In Northampton, supporters of President Donald J. Trump gathered to show their concerns about the restrictions imposed on the public and loss of civil liberties during the coronavirus pandemic.
“These events have been going on mostly in the eastern part of the state all winter, weather permitting,” said former Hampden County Correctional Officer Chris Ryan. “The sub-theme of this event is opening up our country again and holding the China Communist Party accountable for their weaponized virus creation.”
Ryan’s idea that the Chinese weaponized the virus comes from the president claiming on Thursday that he has seen evidence that gives him a “high degree of confidence” that China could have unleashed the coronavirus on the world due to some kind of horrible “mistake.” His intelligence agencies said they are still examining a notion put forward by the president and aides that the pandemic may have resulted from an accident at a Chinese lab.
The event near the Calvin Coolidge Bridge and Damon Road is part of the “nationwide rally for freedom,” which is a series of rallies around the country in support of states opening up after weeks of restrictions to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus.
One of the rally-goers identified herself as a nurse but declined to give her name. She said that the support of other groups that wouldn’t usually be attending a rally with supporters of the president have also come out.
“I'm thrilled that there are people here, Bernie supporters and Biden supporters and I’m just excited to see that people are coming together,” the nurse said.
Protesters showed up to combat the views of Trump supporters over the handling of the pandemic. (Douglas Hook / MassLive)
Multiple Western Massachusetts defense attorneys on Friday were urging area sheriffs not to let correctional officers attend a Northampton rally in favor of Trump and then go to work after the event.
“Since the purpose of this rally is explicitly to support relaxation of social restrictions, we believe it is your responsibility to ensure that none of your correctional staff will be attending this rally, and then reporting for duty at your jail,” the attorneys’ letter said.
The lawyers’ concerns come as worries mount for many incarcerated individuals in the state and the country because of the pandemic. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled last month that pretrial inmates who have not been charged with violent crimes can be released amid the outbreak.
Ryan, the rally organizer also started the group ‘Correctional Officers for Trump 2020.’ He said that he is 99.9% sure that there are no correctional officers at the event as they are far too busy working at the jails.
The choice of venue was because Northampton is renowned for being a politically left-leaning area of Western Massachusetts.
“Northampton, after Cambridge, is probably the most liberal area in Massachusetts and I just decided I don't care,” said Ryan. “There are Trump supporters everywhere. We're just going to come out. I'm pretty sure that the number of beeps and hand waves we've gotten is far exceeding the number of insults that have been hurled at us.”
Protesters showed up to combat the views of Trump supporters over the handling of the pandemic. (Douglas Hook / MassLive)
In the parking lot, there were supporters of former presidential democratic candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders. A protester told MassLive they were there to take up parking spaces so rally goers couldn’t park.
“I was going back and forth because I didn’t want to give the MAGA people more airtime,” said protester and X-Ray Technician Debby Pastrich-Klemer. “But I just felt really compelled to do something today being a healthcare worker and so many of my friends are on the front lines.”
She told MassLive that the people at the rally show no respect for the social distancing guidelines and that they continually put themselves and others at risk.
“We can't hide from something that's going to come into the country,” said Kirk Whatley. “New evidence is showing has a death rate of one-tenth of 1% and it targets, I was looking at the information this morning, 98.2% of people that had pre-existing medical conditions.”
He added that more people have died of the seasonal flu each year than in the U.S. than the new coronavirus.
Covid-19 is on track to kill far more people in the U.S. this year than the seasonal flu with the number of deaths at 66,640 out of over 1.14 million confirmed cases. Per 100 confirmed cases there is a 5.9% mortality rate in the U.S., according to Johns Hopkins University study.
Kirk Whatley stands at the side of the road showing his support for the president and the measures he has taken to curb the pandemic. He does feel that the executive order in Massachusetts is harming the economy and feels it's time to open the country back up. (Douglas Hook / MassLive)
More testing is required to have true numbers on determining just how deadly COVID-19 will be and that is a key question facing epidemiologists, who expect resurgent waves of infection that could last into 2022.
“I'm just frustrated and a bit angry,” said Trump supporter and Engineer Claudina Vargas. “I think [Trump] made a mistake in allowing these Governors to take so much [of our] liberty, to infringe on our freedoms. I’m listening to faulty models from scientists that didn't have all the facts.”
Vargas is an American but was born in the Dominican Republic and later lived in Franco’s Spain said that from these experiences she knows what a dictatorship is like and worries that U.S. citizens will lose their constitutional freedoms.
“I was born in the dictatorship in the Dominican Republic, I lived in Spain on the dictatorship under the Franco and I know about what is a dictatorship and [what is] tyranny,” said Vargas. “I’m just amazed that there are so many people born in this country [with] so much privilege and cannot appreciate the values of freedom and the value of self-determination.”
Claudina Vargas is worried that the pandemic is eroding the freedoms that she values as an American. She spoke to MassLive about her time living in Spain under the fascist Franco dictatorship and in the Dominican Republic where oppression is common, according to Vargas. (Douglas Hook / MassLive)
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