Mass protests and mayhem
continue into a sixth night;
thousands nationwide are
arrested during weekend
By
Police arrested about 4,100 people in U.S. cities over the weekend, according to the Associated Press. Nearly a week after Floyd’s death, it remains unclear whether tensions nationwide are calming or escalating.
Here are some significant developments:
- At least five people have been killed in violence that flared as demonstrations in parts of the country devolved into mayhem. Gunfire rang out from Detroit to Indianapolis, where authorities said people were slain in shootings connected to the protests. In Omaha, a 22-year old black protester was killed in a struggle with a local business owner on Saturday night.
- President Trump was taken by Secret Service agents to an underground bunker at the White House on Friday night, according to two officials familiar with the incident, as protests over Floyd’s death erupted near the presidential residence.
- Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison will lead prosecutions related to Floyd’s death, Gov. Tim Walz announced Sunday. The governor, like Ellison a Democrat, acknowledged many people’s distrust that authorities would bring justice for Floyd, who died after a Minneapolis officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.
- A driver who barreled his tanker truck toward protesters filling Minneapolis’s I-35 highway has been arrested, police said. The truck sent crowds running but, police said, did not appear to hit any of the thousands who had gathered.
- Two Atlanta police officers have been fired after video showed them using excessive force during weekend protests, tasing and then dragging two college students from a car, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms said at a news conference.
- Arizona is enacting a statewide curfew at the request of local leaders, Gov. Doug Ducey (R) announced Sunday, as dozens of major cities try similar measures to maintain order amid protests that have erupted into chaos at night. Thousands of National Guard troops have been activated in 26 states and the District of Columbia.
8:50 a.m.
Atlanta police tear-gas protesters defying city curfew
Atlanta — A mix of local and state police and the National Guard aggressively enforced Atlanta’s 9 p.m. curfew on Sunday, clearing the streets downtown and arresting anyone in the area.
Ahead of the curfew, crews boarded up retail storefronts on Marietta Street beneath the roar of helicopters, while protesters chanted in front of police gathered near the CNN Center, which had been the site of violence 48 hours earlier. A few protesters periodically set off fireworks that exploded and sparked in the streets.
A block away, a statue of Henry W. Grady, a Reconstruction-era Atlanta booster who preached white supremacy, was spray painted with the profanity.
After some in the downtown crowd began throwing water bottles at police, officers donned gas masks, several minutes later, hurled tear gas canisters into the streets.
Wearing a baseball cap that read “black educator,” high school teacher Carmilla Williams emphasized that the vast majority of protesters were peaceful.
“This has been going on for a long time,” she said. “I'm not sure protesting will bring forth the solution that we are wanting, because we've been protesting for years. I don't doubt that this is in vain, but I understand people's anger and frustration and the rioting across the nation. This hasn't happened since the 1960s, not to this extent."
She added, “We can’t allow fear to stop us from making a difference and from holding people accountable.”
By Haisten Willis
8:29 a.m.
Journalists continue to be arrested, struck by police while covering protests
Whether they were wearing press credentials around their necks mattered little, as journalists around the country continued to be targeted by police with arrest, rubber bullets and tear gas while covering the protests.
Los Angeles Times reporter Adolfo Guzman-Lopez showed photos of a large welt on his neck after being struck by a rubber bullet just after interviewing a man in Los Angeles. In Washington, MSNBC correspondent Garrett Haake was struck with a rubber bullet or bean bag — he said he wasn’t certain — while reporting live on the air near the White House, standing across from a line of police in riot gear.
“I have some souvenir welts on my side to show for it,” he wrote later on Twitter. “And sorry for cursing on tv.”
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From the back of a cop car, Des Moines register reporter Andrea May Sahouri said in a Twitter broadcast that she had been arrested while covering a protest that turned violent at Merle Hay Mall.
“I was was saying, ‘I’m press! I’m press! I’m press!’ Police deliberately took me, sprayed pepper spray in my face, and then put me in zip ties,” she said in the video.
Lost my glasses and my ankle is in searing pain after NYPD hit me in the face multiple times with riot shields and pushed me to the ground. I was backing away as request, with my hands up. My NYPD-issued press badge was clearly visible. I’m just sitting here crying. This sucks.
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But protesters also went after reporters in one incident. In Birmingham, Ala., video showed multiple reporters from local outlets being punched in the face, hit in the back of the head and kicked on the ground by a group of protesters.
“My nose is swollen and bleeding,” Madison Underwood, who does social media for the Birmingham News, AL.com and Reckon, said on Twitter. “My phone is gone. I’m thankful to the folks who dragged me out of there, who checked on me, who said nice things. Not sure why that went bad so quickly.
That was terrible. I'm glad my colleagues are okay. I'm okay. My nose is swollen and bleeding. My phone is gone. I'm thankful to the folks who dragged me out of there, who checked on me, who said nice things. Not sure why that went bad so quickly. twitter.com/WarOnDumb/stat…
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Read more by Paul Farhi and Elahe Izadi here.
