Hoosiers among protesters in crowd at US Capitol
WASHINGTON (WISH) — Hoosiers were among Wednesday’s protesters at the U.S. Capitol.
Tim Cramer saw the violence. He said the protest over the 2020 presidential election results started quite peaceful before people broke windows and breached the Capitol building. Congress had to suspend its debate on the Electoral College vote because of the protest.
“It wouldn’t have been my first choice, but I’ll tell you what, these people have been put on notice, haven’t they?” Cramer said.
Cramer was already in Washington on business. He decided to first check out the rally with President Donald Trump.
The crowd was so large, he walked up the Mall to the Capitol building and was there as the fence was moved by someone and protesters started streaming in.
“The crowd was like going to the state fair. That was the crowd,” Cramer said. “We walked across the grass. Capitol Police just moved back. There wasn’t an attack. Nobody was yelling.”
He said it started getting more intense.
He called the people who actually broke into U.S. Capitol bad actors and not representative of most who were there.
“They were there for a different reason than the rest of us,” Cramer said.
Chad Mock drove all night with three friends to attend the Trump rally.
“I felt like this was my opportunity to go out there and see how things were done,” Mock said.
But after the rally, his group went sightseeing and stayed away from the crowd.
As for those who breached the building, “I totally disagree with any of that,” Mock said. “The whole purpose on why we didn’t want to go down to the Capitol building was just in case there was an incident like this.”
But, Cramer isn’t so sure. He’s upset with social media for censoring his posts on both Twitter and Facebook.
While he left the area around 3 p.m. he saw the National Guard start to convene.
“I didn’t want to be arrested. I want my voice to be heard. I want people to know we’re upset but I’m not going to go to jail with the rest of the yahoos,” Cramer said. “That’s our House. Now I understand the security ramifications. No, I don’t want them in there tearing it up and burning it down. That’s not what I’m calling for. But politicians brought this upon themselves because they refused to honor their oath to the Constitution and the laws they set in place.”
Neither Mock nor Cramer planned on any political activities Thursday.
Mock and his group was spending the night in the area and driving back Thursday. Cramer is also coming back Thursday after his afternoon business meetings.