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Aerial shots show the crowd sizes for Obama and Trump's inaugurations
The Park Service did not indicate the precise times that the photos were taken
The National Park Service has released a series of aerial and ground shots that show the crowd sizes during the last three presidential inaugurations in response to a Freedom of Information Act request from various media outlets.
The images show the crowd sizes of President Barack Obama’s 2009 and 2013 inaugurations, as well as President Donald Trump’s inauguration on January 20. The turnout represented in the photos for Trump’s inauguration was smaller than that of his predecessor. The Park Service did not indicate the precise times that the photos were taken.
“The NPS does not have a position or comment about the photos,” NPS spokesman Tom Crosson told CNN in an email Tuesday. CNN has reached out to the White House for comment.
CNN previously reported that the Trump administration asked the Interior Department’s digital team in January to temporarily stop using Twitter after the National Park Service retweeted messages that negatively compared the crowd sizes at Obama’s 2009 inauguration to Trump’s inauguration.
But Crosson denied that the White House was involved, saying that the agency’s Twitter activity was halted due to “unauthorized tweets.”
“The NPS halted Twitter activity for just over 12 hours that day because we thought our national Twitter account was compromised based on unauthorized tweets posted by our account,”