Thousands Protest Against White Supremacy
Demonstrators poured into the
nation’s streets and parks over the weekend to denounce white supremacy
and Nazism, one week after clashes between far-right demonstrators and
counterprotesters in Charlottesville, Va., turned deadly.
By DAPHNE RUSTOW and AINARA TIEFENTHÄLER on Publish Date August 19, 2017.
Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images.
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BOSTON
— Tens of thousands of demonstrators, emboldened and unnerved by the
eruption of fatal violence in Virginia last weekend, surged into the
nation’s streets and parks on Saturday to denounce racism, white
supremacy and Nazism.
Demonstrations
were boisterous but broadly peaceful, even as tension and worry coursed
through protests from Boston Common, the nation’s oldest public park,
to Hot Springs, Ark., and to the bridges that cross the Willamette River
in Portland, Ore. Other rallies played out in Atlanta, Dallas, Houston,
Memphis and New Orleans, among other cities.
The
demonstrations — which drew 40,000 people in Boston alone, according to
police estimates — came one week after a 32-year-old woman died amid
clashes between white nationalists and counterprotesters in
Charlottesville, Va., and they unfolded as the nation was again
confronting questions about race, violence and the standing of
Confederate symbols.
President
Trump, who has faced unyielding — and bipartisan — criticism after
saying that there was “blame on both sides” in Charlottesville, tweeted
Saturday that he wanted “to applaud the many protestors in Boston who
are speaking out against bigotry and hate. Our country will soon come
together as one!”
He
also wrote: “Our great country has been divided for decades. Sometimes
you need protest in order to heal, & we will heal, & be stronger
than ever before!”
It
was an abrupt shift in tone. The president posted earlier Saturday that
it appeared there were “many anti-police agitators in Boston.”
Law
enforcement officials were on alert throughout the day, wary of being
seen as irresolute and ineffective after the protests in Virginia turned
into running street battles and turned fatal when someone drove a car
through a crowd. Officers in riot gear sometimes faced off with
demonstrators to maintain order. There were scattered scuffles and
arrests; in Boston, site of the largest of the weekend’s protests, the
police said there had been 33 arrests, mostly involving charges of
disorderly conduct.
Boston,
where officials had pledged to enforce a policy of zero tolerance for
violence, had been facing dueling demonstrations, but a rally to promote
“free speech” was brief and unamplified beyond the small bandstand
where it was held. The event, whose participants appeared to number only
in the dozens, was undercut by police planning and starved by an
enormous buffer zone between the handful of protesters and the
overwhelming numbers of their opponents.
Organizers
of the speech rally had said they were appealing to “libertarians,
conservatives, traditionalists, classical liberals, Trump supporters or
anyone else who enjoys their right to free speech.”
“All
of us here, in many ways, are true patriots because, in spite of that
noise out there, we’re here to stand up for something very fundamental,
which is called free speech,” Shiva Ayyadurai, an entrepreneur who is
running a long-shot Republican Senate campaign, told the rallygoers,
according to a video posted on YouTube.
But
thousands of others, fearing that the free speech event would be a
platform for neo-Nazis and white nationalists, joined a robust
counterprotest.
“This
city has a history of fighting back against oppression, whether it’s
dumping tea in the harbor or a bunch of dudes standing around with
bandannas screaming at neo-Nazis,” said a 21-year-old protester who
identified himself only as “Frosty” and wore an American flag to obscure
much of his face.
Some
counterprotesters shouted down their opponents — “No Nazis! No K.K.K.!
No fascist U.S.A.!” — as state troopers used their bikes to keep rival
demonstrators apart.
“We
didn’t want for what happened in Virginia to happen here,” William B.
Evans, Boston’s police commissioner, said at a news conference after
Saturday’s main protests. “We didn’t want them at each other’s throats.”
The
free speech rally, which had been scheduled to run from noon until 2
p.m., concluded by about 12:50 p.m. Mr. Evans, who said the event ended
early by mutual agreement between the authorities and the event’s
organizers, said the police had helped the demonstrators get into police
wagons as part of a prearranged “exit strategy.” It was then, he said,
that “we had some kids block the street, it got a little
confrontational, but they were given every opportunity to move.”
“We
had to do a little pushing and shoving there,” said Mr. Evans, whose
department reported that some people pelted officers with rocks and that
some demonstrators threw bottles of urine at officers.
Rondre
Brooks, 36, who said he had traveled from Detroit for the
counterdemonstration, said he was pleased to see the early end of the
free speech rally amid the large number of counterprotesters. “It’s a
very good look for America as a whole,” he said.
