White House Protests Set to Continue for Seventh Day After Organizers Raise $50K

Protests against President Donald Trump are expected to carry on into their seventh day after demonstrators continued to rally outside the White House during heavy rains on Saturday.

Organized by former Hillary Clinton campaign adviser, Adam Parkhomenko, the "Occupy Lafayette Park" protests have continued since the U.S. leader returned from his summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday.

"We stood outside the Kremlin Annex tonight with a blue wave falling on us and it felt great. Tomorrow marks one week of protesting," Parkhomenko tweeted on Saturday, thanking Secret Service and United States Park Police for their "professionalism."

Major thanks to The Collective (@SteeloSoulMusic @MKZuluMusic @yaddiya) for putting on a great show last night. #OccupyLafayettePark pic.twitter.com/7HIxNtRwBn

— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) July 22, 2018

In a later post, Parkhomenko said he had received as many as 2,036 donations since Friday totaling more than $50,000 to keep the demonstrations going.

He said the average contribution made was $23 and suggested that the funds would be going towards getting Washington, D.C. "its own dedicated baby Trump blimp."

"I'll have an update on timing tomorrow," he said.

The protests have featured local bands and other performances, including a Mariachi band and opera singers, with the goal of keeping Trump up at night.

Our first duet at the Kremlin Annex pic.twitter.com/rtOTChSuDy

— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) July 22, 2018

A Facebook post set up by protest organizers suggests that demonstrations will continue even on Sunday, despite expected thunderstorms—and despite the fact that the president is not slated to be at the White House, according to the Hill.

Parkhomenko said he is looking for bagpipers, puppeteers and an auctioneer that "can verbally reenact outside the White House everything important Trump is giving away to the highest bidder."

So far, a number of high-profile protesters have showed up to the rallies, including actress and activist Alyssa Milano and Stormy Daniels' attorney, Michael Avenatti.

The White House has been struggling to handle the political fallout after Trump's summit in Helsinki with Putin, which former CIA director John Brennan said was nothing short of "treasonous," while John McCain branded it "one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president in memory."

The U.S. leader met privately with the Russian president and later rejected findings of the U.S. intelligence community, aligning himself with the country found to have influenced the U.S. 2016 election, according to CIA intelligence.

Trump tried to recover from the misstep days later, claiming that he had meant to say "I don't see any reason why it wouldn't be Russia," after saying he didn't see any reason why the country "would" be responsible for election meddling.

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Chantal Da Silva is Chief Correspondent at Newsweek, with a focus on immigration and human rights. She is a Canadian-British journalist whose work ... Read more

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