Supporters of President Donald Trump stormed the US Capitol building during its session on Wednesday, breaking windows, scaling the walls, and vandalizing the 200-year-old building. One particular person among them is a Filipino holding a "walis tambo," a type of broom in the Philippine households.
'Walis Tambo'
Journalists managed to capture peculiar moments of the protest: a man posing beside a historical statue, a person sitting in a congressman's desk, a person stealing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's podium, someone waving the confederate flag in front of a backdrop of the American flag, and the most absurd moment: a Filipino waving around a walis tambo.
The surreal scene of the protestor waving around the broom was captured by AFP photographer Saul Loeb and eventually went viral.
Philippine Twitterverse was stunned by the spectacle of something that is Filipino in the midst of the mayhem in the United States capital.
Hundreds of pro-Trump demonstrators stormed the building, pleading to overturn the election results.
The subject of the viral photo was wearing a hard hat, a face mask, and the American flag made into a shawl and caught everyone's attention.
The broom was made with a makeshift shield of Captain America, reported Newspapers.
The siege transpired simultaneously with members of Congress counting the Electoral College votes in order to certify President-Elect Joe Biden as the winner, resulting in the destruction of property, arrests, and deaths.
The incumbent president has made multiple allegations of voter fraud. Trump also instigated his supporters to protest in Capitol Hill minutes before the incident, claiming that the United States has had enough" of the alleged theft. Courts have dismissed Trump's claims, reported We the Pvblic.
Protesters were also carrying picks, sticks, guns, and shovels when they stormed the Capitol in a bid to stop Congress from officially announcing the election victory of Biden over Trump.
The unidentified Trump supporter waving the whiskbroom in sunglasses had his or her face covered in cloth.
The certain picture credited to Saul Loeb of Agence France-Presse via Getty Images showed the person holding the object with a raised arm.
Looking closely at the shield, it reveals the word "coup" written on the surface.
The certification made Trump a one-term president, which is rare for the US.
The shield equated "coup" with "pandemic hoax, false media, extremist groups and mail-in fraud," echoing the president's views.
Social media users deduced that the individual who appeared in the viral photos must have been Filipino.
According to Nonoy Espina, a national union Journalist of the Philippines chair, on Twitter, "Surreal photo by AFP's Saul Loeb. Now, who else would bring a walis tambo and wear an upside down flag to a riot?"
Further inspection reveals that the soft broom looks like the ones sold in a city in the Philippines called Baguio.
The foundations of American democracy were rocked when the mob violently protested the nation's runoff election results, which resulted in Democrats obtaining dominance of the Senate and House.
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