As World Pride flows straight into the military parade, DC officials say they're ready for anything

U.S. Park Police stand by as workers put up fencing around Dupont Circle ahead of the World Pride Parade, Friday, June 6, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein) The Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- Officials in the nation's capital generally express full confidence in their ability to handle large, complicated events and huge crowds. As Metropolitan Police Department Chief Pamela Smith recently put it, “We are really the experts in this space when it comes to crowd management.”

Over the next eight days. in the sprawling city that is the nation's capital, that expertise will be put to the test.

The District of Columbia is playing host to massive events on back-to-back weekends. Two wildly divergent events each carry the extra possibility of counterprotests or disruption, ad