How many people were really at the October 2002 protests in Washington, DC?
That’s a good question, since making estimates of big crowds is difficult. If you are familiar with events organized by the WWP/IAC/ANSWER and have seen their estimates afterwards, you’ll notice that they create rosy estimates that go above and beyond the usual activist practice of rounding up numbers. In the case of the September 26, 2000 protests in Washington, DC, you heard crowd estimates that ranged from several thousand to 200,000. ANSWER seems to be sticking with the 200,000 number, so you can take that with a grain of salt. Local activists with more experience with Washington protests generally consensed on an attendance figure of around 100,000. One local activist said that the word on the street was that the attendance was between 80,000 and 120,000. A very respectable turnout, but nowhere near the 200,000 number promoted by ANSWER.
