Bernie Sanders held a rally on Wed. April 27. at Indiana University (IU). The event was live tweeted from on @Fhs_nthered. This is the second political rally I have been to and live tweeted from, the other was Donald Trump’s rally at the state fair grounds, the story of my experience at that one can be found here.
The two rallies differed greatly from each other. The first thing I noticed upon arrival was that the people at the Sanders’ rally seemed more friendly. Upon minutes of standing in line, which stretched to the back of the parking lot, many people had talked to my group. We talked about topics ranging from Sanders and his policies to the weather. At the Trump rally, I had not made conversation with many people. There would be a rare exchange of smiles but nothing more than that.
Another important thing to note is there was not as many protesters at the Sanders’ rally. There were a few, that would walk in between the lines but there had not been a crowd of them, like the Trump rally. One protester and a man even had a discussion on the topic of socialism as a form of government and their beliefs on taxes. I did not see any protesters yelled at for showing their beliefs, there was an occasional eye roll at them but they were left to protest peacefully. At the Trump rally the number of protesters seemed bigger. There was a line of police separating the protesters from the supporters and they did not communicate as well as the ones at the Sanders rally. One thing I saw at the Trump rally that was out of the ordinary, a supporter and a protester hugged each other, so not everybody there was hostile.
The way the speeches and attendees of the events were handled in a different way. Security was tight at both events but at the Sanders’ rally it took longer to get in. This may be because of the time I arrived at the Trump rally compared to the Sanders. At the Sanders’ rally attendees sat down, unlike the Trump rally were attendees were standing. The most major difference was at the Trump rally I had gotten kicked out. I had been peaceful the whole time but within ten minutes, I was kicked out. During Sanders’ I got to hear his whole speech. The event had also been filled to the full capacity and some people had not been able to get in. Before Sanders delivered the speech to the people who had made it in, he had addressed the overflow. Sanders made sure everybody who had taken time out of their day to see him had gotten a chance to hear him speak.
