for Georges one. They gag themselves to throw up. Duffy (anchor): I approached this one residence, this one basement apartment. … Folks in fatigues, you could see their feet hanging out of the sides of the helicopters. Ford (protester): It was unbelievable watching everybody running. NORTHCOM says U.S. must defend interests in the Arctic. Even beyond the way June 1 laid bare the administration’s failures and further galvanized the Black Lives Matter movement, the president’s disregard for D.C.’s autonomy—at one point he threatened to take over Washington’s police force in order to snuff out the protests—has also led to a renewed interest from local and national politicians like Mayor Bowser, D.C. congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, and U.S. Representative Steny Hoyer in D.C.’s fight for full representation. A bird’s-eye view of a protest on Fulton Street near the Grand Rapids Police Department on June 1, 2020. The brazen display of force, captured on video in broad daylight during a demonstration calling attention to yet more instances of the extrajudicial killing of Black Americans—including Breonna Taylor, shot eight times in her home by still-uncharged Louisville police officers; and Ahmaud Arbery, stalked and shot in Southeast Georgia while jogging by three men now charged with murder—symbolized exactly what the current movement is protesting. Touil (protester): It lands on your skin. My door opens out. By Friday, May 29, four days after the killing of Floyd and three days after protests began in Minneapolis, hundreds of people had assembled in Washington, D.C., a number that grew into the thousands as the weekend went on. Duffy (anchor): This group that I was with was way ahead, so I had to run up to catch up to them. The protest drew several hundred people to downtown Portland. Douglas Reyes-Ceron (protester): In general, it’s peaceful but tense and angry. We turned around and then we realized the cops had come in behind us and boxed us in. Ken Duffy (WTOP anchor): All of a sudden the Park Police on horseback started moving forward, and the flash bangs came, and all hell broke loose. They didn’t want to get arrested. People are smart about this. April 15 (UPI) -- The U.S. is going to need to develop more persistence in the Arctic region if it wants to be a player there, the commander of U.S. Northern Command told lawmakers earlier this week. The police’s violent tactics only increased the size and intensity of the movement, in the city and nationwide. I’m going back out there. Haake (correspondent): We were turning south on 17th Street, trying to get out of the way. I could see the fear in their eyes. April 15 (UPI) -- Four all-male platoons have graduated from boot camp at a historically all-female training battalion, according to the U.S. Marine Corps. Meka (protester): The cops chased us to the house and pepper-sprayed us. Thousands of … Summary . They had no idea what was coming. You can’t breathe. People aren’t dumb. Touil (protester): I have a photo. And I’m looking at Lafayette Square. A protest is set for 12 p.m. Saturday in Flemington. A George Floyd protest in Philadelphia on June 6, 2020 In late May to June 2020, the high-profile killings of George Floyd , Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery led to a racial reckoning that greatly increased sentiment regarding systemic racism in the United States, with changes occurring in public opinion, government, industry, and sports. And it was because they needed to quote-unquote secure the site for the president during a very volatile time. It’s not a couple cops. Ford (protester): It was super, super, super tense. Anna (protester): My adrenaline lasted about two days. So we were out on the patio. It didn’t feel right to sit at home and do nothing when I could at least show up and allow my voice to be heard as a Black person in America. The whole time it was like, “Well, this is gonna be interesting.” It’s still pretty loud out there. Haake (MSNBC correspondent): The lines of Park Police, and Secret Service, and National Guard started moving toward the fence. While Trump’s capacity for cruelty and incompetence has been on display since the day he took office, the first day of June was a crystal-clear distillation of his administration’s disregard for its citizens. Finch (reporter): When you don’t live in D.C. and you watch the inauguration, you see the presidents go to that church across the street, you don’t really get how it fits into the fabric of the city. Dubey (Swann Street resident): I wedged myself between the door and the railing. I literally have been a combat photographer before. Gabriel (protester): The thing that was most upsetting was that it was completely uncalled for. I’ll just say that. The demonstration will