
If you’ve seen the video clips and photos of Monday’s gun rights rally in Richmond on social media, you already know that it was entirely peaceful from start to finish.
The crowd has now significantly grown in size at the rally in Richmond, Virginia.
Americans overwhelmingly support the 2nd amendment! 🇺🇸
📸: @Hirschfeld4VA #VirginiaRally #Virginia2A #Richmond2ARally pic.twitter.com/azo8bQrUQi
— Mike Coudrey (@MichaelCoudrey) January 20, 2020
https://twitter.com/Hirschfeld4VA/status/1219291388698820608
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
Attendees remained respectfully behind the relatively flimsy barriers set up for the event. Indeed, they respectfully toed white lines, as requested by the police, where there were no barriers.
We lasted about two hours in the cold (folks, it is cold and windy) but it was SO WORTH IT. I keep seeing gun-grabbers post scary photos of scary armed people so of course I have to share my picture. These guys were AMAZING. 🇺🇸 #TheyArentHiding #VirginiaRally pic.twitter.com/d2mCKr9GyN
— The🐰FOO (@PolitiBunny) January 20, 2020
People sang the national anthem. They recited the pledge of allegiance. They joked with each other and chatted amongst themselves. They talked to media. Some of them hoisted the flag of Hong Kong alongside the American flag and the Gadsden flag, apparently showing solidarity with the determined protesters on the other side of the globe.
Crowd sings star spangled banner as man holds sign saying “I’d rather be an American than a Democrat”#VirginiaRally #Richmond2ARally #LobbyDay
🎥: @SebastianMurdoc— Mike Coudrey (@MichaelCoudrey) January 20, 2020
Speaking with Virginians today at the pro-gun rights rally in #RichmondVA and hearing their side of the story regarding the new gun control measures being unvelied by Democrats. More interviews and footage coming soon from a historic day in American history. #Virginia pic.twitter.com/RJBqDnP13c
— Jorge Ventura Media (@VenturaReport) January 21, 2020
The flag of Hong Kong is flying in Richmond today #VirginiaRally pic.twitter.com/L25HGjZ8Gt
— Jack Poso 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) January 20, 2020
Thank you for supporting Hong Kong! Communism is invading HK, we are suffering from institutional violence! And gun right would help to defend yourself from institutional violence. I wish the people of America will always have gun-rights to protect yourself!#2A #GodBlessAmerica pic.twitter.com/TC4lMR7UUq
— CKY (@CKY30091704) January 20, 2020
In every clip or photo I saw, any on-the-job law enforcement personnel were gathered in small clumps, standing yards away from the rally attendees and on the other side of barriers, not engaged with the crowd.
What is so striking about the scene at the gun rights rally in Richmond is what you don’t see: almost no cops. Just that little cluster of state police there. No lines of riot cops. No law enforcement in riot gear. pic.twitter.com/W0jkwYmmkP
— Lois Beckett (@loisbeckett) January 20, 2020
The crowd was simply behaving itself. The police were just standing there. I’ve seen no videos of police interacting directly with people at the rally. That comports with the news summaries that indicate there was only one arrest, of a woman who refused to remove a mask (or bandanna) from her face in accordance with state law.
Only 1 person was arrested all day; a woman for refusing to remove a bandana from her face. And by the looks of her social media accounts, she's not a conservative. https://t.co/Kc4QqrmlYY
— Chuck Ross (@ChuckRossDC) January 21, 2020
At the end of the event, people from the rally were working their way through the departing rallygoers collecting trash. (One guy said they’d be sending his bag of trash as a gift to Governor Ralph Northam.)
Crowd seems to be clearing, or moving now, volunteers collecting trash. #Virginia2A #VirginiaRally #Richmond2ARally pic.twitter.com/IUZ13SzAtJ
— Jusuchin (@RightWingOtaku) January 20, 2020
Groups picking up trash off the road after the rally is over. #VirginiaRally #Virginia2A @ABC13News pic.twitter.com/RgMlQroE2N
— Caroline Eaker (@caroline_wset) January 20, 2020
The attendees were from all kinds of groups.
