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George Floyd Protests Continue Across U.S. For Fifth Day: Joe Biden Condemns Violent Protests

This article is more than 3 years old.
Updated May 31, 2020, 12:38am EDT

TOPLINE

Protests over the death of George Floyd continued Saturday. Key updates are below.

KEY FACTS

Joe Biden denounced violent protests in a written statement: “Protesting such brutality is right and necessary. It’s an utterly American response. But burning down communities and needless destruction is not. Violence that endangers lives is not. Violence that guts and shutters businesses that serve the community is not.” Read the full statement here.

Civil Rights icon Rep. John Lewis also called for peaceful protests on Saturday: “I know your pain, your rage, your sense of despair and hopelessness. Justice has, indeed, been denied for far too long. Rioting, looting, and burning is not the way. Organize. Demonstrate. Sit-in. Stand-up. Vote. Be constructive, not destructive,” he tweeted.

In New York, a video shows a police car ramming into a group of protesters behind a barricade after they pelted the NYPD cruiser with objects such as water bottles and a traffic cone.

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said the incident is being investigated, but appeared to shift blame onto the protesters: “If those protesters had just gotten out of the way, and not created an attempt to surround that vehicle we would not be talking about this situation,” he said.

Multiple cities and states have activated national guard forces to prepare for a night of violence, including Atlanta, Minneapolis, Kentucky, Ohio, Texas, Washington, Tennessee, Missouri, Los Angeles, Nevada and Utah.

Curfews have been put in place in Minneapolis, Chicago, Seattle, Portland, Denver, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Cleveland, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, Rochester and Miami Dade County—but protesters are largely ignoring them.

Police officers used tear gas and rubber pellets as a form of crowd control in several cities, including Minneapolis, Denver, Syracuse and San Antonio.

Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA) joined demonstrators in Washington DC, making her the most senior Democrat in Congress to protest.

Large crowds have already gathered in Chicago and Los Angeles, where police officers donning riot gear have already clashed with demonstrators.

After the fourth night of rioting President Donald Trump said he is ready to deploy active duty military members to Minneapolis through the Insurrection Act of 1807, which allows for a state to request military assistance in the event of civil unrest. Minneapolis officials have already promised to send additional National Guard troops into the city, making it the largest deployment in state history.

It’s ultimately unclear who is perpetrating the most physical damage: Minneapolis officials said every person arrested during the protest was from out of state, suggesting white nationalists may use the protests as cover to wreak havoc, while President Donald Trump tweeted Saturday “It’s ANTIFA and the Radical Left.”

Protests have also cropped up in cities outside the U.S., including London, Berlin and Toronto.

KEY BACKGROUND

This is the fifth night riots have raged in dozens of city throughout the U.S. over the death of George Floyd. The protests started in Minneapolis, where rioters burned down a police precinct while setting fire and looting over 200 buildings, according to the Star Tribune. On Friday the protests spread across the country, including to Atlanta, New York and Oakland, where protesters continued to vandalize buildings and damage property, resulting in arrests.

News peg

George Floyd died after four police officers attempted to detain him for allegedly using a fake $20 bill. In a video that has since gone viral, one officer is seen pinning Floyd to the ground and continuing to kneel on his neck while Floyd yells that he can’t breathe. The officer who knelt on Floyd, Derek Chauvin, was arrested and charged with third degree murder and manslaughter on Friday after riots broke out in the city the night before. An active investigation into the other three officers are still ongoing and they may still be charged.

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