begin at the Flemington Justice Building and move to the Flemington Courthouse. The investigation report recommended the Army review regulatory guidance to "ensure aviation support to civil disturbance operations is appropriately addressed," the Army's release said. June 1 George Floyd protest news By Jessie Yeung , Steve George , Nick Thompson , Melissa Macaya, Meg Wagner , Mike Hayes and Daniella Diaz , CNN Updated 2:10 a.m. I have an NBC-issued gas mask, I’ve been trained how to use it, and at that corner—and here’s a 2020 thing for you—I had to rip off my coronavirus face mask, literally rip that thing off my face, so I could get the gas mask over my head, and snugly fit it around my face, and took two or three deep breaths to like clear the mask of the gas so that I could actually breathe again. File photo by Tasos Katopodis/UPI |, Police in riot gear charge through tear gas at protestors near the White House during a demonstration against the Minnesota police killing of George Floyd on Monday, June 1, 2020, in Washington D.C. I had to stop and pour water on my face. Meka (protester): We were there for 30 minutes just standing around, trying to figure out what to do, asking the cops what they wanted us to do, because we were stuck there and wouldn’t let us leave. There was a moment where they put us into a room and exposed us to tear gas, and I’m telling you, that memory, in my head, I remembered that smell. Which is pretty surprising being that I’m 31 years old and a pretty outspoken person. A military Humvee blocks an intersection in the Chinatown section of downtown Washington as demonstrators protest the death of George Floyd, Monday, June 1, 2020, in Washington. Michigan National Guard members will provide support to local civil authorities for as long as requested as a peaceful presence for the safety of Michigan communities. June 2, 2020 at 5:30 a.m. UTC. The military is using black hawk helicopters to dispersd in DC right now flying lower than building height of 12 stories pic.twitter.com/RMa9LIh8t4, [Editor’s note: The helicopter shown in the video above is a Lakota.]. The crowd was booing lustily. Duffy (WTOP anchor): I heard something happening, in the area of 16th and H right at the intersection. if you can give me a chance to see what's happening here outside as they make their way past the police Department. I guess people were sleeping it off from Sunday. Because they were clearly trying to physically show force just by being there. There was no more panic in people’s eyes. Gabriel (protester and National Democratic Redistricting Committee press secretary): Once again, I’m not a serial protester or anything. People were sitting on this guard house talking; people were dancing. My dad’s Black, my uncles are Black. There are people in the highest levels of government who are not only endorsing this sort of behavior, but literally ordering it. Nassim Touil (protester): I’m an EMT, I actually go to [George Washington University]. Gabriel (protester and National Democratic Redistricting Committee press secretary): Nobody on our side is putting their hands on anybody, on the cops or the National Guard. You’ve gotta cover your face. Gabriel (protester): People were very scared. I’m not gonna just go home, lick my wounds, and be sad about it. In my head I was like, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this, man.” This is not good. Obviously they were using tear gas or a variation thereof. D.C. police Chief Peter Newsham said that the Metropolitan Police Department made 88 arrests on May 31. It was a flash point, and yet another reminder of how far America has to go in the pursuit of racial justice. On May 25, 2020, Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee onto George Floyd’s neck for almost nine minutes, killing him while staring into the camera of a filming bystander, his three accompanying officers looking on. But the common denominator is: Everyone’s pissed. I was maybe a few yards away. “And it was a mess because of 45. Pages Businesses Media/News Company Broadcasting & Media Production Company The Walton Tribune Videos Peaceful Protest in Downtown Monroe on Monday night, June 1, 2020 Senators seek to boost military spending on quantum computing. Her family didn’t want her to go to the protest, but she said she was tired of sitting on the sidelines. Earlier on June 1, an increasingly petulant Trump had lashed out. Scenes from the protest at Lawrenceville City Hall Monday, June 1, 2020 After law enforcement pushed crowds away from the area around the White House on the night of June 1, one march ended up on Swann Street Northwest between 14th and 15th, a tiny neighborhood about a mile north of the White House. Trinice McNally (founding director of the Center for Diversity, Inclusion & Multicultural Affairs at University of the District of Columbia and member of the D.C. chapter of the Black Youth Project 100): People don’t even know: We have over 30 forces of police here. But what this did was show a lot of Americans that this isn’t just something that happens with police departments in rural towns that are minority African American. I’ve seen military Humvees at events before, but never to that scale and that much of a perimeter. Protesters walked down Route 47, in Rio Grande, June 1 after the death of George Floyd, an African-American Minnesota man, who died in police custody. I’m like, “What the hell?” I see stragglers coming through. People are like, “Why didn’t you just present your badge?” But when you’re facing 40 cops in riot gear on a street, I’m not gonna go walking up to them with my hand up and saying I’m from the media. They had one police cruiser at one intersection just deploying flash bangs. Gabriel (protester): I had been trained for that and I’m familiar with that. So I can look at the National Guardsmen and I can identify them just going off their rank and their unit patches and stuff like that. As thousands gathered in Washington, D.C.’s Lafayette Square on May 29, Secret Service agents reportedly whisked Trump into a bunker. We were aware of them flying around. All day. National World War I memorial dedicated in D.C. April 16 (UPI) -- The National World War I Memorial honoring fallen troops was dedicated Friday in Washington, D.C. DARPA awards 3 deals for work on nuclear propulsion system. On May 30 in D.C., police began using tear gas, pepper spray, flash bang grenades, and fire hoses to clear protesters near the White House. I don’t think I really have to go into why that’s inappropriate. File photo by Tasos Katopodis/UPI |, President Donald J. Trump returns after posing with a bible outside St. John's Episcopal Church after delivering remarks in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, DC, on Monday, June 1, 2020. There were three or four on each side. You’re seeing people go down. Newsfeed Now: Protests across America morning update – June 1, 2020. 'Be the Change' protest in Suffolk June 1, 2020 Video. We thought they might bum-rush the place. I’d never seen that before. Gabriel (protester and National Democratic Redistricting Committee press secretary): Me and my cousin, we like to be in the mix, so we went right up to the gate on H Street. Meka (protester): We didn’t know if the police were gonna be able to come in the house. Haake (correspondent): At one point, I think you see this on TV, there are two guys carrying a woman who had tripped and fallen during the stampede, and they’re running past us and my instinct is to stick a mic at them and ask, “Hey, are you OK?” And the guy yelled at me on live TV, “She’s not fucking OK.”. Captions. Touil (protester): There were the pepper spray balls, there were rubber bullets, and there were flash bangs. Haake (MSNBC correspondent): A little after 6 we saw Barr come out and take this walk around with a couple of guys in suits. Anna, who prefers that her last name not be used, managed to shoot a video of the debris-spraying Lakota, a medical helicopter, flying dangerously low above Chinatown. And just directing this crowd down 15th. During a background briefing reported on by military.com and CNN, an unnamed official said the use of the helicopters "was not prohibited by law or policy" but that there was a "very general lack of understanding" of how to use helicopters in civil disturbances. They were fresh-faced and they obviously had not been trained for this sort of thing. Copyright © 2021 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. And then I looked to my left, I see that there are protesters with their hands up just standing there, and then I looked a little farther down the corner and there were police down the alley. George Floyd protest at Oakland Tech High School, Oakland, California on June 1, 2020. There was stuff flying in my face. The official said the pilots and others involved were not considered to have engaged in misconduct. Today marks the fifth straight day of demonstrations following the police killing of a … Duffy (anchor): They had blocked off this block, completely. Duffy (anchor): It was a very dangerous situation. I’m wondering what’s going on. You could see the rifles. And they’re in twos and in threes and some are carrying signs. Reaves (protester): For the first 10 minutes of being in Rahul’s house, it was mayhem. The Trump administration’s violent response to the protests the evening of June 1 is now the subject of several lawsuits. It was very confusing. 