Women's Rights Protesters Outside Trump Tower Tell Candidate 'Hands Off U.S.'

MIDTOWN, NY — Hundreds of people lined up outside Trump Tower in Midtown Manhattan Wednesday evening to protest Donald Trump's history of insulting and demeaning women. They toted signs that read "P---y Trumps hate," "D.J.T. hands off me!" and "Hands off my sacred p---y." The crowd was hoping to get Trump off his game before the third presidential debate Wednesday night against Hillary Clinton in Las Vegas.

(WARNING: OFFENSIVE LANGUAGE)

The crowd stood outside the tower on the east side of Fifth Avenue in a crowd control gate while a handful of protesters walked by the entrance to the building chanting "Sn--ch grabs back!" and "Dump Trump!" There were a few outspoken Trump supporters marching by the building, attracting several boos and chants of "shame!" from the crowd.

Brooklynite Brittany Herrick, 27, was wearing a statue of liberty crown and red, white and blue. She held a sign that said, "D.J.T. Hands off Me!"

"It means to take your hands off me, hands off the country, you know, Lady Liberty is the symbol of the U.S., so it means hands off Lady Liberty, hands off the U.S.," Herrick said.

"I feel like Trump's comments are indicative of a man who doesn't respect women, and so he cannot be trusted to govern a country that's half women," she added.

Twenty-eight-year-old Leah Goldmann from Brooklyn was also wearing red, white and blue and had outlined her eyelashes in bright blue. She held a sign that said, "Boys will be boys held responsible for their actions and words."

"A lot of the rhetoric in response to Trump's statements has been, 'Oh well it's locker room talk,' 'Boys will be boys,' and we should just accept this, and that is false," Goldmann said. "Men are socialized to oppress and put down and abuse women, and we need to change that and encourage them to be accountable for their actions and their words as well, because words can very much incite these actions."

An elementary school psychotherapist and social worker who preferred to remain anonymous held a sign that said "No me agarres," which means "Don't grab me" in Spanish.

When she first heard the tape of Trump talking to Billy Bush on an "Access Hollywood" truck, bragging that he could assault women because he was a star, she was disgusted, she said.

"I just thought about all the women who I work with and the children, all the people who've experienced domestic violence and childhood sexual abuse, and the fact that it's all boiled down to locker room, very unfairly minimized it," she said.

A group of four 11-year-old girls who study together at Arts & Letters public school each held an anti-Trump sign. One girl, Sadie Fisher, was holding a sign that said "I'm Just Finding My Voice, Don't Silence Me With Your Misogyny."

"Misogyny means discrimination against women," Fisher told Patch.

"And looking at our media, and seeing these horrible things towards women, what our ideal body images should look like, and hearing someone who might be in charge of our country for the next four years? It's really dismaying and horrifying and sickening that he would say something like this, and that's who he is," Fisher said.

Bronx resident and high school history teacher Swati Khurana, 41, held a sign that said "Silent Majority Against Trump." Khurana believes the silent majority will elect Clinton, she told Patch, even if the minority that will vote for Trump is more vocal.

"On Trump's website you can sign up to observe elections, and we know that this country has had centuries of voter intimidation, especially for African Americans," Khurana said. "It's very loaded when you say to observe elections to certain communities, certain neighborhoods, certain precincts. It's a dog whistle for basically people intimidating minority voters. And I'm concerned because his supporters are armed."

Photo credit: Sarah Kaufman/Patch