When fans of Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert descend on Washington, DC, for joint October 30 rallies on the National Mall, they will find plenty of portable toilets in the area but no way to access them. That’s because the U.S. Marine Corps , which is distributing the Porta Potties for its annual marathon on Halloween, doesn’t feel like sharing with Stewart’s and Colbert’s followers.

Officials at Comedy Central offered to help pay the Marines for the rental of the toilets and have them cleaned before the October 31 race, but that didn’t sway the race organizers. They plan to padlock the toilets so no one uses them prior to the race. Race organizer Rick Nealis told The New York Times, “It will cost me a few extra pennies, but it’s worth it to know that my runners won’t run out of toilet paper.”

The permits requested by Stewart’s “Rally to Restore Sanity” and Colbert’s “March to Keep Fear Alive” anticipated crowds of 65,000, the equivalent of 217 toilets. Because the Marines snapped up most of the locally available portable toilets, Comedy Central may have to rent some of theirs from Baltimore.

-Noel Brinkerhoff, David Wallechinsky