NYC Anti-Trump Protests Enter Third Day: 100s Blocked From Approaching Trump Tower

MIDTOWN MANHATTAN, NY — Anti-Trump activists showed up in the hundreds again Friday night to protest in the streets of New York City — their third night of marching dozens of blocks uptown to Trump Tower (between 56th and 57th streets) as a statement against the ideologies and proposed policies of President-elect Donald Trump.

By the time they reached 56th Street, though, they found that barricades erected by the NYPD earlier in the day were blocking them from approaching the tower.

"They won't let us through, but that won't stop us from raising our voices," protester (and Penguin publishing assistant Elizabeth Vogt) wrote on Twitter.

Vogt said one police officer told her "they didn't want people going near the Trump Tower." Another protester said she was told the same.

This directive, if true, contradicts the stance Mayor Bill de Blasio took when addressing the ongoing protests in a press conference Thursday. He said:

"I think there’s a pretty strong tradition in this country that you don’t isolate protest too far from the point where people are focusing on. Even the White House — historically, people get very close to the White House when they’re protesting. That’s actually been something that’s been honored across generations and parties. The NYPD is certainly going to figure out the best location, but I don’t think we’re talking about moving people far away."

"It’s the American tradition," the mayor added. "It’s a good one. It’s a New York City tradition to honor and respect protests whether we agree with it or not."

The NYPD and the Secret Service have been erecting more and more security barriers around Trump's home on 5th Avenue each day since he was elected. CNN is now calling the tower "a fortress ringed by tight security."

DNAinfo reporter Noah Hurowitz photographed three big Department of Corrections buses waiting a few blocks away, at West 49th Street and 6th Avenue, around 7 p.m. These types of buses are typically used to cart arrested protesters down to police precincts to be processed.

Friday's protesters began their demonstration at a daytime "love rally" at Washington Square Park (near 8th Street).

The organizers of the love rally had urged participants on Facebook to "remember that this event will not be explicitly anti-Trump, but will rather serve to tell those who he has targeted in his speech that they are welcome in this country. As such, we're rallying in support of those demographics, not to protest a Trump presidency."

By nightfall, though, Trump was definitely back in their crosshairs.

The group of hundreds of protesters made its way up 6th Avenue early Friday night, pumping anti-Trump signage and shouting slogans like "Sexist, racist, anti-gay! Donald Trump, go away!"

(Previous marches ran along 6th Avenue all the way up. But protesters may have avoided that route Friday night because it also hosted the city's Veteran's Day Parade a few hours earlier, and was still a total mess of street closures and cop cars by dusk.)