A confrontation between a white Trump supporter who allegedly brandished a gun and a Black man recording the incident—possibly part of a “Trump Train” rally in Richmond, Va. on Sunday—was shared on Reddit on Monday. The video highlighted tensions surrounding Tuesday’s presidential election.
The video, shared to Reddit’s r/PublicFreakout subreddit by user CantStopPoppin, captures nearly 2 1/2 minutes of the confrontation. Commenters identified the location as Richmond’s Monument Avenue.
The posting, “Trump supporter forced to re-holster his weapon on an unarmed black man,” showcases an encounter appearing to be part of some pre-election tensions that unfolded in Richmond on Sunday.
According to several Richmond-area media outlets, including ABC affiliate WRIC-TV, the landmark street—originally named for monuments honoring those who fought for the Confederacy during the Civil War—was the site of a Trump rally Sunday.
WRIC’s report on Sunday’s event noted that counter-protesters burned Trump flags at the Robert E. Lee monument at the site, and video included with the story shows one man taking a Trump flag that was displayed on a vehicle.
The Reddit video begins with the man walking toward the Trump supporter, decked out in a cap and sweatshirt identifying his political allegiance. The man filming the video screams, “You better holster your weapon!” repeatedly to the Trump supporter.
After the Trump supporter turns his back to the camera and appears to put something away, the man filming yells, “You pull that gun out again, I’m telling you, it’s not gonna end well,” followed by, “You don’t pull a gun on an unarmed man!”
The Trump supporter, while the man filming repeats that he’s an unarmed man, makes and repeats the statement, “It’s my property.”
The man filming responds, “Whatever. You pull that gun out again, I’m gonna lay you down.”
The face-to-face confrontation when the man filming says, “Your best bet is to go to your car and get the fuck on.” The Trump supporter walks away briskly down Monument Avenue, past a line of cars, but the man filming continues to pursue him, yelling as he does so.
In the discourse that follows, it appears that the property the Trump supporter is lamenting is a flag.
Eventually, the man filming stops and lets the Trump supporter walk away, observing, “You act like we don’t have guns, too. No one pulled a gun on you.”
Then, in contradiction to his earlier assertion that he’s unarmed, he notes, “I got two of ’em on me. I didn’t pull nothin’.”
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