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Lafayette Park Update

Ranb

Penultimate Amazing
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Watchdog report finds Park Police did not clear racial injustice protesters from Lafayette Park for Trump's visit to St. John's Church last June

The US Park Police did not clear racial injustice protesters from Lafayette Park to allow for then-President Donald Trump's march to St. John's Church last June, but instead did so to allow a contractor to install a fence safely around the White House, according to a new inspector general report.
This is news to me.

The head of the Park Police similarly had told Congress last year that Trump's visit to the church was not the motivation for clearing the area of peaceful protesters.
"We did not clear the park for a photo op," acting Chief Gregory Monahan testified. "There was 100%, zero, no correlation between our operation and the President's visit to the church."

Ranb
 
the correlation, of course, is that the cops fired tear gas and rubber bullets into the crowd both there and directly outside the church, including teargassing the priest, and physically attacked protestors and reporters, just before Toupee Fiasco went for his photoshoot (did they ever use any of those photos? Y'know what, who cares).

The fact that the (Cheeto-appointed) IG did not interview anyone with Capitol Police or the White House, and that the supposed fencing schedule was hastily rearranged to also correlate with this violent stunt is...highly suspicious.
 
I honestly don't know which is worse. Firing tear gas and rubber bullets to clear a peaceful protest so the President can have a photo op, or so they could install a fence.
 
I honestly don't know which is worse. Firing tear gas and rubber bullets to clear a peaceful protest so the President can have a photo op, or so they could install a fence.
*Insert Chidi Anagonye "okay, but that's worse. You do get how that's worse?" meme here*
 
The timing of that makes no sense unless it's just another Dumpers-rewriting history.

Donald Trump Put a Fence Around the White House to Keep Demonstrators Away. It Is Now Completely Covered in Protest Art
The eight-foot-tall fences were put up after law enforcement last week used tear gas to clear protestors out of the area so that Trump could pose for a photo op with a bible at nearby St. John’s Episcopal Church.
So the urgent clearing of Lafayette Park an hour before curfew would have gone into effect anyway was a week before the fence was put up.
 
I honestly don't know which is worse. Firing tear gas and rubber bullets to clear a peaceful protest so the President can have a photo op, or so they could install a fence.

Is either as bad as installing a fence purely for implausible deniability so your firing tear gas and rubber bullets to clear a peaceful protest so the President can have a photo op can be pretended not to have been so the president could have a photo op?
 
Is either as bad as installing a fence purely for implausible deniability so your firing tear gas and rubber bullets to clear a peaceful protest so the President can have a photo op can be pretended not to have been so the president could have a photo op?

Well apparently they seem to believe that doing it to install a fence is better, I'm more to the line of at least if it was for a photo op well at least that makes some sort of warped sense. Violating civil rights to install a fence? That's a WTF?
 
I read about this earlier today and was skeptical. The story doesn't quite make sense to me but I didn't want to spend a lot of time on this. I'll just be lazy and follow this thread.
 
I read about this earlier today and was skeptical. The story doesn't quite make sense to me but I didn't want to spend a lot of time on this. I'll just be lazy and follow this thread.
It doesn't make sense at all and I'm not sure why the news media reporting on this seemed to passively accept the claim.
 
Well apparently they seem to believe that doing it to install a fence is better, I'm more to the line of at least if it was for a photo op well at least that makes some sort of warped sense. Violating civil rights to install a fence? That's a WTF?

It's simple-minded lying to protect the orange muppet. Pretty much every reporter there was pretty clear - there was no construction notice, no notice at all before ttacking the demonstrators/reporters/priest, oh also what the hell was with the low-flying helicopters that same night near Chinatown?

"We wanted to put up a fence" no, they wanted to terrorize nonviolent protestors.
 
It's simple-minded lying to protect the orange muppet. Pretty much every reporter there was pretty clear - there was no construction notice, no notice at all before ttacking the demonstrators/reporters/priest, oh also what the hell was with the low-flying helicopters that same night near Chinatown?

"We wanted to put up a fence" no, they wanted to terrorize nonviolent protestors.

I am well aware of that. The issue I am having is that anybody thought that saying "We didn't do it because the President wanted an Photo Op, we did it because we wanted to put up a fence," was somehow better than admitting the truth.
 
The left seems to have the corner on the "somebody should punch those guys" market these days.

Can you elaborate on this? Do you mean left leaning people saying, for example, a person of a certain way of thinking deserves to be punched? If this is the case, I would posit that is completely different to the Government using the police to attack protestors.
 
Watchdog report finds Park Police did not clear racial injustice protesters from Lafayette Park for Trump's visit to St. John's Church last June


This is news to me.



