Attendance for President Trump’s campaign rally at the BOK Center in Tulsa Saturday night was set at 6,200 by the Tulsa fire marshal and and at 6,624 by the chairman of AEG which manages the BOK Center. The arena’s capacity is 19,199. The Trump campaign had originally planned for Trump to give two speeches, one inside and one to an overflow crowd expected outside the arena that was cancelled hours before it was scheduled to take place as Black Lives Matter protesters swarmed the security perimeter, blocking entrances and preventing Trump supporters from getting in. The Trump campaign says about 12,000 supporters were screened at metal detectors at entrances at the BOK Center for the rally.
President Trump was all smiles as he took the stage Saturday in Tulsa for a campaign rally, screen images via C-SPAN.
The New York Times reported the arena was about one-third short of capacity, which would be about the 12,000 attendees stated by the campaign:
“While the president’s campaign had claimed that more than a million people had sought tickets for the rally, the 19,000-seat BOK Center was at least one-third empty during the rally. A second, outdoor venue was so sparsely attended that he and Vice President Mike Pence both canceled appearances there.”
An estimated 6.7 million people watched the Trump rally online.
AEG Chairman Jay Marciano tweeted the attendance number Saturday night in gloating attack on Trump. Entertainment reporter Roger Friedman made a screengrab of the tweet for his exclusive report Saturday night.
On Sunday it was reported the Tulsa fire marshal put attendance at 6,200, “Tulsa Fire Marshal says 6,200 attended Saturday rally. The Trump Campaign disputes that number saying 12,000 went through metal detectors.”
Tulsa Fire Marshal says 6,200 attended Saturday rally. The Trump Campaign disputes that number saying 12,000 went through metal detectors.
— Ana Cabrera (@AnaCabrera) June 21, 2020
Earlier Sunday, Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale issued a statement on the rally attendance:
Trump campaign statement on bogus claims of ticket hacking
“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. 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. Registering for a rally means you’ve RSVPed with a cell phone number and we constantly weed out bogus numbers, as we did with tens of thousands at the Tulsa rally, in calculating our possible attendee pool. These phony ticket requests never factor into our thinking. What makes this lame attempt at hacking our events even more foolish is the fact that every rally is general admission – entry is on a first-come-first-served basis and prior registration is not required. The fact is that a week’s worth of the fake news media warning people away from the rally because of COVID and protestors, coupled with recent images of American cities on fire, had a real impact on people bringing their families and children to the rally. MSNBC was among outlets reporting that protesters even blocked entrances to the rally at times. For the media to now celebrate the fear that they helped create is disgusting, but typical. And it makes us wonder why we bother credentialing media for events when they don’t do their full jobs as professionals.”
– Brad Parscale, Trump 2020 campaign manager
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