This is, side by side, the crowds Donald Trump’s inauguration has drawn compared with Barack Obama.
Timothy Burke, an editor at sports news site Deadspin, tweeted the two network news stills side by side, one showing the Mall in Washington on the day of Barack Obama’s second inauguration in 2013 and the other from Friday - both at the exact same time of day.
The still on the left shows the Mall, looking towards the Washington Monument, while the Trump image shows the Mall looking towards Congress.
With less than 90 minutes to go until the inauguration, Trump was drawing a fraction of the crowd that gathered for his predecessor.
It was later confirmed Trump had 250,000 people in the crowd, a quarter of those who turned out for Obama in 2013 and far fewer than the 1.8 million who turned out in 2009.
People noted the sparse crowds throughout the morning.
Aerial photos showed how uncrowded the Mall was.
Trump was mocked by Dulwich Hamlet FC, a club in the Isthmian League Premier Division.
The Mall did fill up more closer to Trump’s actual inauguration and speech.
But it still looked like the crowd was smaller than the one Obama drew four years ago.
After the inaugural address, NBC reporter Katy Tur showed a video of the parade route, showing the lack of crowds.
The city’s metro system said there had been 193,000 trips by 11am, compared with 317,000 at the same time on the day of Obama’s second inauguration and 513,000 on the day of his first.
There were more trips by 11am on the day of George W Bush’s second inauguration in 2005 than there were today.
Earlier, Politics1.com said the grows in the Mall were a “fraction” of those at Obama’s first inauguration in 2009, adding the city’s Metro was not crowded.
On Thursday evening, Trump had an inauguration concert at the Lincoln Memorial which also appeared sparely attended. MSNC estimated there were 10,000 people there.
Trump told the audience he “didn’t know” whether a concert at the Lincoln Memorial had been done before.
It has, in 2009 just before Barack Obama was inaugurated.
