The crowd at the March for Our Lives demonstration in the nation’s capital on Saturday, March 24, was much smaller than estimates from the organizers of the event, according to an imaging company.
The agency reported a total ridership of 1 million on the day of the Women’s March in Washington last year.
That march was the largest single-day demonstration in U.S. history, according to Digital Design & Imaging Service. That event drew 440,000 people, the company said.
A city official told The Associated Press that participation in the march likely surpassed half a million.
Participation estimates in gatherings on the National Mall and nearby areas used to be provided by the service, but the agency stopped after the Million Man March in 1995.
Nation of Islam Louis Farrakhan, known for his racist comments against white people and his disparaging comments against Jews, threatened to sue the park service after the agency estimated that 400,000 attended the march, while organizers believed they had reached their goal of 1 million participants, according to AP.
Researchers at Boston University later estimated that the crowd was actually in between the figures, around 800,000 people.
No lawsuit ended up being filed but it ended the official estimates from the park service. The following year, Congress barred the agency from spending money to count crowds, and the practice has continued to this day despite the language disappearing from subsequent budgets.
“No matter what we said or did, no one ever felt we gave a fair estimate,” U.S. Park Police Maj. J.J. McLaughlin said.