Representation for the gay community is also in attendance at the 2nd amendment rally in Richmond, Virginia.
“Gun rights are also gay rights” #VirginiaRally #Richmond2ARally pic.twitter.com/ED98qLXsKL
— Mike Coudrey (@MichaelCoudrey) January 20, 2020
Virginians rallying for civil rights #VirginiaRally #Virginia2A pic.twitter.com/uYOwVTJo7D
— Gayle Trotter (@gayletrotter) January 20, 2020
More pictures of people carrying rifles at the #VirginiaRally and more evidence that debunks the narrative that the rally is filled with racists and white supremacists. pic.twitter.com/V0jGLpKW2d
— Julio Rosas (@Julio_Rosas11) January 20, 2020
https://twitter.com/MarkerG19/status/1219469090689032192
VA Sheriffs show up and join VA gun rights rally#Grayson County Sheriff #RichardVaughan – he said “If the bills go through as proposed, they will NOT BE ENFORCED… “
FIRE HIM?
FIRE ALL OF THEM!!!#MOG#MAGA #Virginia#Resist #Resisters
https://t.co/WZCz4q99HW— Michael O'Grady (@mog7546) January 20, 2020
If there were “white supremacists” there, they didn’t seem to register with anyone as a hostile element.
It was clear within the first couple of hours that the “threat” to public safety from this rally had been wildly overhyped.
There was one fellow (in the video clip below) who seemed to want to incite something. He called himself a “libertarian,” but the group of demonstrators he was trying to engage were probably correct in their assessment that he was an Antifa member (or at least a leftist radical) trying to get something started.
https://twitter.com/KAGSocial/status/1219466108316672000
Libertarians who genuinely regard that as their identity are very rarely the source of inflammatory incitement.
That particular video clip got a lot of attention online during the event, probably because it was the only one of its kind. The Second Amendment rallyers on-scene were having none of it. They refused to get drawn into a contentious exchange.
The bottom line: there was nothing to de-escalate.
That didn’t stop Northam from claiming that his “teams” had successfully de-escalated the rally.
We are all thankful that today passed without incident. The teams successfully de-escalated what could have been a volatile situation. I will continue to listen to the voices of Virginians, and will do everything in my power to keep our Commonwealth safe. https://t.co/xrHxhOczvv
— Governor Ralph Northam (@VAGovernor73) January 20, 2020
His tweet was probably more for media consumption than for persuasion, however. He needed something to say, when it turned out that the rally – contrary to his previous apprehensions – caused no problems whatsoever. So he went with taking credit for the benign outcome.
All in all, there were reportedly about 22,000 people in attendance. The media seemed to be hoping for blood and gore, and were uncertain what to do when they didn’t get any.
CNN: Threats which caused Gov. Northam to call for a State of Emergency "Have simply not emerged".. "The police very clear in saying they have not had a single arrest during this rally and we have been standing here all morning" pic.twitter.com/6p2JfebvFO
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) January 20, 2020
#NEW MONTAGE from me showing how @CNN and @MSNBC spent their mornings hyping fears that "white nationalists" and "extremists" would cause "violence" at #VirginiaRally for the #2A like in 2017 at Charlottesville #LobbyDay2020 pic.twitter.com/wR91mMPfmR
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) January 20, 2020
Some went with misrepresentations that were really honking weird.
Even for NBC, this is…odd. https://t.co/BdR6niSJQk
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) January 20, 2020
I’ve listened to that clip five times now, as carefully as possible, and I have yet to hear anyone chanting “We will not comply!” I do hear the crowd reciting the pledge of allegiance.
Many of the attendees carried signs that said “We will not comply,” and no doubt some of them, somewhere, chanted the slogan during the rally. This was not the video clip to illustrate that with, however. It doesn’t bolster the media’s credibility.
