It was over almost as soon as it began.

The white supremacists were met along their march route and at the rally site by thousands of counterdemonstrators denouncing racism and white supremacy. The white nationalists, who numbered about two dozen, stayed in Lafayette Square, a park just north of the White House, for a short time and left before 6 p.m.

They had been scheduled to hold a two-hour rally in the square beginning at 5:30. A spokesman for the National Park Service confirmed that the white nationalists had ended their event by that time.

Before they made their exit, the white nationalists were separated from the counterprotesters by metal fences and dozens of law enforcement officers guarding against any outbreaks of violence.

After marching from a neighborhood just west of the White House, the handful of supremacists settled in a pocket of Lafayette Square, tucked underneath trees. Many of them carried American flags, and several wore President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign hats.

The group’s organizer, Jason Kessler, stood on a platform with a microphone, addressing attendees who arrived before the event was scheduled to begin. He blamed a harsh law enforcement response after last year’s Charlottesville rally for his group’s meager showing.

“There were a lot of people who were at last year’s rally who are very scared this year,” he said.

Counterprotesters in Lafayette Square stood against fencing, shouting and booing in the direction of the white supremacists.

Even as rain began to fall and lightning lit the sky, protesters bearing signs and shirts deploring racism and anti-Semitism remained in Lafayette Square, chanting across rows of police officers.

In Charlottesville, organizers and participants from last August’s counterdemonstrations there massed in Booker T. Washington Park, just north of the University of Virginia, and 1 mile from the area downtown where a 32-year-old woman was killed by a neo-Nazi.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Noah Weiland and Andy Parsons © 2018 The New York Times