What is At Stake Here At the RNC (Or What Was At Stake Here)

The police proceeded to make this worse than it needed to be, as always, by blocking an exit on to I-94 and by choosing to stop protesters on a bridge. There has not been a time when I was present that the police were not responsible for making the situation a chaotic mess and creating a traffic problem would be cover for eventually using violence to disperse protesters.

The police stopped the march on the bridge and instructed the protesters/activists to get off the road. The marchers went left and right emptying off the street and the street’s meridian. Divided, the marchers expressed a desire to continue the march but were incapable of getting out of the secured area which had bicycle police preventing an exit and police at the front of the march preventing movement forward.

The courageous and morally righteous leaders of the Anti-War Committee did everything possible to hold the action together by delivering chants to agitate all those focused in on the situation on the bridge.

After about 20 minutes, the possibility of violence escalated as bicycle cops put on their gas masks. The riot police added more gear to their persons in preparation for what would happen.

Two snow plows came onto the bridge to be used to push protesters to disperse.

At this point, it could easily be said that the police had allowed this to escalate to a level that would certainly endanger innocent civilians. The press had been attracted to the scene because of the police presence and for the same reason so had hundreds of bystanders.

In total, I would say there were between 2,000-3,000 people down in this area braced for whatever would happen.

A member of the press was wearing a gas mask and courteously informed all present that they should step back because the police were planning to fire tear gas and rubber bullets. I was unable to figure out what news organization he was affiliated with.

Away from the scene and prior to this, I had received reports from ColdSnapLegal’s twitter on my phone that informed me that city workers were informed that they might want to leave early because something would be happening.

In Denver, several unpermitted marches took place during the Democratic National Convention. The city received 50 million dollars for security and they were developing contingency plans for security way before the DNC came to town. But, the city was able to work with organizers to allow unpermitted marches to occur; for example, IVAW’s march was unpermitted.

The whole situation begs the question: Should protesters/activists be required to arrange for permits in order to peacefully assemble?

Regrettably or fortunately, I had to leave the scene just as the tension was reaching its highest point. It was time for me to fulfill my duties as a camera operator, researcher, and production assistant and go help film the Open the Debates Nader Super Rally in Minneapolis.

I drove off cringing as ColdSnapLegal collective notified via Twitter that a ten minute warning had been given to protesters to disperse or chemical agents would be deployed.

ColdSnapLegal’s play-by-play of the situation I missed is as follows and describes what happened. Video of the situation is above ColdSnapLegal's coverage:

VIDEO

confirmed reports of 250-300 cops "of all walks," aggresively pushing crowd into park to rice at john ireland. LOs on site

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