love you” calls). He is genuine. When it was over and we all filed out, there were smiles on everyone’s face. Kind of sappy, but it just was a great feeling in there.
Got to my car on the 4th floor of the parking structure, pulled it out and was “in line” to descend. Never moved an inch in about an hour. At one point, people who were hanging out outside their vehicles started running past me. There was yelling, there were bullhorns. I saw on the floor below us (to the side you could see the lower level) some guys hurling things off the garage level onto the ground below. I think those were protesters. I couldn’t go see what was going on, because I was alone, but people going past were telling me various things. One thing was for sure: we were not being let out of the parking structure. Kind of scary.
Cops on those Segway like vehicles came up and whooshed past. Sometimes there was yelling and honking of horns. Finally the line of cars started to move. Slowly we circled down the garage levels and emerged onto the street.
I’ve never seen that many police with my own eyes before. The guys with the extra bulky protection on, weapons all over them. All those mounted police. Dozens of officers in groups all over that street. All directions blocked off but one. Helicopters whirring overhead. We were sent down a residential street, and around each corner were more cops. People were outside of their houses watching. I had been hearing on the radio that the big streets were blocked so I wanted to go somewhere to the south to take another street, but there were so many police everywhere. Even many blocks away, on the big streets things were blocked off. One intersection had a lot of Hispanic people milling about, and I couldn’t tell if they had been protesters or not. When I got to Chapman, it was blocked too, but I saw the police were removing their cones there so I could turn left there.
An adventure. And worth all of the trouble to experience the Trump rally and to be among thousands of Americans who loved this country and want To make her thriving and sustaining to her people again.
thanks for this wonderful report!!!! Glad you had a good time and the parking deck experience sounded scary.(Movie addict that I am, I think of the MANY scary happenings in parking garages/decks)
At work and been busier than I would like! Going to see if I can find the Cavaliers on... (yes, they are on, the challenge is for me to find them)
hugs/love from Ohio
Am so glad you reported in. Have been waiting and to be honest a bit worried.
They turned the sound of the crowd off while singing the antham but you could see mouths moving. Just knew it had to be inspirational . I linked to a video of it above.
Know how you feel about the crowd. Just multiply that by the hundred of rallies and tens of thousands of people. AMERICANS ARE GREAT!
Given the right leadership the country will bounce back quickly.
Now relax, put your feet up and have sweet memories !
Thanks for the terrific report!
How wonderful that you enjoyed the rally so much! I’m going to one tomorrow. If it’s half as much fun as yours, it will be yuuuuge!
Thank you for sharing,sounds so wonderful for you! I’m very happy for you! :)
Thanks for the rally play-by-play. I’m glad you got home safe!
So glad you made it safely out. That must have been a bit of a hair raiser. Something to remember and retell for years to come.
Wow—wonderful after action report Yaelle—thanks so much for writing it.
I am grinning like a Cheshire Cat after reading it.
Maybe having the whole crowd sing the anthem is an idea that will take.
Thank you so much for this wonderfully detailed recap of today’s Trump rally, dearest Yaelle.
We get to relive the entire event through your on-the-scene eyes!!
I am thankful you are home safe. Really appreciate all of the fine details/descriptions. Beautiful :)
I also noticed a strange dude. Tall, late 20s/early30's. He was first over where the hispanic or whatever who tore the sign in half was, on the upper level behind and to the left of the podium. He was going through the rows, like he had dropped something and was searching for something. I thought he was maybe looking for extra Trump signs. Then, after the guy with the torn sign was escorted out, this young man came over behind us, where we had just wandered a few minutes before, directly behind Trump, thinking to get an wide audience pix. I noticed him because he seemed rushed, and he was standing with his back to us, fiddling with something. When he took his backpack off his shirt was sweaty and he was wiping sweat off his face. I expected him to sit down. I mean, if someone rushed to find something they'd dropped, wouldn't they want to rest a second? But instead he took some sort of battery pack or something that had a white wire and hung it around his neck, along with a round base (magnetic?) for a iPhone. This fiddling went on for a bit and my better half walked to the section exit and mentioned the behavior to the agent there.
A minute or two after that, this guy starts reaching up into the ceiling tiles (!) like he was trying to mount his camera there? I couldn't understand why. We had already discovered that we were too far away for a good clear view of the audience with our own phones and he had been fiddling with his phone long enough to discover that too. All this drew the attention of at least two guys on the lower level, who I saw were pointing him out. All of a sudden a guy in a white shirt came from my left towards the guy and the agent got up to where the guy was and they talked a bit. Next thing I know, the guy is now sitting 4 seats from us, with the iPhone in this maybe magnetic base, trying to balance it on the rail - like he was trying to show what he was doing, but wasn't keeping the camera steady and also was not saying anything. Then he gets up, moved a section over and did the same thing with the iphone, and another section over and then he disappeared. Just like the guy who tore the sign in half, and then waved it around until someone noticed, it was like 'ceiling tile' guy was trying to get noticed.
When I got home, I learned the first person booted (also booted in Costa Mesa) from the rally, Naui Huitzilopochtli, who complained he was "tackled going to the restroom," said he was a photographer. I saw his photo, and it's not the same guy we saw messing with the ceiling tiles. It's a little strange that there would be two or maybe three wonky photographers at the same event, but maybe SoCal just has some really, really weird photographers?
The good news for us was, we were in overflow parking so we were able to drive out the side away from the parking garage and missed all the 'fun'.( Which I'm sure it wasn't being trapped in a parking garage!!) As we're driving home, expecting everything to be pretty much over and done, we're listening to talk radio about rocks being thrown at horses by a few dozen protestors which was thinned to 12. Then we hear the numbers grew to 40 by 5pm and 100ish by 6pm, all of them trying to get ugly with the PD, which probably outnumbered them by 4 to 1 ! It was 9pm before things were quiet again.
WOW TINK!!!!
A great report. I felt I was there with you. We’ve wanted AMERICAN’S TO WAKE UP and now they finally have and we are witnessing it!
I bet Donald gets in his plane at night and is still in awe of what’s going on and how he’s hit a nerve. He’s probably telling his wife and kids how sad we American’s are because ALL it took basically was listening with the ears and doing what’s right!
He’s seeing it up close and it hasn’t been easy for him I’m sure realizing how American’s have sold out their country so easily....
Donald’s responsibility is ENORMOUS! I pray for him every day....
Thanks “Tink”. Beautiful writing...