Organized Resistance Takes Its Place in the United States

Fight for Justice and to End State-Organized Racist Attacks and Use of Military Against the People


Youth lead Oakland, California demonstration, June 11, 2020, demanding police get out of
their schools.

Across the U.S., actions that started on May 26 to demand justice for the police killing of George Floyd continue as organized resistance emerges to take its place. In Minneapolis where Floyd was killed and across the country, calls for justice in numerous cases of police brutality and killings, especially of African Americans, ring out. Calls also demand profound changes to policing that will not permit the people to be victimized by a militarized force that does not represent their interests. The people continue to affirm their convictions for new arrangements and their own empowerment, through protests as well as other forms.

Since May 26, protests have taken place in at least 750 cities in all 50 U.S. states, and internationally in 60 countries on all continents except Antarctica. The people have not been cowed by the massive deployments of the National Guard and police forces against them and widespread acts of police brutality. Activists have been compiling reports and footage of such incidents.[1] One such database as of June 13 has 659 entries. Just one example is the killing of an unarmed 22-year-old man in northern California on June 1, while he was on his knees with his hands raised. Police shot him from their squad car, claiming to have mistaken a hammer in his pocket for a gun. Meanwhile, the website Bellingcat.com has compiled a list of police violence against journalists that as of June 2 had 148 entries. It points out that "To give you perspective on just how enormous this number really is, the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker tracked 150 press freedom violations for the whole of 2019. The incidents in these protests have almost surpassed the 2019 numbers in a week."[2]

The standout feature of unfolding events is the organized character of the resistance. People and their collectives are speaking out in their own name, basing themselves on their own demands despite pressure to back factions of the military and ruling elite that oppose Trump and say they support the Constitution. The movement has thus far not been diverted from achieving its aims into maintaining the status quo that disempowers the people.

In Minneapolis, with the mass demonstrations resulting in the firing of and criminal charges against the four police officers responsible for killing George Floyd, the people's attention is focused on making profound changes to the policing system which criminalizes African Americans and other disenfranchised minorities as a matter of course.


Demonstration in Minneapolis, June 7, 2020.

In the face of the people's demands, on June 12, Minneapolis City Council unanimously passed a resolution to replace the police department with a community-led public safety system. "The murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, by Minneapolis police officers is a tragedy that shows that no amount of reforms will prevent lethal violence and abuse by some members of the Police Department against members of our community, especially Black people and people of color," wrote five council members in the resolution. The resolution states that the council will begin a year-long process of engaging "with every willing community member in Minneapolis" in its "Future of Community Safety Work Group," to develop a "transformative new model" of public safety in the city. The council also voted unanimously to end the local emergency order that had been declared due to the mass protests that began on May 26 after George Floyd's death at the hands of the police.

Demands to city council for police accountability and to disband the Minneapolis police long predate the killing of George Floyd, local activists point out, noting that timely action on previous occasions could have prevented George Floyd's death. The organization Twin Cities Coalition for Justice 4 Jamar (TCC4J) -- formed after the 2015 police killing of 24-year-old Jamar Clark -- on June 11 called for the police officers responsible for similar killings and other crimes to be held to account and that justice be brought for all of the victims and their friends and families. Activists across the U.S. are making similar calls to defund police departments and replace them with bodies over which the people can exercise control, while increasing social services to provide working people, not the rich, with security based on meeting human needs, not the use of state violence and criminalization of minorities, the poor and working poor, the marginalized and the most vulnerable sectors of society.


Minneapolis,  June 11, 2020.

The people's resistance is also taking the form of National Guardsmen refusing orders to be deployed against protestors, because they see the justice of those who have taken up the call "Black Lives Matter" and do not wish to be put in a position of carrying out brutality against those exercising their right to protest.  As one member of the California National Air Guard put it, "What we're told is, 'Discourage people from criminal activity,' and things like that. But that doesn't necessarily matter. What's going to be communicated on the ground when you see people in uniform with weapons, standing in formation?" He added that he signed up to do humanitarian work, "But to actually go out and be this invading force? Many people are not comfortable with it. They feel like it's not really what they signed up for." Veterans' organizations and GI rights groups report fielding a larger number of calls from troops asking about their options for refusing orders. The veterans' peace group About Face says it knows of some 10 service members who have taken concrete steps to avoid deployment, while many others have asked for support in resisting orders they think are illegal.

Another way this resistance is manifesting is the tearing down of symbols that glorify slavery or statues commemorating slave traders. Amidst this situation, Indigenous peoples living on U.S. territory are gaining broader support for the removal of statues of Christopher Columbus as part of ending the presentation of the genocide and dispossession of Indigenous peoples as laudatory historical achievements, rather than crimes against humanity.

On June 3, attorneys for the families of George Floyd and others informed that they are calling on the UN to open a human rights case against the U.S. and sanction it for its mistreatment of African Americans.

As a result of broad and continuing resistance, former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who held his knee on George Floyd's neck, is currently being held at the Minnesota Department of Corrections facility in Oak Park. His bail was increased to $1 million June 3 when charges were upgraded to second-degree murder. Former police officers Thomas Lane and J. Alexander Kueng, who helped restrain Floyd, and Tou Thao, who stood near the others, are charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter. Bail for them was set at $1 million without conditions or $750, 000 with conditions. Lane was released June 10 on a $750,000 bond. 

In this TML Weekly Supplement we publish calls by the organized resistance as well as a photo review.

Notes

1. To view the spreadsheet, click here

2. "Visualizing Police Violence Against Journalists At Protests Across The U.S.," Charlotte Godart, Bellingcat.com, June 5, 2020


Supplement
Organized Resistance Takes Its Place in the United States  


This article was published in

Volume 50 Number 21 - June 13, 2020

Article Link:
Organized Resistance Takes Its Place in the United States: Fight for Justice and to End State-Organized Racist Attacks and Use of Military Against the People


    

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