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Police say groups arrived in D.C. ‘intent on clashing’ as they assess violent end to Trump rallies

InternationalNov 16. 2020Members of Proud Boys march at the Washington Monument on Nov. 14, 2020, in Washington, D.C. MUST CREDIT: Photo for The Washington Post by Evelyn Hockstein 

By The Washington Post · Peter Hermann, Lauren Lumpkin · NATIONAL, POLITICS

WASHINGTON – D.C. police said Sunday that nearly two dozen people were arrested, including several on gun charges, as thousands of people converged downtown Saturday for a pro-Trump march and rally. One person was stabbed and four police officers were injured.

Demonstrators confront D.C. police at Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 14, 2020. MUST CREDIT: Photo for The Washington Post by Astrid Riecken

For the better part of the day, police managed to keep supporters of President Donald Trump and his opponents apart, save for minor skirmishes during a “Stop the Steal” rally.

Organizers of the event falsely claim that the election won by President-elect Joe Biden was stolen.

Tensions grew as the main march moved from Freedom Plaza to outside the U.S. Supreme Court, and as the final speeches ended, clashes turned into roving street fights that left police struggling to keep up.

Shortly before 8 p.m., members of the extremist group the Proud Boys and other Trump supporters moved through downtown in the area of 12th and F streets NW. At the same time, a group of counterprotesters moved north on 10th Street.

It was not clear whether the groups, which were blocks apart, were initially aware of each other’s location. Police said they were monitoring both as they neared a collision course.

The groups met head-on at H Street near 11th Street. Police in riot gear rushed toward the fray but not quickly enough to stave off a brawl involving dozens, including the Proud Boys, that left participants bloodied and one man stabbed three times in the back and seriously wounded.

“I came here to fight,” a Trump supporter yelled moments before the clash began.

The day’s outcome appeared inevitable despite attempts by hundreds of police dealing with unrest throughout downtown.

Protesters force a Trump supporter out of Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 14, 2020. MUST CREDIT: Photo for The Washington Post by Evelyn Hockstein

D.C. Police Chief Peter Newsham said people from both sides – and from outside and inside the region – came “intent on clashing,” and “the police department was put directly in the middle of it.”

Newsham said as opposing groups faced off, “police officers ran and placed themselves between them,” which he said he believed “prevented a much worse outcome.”

“We did our damnedest” to prevent violence, Newsham said. “We were doing the best we could to keep them separated.”

In all, police arrested 21 people, including one juvenile, on charges that include assault, disorderly conduct and inciting violence. Eight firearms were seized and five people were arrested on gun charges, including two Newsham said were linked to a Georgia-based militia group.

Newsham said police found three additional firearms and ammunition in a room linked to the two: Joshua Skillman, 28, and Samantha Falk, 33, both of Georgia. The name of the group was not available.

The others arrested on gun charges were identified as Jason Fisher, 41, of Virginia; Braxton McDonald, 28, of New Jersey; and Kenneth Deberry, 39, of Washington, D.C.

Of the adults arrested, nine are from Washington, three are from Maryland, two are from New York, two are from Georgia and one each are from Virginia, New Jersey, and South Carolina. The residence of one of those arrested was unknown.

Four officers were injured, one seriously when a chemical was sprayed into an eye.

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, D, declined to comment Sunday. A spokeswoman said Bowser planned to address the news media and discuss the events on Monday.

On Sunday morning, Black Lives Matter Plaza near the White House had returned to relative quiet, though some volatility remained when a group of women started tearing down signs condemning racism, honoring Black people killed by police and denouncing Trump.

The women, who declined to give their names, clawed at the posters and tore them to the ground. A few people who arrived earlier to protect the wall, including 57-year-old software engineer Mike Manos, tried to guard the posters with their bodies.

“You have the right to put it up, we have the right to tear it down!” one woman shouted.

Everett Turner, 62, a mason from Washington, said he was on a bike ride before he stopped near the White House. “It’s sad,” Turner said. “Just get ready for the new president and move on.”

A few moments later, Turner got into a screaming match with a woman wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat.

“Go back to Europe or somewhere!” Turner, who is Black, shouted.

“Your ancestors sold you!” the White woman screamed back.

