Political Reckoning: America convulses amid a week of protests, but can it change?
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The coronavirus pandemic and the battered economy will be on the ballot in November when Americans pick a president, and those issues will be on the agenda of whichever candidate, Trump or former vice president Joe Biden, wins the election. But so, too, now will issues of racial justice, racial inequalities and the persistence of racism. If the past seven days have proved anything, it is that those issues will not easily be ignored and that the time of choosing is underway.
Then they saw the park forcibly cleared of peaceful demonstrators on Monday afternoon, ultimately to make way for a presidential appearance. “We were not coming down here for four days, because we were frightened it was going to be too compromising for our health,” Louis de Merode told The Washington Post’s Peter Jamison. “Then things started piling up in our brains and our hearts, and we both decided that we couldn’t not do it.
, marking the resumption of manned space missions from U.S. soil for the first time in nearly a decade, Trump’s tone softened. In remarks at the John F. Kennedy Space Center, he said: Michelle Brown heard just after midnight that her Teaism restaurant in the District had been badly damaged. As she prepared to head to the restaurant, she sent out a message on Twitter: “Before anyone puts a single word in our mouths. Black lives matter.”
If the anger continued to build on the streets, the same thing was happening inside the White House as the president monitored developments on television. On Monday morning, his anger boiled over as he berated the nation’s governors on a conference call. “You have to dominate,” he said. “If you don’t dominate, you’re wasting your time. They’re going to run over you. You’re going to look like a bunch of jerks.
Just after 4 p.m., hundreds of protesters stopped in front of the Capitol. Chants of “No Justice, No Peace” mixed with the music of Kendrick Lamar and Childish Gambino, which protesters blared from their smartphones. A group of young African Americans danced, stepped and swiveled to the deep bass of “This is America.”
From there, events spiraled toward chaos and dissension. By Monday afternoon, protesters again filled Lafayette Square, peacefully assembling to air their grievances over the killing of Floyd and to demand action against discrimination and racism. At first, the demonstrators were well separated from the line of security forces guarding the White House.
At 6:35 p.m., security forces moved aggressively to clear Lafayette Square, wielding their shields to attack the demonstrators and using pepper balls and chemical spray to disperse the crowd. Cable television captured it all live. The violent removal began just before Trump began to speak. He finished by saying he would soon “pay my respects to a very, very special place.” Within minutes, the gates of the White House opened and the president, accompanied by a group including Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper and Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, marched across the park to stand in front of St. John’s Church.
The Right Rev. Mariann Budde, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, had not been informed that the president intended to use St. John’s for the photo op.. “Everything he has said and done is to inflame violence. We need moral leadership, and he’s done everything to divide us.” In Annapolis, retired U.S. Navy Adm. Michael Mullen had spent Monday evening in a state of agitation, scribbling his thoughts onto pieces of paper. By midday Tuesday, he was sharing drafts of an extraordinary statement condemning the president, his voice the first in what would become an unprecedented chorus of former senior officers condemning the commander in chief.
But Mullen was troubled by images of National Guard units sweeping into Washington. Concern became alarm when he learned that Trump and Esper had used words like “dominate” and “battlespace” in their call with the nation’s governors on Monday morning. His confidence in the military remained unshaken, Mullen said, but “I am less confident in the soundness of the orders they will be given by this commander in chief.”
Trump had gone further in trying to politicize the military, and test its constitutional allegiance, than any president in memory, one former U.S. military official said. “That’s what made Monday such a precipice moment,” he said.Those who had joined Trump in approaching that precipice spent much of Tuesday backpedaling.
Though it did not mention the name of the president, the memo was widely interpreted as a rebuke of Trump and the way protesters’ rights had been trampled at Lafayette Square.Retired U.S. Marine Corps Gen. Jim Mattis had, like Mullen, resolutely refused to comment on politics after resigning 18 months ago as secretary of defense. He had chafed under Trump as the president trashed U.S.
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