The Pennsylvania truck protest convoy largely fizzled out on Wednesday in spite of its organizer promising a spectacular run along the highways to Washington.
The convoy organized by Scranton-area business Bob Bolus got off to a rocky start in the morning, when he reportedly had to tend to flat tires on his truck.
At its departure mid-morning from Scranton, the convoy had eight vehicles, including the 18-wheeler belonging to Bolus and five pickup trucks.
“At one point we had 50,” Bolus told PennLive in the early afternoon, referencing the number of trucks in the caravan. But the convoy, which made its way west towards Harrisburg en route to the nation’s capital, never came near having a dozen vehicles, according to journalists trailing the convoy.
“People have work to do,” Bolus said when asked about the meager show of participants.
He’s back on the highway
— Julio-César Chávez (@JulioCesrChavez) February 23, 2022
Bob Bolus just left the truck stop north of Harrisburg. He leads a caravan of 8 vehicles total
His 18 wheeler
4 pickup trucks
1 SUV
2 sedans
Bolus plans to drive to DC but says he won’t disrupt traffic pic.twitter.com/GT5HqejzsJ
One of the trucks in the caravan was decked out with half a dozen or so flags ranging from pro-Trump flags, what appeared to be a “Q” flag referencing Qanon, to derogatory flags targeting President Joe Biden.
The owner of a towing service and truck parts business in Scranton, Bolus had hoped to replicate something near what was seen out of the Canadian capital a few weeks ago when hundreds of tractor trailers laid the city under siege, paralyzing traffic in and out.
I’m currently out in Washington, D.C. area traffic attempting to locate Scranton-based trucker Bob Bolus’ tiny convoy and there are three big problems: Bolus has no idea where he is going, is stuck in traffic, and has no idea where he is.
— Zachary Petrizzo (@ZTPetrizzo) February 23, 2022
His was the first in what a series of planned protests by truck convoys modeled after recent trucker protests that shut down a U.S.-Canadian border crossing and besieged the streets of Ottawa for weeks to protest government pandemic restrictions in Canada.
Separate convoys have been planned through online forums, all with different starting points, departure dates and routes to the Washington, D.C. area. It’s not known if any would seek to actively shut down Washington’s streets, but the Pentagon has approved deployment of 700 unarmed National Guard troops to prepare for the convoys.
Bolus said his protest encompasses a slew of grievances against what he said was government overreach. His list of grievances included foreign oil imports, pandemic restrictions, the economy and even critical race theory. Bolus also objects to Scranton changing the names of two roads to honor its native son, Biden.
“You are not taking any more of our rights away,” Bolus said on Tuesday. “You are giving rights to illegals. It’s ok for them to do but not us as American citizens. We want the pipeline put back into service. We want fuel back in our country. We want to go back to where we were before instead of giving the rights to foreign countries to put the screws to us because they are feathering their own nests.”
On Wednesday, the convoy made it to the Harrisburg area in early afternoon, then spent nearly three hours at the Manada Hill truck stop on Interstate 81, before getting back on the road sometime after 3 p.m.
Bolus and his small caravan of pickup trucks headed south on Interstate 83. He said he still intended to head to Washington, D.C.
"A lot of the guys that were joining us were somewhat intimidated by all the news media coming here, 'you're gonna get arrested, they got all kind of military.'"@Brad7News spoke with Bob Bolus on the small turnout for his convoy coming to the D.C. area. https://t.co/iK5ve0MkZL pic.twitter.com/8Bfown34qw
— 7News DC (@7NewsDC) February 23, 2022
Bolus has previously generated news coverage.
In 2017, he was interviewed by a National Public Radio station in southern Florida for his participation in a counter protest to a rally demanding a Confederate statute be preserved and not torn down from its location in front of the Manatee County courthouse.
In its news coverage that day, NPR noted that Bolus shouted “You don’t like America? Go back to Africa!” pointing both middle fingers to the gathering of people demanding the statute be torn down.
