Bill Laitner

Detroit Free Press

With hundreds of thousands of women on their way to Washington, D.C., to make their voices heard on national issues -- on President Donald Trump's first full day in office – a stunned contingent of two dozen Michigan women who paid for a trip to the nation's capital were left stranded Friday night in Detroit by the coach company that was to take them to the Women's March on Washington.

Planning to leave Friday night in downtown Detroit for the march, the women had bags packed, but started heading to the pickup spot outside MGM Grand Casino with heavy hearts, sure they’d been scammed by a bus company via the internet. They’d heard no confirmations, no replies to e-mails, just a disconnected phone all day on Friday.

Suddenly, though, as they converged from across southeast Michigan on the pickup spot outside MGM Grand Casino, the bus company sent an e-mail that said, “the bus will be there at 9 p.m. I’m apologize for the confirmation.”

“Look! They said they are still coming!” said an excited Michigan’s Women’s March organizer Phoebe Hopps, 35, of Traverse City.

“I mobilized 8,000 people -- I’ve been working 18 hours a day on this for weeks,” Hopps said Friday by phone from Washington, D.C., where she’d arrived Wednesday, in time to join Friday’s demonstrations after Trump's inauguration ceremony.

The women waited and waited. And when 9 p.m. rolled by, the bus had not yet arrived.

Nearly 100 buses left on time, carrying some 5,000 women and a few men and children; and passenger vehicles carried another 3,000 to the nation’s capital, Hopps said. But when calls and e-mails on Friday to confirm the 8 p.m. pickup time solicited no response from Get On Board Charters -- the salesman's phone number was suddenly disconnected -- panic began to set in with the thoughts that the women may have been duped, Hopps said.

Each woman had sent $120 to what they thought was a Pennsylvania-based bus service, said Katy Schurig, 38, a high school English and history teacher from Grand Blanc.

“About 14 of us have been e-mailing the company all day,” hoping for good news, Schurig said.

“I’m a teacher and I try to cover all my bases,” said Schurig. “The day I sent my money to them (via the online payment portal, PayPal), I got an e-mail back from a William Smith,” someone she’d never heard from before.

“He said they had four buses leaving from Michigan.

"It’s not the money, it’s just the disappointment,” she said. But as she and the others gathered at the curbside outside the casino, their hearts soared with fresh anticipation of joining the historic march, scheduled to start at 10 a.m. Saturday.

Late Friday, the women said they received another e-mail apologizing for the getting stood up and promising refunds.

"I apologize for the delay but there has been some technical difficulties with the bus leaving from Michigan chapter to Washington DC monies will be refunded," the e-mail read. No person's name was attached as the sender, only the company's name. The company could not be reached for comment.

But the disappointment wasn't enough to stop some women. Two sisters from Lansing -- Tandreka Keaton and Anaya Keaton -- volunteered Anaya's Toyota Camry to take others with them for the nine-hour drive.

And Nicole Leveque of Ferndale hurried to introduce herself and claim a seat.

"It's all about a peaceful protest," said Anaya Keaton. "This is too important not to be a part of."

Contact Bill Laitner: blaitner@freepress.com