As President Donald Trump’s deployment of National Guard troops continued, protesters lashed out at three of his top officials who took time for a photo op with the guardsmen on Wednesday in Washington, D.C.,’s Union Station.
Protesters booed and jeered Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller as they came to the station, located blocks from the U.S. Capitol, to thank the troops. The crowd’s chants drowned out the voices of the officials.
“Free DC,” the protesters shouted as three officials arrived in their motorcade.
Vance, Hegseth and Miller stopped by at the station’s Shake Shack and bought and ate lunch for the guard members.
Vance and Miller dismissed the jeers of the protesters, which drowned out their press gaggle, calling them “crazy” and “communists.”
“They appear to hate the idea that Americans can enjoy their communities,” Vance said.
Vance was asked why the troops were stationed at Union Station instead of parts of the city with higher crime rates. The vice president claimed that the station was being overrun with homeless people and visitors didn’t feel safe.
“This should be a monument to American greatness,” he said.
Vance added that he believed that crime statistics do not report the full scope of crime on the streets, however he declined to talk about evidence that backed his claim up and told a reporter to “You just got to look around.”
The event happened at the same time that D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser was giving a news conference on Wednesday.
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