4 all-male platoons graduate boot camp at formerly all-female batallion. I don’t plan on just throwing in the towel. “They were not peaceful protesters,” he claimed. Ford (protester): I really don’t want people to lose sight of why we’re down there. Garrett Reaves (protester): We were on the other side of the street and I saw my friend say, “Come on, hurry up,” ’cause I saw someone like 5 feet ahead of me get hit with a club in the head [by police] multiple times. On May 31, the White House and its turned-off lights was an image almost too symbolic to be real. Ford (protester): I went back out the next day. Anna (protester): We eventually sort of regrouped and started moving again. Haake (MSNBC correspondent): We just saw this continual build-up on the other side of the fence from the heavily armored law enforcement. Here is the story of how the events of Monday, June 1, in Washington became a flash point, as told by those who were on the ground. I had never seen a police or military presence that large for a protest before. Until June 1, the president of the United States had commented on the nationwide unrest only via his Twitter account. I was a public affairs Marine, with a camera. Dubey (Swann Street resident): Swann Street was filled up about three-quarters. After making a highly charged, emotional speech to the nation where he threatened military force, his officials cleared peaceful protests with tear gas and horses and walked on to the courtyard of St. John’s Church and held up a Bible as if it were a prop or an extension of his military and authoritarian position, and stood in front of our building as if it were a backdrop for his agenda. It really went from 0 to 100 out of nowhere. There was no amping up of tensions, there was none of that feeling of, “This is gonna go down.” Within 15 minutes, it went from protest to pandemonium. They covered all the alleys along that block so no one could go anywhere. I feel like that’s important. Such an atrocity can never happen again.”. On June 7, Barr smeared those who had gathered near the White House on June 1. Gabriel (protester): It’s super frustrating because, I mean, we’ve already seen the tension between citizens and the police. And folks are not surprised this is happening. Gabriel (protester): It’s been real for a while now. And it happened almost out of nowhere. At 6:18 [law enforcement] started mobilizing. The protest in question started peacefully in downtown Portland on June 1, 2020, and became increasingly tense as night fell and police clashed with protesters in the streets. These are not just some protests that are gonna go away in a couple days. Finch (reporter): I think the shock of seeing the munitions use in Lafayette Square, the aggression with which they were trying to get away from that scene, a few of them may have seen their lives flash before their eyes. As criticism of his retreat in the face of a historical moment mounted a day later, Trump decided to show his face. All sorts of things. The official said Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Joseph Martin "will [take] or has taken appropriate administrative action against a number of individuals involved in the set of circumstances," but did not release the officers' identities or the actions taken against them. McNally (Center for Diversity, Inclusion & Multicultural Affairs): I just felt so disgusted and so immediately alarmed that, “Yo, this is urgent. The D.C. chapter of Black Lives Matter and the American Civil Liberties Union are suing Trump for civil rights violations. Photo by Tasos Katopodis/UPI |, V-22 Osprey conducts first landing on deck of a ship. Back up! I was with a friend, and when this all went down, I looked for him immediately, and I saw him running up the stairs and calling my name. I was looking at it like, “Well, I’m out here working for [former U.S. Attorney General] Eric Holder, I’m trying to do my part behind the scenes,” so I feel attached to it in that way. WAVY News in Suffolk on June 1, 2020. Meanwhile, The New York Times reported, some of Trump’s closest advisers planned for him to make a speech in the Rose Garden and then walk to St. John’s. I heard a little commotion. April 16 (UPI) -- The Biden administration is seeing pushback from Senate Democrats after going ahead with a Trump-era deal to sell F-35 fighter aircraft to the United Arab Emirates. Protesters listen to a man speak as they gather peacefully in front of the Ohio Statehouse in Downtown Columbus, Ohio, June 1, 2020, to protest the death of George Floyd. And the whole country is watching.” Really, the blood is on his hands. People were so angry and so upset and the atmosphere was so charged. Duffy (anchor): The media was technically exempt from the curfew. We've got a protest going in downtown. Meka (protester): The [police] just started closing in on us, macing people, hitting people, and it got pretty chaotic, pretty