President Trump is “furious” at the “underwhelming” crowd at his rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on Saturday evening, a major disappointment for what had been expected to be a raucous return to the campaign trail after three months off because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Trump was fuming at his top political aides Saturday even before the rally began after his campaign revealed that six members of the advance team on the ground in Tulsa had tested positive for COVID-19, including Secret Service personnel.
Trump asked those around him why the information was exposed and expressed annoyance that the coverage ahead of his mega-rally was dominated by the revelation.
While the Trump re-election effort boasted that it would fill BOK Center, which seats more than 19,000 people, only 6,200 supporters ultimately occupied the general admission sections, the Tulsa fire marshal announced today.
The campaign was so confident about a high turnout that it set up an overflow area, which it had expected to attract thousands.
But the plan was scrapped at the last minute when only dozens gathered at the time the Vice President Mike Pence and Trump were set to address the crowd inside.
“It’s politics 101: You under-promise and overdeliver,” a Trump ally said, conceding the missteps the Trump 2020 team took in the lead-up to the event by saying nearly 1 million people had responded to requests for admission.
Much of the blame is falling on campaign manager Brad Parscale, who in the days leading up the event aggressively touted the number of registrations, but those close to him stress that his job is safe, for now.
Last month, after dismal polling revealed that the president is trailing the presumptive Democratic nominee, Joe Biden, in key battleground states that Trump won in 2016,
Parscale was reprimanded and a deputy was brought in to help steer the ship.
There are growing concerns among Trump campaign officials that neither the president nor the 2020 team have a coherent message for why he should serve a second term.
Saturday evening’s meandering, nearly two-hour rally speech is the latest evidence of a lack of a targeted strategy to attack Biden with less than five months to go until the general election.
Many issues could have contributed to the poor attendance in Tulsa: a fear of contracting the virus, concern over potential protests and torrential thunderstorms in 95-degree heat.
But outside advisers see the visuals of empty seats overshadowing Trump’s remarks as a significant problem for a president and a campaign that are obsessed with optics.
“This was a major failure,” one outside adviser said.
Meanwhile, Parscale dismissed a report that TikTok users and K-pop fans sabotaged attendance by registering for free tickets and not showing up.
“Leftists and online trolls doing a victory lap, thinking they somehow impacted rally attendance, don’t know what they’re talking about or how our rallies work,” Parscale said in a statement today.
“Reporters who wrote gleefully about TikTok and K-pop fans – without contacting the campaign for comment – behaved unprofessionally and were willing dupes to the charade,” he added.
K-pop fan accounts and TikTok users started sharing information about a tweet from the Trump campaign asking supporters to register for free tickets, encouraging users to sign up for the rally and then not show, The New York Times reported today.
YouTuber Elijah Daniel told the Times the trend spread mostly through “Alt TikTok.”
“We kept it on the quiet side where people do pranks and a lot of activism,” Daniel, 26, who participated in the social media campaign, told the newspaper. “K-pop Twitter and Alt TikTok have a good alliance where they spread information amongst each other very quickly. They all know the algorithms and how they can boost videos to get where they want.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) even lauded “teens on TikTok” for the effort.
“Shout out to Zoomers. Y’all make me so proud,” the congresswoman tweeted before thanking “KPop allies” in a subsequent post.
Parscale earlier this week said the campaign had passed 800,000 tickets, calling it the “biggest data haul and rally sign up of all time.”
Trump had also hyped attendance, tweeting that “almost One Million people” had requested tickets for the rally.