Donald Trump made the unusual decision to hold a campaign event in Coachella, California on Saturday — a state that he’s undoubtedly set to lose in this year’s election — and bussed supporters 5 miles into the venue to do so. Unfortunately for thousands of those who showed up, the buses seemingly didn’t return to the venue late into the night, leaving many attendees stranded.
The story unfolded through a series of videos shared on social media Saturday night into Sunday. In a series of posts on X that were eventually deleted but were shared in screenshots, @WesleyxJohnson wrote that there was “only one bus in rotation” and “turnaround time for each drop off was 30 minutes,” with thousands waiting for said bus. Johnson added that there were originally 20-30 buses at the event.
He also charged that “something nefarious went down tonight to spark a riot.” Johnson later added that a bus driver told some abandoned attendees that “ALL of the fuel stations for BUSES (not cars) were completely depleted,” which meant some of the bus drivers were stranded without gas. “There were apparently 60 buses employed for this event,” he added, “and the fuel reserves were completely depleted or never refilled before the event.”
“Smells like sabotage!” Johnson asserted, without basis for his charge. He later explained that he deleted his initial posts “because I was hoping some help would come from it, but all it did was cause drama.”
“The buses had to drive 30 minutes out to find fuel and many didn’t return and some got stranded themselves trying to find fuel,” he added. “Then the CHP ordered the bus drivers to stop driving. This all came from the bus drivers updating us as we sat on the bus asking what happened. They and the Sheriffs were all just as confused as we were. My story stands, but the drama got out of hand.”
In a separate video re-shared on X, a man explained, “This isn’t normal. Apparently, the buses are no longer coming. Or at least there used to be like 20 buses when we were being brought here. But now there’s only like three buses operating, and it’s an absolute… It’s just chaos, absolute chaos. All of us are stranded here. Everyone’s stranded here.”
TikTok was also awash in videos from the event and its aftermath. The account @ohsorandom1977 shared several videos aggregated from attendees. One woman took to the social media platform to share that she and her husband were set to attend the event, but ended up missing it due to the tremendous crowds looking to attend — and apparently lacking logistics in support of those attending.
As @shannonachristine55 explained, the pair arrived at the event and “it was a nightmare.” The line to park cars was “a mile long” and “and the cars were not moving.” They parked about a mile from the venue and walked the entire distance to the parking lot, where they hoped to board a shuttle.
The pair decided to leave after waiting in line for an hour. “And thankfully, I did hear from another woman who got there around the same time that we did, she stood in line for two hours. Was just about to get on the shuttle bus, and they said they had to stop because the venue was maxed out. So I’m telling myself that that’s probably what was going to happen with us,” she added.
Trump has not commented on the bussing debacle.
The Desert Sun reported that the event was limited to a maximum capacity of 15,000 people by Riverside County, but Trump claimed that the rally was attended by 100,000.
The GOP candidate visited the city in between stops in Las Vegas and Prescott, Arizona. Trump spoke to California attendees for about 80 minutes and “ran through the standard list of Republican complaints about the Democrat-dominated state — its large number of immigrants in the U.S. illegally, its homeless population and its thicket of regulations — and waded into a water rights battle over the endangered Delta smelt that has pitted environmentalists against farmers,” the Associated Press reported.
