At the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., last night, attendees spent $225 to $500 on tickets to attend an exclusive, one-night premiere of the new Diamond and Silk feature-length film, “Dummycrats.”
Sisters Lynnette Hardaway and Rochelle Richardson are best known by their stage names Diamond and Silk, which they donned to feverishly campaign for President Donald Trump during the 2016 general election. They’ve kept up their support for Trump since his inauguration, accusing Democrats of expecting black voters to fall on party lines like “slaves,” akin to a “plantation.” The online personalities have also made headlines testifying before Congress that a community guideline enforcement error against their branded Facebook page was proof of tech companies’ systemic oppression of conservative voices.
Just so you know, we will always have our Presidents back.
"Don't Get It Twisted!"(Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead) pic.twitter.com/d5YwEqbT3g
— Diamond and Silk® (@DiamondandSilk) March 24, 2018
Diamond and Silk’s movie premiere at the Trump hotel was studded with other mid-level pro-Trump social media personalities, including former Pussycat Dolls member Kaya Jones, Brandon Straka of the online “#WalkAway” movement, commentator Harlan Hill, and conservative comedian Terrence Williams (not to be confused with the Dallas Cowboys wide receiver Terrance Williams). Juanita Broadrick, who has accused former president Bill Clinton of raping her in 1978, was also in attendance. The press table held a pre-printed badge for Fox News Channel host Jeanine Pirro, although this reporter left the event before she could be spotted. The red carpet was broadcast live to YouTube by Right Side Broadcasting Network.
On the ground floor of an event space that hosted Vice President Mike Pence on the floor above, right-wing media figures like The Daily Caller’s Benny Johnson snacked on popcorn served in Diamond and Silk-themed cups and watched the film projected on a screen in a ballroom. In the next room over, a bar served VIP ticket-holders glasses of alcohol while they mingled with the night’s distinguished guests.
The film’s GoFundMe effort raised more than $45,000 for production, which is perplexing given the objectively shoddy production quality. The fundraiser started on June 21, meaning the film was funded, produced, filmed, and distributed in just 116 days.
After leaving the Trump hotel for quick bowl of restaurant ramen, I meandered to a local Washington theater that was also showing the movie Monday night only. When I entered the theater in Washington’s Chinatown neighborhood, seven other moviegoers were standing with their hands over their hearts as the film opened with Jones performing the national anthem. The film then issued a “viewer discretion” warning, particularly to those in the audience who were liberal.
“We’re looking at you, Robert De Niro,” a voice-over read.
The film opened with Kyle Olson, who runs the conservative website “The American Mirror,” explaining that the premise of the movie was based on the fifth of 13 “rules” in activist Saul Alinsky’s book “Rules for Radicals.” That rule states that “ridicule is man's most potent weapon.”
What followed was nearly 20-minute series of YouTube clip montages of Diamond and Silk speaking at Trump events and compilations of liberal politicians stumbling over their words. One part of the film featured dramatically edited footage of Joe Biden kissing the tops of women’s and children’s heads at ceremonies during his time in office set to creepy music. Another clip features 15 seconds of footage of Hillary Clinton coughing during speeches while whimsical carnival music played.
After the exhaustive series of YouTube clips, Diamond and Silk appeared on camera to travel to Inglewood, California, in an effort to confront Rep. Maxine Waters. In interviews with people on the street, the duo showed pedestrians outside a donut shop and grocery store laminated photos of Waters’ home. Diamond and Silk goaded the strangers to complain that Waters lives in a nice house in a good neighborhood while some people in her district experience homelessness.
Throughout the film, hired private security guards lingered in and out of the background behind Diamond and Silk.
At one point, the pair decided to visit Waters’ California office and demand that she meet with them. A front desk worker told them that the Congresswoman had flown to Washington that morning but that she would forward along a question if they would write it down on a form she would provide. Their visit ended abruptly shortly after Diamond and Silk start ranting about Waters, when the front desk worker noticed that the interaction was being filmed by a camera crew.
Diamond and Silk and their film crew were asked to leave the office, but they then headed to Waters’ home, where they waited outside, filming through a car window, until they were spotted by Waters’ grandson Mikael Moore, who called the police.
The next portion of the film featured Diamond and Silk in Washington, where they were filmed yelling at the Capitol Building demanding a meeting with Waters before wandering downtown D.C. with missing-person flyers for Waters and Rep. Nancy Pelosi. The duo was filmed as if they are asking pedestrians about the whereabouts of the congresswomen, but the shots are framed to clearly show the duo directing their questions to inanimate objects including parking meters and an empty bus.
While in Washington, they stopped at the Rayburn House Office Building and requested a meeting with Waters to take place that the same day, to which a staffer told them that they would be called if an opening happens to appear on the congresswoman’s otherwise busy schedule. The duo used the fact that Waters was unable to meet with them spontaneously to assert that she was “afraid” of them.
Rep. Steve King of Iowa did take a moment to speak with Diamond and Silk, however, during which he criticized welfare programs in the United States. It’s worth noting that King regularly echoes the sentiments of white nationalists and retweets white supremacists on Twitter.
The film suddenly shifted to feature the testimony of “Angel Mom” Michelle Root, whose daughter was killed in an automobile accident by a man who was an undocumented immigrant. Directly after that segment, Olson is seen traveling to the U.S.-Mexico border to speak with a border patrol agent about the construction of a border wall, where the agent told Olson that he thought border patrol agents were unfairly criticized for doing their job.
Viewers were then reintroduced to Diamond and Silk in the city of San Francisco, where the film hyper-focused on the area’s problem of feces on sidewalks. One portion of the film featured close-up shots of fecal matter on streets and sidewalks while a song declaring “everybody poops” played. They also paid a visit to conspiracy theorist radio host Michael "Savage" Weiner, who says he was among the first to comment on the increased amount of poop on the city’s sidewalks.
During the interview with Weiner, the group agreed that undocumented immigrants would become the “new slaves” on the “Democratic plantation” in a few years’ time. To close the segment, Diamond and Silk traveled to the office building where Pelosi’s California staff work and left two metal pooper-scoopers on the sidewalk outside.
After the credits rolled, the film featured thirty minutes of interviews promoting Straka and Olson.
