In the hours before President Trump’s controversial rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma last week, his campaign directed workers to remove thousands of “Do Not Sit Here, Please!” stickers from seats, which were put in place by the venue to encourage social distancing, the Washington Post reported.
According to video and photos obtained by the Post and a person familiar with the matter, staff at the BOK Center in downtown Tulsa had already placed nearly 12,000 distancing stickers on every other seat in the arena when the Trump campaign put a stop to the effort. Trump campaign staffers then reportedly started removing the stickers from the chairs themselves.
The Post obtained a video that reportedly showed two unidentified men pulling the stickers off the seats ahead of the rally.
While there were thousands of empty seats at Trump’s June 20 rally, social distancing efforts were largely ignored during the event, which was billed as a masks-optional affair.
Trump was widely criticized for holding such a large rally amid the pandemic. Since the event, several staffers and even Secret Service agents have tested positive for COVID-19.
