A protester waves an American flag during a "ReOpen PA" rally in front of the Pennsylvania capitol in Harrisburg on Monday, April 20, 2020.
Kate Landis / PA Post
A protester waves an American flag during a "ReOpen PA" rally in front of the Pennsylvania capitol in Harrisburg on Monday, April 20, 2020.
Kate Landis / PA Post
“Harrisburg” trended on Twitter across the country on Monday afternoon. A protest outside the Pennsylvania capitol that was billed as an economic rally representing citizens who want to go back to work ended up being more of a campaign rally for supporters of President Trump.
The proposed intent of the protest, organized by “ReOpen PA” and several similarly named groups that exist largely as Facebook pages, was to argue that businesses should be able to reopen their doors if they can follow CDC guidelines for minimizing the spread of coronavirus.
The irony is that nobody at the protest was actively abiding by social distancing guidelines. In fact, when I asked one of the organizers why he wasn’t enforcing social distancing to help prove his point, he said it wasn’t his job.
The protesters were a mix of gun owners openly carrying semiautomatic rifles, anti-abortion folks, and more than a few people waving anti-vaxxer and transphobic signs. Few were practicing social distancing, and the mask-wearers were well outnumbered.
And that’s one takeaway: The rally was – more than anything – a rebuke of the guidance provided by medical experts. Many of the people at the protest didn’t believe there was a widespread lethal virus twice as infectious as the flu and at least 10 times as deadly, and they didn’t believe that hospital workers were having issues with treating the ill.
What they overwhelmingly believed was that America is a country of rugged individualism, and that just because the public health is in danger, it shouldn’t limit their ability to go about their lives.
But what was fascinating – and heartbreaking – to watch was protesters talking down to a small group of health care workers who came to counter-protest.
While the main rally was taking place, I went to the end of State Street – the drag leading up to the capitol building – and found a handful of nurses and physician assistants. They came from around the state to tell protesters to go back home.
“They’re not social distancing, they don’t have a mask on,” said Katrina Rectenwald, a 36-year-old registered nurse I spoke to. “And when they all end up sick, our hospital systems are going to end up overwhelmed, which is going to end up in people dying.”
These health care professionals had their message drowned out by yelling protesters, honking horns, and even drivers screaming back at them.
At one point during my interview with Yetta Timothy, a 43-year-old certified nursing assistant, she turned her back away from the crowd of protesters screaming at her and broke down.
“I just can’t believe all this is happening and they’re trying to reopen the state,” she said through fits of tears.
There’s plenty of evidence that the protests – which happened in a handful of other states over the past week– were likely orchestrated by conservative groups that aim to shift the conversation away from public health to politics.
And while the hundreds of protesters who showed up in Harrisburg to thumb their noses at Gov. Wolf’s shutdown order were able to steal the limelight for a few hours, their tantrum doesn’t reflect the views of the majority of Pennsylvanians who recognize that the stay-at-home orders are flattening the curve.
You can read my story here. Other coverage of the rally:
PennLive: More than 1,000 gather in Pa. Capitol rally to ‘Reopen PA’
LNP: Scenes from ReOpen PA rally at State Capitol in Harrisburg
ABC27: Anti-shutdown protesters in front of State Capitol demanding change
York Daily Record: ‘Wolf works for us!’: protesters chant at rally to reopen Pennsylvania’s economy
NPR: Anti-Quarantine Protest Draws Crowd In Harrisburg, Pa., But Gov. Keeps Stay-Home Plan
Pittsburgh City Paper: About 120 protest in Downtown Pittsburgh, calling for Pennsylvania to reopen during coronavirus pandemic
New York Times: How Abortion, Guns and Church Closings Made Coronavirus a Culture War
The game and the pandemic: Why was Italy so hard hit in one certain province? Likely, it was because of a soccer match (now dubbed “Game Zero”). In Seattle, several sporting events also contributed to a large number of infections. After poring over hundreds of emails and records, reporters at the Seattle Times and ProPublica found that despite public health officials’ urge to close down large gatherings, events still happened. And while major sports leagues started to push back against closing events, thousands were infected.