By Meagan Flynn
8:15 a.m.
Crowded protests spark concerns about new outbreaks of coronavirus
NEW YORK — Outside Brooklyn's Barclays Center, thousands of protesters churned this weekend in tightly packed crowds, casting aside social distancing to express their rage and grief.
In Minneapolis, ungloved demonstrators held hands as they marched. In Las Vegas, demonstrators roared their anger into the faces of police lined up just a few feet away.
And in nearly two dozen U.S. cities, police grappled physically with more than 2,500 people arrested during often-violent protests over the death of a black man, George Floyd, in the custody of Minneapolis police on Memorial Day.
Read more here.
By Lenny Bernstein
8:00 a.m.
NYPD officer appears to point gun at protesters
A New York police officer appeared to point a gun at protesters in Lower Manhattan on Sunday evening, according to a video posted to social media.
The scene, captured in a 12-second video posted to Twitter by Gothamist reporter Jake Offenhartz, occurred at approximately 10 p.m., just steps away from the city’s famed Strand bookstore and a few blocks south of Union Square.
While crossing the street, the officer reaches for the weapon with his left hand and, pointing it at a small crowd as they run down the block. He does not appear to fire the weapon and is later corralled by a supervisory officer in white.
“Point your gun at the f------ ground,” someone can be heard yelling the video.
A source shared this video, which he says he took at around 10 pm near near 12th and Broadway. It appears to show an NYPD officer pointing a gun at protesters outside the Strand
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The office of New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) responded on Twitter, requesting a copy of the video to investigate further. Her office sent several similar messages over the course of the evening, asking for evidence of instances of alleged police misconduct on social media.
In a separate video late Sunday, James urged New Yorkers to forward her office any videos and written testimony and vowed to investigate the incidents swiftly.
“We find ourselves once again demanding equal justice under the law. I stand with protesters and I will defend your right to protest and I will guard,” she said. “But we must march and protest in a righteous fashion.”
James, a former New York City councilwoman who said she has participated in previous protests against police killings, said she wanted to use the moment as an opportunity to push for reform of the criminal justice system.
An NYPD representative didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the video.
By Teo Armus
7:50 a.m.
Observers see Trump’s campaign against antifa as attempt to distract from protesters’ genuine outrage
The Trump administration on Sunday intensified its effort to pin blame on the far-left “antifa” movement for violent demonstrations over police killings of black people, as the president vowed on Twitter to designate antifa a terrorist organization and Attorney General William P. Barr asserted that it and other groups’ activities constituted “domestic terrorism.”
Trump cannot, for practical and legal reasons, formally designate antifa a terrorist organization, and neither he nor his attorney general has made public specific evidence that the far-left movement is orchestrating the fiery protests that have erupted in dozens of U.S. cities.
In Minnesota, where the unrest began after 46-year-old George Floyd died after police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for more than eight minutes, officials have alleged the violence was fueled by different external forces, including white supremacists and drug cartels. They, too, have not offered detailed evidence to support those claims.
Read more here.
By Matt Zapotosky, Robert Klemko and Jacqueline Alemany
7:36 a.m.
Flames, tear gas, fear engulf D.C. as protests turn violent
Peaceful protests exploded into unrest and outrage in Washington on Sunday night, with some demonstrators setting and feeding fires as an 11 p.m. curfew neared.
Protesters pulled an American flag off St. John’s Episcopal Church near the White House, where presidents have historically worshiped, and set fire to an orange street sign nearby. A small fire was also set in the basement of the 19th-century yellow church, D.C. police said. Firefighters, escorted by police, quickly extinguished the blaze.
Nearby, a car had been set on fire, along with a small building near the White House and the lobby of AFL-CIO headquarters. Car windows were smashed, and looting was reported in multiple neighborhoods.
Police officers periodically sprayed pepper bullets and tear gas into the crowds near the White House.
Just before 10 p.m., police fired flash bangs in an apparent attempt to clear the area. A few protesters threw fireworks at the officers. One young man marched toward the police with a fire extinguisher, ready to fling it. But Emily Stanford, 21, and Amber Gilden, 19, yelled, “No! Don’t do that.” A third woman threatened to assault him if he threw the extinguisher. “Don’t give them a reason to retaliate,” Stanford said. “This is a peaceful protest. There’s no need.”
Groups broke windows of Sweetgreen, Compass Coffee and SunTrust Bank, among other buildings, in downtown D.C. On F Street, looters ransacked Zara and Sephora, leaving mascara, eyeliner, peach-colored striped shirts and distressed jeans strewn in the street.
“Somebody get me something!” yelled one of the lookouts. One man came out with striped shopping bags, while another carried out an entire display case of body products.
In Friendship Heights, Steve Bellman found his shop, Paul’s Wine and Spirits, with a window smashed but relatively few bottles missing. “It’s sad,” he said. “I hope it stops and we go back to normal.”
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