Trump crowd arrived early at Nassau Coliseum, and so did protesters

Long before former President Donald Trump took the stage at Nassau Coliseum Wednesday night, throngs of his supporters reveled ahead of the rally, bringing lawn chairs to the arena’s parking lot as loud music played, merchandise got hawked and counterprotests loomed.

The crowds came wearing Trump hats, sporting novelty shirts excoriating Trump’s Democratic rival and engaged in political conversation. They came in pickup trucks displaying "Back the Blue" and "Take Back America" flags.

And they came early.

Trump’s rally marked the first time in seven years he has held one on Long Island, giving supporters a jolt less than two months before the presidential election.

Babylon resident Donna Lynn, who works in insurance and is an unaffiliated voter, was among those who got there Wednesday morning.

"It gives us hope to see other people who share our values," Lynn said. "When you’re at a Trump rally, you are welcome."

Brendan McManamy, 32, a landscaper from Elmont, said he is concerned about the economy, wars overseas and the opioid epidemic.

"The Nassau GOP has done a fantastic job in flipping the county red, and Trump coming here is another opportunity to get someone who listens to middle class people," McManamy said. "Feel like we took a hard turn in the opposite direction."

The Suffolk County Police Benevolent Association, planning a watch party at Mitchel Field, bused in about 80 members and their families. The PBA was the first police union in New York to endorse Trump, which PBA President Lou Civello said came down to a difference in policy on police funding.

Some officers held signs reading "Suffolk County PBA for Trump" and Trump’s signature hairdo atop a pistol.

"Only one candidate in this race backs the blue," Civello said. "The other candidate wants to defund us," 

Democratic counterprotests

The PBA’s gathering came after some Democrat-led counterprotests. State and Nassau County Democratic Chairman Jay Jacobs led a protest of about 50 people just outside the Coliseum gate.

He said Long Island’s Republican congressional candidates are trying to frame themselves as moderates in their speeches and mailers.

"The truth of the matter is they stand shoulder to shoulder with Donald Trump. They stand for what he stands for," Jacobs said. "They own the crazy things he says, and we need different representation here in Nassau County."

Robert Zimmerman, a national Democratic committeeman who ran for Congress in 2022, sarcastically called the Coliseum gathering "the largest Democratic get-out-the-vote event you’ve ever seen."

He said he believes voters will go to the polls and vote Democratic "to stop the insanity and stop the lies."

Others at the demonstration included Manhattan resident Christian Cooper — the Black man who was threatened by a white woman in Central Park in May 2020 — who came to his hometown of Uniondale to oppose the former president’s arrival.

"I’m not letting that happen without raising my own voice," Cooper said.

By midafternoon, Haitian Americans, Democratic leaders, union workers, spiritual leaders and officials with the Holocaust Memorial and Tolerance Center rallied against a debunked conspiracy theory that Haitian migrants in Ohio are eating pets.

They held a sign, which read, "We don't eat pets, we vote."

"This might benefit the Haitian community, because Haitians who were not going to vote before, will now vote," Assemb. Phil Ramos (D-Brentwood) said. 

Trump supporters confronted some of the protesters. Despite a few close shouting matches, Nassau County police intervened to defuse any skirmishes with no arrests as of Wednesday afternoon.

Early arrivals

The rally was highly anticipated for Trump’s Long Island supporters, some of whom waited outside the Coliseum more than 24 hours before the start of the rally.

Barbara Keuning, a retired nurse from Levittown, was buying a commemorative Trump-Vance T-shirt in the parking lot, where two merchants were set up briefly on Tuesday before Nassau police asked them to leave.

"This will be my first time seeing my president in person and I'd sit on the ceiling if I have to," said Keuning, who donned a light pink "Women for Trump" baseball cap.

Ken Lane, 62, who said he moved from Amityville to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, in 2019 because he could no longer afford to live on Long Island, had been at the Coliseum since midnight Tuesday.

Wearing a white Trump-Vance campaign cowboy hat, sunglasses and a navy blue "Keep America Great" sweatshirt, he sat in a folding chair just outside the gate to the Coliseum parking lot.

"The first time I had become political for anyone is for Donald Trump," Lane said. "I love this country, and I love our children.He’s one of the rare leaders who cares about the populace. We have been spiraling as a nation — out of control — and it seems like they [Democrats] don’t care about the citizens of this country."