- Hundreds lined up Friday outside BOK Center in Tulsa in anticipation of President Donald Trump’s rally on Saturday.
- “There are people who support will support Donald Trump and we’re not all racists, we’re not all homophobes,” Hayden Hyman, a college student told insider.
- Deedee Manor said she came to stand against abortion. “We are in a Holocaust. Pro-life is not working, the only antidote is illegalizing.”
- Experts say the rally could be a superspreader event, but many in attendance said they’re not worried.
- The Oklahoma National Guard has been sent to secure the area in case of clashes between attendees and protesters.
- Visit Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Despite sporadic rain, hundreds of Trump supporters lined up Friday near the BOK Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma, for a chance to see the president at his first campaign rally since the coronavirus pandemic began.
Health experts worry the rally could become a superspreader event. Attendees are required to sign a waiver agreeing they won’t sue if they contract COVID-19.
There are also concerns about clashes between supporters and protesters. On Friday afternoon, rallygoers surrounded CNN correspondent Gary Tuchman and his crew and shouted at them until they left.
The Oklahoma National Guard has been sent to guard the area around the BOK Center over the weekend. On Thursday, Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum issued a weekend curfew, but lifted it Friday before it took effect.
Here's what people lining up for President Trump's rally in Tulsa had to say.
"I've supported Trump long before he was president," Matthew Kober, an electrician from Allentown, Pennsylvania said. "The guy's got money and real estate."
"God has a plan for everybody," Kober says of the virus. "I had a friend die from the Bronx - the treatment that they gave him killed him, not the virus."
"I think the Lord brought us out here," Deborah Adams said about why she brought her children to the rally. We like Trump, we like what he stands for."
"I'm not concerned" about being exposed to the coronavirus, Adams said. "We're healthy and strong and young."
Deedee Mannor is attending the rally because of her beliefs about abortion. "We are in a Holocaust," Mannor said. "Pro-life is not working. The only antidote is illegalizing."
Mannor says she is not concerned about the spread of COVID-19. "The sun kills the virus, the sun kills the flu. We're in June," she told Insider.
Hayden Hyman, a student at the University of Central Arkansas, said he wanted to show "there are people who support will support Donald Trump and we're not all racists, we're not all homophobes."
UCA student Morgan Thomas added about the political rhetoric around the rally, "I wish people would be kinder … have an actual conversation with us."
Not everyone in Tulsa is supportive of the rally. Opponents put signs in the window of a nearby building.
"The chaos around here is gonna be a lot for Tulsa," city worker Tabitha Burns said about working during the rally.
Her co-worker, Jennifer Oakes, said she wasn't working Saturday and risking contracting COVID-19.
"I'm going to avoid this place like the plague," Oakes told Insider.
Artist Tommy Zegan brought his stainless steel sculpture, "Trump and His Magic Wand" to the rally. Zegan hopes to have it one day displayed in the Trump presidential library.
Zegan says the 6'3" work - in which the president holds a copy of the Constitution in one hand and a magic wand in the other - is a humorous caricature inspired by President Obama's questioning then-candidate Trump's 2016 promise to bring back manufacturing jobs.
"What magic wand do you have?" Obama said at a PBS town hall. "And usually the answer is, he doesn't have an answer."
Zegan, who lives in Rosarita Beach, Mexico, is raffling off a fiberglass-and-chrome replica with proceeds benefiting President Trump's reelection campaign and disabled veterans.
Some rallygoers set up tents and got some sleep before Saturday's rally.
Amber Wichers, who was selling Donald Trump merchandise, said she'd never been to a rally before. "So far it's been great, it's been peaceful besides a couple of people yelling," she said.
Wichers says she's trying to be responsible about avoiding exposure to the coronavirus.
"We are selling and using masks, we are keeping all of the preventive measures that we can," she said.
Eric Washington, a 61-year-old vendor selling t-shirts, says he's not worried about getting COVID. "God got it," Washington said. "I'm not used to wearing masks."
"I'm having fun meeting people," Washington, who came from Greensboro, North Carolina, told Insider.
As many as 250 Oklahoma Army National Guard soldiers are being activated to help provide security on Saturday, the AP reported.
Tulsa Police Chief Wendell Franklin said the Guardsmen will serve as a "force multiplier" to help secure the area around the BOK Center.
Greg Adams drove an hour from Stillwater, Oklahoma, with his teen daughters to attend the rally. "We're not worried about the coronavirus," he said. "I'm supposed to stay at home when I'm sick and wash my hands for 20 seconds, so I'm doing those things."
To date, Oklahoma has reported 9,354 infections and 366 deaths from COVID-19.
Gary Brumley, a 60-year-old Tulsa native, says he came "to protest the dismemberment of our national monuments that are sacred to this country,"
Brumley dismissed the coronavirus as "pretty much a conspiracy brought on by the Democrats to try to disrupt the election process."