A very positive aspect to the rally was the diversity of rallygoers, and the opportunity the rally afforded to hear them talk about why they were there. (All of these clips are well worth the entire time they run. I recommend not missing them.)
An attendee at the rally in Richmond Virginia dispels the media smears against rally-goers.
He says the media is mischaracterizing them, & that they are just law abiding citizens who want to advocate for their constitutional rights.#VirginiaRally
https://t.co/Vp3bJX8eNi— Mike Coudrey (@MichaelCoudrey) January 20, 2020
This is who the media was trying to call white supremacists in Richmond for supporting the 2nd amendment. The left's lies didn't work today! #VirginiaRally pic.twitter.com/ZuDPb8duY7
— Kaitlin Bennett (@KaitMarieox) January 20, 2020
This pro-2A protester in Richmond just blew the doors off of every Democrat talking point on guns: pic.twitter.com/gI2AGzItlc
— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) January 20, 2020
You have to love the lawmen standing up for the law. They won’t enforce the unconstitutional laws of Virginia if passed! Spread it around. https://t.co/N49Duuwzj6
— Chris Loesch 𝕏 (@ChrisLoesch) January 20, 2020
“Sir, are you a White Supremacist?” pic.twitter.com/JFhxLRfgv1
— Zach Vorhies / Google Whistleblower (@Perpetualmaniac) January 20, 2020
Red Flag 🚩 Laws Virginia 2A Rally Defend Your Gun Rights Not White Supremacy @K1Kinte #2a #2ARally #VirginiaRally #Virginia2ARally #RichmondVA #Virginia #BlackGunsMatter #VA #RedFlagLaws #StateCapital #RVA #MLK2020 #richmondrally #2AShallNotBeInfringed pic.twitter.com/RA5xQZgf32
— Haki Kweli Shakur (@Haki_Shakur) January 21, 2020
A great many in the crowd came armed. They remained in the streets off the Capitol grounds, as Northam had banned carrying on the Capitol grounds themselves for the duration of the rally.
Many observers suggested that Antifa demonstrators (who had announced they were going to rally “alongside” the gun rights supporters) made none of their typical moves to disrupt the proceedings because they were surrounded by armed rallygoers.
There’s probably a lot to that. It’s a feature, not a bug; nothing in this world is better for anyone, when Antifa feels free to provoke mayhem and havoc. Deterring Antifa is a good thing. Too many police forces, from Charlottesville to Seattle to Portland and the San Francisco Bay Area, have been unwilling to exercise proper deterrence – or at least have been under orders from local political authorities to stand back and let Antifa run riot.
Interestingly, the police deployed for the 20 January rally didn’t look as if they were prepared to intervene effectively if Antifa started something. There didn’t appear to be enough of them, and they were comparatively lightly equipped.
In spite of Northam’s earlier agitation, the signal sent by the police posture appeared to be that the authorities didn’t truly expect things to get out of hand. Two reasons for that can be logically deduced: the main crowd was law-abiding and self-disciplined, and the main crowd was armed, and itself functioned as a walking deterrent.
The Capitol surroundings of Richmond were a very safe place to be on Monday, in other words, because the rallygoers were armed.
The peace and quiet in which the rally passed stand in strong contrast to the numerous outcomes when Antifa has shown up to harass other groups’ demonstrations, and the other groups have no way to deter Antifa’s tactics and must depend entirely on the police.
In those circumstances, physical violence and property destruction have been nearly inevitable. This has been equally the case whether the opposing groups (Antifa and, for example, the “Proud Boys” or “Patriot Prayer”) showed up for the specific purpose of demonstrating, or Antifa showed up to disrupt a non-demonstration event like a Trump rally or a campus lecture by a conservative pundit.
The difference between those previous instances and the gun rights rally on Monday is that in Richmond, on 20 January, thousands of the 22,000 attendees were armed.