Ranb

Except that Trump said he was taking a walk over to the church before the gestapo from the park police rioted and attacked the crowd.
 
Can you elaborate on this? Do you mean left leaning people saying, for example, a person of a certain way of thinking deserves to be punched? If this is the case, I would posit that is completely different to the Government using the police to attack protestors.
Well, to be fair on the right it is more "someone should shoot said people" or "someone should be allowed to commit vehicular assault against said people."
 
Since it's obvious that the "but DRUMPF111!!11!!1!!1!1" knuckleheads can't be bothered to read the actual report and choose to continue with their "orange man bad" conspiracy nonsense, I'll post some of the relevant quotes from the report.


Not peaceful protesters.
In the early evening of June 1, acts of violence directed toward law enforcement increased as the crowd size grew, as they had May 29 through 31. According to USPP radio logs, intelligence reports, photographs, and videos, protesters breached the bike-rack fencing and entered the secured area, climbed on top of the burned-out comfort station, and threw projectiles like rocks, water bottles, and eggs at law enforcement officers (see Figures 6 and 7). Because of the increased unrest and intelligence reports the USPP received of armed individuals in the crowd including reports of people wearing ballistic vests and carrying baseball bats- the USPP incident commander told us that he and the Secret Service UD WHB deputy chief decided to clear Lafayette Park and the surrounding areas by deploying USPP and ACPD officers trained in advanced civil disturbance tactics.


No federal agency used "gas", they were forbidden to. The DC Metropolitan Police Department was the only agency to use CS gas on protesters, they were not coordinating with USSS for USPP, and only used gas after being attacked by violent protesters.
The MPD, however, was not a participant in or under the control of the USPP and the Secret Service’s unified command. The MPD assistant chief of police later confirmed that the MPD used CS gas on 17th Street and told us that it did so in response to protesters who engaged in acts of violence against MPD officers after the USPP cleared Lafayette Park and began pushing protesters toward 17th.


"Drumpf and his Gestapo practically murdered peaceful protesters for a photo op" has been and always will be a big ole steaming pile of conspiracy dog ****.
Furthermore, the USPP acting chief of police and the USPP incident commander both stated they never learned an exact time for the President’s potential movement and were unaware that he planned to give a speech in the Rose Garden that evening. Numerous witnesses, including the DCNG major and the MPD assistant chief of police, also told us it was their understanding that the USPP cleared the park to allow the contractor to build and install the antiscale fence. No one we interviewed stated that the USPP cleared the park because of a potential visit by the President or that the USPP altered the timeline to accommodate the President’s movement.
 
"Orange Man Bad"....oh, goodie...we're back to that phrase again. :rolleyes:

Even if the park wasn't cleared FOR Trump, his idiotic photo-op walk to the park and standing in front of the church holding up a Bible immediately after the forced removal of protesters was typical of his bad judgment. The man is a fool.
 
You can (and I have) watch uninterrupted, multiple viewpoint synchronized footage of the entire event and the leadup to it with maps and arrows and the whole nine yards. Yeah a couple people hucked things. It’s still pretty much how the protestors said it was, nitpicks (it wasn’t gas canisters, it was smoke canisters! It wasn’t x type of crowd control projectile, it was y! etc) aside. Most notably their announcements were both unclear and unintelligible to most people present despite the crowd being pretty quiet at that point.
 
You can (and I have) watch uninterrupted, multiple viewpoint synchronized footage of the entire event and the leadup to it with maps and arrows and the whole nine yards. Yeah a couple people hucked things. It’s still pretty much how the protestors said it was, nitpicks (it wasn’t gas canisters, it was smoke canisters! It wasn’t x type of crowd control projectile, it was y! etc) aside. Most notably their announcements were both unclear and unintelligible to most people present despite the crowd being pretty quiet at that point.

Also, there's this:

An attorney for DC Police said in court, for the first time, that the department did indeed use tear gas on protesters around Lafayette Square Park last June. Protesters and the ACLU are suing federal police, and MPD, over their use of tear gas.

MPD has consistently said that it was “not involved” in what happened at Lafayette Square Park on June 1, 2020 when protesters were forcefully cleared minutes before former President Donald Trump walked to St. John’s Episcopal Church.

Sorry, "but my department didn't use tear gas" won't cut it when the guy from some other department standing next to you did, and then you ran around beating people.

ETA: I never bother reading bogaive’s racist crap, but I’ll assume he brought up the “orange man bad” thing. If so, it’s likely the only correct thing he wrote, since the orange man actually is bad.
 
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Since it's obvious that the "but DRUMPF111!!11!!1!!1!1" knuckleheads can't be bothered to read the actual report and choose to continue with their "orange man bad" conspiracy nonsense, I'll post some of the relevant quotes from the report.


