On Monday 25 May, Dereck Chauvin was a respected officer of the Minneapolis police force. By Friday, he was unemployed and charged with one count of murder and manslaughter for killing George Floyd. Over the course of that time, riots erupted in cities across America. And, just like that, the Wuhan Coronavirus was no longer the number one news story in America.
The night after Officer Chauvin killed George Floyd, protestors took to the streets of Minneapolis to demand justice. Fearing a violent confrontation, Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey ordered police to back off. Without strong police presence, the protests turned violent. Rioters looted dozens of businesses in downtown Minneapolis, burned several buildings to the ground, and even overran the 3rd District Police Station. Americans watched as a long line of police cars fled the scene, rioters in chase. It was an anarchist’s dream. The riots spread across the country.
In Los Angeles, rioters battled the police, set fire to dozens of buildings, and looted stores along the toney Rodeo Drive. Police made hundreds of arrests. In Chicago, looters rampaged down Michigan Avenue and injured dozens of officers. Chicago police arrested hundreds. To contain the riots, authorities closed highway exit ramps into the city and raised the Chicago River bridges. Rioters shot and killed a Federal police officer in Oakland and wounded another. In Nashville, rioters set fire to city hall. In Portland, rioters attacked banks, looted the city’s shopping mall, broke into and trashed the justice center municipal building. In New York City, rioters attacked police with Molotov Cocktails. Rioters broke the façade of CNN Center in Atlanta. In Washington, a mob tried to storm the White House grounds.
Amid the riots were acts of humanity. In Brooklyn, protest organizers stood in front of the entrance to a Target store and held off would be looters. In Louisville, peaceful protestors locked arms and formed a human shield around a riot cop who’d been cut off from his unit. Peaceful protestors in Washington stopped an agitator from hammering the sidewalk into throwable pieces of rock and handed him over to police. In Michigan, the Genesee County Sheriff took off his helmet, put down his baton, and walked in solidarity with the marchers. Newark protestors were entirely peaceful and danced in the streets. In Minneapolis, hundreds of volunteers helped business owners clean up.
Eyewitnesses tweeted photographs of black clad rioters armed with bricks, rocks, batons, and makeshift shields in many cities. Internet sleuths posted screen captures of Antifa pages coordinating efforts throughout the nation. The NYPD intelligence unit concludes that Antifa has planned these riots for some time, has trained medics and bicycle scouts, and is using encrypted communications. Antifa operatives have prepositioned pallets of bricks and Molotov cocktails for use during the riots.
On Saturday, Attorney General William Barr announced that far left extremist groups using Antifa-like tactics had infiltrated the protests. On Sunday, President Trump declared Antifa a terrorist organization. Barr followed with a statement that said, in part, ‘Federal law enforcement actions will be directed at apprehending and charging the violent radical agitators who have hijacked peaceful protest and are engaged in violations of federal law.’ He also said Federal Joint Terrorism Task Forces would identify and locate Antifa organizations.
After the police and National Guard reasserted control in Minneapolis on Saturday, Minnesota politicians tried to explain why they left the streets to the rioters all week. Mayor Fry justified abandoning the 3rd Precinct station to the mob saying, ‘The symbolism of a building cannot outweigh the importance of life.’ Governor Tim Walz said police and the National Guard weren’t in the city streets because they were protecting the Minneapolis Federal reserve and other important institutions. Walz ludicrously claimed the riots were the work of ‘white supremacists’ and ‘outsiders’. Publicly available records show the vast majority of those arrested in Minneapolis came from Minnesota. State Attorney General Keith Ellison urged rioters to focus their ire not on the National Guard but the police. Ellison also claimed outside ‘provocateurs’ were responsible for the chaos. Ellison himself is a former member of the anti-sematic nation of Islam and publicly supports Antifa. He’s not the only Democrat supporting the Minnesota riots.
New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio’s daughter was arrested over the weekend. Much of America’s cultural and political elite sympathize with the rioters. Thirteen Biden campaign staffers have contributed to the so-called Minnesota Freedom Fund, an organization helping rioters post bail which has already received thousands in donations from celebrities. Keith Elision’s son tweeted his support for the Antifa riots, as did Tim Walz’s daughter, and the daughter of Congresswoman Ilhan Omar the Islamic Firebrand from Minneapolis.
Minnesota is a blue state with a Democrat governor and attorney general. Minneapolis is a Democrat city that sent radical Islamist and Democrat Ilhan Omar to Congress. The cities’ last Republican mayor left office in 1961. The killing of George Floyd is a Democrat scandal, and these are Democrat riots.