Police officers moved between the groups and admonished the women tearing down the posters to stop, though they did not physically intervene. Newsham said officers try to avoid getting involved in the destruction of signs, worried that their intervention could escalate tensions, and that it might not be illegal to remove signs placed on public property.

However, by Sunday evening, police had cordoned off a section of the plaza that had been vandalized, in what appeared to be an effort to prevent more destruction.

Trump – who in September refused to denounce the Proud Boys and instead urged them to “stand back and stand by” – appeared to relish the mayhem. In one tweet, Trump wrote, “Antifa SCUM ran for the hills today when they tried attacking the people at the Trump rally, because these people aggressively fought back.”

The outgoing president also tweeted for D.C. police to “Get going – do your job and don’t hold back!!!” in arresting counterprotesters. He accused Bowser of “not doing her job!” as he linked to a video of an older man dressed in pro-Trump regalia being hit in the face from behind and falling to the pavement, bleeding and unconscious.

But the video showed only part of the incident. A longer video posted online shows the man pushing a counterdemonstrator to the ground, stomping on his head and shaking his fist at people. Police said they arrested four people at that scene, including one charged in the assault. Newsham said the incident remains under investigation and could lead to charges filed against the older man.

Black Lives Matter DC, in turn, blamed Trump supporters for instigating the violence, and alleged in a tweet that “MPD has been protecting the Proud Boys and white nationalists all night,” and that police only put on riot gear and fired chemical irritants at city residents.

“They allowed white supremacists to spend the day in our City doing whatever they want while not wearing Masks,” the group said.

Another anti-Trump group, All Out DC, took to Twitter to complain that not enough of their supporters turned out, and said, “The people who stayed home today enabled fascist violence.”

No arrest was made in the stabbing, which injured a man who police said provided them with home addresses in the District and in Maryland. The incident occurred near 10th Street and New York Avenue NW during a brawl that had erupted nearby. A police report says the victim did not cooperate with investigators.

Police said that among the arrests were people – one from New York, the other from the District – who are charged with beating a person with a flagpole after that person tried to steal a sign. Another person was charged with throwing a firework at several people.

The individuals with firearms-related charges could make initial appearances in D.C. Superior Court on Monday.

Newsham said that “the majority of people left after the sun went down,” which was around the time the events at the Supreme Court had ended. There were still sporadic clashes that appeared isolated, some outside hotels where Trump supporters were staying.

Anticipating crowds and potential violence, police had blocked traffic from a wide swath of downtown, and as the formal event ended and people departed from the Supreme Court, police sealed off Black Lives Matter Plaza for a time to prevent rival groups from heading there.

One group of Trump supporters marched while tearing down Black Lives Matter signs from buildings, which police said they intervened to stop, as another group paraded a large blue and white banner with the slogan, “Trump law and order.”

By 12:30 a.m., there were few if any counterprotesters left, and the group with the Trump banner split. Many ducked into the Trump International Hotel, as a few people with the banner continued on into the now-quiet night.

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Michigan, Washington state order new restrictions as U.S. passes 11 million coronavirus cases

InternationalNov 16. 2020

By The Washington Post · Paulina Firozi, Hannah Knowles · NATIONAL, HEALTH, HEALTH-NEWS

Coronavirus cases reported in the United States passed 11 million on Sunday, as the nation shatters records for hospitalizations and daily new infections and as leaders turn to new, painful restrictions to stem the pandemic’s long-predicted surge.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/c/embed/537d8149-48c8-4606-b0d5-acc98f5c0e02?ptvads=block&playthrough=false

The milestone came one week after the country hit 10 million cases, a testament to just how rapidly the virus is spreading – the first 1 million cases took more than three months. This new wave has increased covid-19 hospitalizations past the peaks seen in April and July, straining health-care systems and pushing some reluctant Republican governors to enact statewide mask mandates for the first time.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/c/embed/ed14ef39-e148-4a5c-8b51-58aa64344fce?ptvads=block&playthrough=false

Other states are reenacting stay-at-home orders and store closures. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, D, on Sunday announced sweeping new limits on gatherings for three-weeks – including a ban on indoor dining at restaurants and bars, and a halt to in-person classes at high schools and colleges. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, D, also laid out a slew of new rules, which prohibit indoor social gatherings with people outside one’s household and indoor service at restaurants, bars and more.

