On Sunday, a “massive” caravan of Trump supporters temporarily disrupted access to a polling place in southern California, according to the Los Angeles Times. The Trump supporters had converged on the site after a parade down local highways that went on for about 60 miles. The procession began at a restaurant in Riverside County before ending up at the Ronald Reagan Sports Park in Temecula, and there’s a polling place at the adjacent Temecula Community Recreation Center. Across the premises as a whole, local officials said that about 4,000 Trump supporters turned out.
Local law enforcement officers responded to the scene and “cleared access to the parking lot and voter assistance center,” according to Riverside County spokesperson Brooke Federico. Capt. Zach Hall of the local Riverside County Sheriff’s Department said that his department made no arrests at the scene, but he did indicate that there were “a few telephone complaints from voters who said the partisan signs, shirts and other materials potentially violated the 100-foot electioneering rule in state law,” the Los Angeles Times summarizes.
Hall said:
‘They kind of caught us off guard. We had a lot of traffic issues. The infrastructure there is not really designed for that kind of traffic.’
Hall noted that Trump supporters had actually rallied at the site in the past, and he said that he did not “think this had anything to do with the polling center.” Some of those who turned out for this latest Trump event filled up a circular driveway outside the Community Recreation Center polling place. A flier for the event asked participants to “PLEASE BE COURTEOUS” and admonished them not to engage with Trump’s “haters.” Instead, the flier insisted, participants in the event would simply “celebrate God, country and 4 more years of Donald J. Trump.” To be clear, with little time to go before Election Day, there’s little solid indication that Trump actually will win four more years in office.
The Sunday debacle in southern California unfolded amidst a flurry of large public demonstrations from Trump supporters around the country. Recently, Trump supporters even took over and shut down portions of major highways in both New York and New Jersey (both of which, like California, aren’t exactly likely pick-ups for Trump in this election cycle — to say the least). Although the southern California event seems to have been slightly less confrontational — polls workers told local deputies that “the Trump supporters largely kept their distance from voters,” the Los Angeles Times says — it’s clear: the president’s supporters seem consistently ready and willing to rely on shows of force for their agenda.
During one of the debates between Trump and Biden, Trump even said that he was “urging” his supporters to watch polling places “very carefully,” insisting that this supervision “has to happen.” Trump sounded like he was endorsing potential physical intimidation of potential political opponents.
Trump alleges that these opponents are plotting to steal the election, but this conspiracy theory is completely false. There is no Democratic plot to rig or steal the election. Democrats simply want all valid votes to count — which shouldn’t be controversial!
