Protesters laid body bags in front of the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., on Thursday, to call attention to the president's disastrous and deadly response to the COVID-19 crisis. MSNBC host Rachel Maddow highlighted the protest, organized by the Center for Popular Democracy Action, during her show Thursday night:
“That was a little bit of what it looked like today in the rain, in downtown Washington, D.C., as a long line of cars processed pretty slowly, from the White House, down through the streets of DC, slowly, all in a line, with their hazards flashing,” Maddow said. “But this was different for a couple of reasons. Number one, they were honking for the most part. And number two, they were not going to a cemetery. They were going to President Trump's downtown Washington, D.C. hotel. You can see the signs on some of the cars: ‘Trump lies, people die.' And then you can see the body bags. People got out of those vehicles, and laid body bags at the threshold of President Trump's hotel.
“The U.S. death toll from coronavirus, as of today, is staggering,” she added. “As of today, 48,902 Americans have been killed. And that's just over the course of about a month. … But I don't know if the president knows that. And so the people who are mad at the president about this response, people are starting to pile up body bags in front of his hotel, because maybe that at least might capture his attention, maybe that will let him know that the real body count is.”
More from American University Radio: Jennifer Flynn Walker, an organizer with the center, said demonstrators wanted to counteract messages sent by protestors around the country who have defied social distancing orders and other measures intended to slow the spread of the coronavirus. The “body bags” were fashioned from plastic garbage bags filled with paper, she said. “We needed to do something to show that most of the country believes in science, thinks that Trump is failing,” Flynn Walker said. “We really do see that tens of thousands of people dying from COVID is a direct result of his failure as a leader.” The Trump Organization, which operates the hotel, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday night.