But
another man, who said he supported the speech rally and gave his name,
after some hesitation, as Matt Staley, interjected to ask if those
demonstrating in support of free speech were not Americans, too.
Continue reading the main story
“I think it’s awful that people can’t speak out to express opinions,” Mr. Staley said.
The
counterprotesters descended on the Common hours before the rally and
found fliers showing white supremacist and neo-Nazi symbols. The
leaflets, which other counterprotesters appeared to have prepared, urged
people to “learn to identify these symbols and let anyone displaying
them know that they are not welcome in our city!”
“Charlottesville
is what forced me out here,” said Rose Fowler, 68, a retired teacher
who is black and was among the people who had gathered to march from
Roxbury toward the Common, about two miles away. “Somebody killed for
fighting for me. What is wrong with me if I can’t fight for myself and
others?”
Although
the protests in Boston were expected to be the weekend’s largest,
people gathered on Friday evening in Portland for an “Eclipse Hate”
rally. The Oregon protest swelled to more than 1,000 people, and
demonstrators swarmed two of Portland’s bridges, halting traffic in both
directions and chanting: “Whose bridge? Our bridge!”
In
Arkansas, a small demonstration supporting Confederate symbols drew
about 50 people in Hot Springs. Opponents walked by occasionally,
denouncing Mr. Trump and racial hatred. At least three people were
arrested.
And
along a side street in Charlottesville, the mood was somber about 1:30
p.m., as people marked the time a week earlier when a man drove his car
into a crowd, killing Heather D. Heyer.
Ms.
Heyer’s mother, Susan Bro, stood before a memorial of flowers and
candles, weeping as she leaned into her husband, Kim Bro. Hundreds of
people gathered around as someone wrote with purple chalk — Ms. Heyer’s
favorite color — on the pavement, “I miss you baby girl, love mom.”
Continue reading the main story
Ms.
Bro eventually encouraged people to come closer to her. Some people
laid hands on her, and they sang “This Little Light of Mine.”
Ms.
Bro said she hoped that some good could come out of her daughter’s
death. And for those who might take joy in seeing her grieve, she said,
“Karma’s a you know what.”
Law enforcement officials made extensive plans for the demonstrations in the wake of the Virginia bloodshed.
In
Dallas, where a gunman killed five police officers who were protecting a
protest in July 2016, the authorities formed a barricade around
Saturday’s demonstration site with buses and dump trucks to “lock down”
the area and keep any cars from drawing too close. As sunset approached
at a Confederate monument in the city, people engaged in shouting
matches, but no violence, while state troopers stood guard and
helicopters flew overhead.
As the rally outside City Hall was winding down, tensions heightened at the Confederate monument at a park nearby.
Shouting
matches erupted between protesters wearing bandannas over their faces
and a group of counterprotesters wearing Confederate belt buckles and
flags. Water bottles were thrown at police officers on horseback, and
water and what appeared to be urine were sprayed on the Confederate
supporters.
Continue reading the main story
One
monument supporter, wearing a red “Make America Great Again” cap,
declined to give his real name but identified himself as Wiggz, a
32-year-old Dallas resident.
“They
can call it an anti-white-supremacist rally all they want,” he said. “I
don’t believe it is. I think it’s an anti-Trump rally. And that’s why
I’m here. I’m a Trump supporter, and I’m not a white supremacist at
all.”
Before
the Dallas protests began, several men and women armed with
high-powered rifles and dressed in military fatigues assembled near a
rally site. A representative of the group, called the Texas Elite III%,
said they planned to provide security at the rally and were not
affiliated with either side.
“With
Charlottesville and how things went down there, and what we’ve heard so
far intel-wise, we are expecting possible problems,” said the
representative, who declined to give her real name and identified
herself as Momma Doc.
The
Boston authorities seemed to face nothing of that sort on Saturday, but
they cleared the Common of vendors and their carts and shut down the
Swan Boats, a nearby tourist attraction.
Tensions here had been rising all week. On Monday night, a teenager threw a rock at the New England Holocaust Memorial, shattering the glass; passers-by quickly tackled the youth before the police arrived.
But
elsewhere in the country, officials were moving to defuse anger that
surrounded the revived debate about Confederate monuments.
Duke
University announced early Saturday that it had removed a recently
vandalized statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee from the entrance to its campus
chapel in Durham, N.C.
“I
took this course of action to protect Duke Chapel, to ensure the vital
safety of students and community members who worship there, and above
all to express the deep and abiding values of our university,” Vincent
E. Price, the university’s president, said in an email to students, employees and alumni.
Dr.
Price said the statue would be “preserved so that students can study
Duke’s complex past and take part in a more inclusive future
