COSTA MESA, CA A clash between protestors, Donald Trump supporters and police turned violent outside Thursday’s Trump rally in Costa Mesa.
Police worked for hours to control the boisterous crowd that refused to disperse and instead swarmed the intersection outside the Orange County Fair & Event Center after the Republican presidential front-runner gave a fiery speech at the Pacific Amphitheatre.
By 10 p.m. a fistfight had broken out, protesters had broken the windows of a patrol car and hurled rocks at cars, a driver did donuts in the middle of a crowd of protesters and at least 20 people were arrested.
That tensions would flare up between protesters and Trump supporters in Orange County isn’t surprising. Once described by President George W. Bush as ground zero for the immigration debate, Orange County is home to the Minutemen anti-immigration movement as well as a changing demographic where minorities now make up the majority of residents in several cities. Earlier this year, a KKK rally resulted in a series of stabbings outside Anaheim city hall.
While protesters outside chanted "Dump Trump," denouncing him as a racist, Trump began speaking to a capacity crowd of thousands.
For his part, Trump didn’t shy away from his controversial comments about immigrants.
He opened his speech flanked by a group of people whom he identified as the victims of terrible crimes at the hands of illegal immigrants or “people that shouldn’t have been here, people that were able to come over the border like it’s nothing,” he said. “These are horrible stories. They happen so much...Your crime numbers are so crazy, they are going through the roof. We can’t have it anymore.”
The crowd erupted into applause and chants of of “Build that wall.”
"We're going to get our country back to a balance," Trump promised the crowd.
But as the evening wore on, anger between the Trump supporters and protesters outside boiled over, escalating from shouting matches to rock throwing. A large police presence was apparent, but officials may not have anticipated such as large crowd.
"It definitely got out of control," said Megan Iyall, 20, told the Los Angeles Times. "I shouldn't feel this unsafe."
People had been gathering at the venue since about 4 p.m. Costa Mesa police and sheriff's deputies, including mounted units, worked to clear the intersection and get the crowd to disperse, according to Orange County sheriff's Lt. Mark Stichter.
Some of those in the crowd were thought to be Trump supporters who were unable to get inside to see the candidate's speech. Thousands were turned away from the overbooked rally including many who had tickets.
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City News Service contributed to this report.