As all of you are aware, Trump will be arraigned this afternoon at 4 P.M. for his role in the January 6th insurrection in which he attempted a putsch. If you haven’t read the indictment yet, I highly recommend you do. You can read an annotated version here for free, thanks to the NYT offering it without no paywall.
We were all victims on that day, as Trump tried to subvert and steal the election from all American voters, even the ding-dongs who voted for him. He deliberately intended to crush the democratic process and destroy our democratic institutions.
I was a direct victim of Trump, and if the events of those days had taken an even bloodier turn than it did, it’s a wonder what would have happened to me and my fiancée. There is no doubt we would had to have fled our apartment in D.C., perhaps been gravely injured, or even killed. It was beyond harrowing, a day a will never forget.
On the two year anniversary, I wrote up a long thread on twitter about my personal experience of the day. Here’s that story (in two parts) with my own photographs:
2 years ago today marked an absolutely horrific and harrowing day for me at ground zero of #January6th.
Let’s first, however, go back to November 7th, 2021. This date was a major on for the United State — I’d argue for the world — and it was especially exciting to be in D.C. We were particularly delighted to know that our trashy, bigoted, rapist neighbor DONALD TRUMP would soon be kicked out of the White House. Locals poured into the streets to celebrate, as they did all over rest of the country. In the picture below, which I took not too far from Whited House, the man wearing a tuxedo was a server. The man in the suit was a French broadcaster discussing the election. The server had just jumped up in the air, celebrating Biden’s victory.
Naturally, it was next to impossible to concentrate on the piles of work I had to get done (ah, yes, the pandemic and workloads — what a dream that was . . . being surrounded by death and disease, and yet being buried in mountains of work, but I digress).
As soon as most of the networks called Biden as the winner, we heard people yelling, honking horns, screaming, etc. What is a person to do but — of course — pop champagne in the morning. What a major, major day . . . here is my Biden/Harris flag hanging at 1331 Maryland in S.W. D.C. inside my beautiful apartment there (more on the flag later, which is grim).
Since the atmosphere was overwhelmingly jubilant, and it had been remarkably depressing with MAGA cultists showing up every weekend to worship their leader, and also spreading COVID to locals, we decided to leave our apartment in the early afternoon to join all the spontaneous celebrations in the street. It’s hard to convey how it felt to be out with our fellow Washingtonians in the streets. Again, jubilance doesn’t begin to capture the collective emotions pulsating through downtown. There was also a sense of intense relief. This image still gives me the chills. I wanted to go up to this woman and give her a massive hug. I love this woman. She made me feel pride in the flag, something I hadn’t felt in years, all thanks to Trump and his MAGA cultists who had viciously appropriated it.
While I was just as overjoyed, like everyone else, I also had deep fears about Trump’s reaction. I knew he would refuse to leave the White House. But how that would play out at that point was anyone’s guess. And Trump’s cheese-dust criminality still encased the entire city, country, and — for that matter — globe. (By the way, when the entire city was closed down, Trump left every single light was left on in his hotel, which was a stone’s throw from my apartment).
I wish I could have been in D.C. on 11/7/2021 to participate in that celebration..