fast. Gabriel (protester): You messed up a peaceful protest. I haven’t said this explicitly: I’m Black. They were stopped at one point at Florida Avenue, and then they hooked a left onto Florida Avenue Northwest, and it looked like they were headed toward Adams Morgan. A military Humvee blocks an intersection in the Chinatown section of downtown Washington as demonstrators protest the death of George Floyd, Monday, June 1, 2020, in Washington. Reporting live, MSNBC correspondent Garrett Haake knew he couldn’t soft-pedal what he was seeing. Anna (protester): I had to hold up my phone toward it and look in the other direction. The central location for the D.C. protests was (and still is) Lafayette Square, a park that abuts the northern border of the White House grounds, sitting between Pennsylvania Avenue and H Street, where St. John’s is located. I just felt an immense amount of guilt. Minutes earlier, on the orders of U.S. Attorney General William Barr, U.S. Park Police, local police, Secret Service officers, and National Guard troops had used tear gas (the exact type is under dispute) and rubber bullets to drive protesters away from the exact spot where the president was standing. A week later, protests against yet another police killing of a Black person that began in Minnesota had spread across all 50 states. Here’s how a photo op became a flashpoint in the movement against racism. If this doesn’t get your attention, I’m not sure what else will. In a statement, White House spokesperson Judd Deere told Vox that the Park Police issued three dispersal warnings to protesters to “help enforce the 7:00 pm curfew.” Witnesses told The Washington Post that the orders were difficult to hear. Touil (protester): The mood, at that time, wasn’t really aggressive. It stays on you. Police were trying to reach for them and pull them back outside. Blowing shit everywhere. June 1, 2020 ‘We Are All George Floyd’: Global Anger Grows Over a Death in Minneapolis In many parts of the world, the death of yet another black man at the hands of the police in the United States is setting off mass protests against police brutality and reviving concerns that America is abandoning its traditional role as a defender of human rights. It’s also frustrating seeing military equipment being used against Americans. I was like, “Dang, I can’t believe they picked this group of people to do this.” And I feel for ’em, too, because as a veteran, nobody signs up for the military thinking you are gonna have to engage American citizens. Everybody’s being cool. A day of peaceful protesting against the police killing of George Floyd turned violent in the nation’s capital, as President Trump forced people away from the area surrounding the White House. Some of them were taking a nap. People started to scatter a little bit. Anna (protester): I was in this march with folks for a little while, a few miles, and we were in the Chinatown area when the first chopper descended on us. Dubey ordered from Duccini’s Pizza, which delivered the pies over his home’s back fence. With coronavirus, everybody—well, not everybody, but a lot of people—have been at home for months on end and you’re forced to consume what’s going on around you. And it started to come down around Wednesday or so, and that’s when I realized what I’d been through and that my body hurt. News. The release also said the Army "immediately began implementing corrective actions related to the planning, training, equipping, command and control, oversight, and orders processes for the integration of D.C. National Guard aviation assets into civil disturbance operations.". Related Videos The Washington Post reported heights as low as 45 feet. Marchers protest the Minnesota police killing of George Floyd during a demonstration in front of the White House on Monday, June 1, 2020, in Washington D.C. Thousands of demonstrators were arrested over the weekend after clashing with police and defying curfews in numerous major U.S. cities. In many cities across the country, police met the protests against police brutality with more brutality. Duffy (anchor): I do believe that these homeowners saved lives by taking people in. I was in the Marine Corps from 2007 to 2011, did a year in Afghanistan. “I didn’t want it to be, ‘The president just spoke’ or ‘clash with protesters.’ There was no clash. Not just his hands but everyone that enables him as well. Senate bill would restrict F-35 sales to United Arab Emirates. And as I walked over there, I asked somebody to my right, “What happened?” And according to him—this was before they really cleared everybody out—someone was tear-gassed. Nobody provoked the police. But I see people out there in the streets doing something. Usually I can say that it starts to get a little bit more agitated.