The Daily Beast reports:

Drivers in a pro-Trump caravan shouted obscenities as they cruised through an intersection near Jennifer Merritt’s home in Larchmont, New York, on Sunday. Some flipped the bird at bystanders. Then one of Merritt’s neighbors saw something more alarming than rude hand gestures.

“That guy has a gun!” the woman told Merritt of a man in a black pickup truck.

As the COVID-19 pandemic wears on and the election looms, fans of President Donald Trump have increasingly turned to vehicle parades or “Trump trains” in support of their candidate, who has openly encouraged voter intimidation. And as one of the most hotly-contested campaigns in American history veers toward the finish line, people across the country have complained of aggressive actions by the caravans, especially when they bring their bullhorns and signboards near early voting sites.

Merritt, who has already cast an early vote for Joe Biden, said she learned on social media that a Trump caravan was in her area in suburban Westchester County, and that it had been blocking traffic in a nearby town. But she didn’t know the group of cars and trucks was nearing her house until she heard the sound of their horns blaring down a nearby road. She made a “split-second decision” to stand outside holding her Biden lawn sign, she explained in an interview. Another neighborhood woman stood nearby and booed the caravan, although Merritt decided to commit to a “silent protest.”

Ultimately, she told The Daily Beast, the pro-Trump drivers shouted sexist slurs at her and the other woman anyway. Then the women noticed the driver holding a handgun, Merritt recalled.

“He was pointing a gun at us while driving,” she told The Daily Beast. “He didn’t stick it out the window, it was just there and he was staring at us. Traffic was moving slowly.”

Merritt said she called 911—largely out of concern that the group was approaching a nearby early voting site where locals were lined up to cast their ballots.

“There was a long line, even though it’s raining. I just thought about these people, all these people standing out there and this guy with his gun,” she said. “You can have your freedom to rally and annoy people with your loud horns or whatever, but he had a gun.”

Nancy Seligson, the town supervisor for nearby Mamaroneck (where the 911 call was routed), told The Daily Beast that police received the call, but that the parade was full of black pickup trucks that fit the description. “The decision was made to monitor the caravan until it left the town,” she said.

Merritt said she joined a larger group of neighbors when the caravan passed again. This time, she said, a couple spat at her, and multiple people issued threats, including someone who threatened to cut her head off. [Continue reading…]

SF Chronicle reports:

A caravan of flag-fluttering Trump partisans motored into the parking lot at the Gateway Center in Marin City on Sunday morning, with some members hurling racial epithets at bystanders in what is Marin County’s only predominantly minority community, according to two witnesses and reports on the social media website Nextdoor.

Marin City resident Amber Allen-Peirson, who works in the wellness center at Tamalpais High School in Mill Valley, said she arrived around 11:30 a.m. after receiving several texts that local residents were being insulted by the interlopers. By the time she arrived, tensions were already high, with several dozen residents confronting the Trump supporters.

“They were calling children n–,” she said. “They were yelling at kids I know, kids I care about.”

The caravan started in Santa Rosa and arrived at about 11 a.m. at the Vintage Oaks Shopping Center in Novato. It ended at the Marin Gateway Shopping Center in Marin City, according to Sgt. Brenton Schneider of the Marin County sheriff’s office. He said the caravan included an estimated 250 to 350 vehicles. Nobody was arrested, but the sheriff’s office received reports of arguments, fights, as well as paintball shots and eggs chucked at the Trump supporters.

Allen-Peirson said she was worried that the Trump convoy had purposefully selected Marin City as a minority-majority community in a county that is 80% white. Marin City has had a strong African American presence since World War II, when many people worked in wartime shipyards.

“I’m concerned about Marin City, because it’s the only Black community in Marin and there is only one entrance and one exit,” she said. “Are they going to attack us in the future? What was their point? Were they trying to make a statement?”

She said she was grateful nobody was hurt “because the tension was high and the environment was definitely unsafe.” [Continue reading…]