The population of Tulsa, Oklahoma, is just over 400,000. The Trump campaign bragged for days that they’d received over a million requests for tickets. So, right away, they should be a little suspicious, right? Hundreds of thousands flocking to Tulsa in the middle of a pandemic? It didn’t happen.
The arena seats 19,000. The Tulsa Fire Department says just under 6200 were in the house. The New York Times writes that Trump’s attempt to revive his campaign “sputtered badly” on Saturday.
“While the president’s campaign had claimed that more than a million people had sought tickets for the rally, the 19,000-seat BOK Center was at least one-third empty during the rally. A second, outdoor venue was so sparsely attended that he and Vice President Mike Pence both canceled appearances there.“
So where were the adoring masses? It seems the Trump campaign got punked.
“TikTok users and fans of Korean pop music groups claimed to have registered potentially hundreds of thousands of tickets for Mr. Trump’s campaign rally as a prank. After the Trump campaign’s official account @TeamTrump posted a tweetasking supporters to register for free tickets using their phones on June 11, K-pop fan accounts began sharing the information with followers, encouraging them to register for the rally — and then not show.
“Many users deleted their posts after 24 to 48 hours in order to conceal their plan and keep it from spreading into the mainstream internet. “The majority of people who made them deleted them after the first day because we didn’t want the Trump campaign to catch wind,” Mr. Daniel said. “These kids are smart and they thought of everything.”
Trump campaign head Brad Parscale is no doubt fighting for his job this morning. The president was reportedly furious at the turnout and having to cancel the outdoor event due to poor attendance.
