• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

August 27, 2019 Sandy Robson

Tonight I attended the “Hate Has No Home Here” Ferndale community meeting against hate groups event, hosted by the Riveters Collective, that was held at the Ferndale Library.

There were speakers for about the first 30 minutes, and then attendees were asked to split up into small groups to have some workshop-type discussions for about 30 minutes. After those workgroup discussions were completed, then people were sharing what was talked about in their groups. 

I left to go outside when the small groups were forming (around 7:00 PM) because I’m not someone who feels comfortable in those kinds of small group discussions. As I walked outside the library to the parking lot a vehicle drove by that had a large Trump flag and 2 large American flags flying, and which were attached to the top of the vehicle. There were multiple stickers on the back windshield as well. 

The vehicle eventually pulled into a parking spot down at the far end of the lot which was nearly full. Two individuals exited the car; a man and a young girl who appeared to be his daughter. They both were wearing what may be best described as star spangled pants, and he wore a red hat, which I could not see if it had writing on it or not. 

They both walked up the ramp to the library so I continued walking down the parking lot toward their vehicle to take some photos since the initial two photos I took were taken from far away. I was able to take a number of photos, and then went to my vehicle and stayed inside it for the rest of the event. 

It’s my understanding from talking to a couple people after the event, that the man went inside the event room during the time people were broken up into small groups having discussions. I am not sure if the young girl accompanied him inside the event room or not. 

I was told that due to the man’s offensive behavior inside the event room, people were called on to remove him, and they did remove him. Maybe other people who were actually inside the event room can, and might, provide details as I have no details since I was not present and the couple people I spoke with had had only some basic information. 

One of the reasons I was alert to the Trump flag vehicle was because I had seen it yesterday when it drove past me as I was in a restaurant on Railroad Ave. I was unable to get any photos at that time.