Standing Tall Amid "Rollin' Coal" in Annapolis, MD
Over in Annapolis, MD, there’s a group of people who gather every Saturday morning to protest the second Trump administration. The meet at the edge of the sprawling Annapolis Mall, a structural dividing line between the city and its suburbs. They’re part of a local Indivisible group that’s been protesting every weekend for over a year and a half.
On this particular Saturday, there were over a dozen people. When I asked Robin Faitoute and her husband, Randy Schneider, both 73, about how many they usually have, Randy grinned.
“It’s the summer,” Randy says.” We tend to get twice the numbers during the winter when people aren’t in vacation!” Usually, he says, their group runs about 30 people, though it’s gotten as large as 60.
Randy and Robin walk up and down the sidewalk, checking on the other protesters in the sweltering heat. They wear yellow vests adorned with various pins. They wave and smile at supporters, and shrug off their detractors.
“Sometimes guys roll their windows down and wave their MAGA hats, or give us the finger,” Randy says.
“And sometimes they stop, and come and join us,” says Robin.
Occasionally someone in a large truck will pass by and “roll coal.” That’s when you stomp the accelerator of a large, heavily modified diesel-powered engine to purposefully emit a large cloud of foul-smelling black soot from the exhaust manifold. It’s an recklessly expensive form of anti-environmental protest, usually carried out by conservatives who drive large, lifted pick-up trucks with oversized mud tires. Maryland has laws prohibiting “rolling coal.” So does the federal government.
“The police know we’re here,” Robin says. “In general, they keep an eye out. They’ve actually pulled someone over for rolling coal.”
Comprised of mostly retired folks, nobody says they feel threatened.
People in the group say they feel like they’ve been getting more attention. Supporters honk and cheer, they say. Detractors tend to flip them a middle-finger, shout or wave a MAGA hat. There’s been a few people who’ve made finger guns, Randy and Robin say, but nobody has ever pointed an actual gun.
There’s even a regular counter-protester. A neighbor Randy and Robin know quite well. A contractor, the man has done work on the homes of people they know. He likes to drive around the protest with pro-Trump flags on his truck. Randy and Robin say they just have a fundamental disagreement about their respective politics.
The group comes out every Saturday morning for two hours. Like many other protest groups, once the reach the agreed upon time limit, they quickly gather all their signs and leave without a trace.
Randy thinks people should come out to protest groups like his. He says it’s fun to stand in the side of the road with a bunch of other like-minded people exercising their first amendment right.
“There’s comradery,” Robin adds.
As the group had began to dwindle, there was an audible increase in hecklers.
“Save America” said a guy in a truck. “MAGA, baby,” said another. “Lets go Brandon,” shouted one young woman gunning her engine through a yellow traffic light.
“They tend to yell more stuff at the end of the day,” said Kari Alperovitz-Bichell, 67. She and laughed, adding that people seem to feel emboldened when their group is much smaller.
They weren’t so vocal when there was a whole group of them standing on the corner.
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