President Trump renewed his threat to take federal action against local protesters in a late-night tweet on Wednesday, telling government officials in Washington state that they needed to crack down on demonstrators in Seattle.
Trump said protesters were taunting government leaders, apparently referring to a group that has set up barricades to occupy territory in several blocks of Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighbourhood.
“Take back your city NOW,” Trump wrote in a tweet directed at mayor Jenny Durkan and Gov. Jay Inslee. “If you don’t do it, I will. This is not a game.”
The President added, “Domestic Terrorists have taken over Seattle, run by Radical Left Democrats, of course. LAW & ORDER!”
Durkan responded with a tweet of her own: “Make us all safe. Go back to your bunker.”
Later, Inslee also had a response on Twitter: “A man who is totally incapable of governing should stay out of Washington state’s business,” he wrote.
Police officers and protesters had repeatedly clashed next to the Capitol Hill police station in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd, whose death in Minneapolis police custody sparked nationwide protests. City leaders, in a bid to de-escalate the tensions, decided to abandon the station on Monday, boarding it up and allowing protesters to demonstrate in the area without a police presence.
At gatherings on Wednesday afternoon, protesters held discussions about their priorities, listening to speeches and poetry while children drew with chalk on the street. There was no violence or looting, and the city’s fire chief wandered around the area talking with protesters about their needs and a collaborative path forward.
Trump had previously discussed deploying active-duty troops to quell the protests in American cities, which experts said would require invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807. That led to objections from former military leaders who warned that such action could cause the military to lose credibility with Americans.
While protests have waned in places around the country, persistent demonstrations in the Pacific Northwest have continued to force change. In Portland this week, the police chief resigned. In Seattle on Wednesday, the city council began an “inquest” into police spending.
Council members themselves have sometimes joined the demonstrations. On Tuesday night, one of them, Kshama Sawant of the Socialist Alternative Party, led a group of people from the protest zone down to City Hall, holding an impromptu gathering inside that ended without incident.
Black Lives Matter Seattle-King county has called for people to leave their workplaces to join a major march on Friday.
Columbus statue
A group of protesters pulled down a statue of Italian explorer Christopher Columbus in Saint Paul, Minnesota, on Thursday, the latest US monument to be torn down amid nationwide demonstrations against police brutality and racial inequalities.
The 10-foot bronze statue was pulled from its granite base by several dozen people led by a Minnesota-based Native American activist outside the state Capitol, documented by news photographers and television camera operators.
“It was the right thing to do and it was the right time to do it,” the activist, Mike Forcia, said in reference to more than two weeks of protests over the May 25 death of George Floyd under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer.
Native American activists have long objected to honouring Columbus, saying that his expeditions to the Americas led to the colonisation and genocide of their ancestors.
