Channel 4, the NBC outlet (
http://www.nbcwashington.com/) for Washington, DC and some other television stations have a good bit of coverage online using helicopters to show the riders today. Time, The Washington Times, the Huffington Post and other media also reported the ride, though most of the coverage online is by obscure right-wing and Tea Party sites. (A Muslim group led by an alleged anti-Semite had also organized a demonstration, but only a few hundred people showed up.)
WNBC Washington reports:
>>"Thousands of bikers roared through the Washington, D.C., area Wednesday to mark the anniversary of 9/11. The bikers -- riding with the group "Two Million Bikers to D.C." -- snarled traffic on the Beltway with a ride honoring the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the members of the military called to serve after the attacks. On their Facebook page, in all caps, the group said they will stand by the Constitution [unfortunately the group misspelled Constitution] and Bill of Rights, adding that they're "against any fundamental transformation of America." By 5 p.m., there were just a handful of motorcycles still rolling around the National Mall. But earlier Wednesday, the scene was absolutely overwhelming. While the numbers fell short of the "two million" implied by the name of the event, there were easily thousands of bikers participating.<<
A permit to demonstrate in DC isn't required, so the bikers rode without one. But a permit is required to close major traffic intersections and ignore red lights, especially on a workday.
It's hard to say, but from the chopper footage it looks like altogether ten to thirty thousand bikers showed up, not 2 million.
I think there are 84,000 supporters of the Bikers' Facebook site. To put that into context, about a year ago President Obama had around 24 million Facebook supporters.