This archive report was first published on 21 June 2020.
Donald Trump's campaign manager, Brad Parscale, has come under fire for his claims about the attendance at the president's rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on Saturday.
According to the Tulsa Fire Department, only 6,200 people attended the rally, held at the BOK Center, which has a capacity of up to 19,000. The Trump campaign, however, claims that 12,000 people attended.
On Sunday, CNN reported that Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner are 'pissed' at Parscale for predicting a much larger turnout than actually materialized.
Responding to the criticism, Parscale blamed the low attendance on 'a week's worth of the fake news media warning people away from the rally because of Covid and protestors, coupled with recent images of American cities on fire, had a real impact on people bringing their families and children to the rally.'
However, Parscale then appeared to threaten to rescind accreditation for journalists critical of the Trump campaign, saying, 'For the media to now celebrate the fear that they helped create is disgusting, but typical. And it makes us wonder why we bother credentialing media for events when they don’t do their full jobs as professionals.'
Some have speculated that the number of applicants to the rally may have been inflated by young users on social media platform TikTok applying for tickets and then deliberately not attending.
