By Benjamin Ibarra
Large crowds of Trump supporters got into multiple lines around Madison Square Garden early Sunday morning, an iconic venue with a capacity of 19,500 people. It’s the last full week before election day and the beginning of early voting in New York.
Multiple polls show a deadlocked presidential race between Republican candidate and former president Donald Trump and current Democratic candidate Vice President Kamala Harris. The chances of either candidate winning the 2024 Presidential election are within a razor-thin margin of error.
While Harris was campaigning in the crucial battleground state of Pennsylvania, Trump decided to return to his hometown of New York City, a Democratic stronghold, during the last sprint of the election.
“I did it because it’s a very big stop,” said Trump on the Brian Kilmeade Show on Fox News a day before the rally when being asked why came to New York City. “And you know we sold it out in three hours,” Trump added that for people like him, the words Madison Square Garden means a lot.
Inside the venue, the first speaker sparked nationwide outrage after cracking jokes insulting Hispanics, Blacks, and Jews which Trump refused to disavow.
Across 8th Ave from Madison Square Garden, protestors gathered on the steps of the James A. Farley Post Office holding up anti-Trump signs calling the former president a criminal, and a fraud, and demanding to lock him up.
“No dictators in the USA,” the crowd, including members of Veterans Against Trump and Republicans Against Trump, chanted toward the Trump supporters.
Trump, who moved to Florida in Sept. 2019, staged his rally in the city in which he was convicted of 34 felony charges in connection with making illegal payments to a former adult film actress, adjudicated as a rapist in a defamation case filed by a former magazine writer and fined over $450 million after he was found guilty of fraud.
Trump continues to deny any wrongdoing and maintains that the 2020 election was rigged against him. He has also indicated that he will only accept the 2024 election results if he is the winner.
And yet somehow he remains popular with millions of voters. Multiple outlets report Trump shows strong support when it comes to his handling of the economy, though that lead has eroded in the weeks leading up to the election.
“Things that are supposed to be cheap right now are not affordable for middle-class families and that’s the majority of our people,” said Kevin Locoe, 20 years old, from Queens. “Nobody can afford things, it’s double the price of what it used to be. People in the middle class are living like they’re not.”
Before the barrage of anti-Hispanic jokes, one of which compared Puerto Rico to, “a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean,” Trump had been gaining support in the Latino communities when it came to his proposals for handling migrants from Venezuela and the mass influx of people crossing the southern border.
“We don’t need illegals in our country,” said Christina Pulido, 50, from Colombia. “I came here legally and I waited for my green card for almost three years. Then I went to the doctor for this and that. I paid almost $5,000 and then they gave me a green card. Then I became a citizen. It’s a lot of steps we have to go through.”
Pulido drove with her two children and husband from New Jersey to attend the rally and had already spent 3 hours waiting in line. This will be Pulido’s first time attending a Trump rally and getting to see Trump in person, explained Pulido.
During the rally, Trump reiterated that if he became president again he would invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to target and dismantle migrant criminal networks and deport its members. He is also calling for the death penalty for any migrant who kills a law enforcement officer.
“The day I take office the migrant invasion ends and our country’s restoration will begin,” said Trump while speaking at the rally.
Trump also warned parents that if Democrats remain in power they might find their children receiving draft notice to go fight in a country they have never heard of.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, wrestler Hulk Hogan, talk show host Dr. Phil, and Forbes Magazine world’s richest man Elon Musk were some of the high-profile speakers of the night.
Trump Rally attendees and supporters organizing outside of Madison Square Garden as protesters organize across 8th Ave.
Trump protesters across Madison Square Garden in front of James A. Farley Post Office on 8th Ave.
Trump supporters waiting in line outside of Madison Square Garden. Back the Blue is a slogan in support of the Back the Blue Act reintroduced in 2023 that would make it a federal crime to kill law enforcement officers and other public safety officials and allow them to carry firearms into federal facilities.
Trump Rally attendees waiting in line in one of three lines to be let into Madison Square Garden.