“As hard as those first months were for our state, these next few are going to be even harder,” Whitmer said at a news conference, as health experts fear that winter weather driving people indoors will accelerate the crisis.

Inslee acknowledged that slowing the virus would come at a steep price for struggling businesses, even as the state works to distribute millions more in aid. He and Whitmer both appealed to the federal government to step in with more help. Congress remains deadlocked on a stimulus package, and President Donald Trump – still denying his election loss – largely has tuned out the pandemic’s surge; his refusal to concede is also stalling the transition to a new administration, including the formal transfer of information on the nation’s pandemic response.

Whitmer said that Trump has “an opportunity to meet the needs of the people of this country” and emphasized the importance of his final months in office. Inslee was already looking ahead to the administration of President-elect Joe Biden.

“All of us who feel, as I do, the pain of the small-business people ought to be pounding the doors of the Congress and the new president, who I’m glad we’re going to have, to really get this job done,” Inslee said.

Washington’s restrictions are not as tough as its stay-at-home order issued in March but extend into nearly every aspect of daily life. Wedding and funeral receptions are forbidden. Religious services and in-store retail are forced to operate at reduced capacity. Even outdoor social gatherings must be kept to a maximum of five people from outside one’s household.

Inslee and other leaders in the state emphasized the need to intervene early amid spiraling statistics, even as Washington posts some of the lowest numbers for new coronavirus infections in the country. The number of hospital patients with covid-19 recently rose about 40 percent in a week, officials said, and Seattle’s mayor said that nearly a fifth of the city’s cases have come just in the past two weeks.

Clint Wallace, an ICU nurse in Spokane, joined Inslee at Sunday’s news conference to plead with residents for their help. He called the ICU “as busy as I’ve seen it.”

“We are exhausted,” Wallace said of health-care workers around the state.

State and local officials nationwide are reinstating restrictions to fight the virus. New Mexico and Oregon on Friday ordered extensive new statewide shutdowns, while the Navajo Nation – devastated early on by the virus – reissued its stay-at-home order for at least three weeks. The Navajo Nation said cases threaten to swamp the health system on the southwestern reservation without immediate action.

North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, R, on Friday issued a statewide mask mandate and new capacity limits on businesses, less than a week after Utah Gov. Gary Herbert, R, announced a similar mask order in the face of overwhelmed hospitals warning that they might have to ration care.

“Our situation has changed, and we must change with it,” Burgum said in a late-night video message.

But state rules are just one piece of the puzzle, and some leaders are looking to Congress and the incoming president to take stronger action.

Ron Klain, Joe Biden’s incoming chief of staff, said Sunday it’s critical for the president-elect’s transition team to start working with Trump administration officials to ensure “nothing drops in this change of power” that could imperil the distribution of a potential coronavirus vaccine.

“Joe Biden is going to become president of the United States in the midst of an ongoing crisis. That has to be a seamless transition,” Klain said on NBC News’s “Meet the Press.”

The Trump White House is blocking the administration from formally cooperating with Biden, forcing the president-elect’s transition team to continue preparations with recently departed government officials and other experts. That means Biden’s team has not heard from Trump’s about vaccine development and other work to combat the pandemic.

A health expert on Biden’s covid-19 advisory board said there’s “a lot of information that needs to be transmitted. It can’t wait until the last minute.”

It is in the nation’s interest that the transition team get the threat assessments that the team knows about, understand the vaccine distribution plans, need to know where the stockpiles are, what the status is of masks and gloves,” said Atul Gawande, a surgeon at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and a professor at Harvard Medical School, on ABC News’s “This Week.”

Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, compared the process Sunday to “passing a baton in a race.”

“I’ve been through multiple transitions now, having served six presidents for 36 years, and it’s very clear that transition process that we go through . . . is really important in a smooth handing over of the information,” Fauci said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

“Of course it would be better if we could start working with them,” he added when asked whether working with Biden’s team would serve the public interest.

On “Meet the Press,” Klain said there is “not that much Joe Biden can do right now to change things,” because he is not yet president.

“Right now we have a crisis that’s getting worse,” Klain said. “We had never had a day with 100,000 cases in a single day until last week. By next week, we may see 200,000 cases in a single day.”