Letter from Washington: Hope at the Women’s March

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Inauguration Day ended with me running in fear down K Street, as the DC police fired “flash-bangs” to clear the mob of anti-Trump protesters.

Anarchists had set a limo on fire and were trying to stop the fire department from putting out the blaze. The explosions made me jump but it was being in the middle of a crowd that suddenly turned tail that was so frightening. It was run, or be trampled.

I needed a large bourbon when I got home.

The next day was the Women’s March on Washington, the first stirrings of opposition to President Trump. No one was sure how many people would attend.

The crowd turned out to be three times the size of the inauguration, nearly half a million people crammed into the streets of DC. The march was so large that they couldn’t march, the route being filled with people from mid-morning until night.

Women's March

Not being a fan of crowds, I was going to meet some friends after the march. But they couldn’t get to me and I couldn’t get to them, separated by a few blocks and a couple hundred thousand people.

On Inauguration Day, I rode my bike down H Street, virtually alone. Now, a day later, tens of thousands of people streamed down this street by the White House. Rounding the corner on 15th St, I ran into a vast and immeasurable horde of women in pink hats pouring up from the Mall. I’d never seen anything like it, not even during the Obama inauguration of 2009.

I wanted to get to Freedom Plaza so I could get a photo of Pennsylvania Avenue and marchers stretching to the Capitol. But I couldn’t get there, feeling like a salmon trying to swim upstream. A never-ending crowd marched down the inaugural route, doing their own alternative parade, cheered on by protesters occupying the bleachers lining the route.

Women's March on 14th St

I dipped into one little corner of this vast throng, before turning to go back up 14th St. There’s a little crest on the street. Looking behind me, I could see the crowd stretching down 14th all the way to the Mall, where thousands more were marching. More people than I’ve ever seen in my life. Every few minutes, a vast cheer would rise up, echoing off the office buildings.

In contrast to the Inauguration Day protests, everyone was happy. There were no arrests. No one was masked. People smiled, took photos together and laughed at the signs mocking Trump.happy protesters

The celebration went on into the night, demonstrators with signs parading around the White House for hours after the official end of the march.

I met friends for dinner afterward, going to an Irish bar a dozen blocks away from the protest. Far enough where I thought we could get a table. Wrong. Every seat of the bar was filled with women in pink hats. The TV was turned from a basketball game to CNN. When the broadcast showed video from the march, the crowd cheered, their voices filling up the bar, the sound of a vast protest movement coming to life.

Inauguration Dispatch: Day of Fear

Socialism, as the limo burns

May you live in interesting times.

– An old Chinese curse

No fan of Trump, I contemplated leaving the city for the Presidential Inauguration. I ended up staying for leaving was a kind of surrender. The inauguration was just in one corner of the city and could easily be ignored.

But the pull of history was too strong to ignore. I’m a writer and a photographer. These historic events are material for me, to be captured in photos and transmuted into fiction, like how I turned my election night experience into my short story, Victory Party.

I wanted to be in the room where it happens. Or at least on the street.

On Fridays, I go to Friday Coffee Club, a meetup of bike folks at A Baked Joint. The coffee shop was open so I went, figuring that I might run into some inaugural crowds.

empty streets on Inauguration Day

Nope. A couple hours before the inauguration and the streets were empty. H Street had been blocked off to traffic so I rode down the middle of it, just seeing a couple of buses go by. There’s always a line at A Baked Joint but on this Friday, nobody was there. And there were no bikes out front. Just a couple of Friday Coffee Club people had made it in.

The only action on the street was from the anti-Trump demonstrators, who were assembling at McPherson Square. It started to rain, so I headed home to watch the inauguration.

As Trump wrapped up his “American carnage” speech, I heard a helicopter overhead, hovering just a few blocks away. A well-organized band of anarchists (oxymoron alert) had thrown rocks at Starbucks and other businesses. It takes a lot to get the DC police to arrest you but they did, making more than 200 on Friday.

The helicopter went east and continued to hover, eventually drawing me out my apartment, camera in hand, expecting to see one of those typical DC protesters where people chant and sit in the street.

But McPherson Square, packed with anarchists and the Black Bloc, had a very different vibe. Within five minutes of entering the park, I saw a Trump supporter get punched in the head and knocked unconscious by a guy who was dressed like Bane. The First Aid tent was nearby; the medical volunteers did nothing, unconcerned about a Trump supporter’s injury. Instead, National Guardsmen came into the park to rescue the guy. The police were lined up outside the park and would not come in.

Trump supporter in McPherson Square

scary dude

Anarchists on K St

I live in DC. It’s my city. I felt afraid in that park, in a way that I never did during the Occupy and other demonstrations in DC. Violence has an ugly quality that’s instantly recognizable. You feel it when it occurs, an anxiety rippling through the crowd.

The kids in the hoodies weren’t going to square off against the heavily armed police. Instead, they were looking for soft targets, such as businesses and lone Trump supporters. Or you and me, if they wanted to – the police were not coming into the park. I left.

14th and K was the epicenter of the protest. In front of the Washington Post building, the windows of a limo had been smashed in by the demonstrators. Protesters were standing on it. Then members of the Black Bloc marched by, their faces covered. Someone threw something into the limo. It caught fire, black smoke billowing up into the sky.

inauguration protesters set limo on fire

I snapped some quick pictures. People said the gas tank was going to blow. Others said the police were coming.

As I turned to leave, I saw a woman behind me, silently pleading for peace. It’s her heartbroken face that I’ll remember more than anything else. Within seconds, I would be running as the police fired flash-bangs into the street.

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