Astroturf: From the top of this Inquirer story: “A trio of far-right, pro-gun provocateurs is behind some of the largest Facebook groups calling for anti-quarantine protests across the country, offering the latest illustration that some seemingly organic demonstrations are being engineered by a network of conservative activists.” Many will argue that the protest that happened yesterday was a grassroots movement. In fact, it was “astroturfed,” the term used to describe making an online presence only seem organic. As a result, Facebook started closing the groups in an effort to combat fake news. Related: Politico reports that Republicans are calling it censorship; and, Brian Krebs looks at Who’s Behind the ‘Reopen’ Domain Surge?
New York, New York. It was one helluva town: The city after its shutdown will likely not be the same for years, writes J. David Goodman with the New York Times. The Big Apple’s booming tech economy and tourism is what helped its financial turnaround in the early aughts under Mayor Michael Bloomberg, but with its main industries demolished, it’s anyone’s guess what the next few years might look like. “I don’t think the New York that we left will be back for some years,” said Gregg Bishop, the commissioner of the city’s small businesses agency. “I don’t know if we’ll ever get it back.”
Weeks behind: Facing political pressure from the President, Boeing and other manufacturers are looking to open up shop in the same time frame as European countries. But where Spain, Italy and other countries have been able to snub the infection rates, the U.S. is weeks behind in testing compared to them. The AP has that story.
Is your quarantine feeling like jail? Having a hard time self isolating? Want to see your friends and give a hug? I know it’s hard. (Trust me, I know.) So, how do you get through it? Take some advice from prisoners who had to live in isolation. Related: Keep in mind, though, that your self-isolation — however difficult — is nothing compared to a jail lockdown.
The roots of the virus: How does the coronavirus evolve? And how has it evolved from animals to humans? An evolutionary biologist in the New Yorker breaks down exactly how scientists have traced the roots of the novel virus back to specific animals, and how those branches of the virus’s evolution inform medical professionals about the virus’s spread. A fascinating read on a less-known profession.
Failed States of America: The coronavirus has exposed deep problems within our country — from medical care to mass incarceration — and it’s also exposed our inability to address those problems quickly in the event of a global health emergency, argues George Packer in The Atlantic. From his piece: “This was the American landscape that lay open to the virus: in prosperous cities, a class of globally connected desk workers dependent on a class of precarious and invisible service workers; in the countryside, decaying communities in revolt against the modern world; on social media, mutual hatred and endless vituperation among different camps; in the economy, even with full employment, a large and growing gap between triumphant capital and beleaguered labor; in Washington, an empty government led by a con man and his intellectually bankrupt party; around the country, a mood of cynical exhaustion, with no vision of a shared identity or future.”
A few more Pennsylvania links:
Spotlight PA: Gov. Tom Wolf vetoes bill that would have allowed more Pa. businesses to reopen over public health objections
Spotlight PA: Gov. Tom Wolf extends stay-at-home order to May 8, will allow curbside liquor pick-up and online car sales
Reading Eagle: Salvation Army works with barbecue restaurants to feed hungry during coronavirus crisis
Philadelphia Inquirer: Philly jails still aren’t doing enough to stop coronavirus spread, ACLU says in new suit
Pennsylvania Capital-Star: Lawmakers voice concern over unemployment compensation claims backlog
Click for the photo: The Philadelphia Inquirer reports on dairy farmers dumping milk in the face of lower demand.
Don’t click for the photo: The Inquirer headline says all you need to know about the story — Hospital delivers bodies to Philly medical examiner in the open back of a pickup truck
Watch: WITF’s Keira McGuire shows us a day in the life of an EMS provider battling the coronavirus
The days of journalism’s one-way street of simply producing stories for the public have long been over. Now, it’s time to find better ways to interact with you and ensure we meet your high standards of what a credible media organization should be.