Miami joined other rallies around the nation in support of Donald Trump at Tropical Park, on Saturday morning.
About 2,000 people showed up to rebuttal some anti-Trump protests that have occurred since the beginning of the president’s term. Supporters wore Trump’s signature “Make America Great Again” caps and bolstered American flags, while yelling “U.S.A.,” and “Unify America.”
The conservative-leaning website Breibart News called the events “Spirit of America Rallies.”
“It’s just a support system because there’s just so much lies against him [Trump] that I think it’s time for us to rise up and say we stand by our president,” said Lily Diaz, an elementary school teacher in Hialeah, who commenced the rally with a prayer.
Organizers of the rally included partisan organizations like the Tea Party - 40 Miami, Miami Dade Citizens 4 Trump, Cubans4Trump and Latinas Por Trump.
A good portion of supporters at the rally also waved Cuban flags up, which comes to no surprise since more than half of Cubans in Florida backed Trump during his campaign, according to a Pew Research analysis.
Linda Chris, a registered Democrat who voted for Trump, said this kind of rally is unprecedented.
“This is the first time I’ve ever seen anything like this,” Chris, a retired AT&T employee from Little Havana, said. “There’s never been a need to have a political rally to support your candidate after you’re elected.”
South Miami vice mayor Bob Welsh was on the outskirts of the rally in opposition to the Trump supporters.
He held a large anti-trump sign, to which he justified because “two-thirds of his district voted for the Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.”
“If you’re out protesting in Trump rallies you better have thick skin because you’re going to get flipped-off by grandmothers,” Welsh added.
The opening of relations between Cuba and America was a popular topic at the rally, as well as “fake news.”
Jorge Cast, a teacher in South Miami, said the current state of media in America reminds him of what his parents used to tell him about Cuba before migrating to the states.
“My family came from Cuba, and they taught me something very basic: when the media tells you something is white, you believe it’s black. When they tell you it’s right, you believe it’s wrong,” Cast said.
Supporters marched from the Tropical Park entrance on Bird Road to the Cuban restaurant “La Carreta” a couple blocks away.
Julio Martinez, chairman of the Trump campaign in Miami-Dade County, and Frank De Varona, who runs the Trump volunteer office in West-Dade, made appearances at the event.