Not peaceful protesters.



No federal agency used "gas", they were forbidden to. The DC Metropolitan Police Department was the only agency to use CS gas on protesters, they were not coordinating with USSS for USPP, and only used gas after being attacked by violent protesters.


"Drumpf and his Gestapo practically murdered peaceful protesters for a photo op" has been and always will be a big ole steaming pile of conspiracy dog ****.
How does any of their horse **** square with actual timed video of the situation?
 
Read the report, truther.
So you can't/won't explain why it doesn't square with all the timed video at all. Including from many independent international media organisations who had no dog in the fight. Plus all the official sources at the time, including Barr who ordered the attack, which contradicted this report.

So in summary, it is a massive steaming heap of ****** excuses, just like the 911-twoofer crap, and you are wanting to promote it.

You sure you want to die on that hill?
 
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Lets take a look at some of the findings of the report that "exonerates" the Trump administration...

From: NBC News
...that Attorney General William Barr urged officials to speed up the clearing process once Trump had decided to walk through the area that evening....The report adds that the law enforcement agencies at the scene did not coordinate well, and that the U.S. Secret Service began advancing on protesters before the Park Police had a chance to warn them to disperse.

So even if you accept the premise that the park was going to be cleared anyways for construction purposes, that doesn't mean that the Trump's photo-op didn't have a negative impact on events of that day, by forcing a change in timing, and/or requiring different tactics to be used than might otherwise be used.
 
Lets take a look at some of the findings of the report that "exonerates" the Trump administration...

From: NBC News
...that Attorney General William Barr urged officials to speed up the clearing process once Trump had decided to walk through the area that evening....The report adds that the law enforcement agencies at the scene did not coordinate well, and that the U.S. Secret Service began advancing on protesters before the Park Police had a chance to warn them to disperse.

So even if you accept the premise that the park was going to be cleared anyways for construction purposes, that doesn't mean that the Trump's photo-op didn't have a negative impact on events of that day, by forcing a change in timing, and/or requiring different tactics to be used than might otherwise be used.
The video I linked above shows Park Police totally excessive thuggery (un-warned and unwarranted shield and baton strikes) against bystanders, in this case, Australian journalists. This graphically contradicts the narrative that the Park Police were issuing warnings or trying to de-escalate the situation at any time. Quite the contrary.
 
The video I linked above shows Park Police totally excessive thuggery (un-warned and unwarranted shield and baton strikes) against bystanders, in this case, Australian journalists. This graphically contradicts the narrative that the Park Police were issuing warnings or trying to de-escalate the situation at any time. Quite the contrary.
That excessive force was used is not in doubt (at least for most people).

For many people, the question is how much did Trump's photo-op contribute to the situation. Trump supporters will try to claim "It wasn't Trump's fault... it was because of the fence".

Perhaps if Trump wasn't going to make is little photo-op, park police might have been able to give more warnings. Maybe there would have been more effort to de-escalate the situation. But the journey of Stubby McBonespurs might have put pressure on the Park Police to "speed things up", and eschew any attempts at de-escalation.
 
That excessive force was used is not in doubt (at least for most people).

For many people, the question is how much did Trump's photo-op contribute to the situation. Trump supporters will try to claim "It wasn't Trump's fault... it was because of the fence".

Perhaps if Trump wasn't going to make is little photo-op, park police might have been able to give more warnings. Maybe there would have been more effort to de-escalate the situation. But the journey of Stubby McBonespurs might have put pressure on the Park Police to "speed things up", and eschew any attempts at de-escalation.

:thumbsup:
 
Read the report, truther.

I don't need to. I watched it all live. The report is no substitute for what I watched. Besides, we don't know the political affiliation of the author. It could be from a Trump supporter which means it needs validation from Americans.
 
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I don't need to. I watched it all live. The report is no substitute for what I watched. Besides, we don't know the political affiliation of the author. It could be from a Trump supporter which means it needs validation from Americans.

:confused:

The author of the report is Inspector General of the Interior Department, Mark Lee Greenblatt
 
I don't need to. I watched it all live. The report is no substitute for what I watched. Besides, we don't know the political affiliation of the author. It could be from a Trump supporter which means it needs validation from Americans.


Sounds like something a 9/11 truther would say.

You should print out some T-shirts with "Lafayette Park was an inside job." I recommend white on black, it really stands out. Let me know if you need help with an off cadence chant for your protests.



ETA: I recall 9/11 truthers dismissing the 9/11 report because of who was on the commission. Something about the lackeys of the perpetrators could not be trusted to investigate the perpetrators.
 
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