We are witnessing the birth of a movement - and the downfall of a president // Minneapolis City Council members commit to disbanding police department
We are witnessing the birth of a movement — and the downfall of a president
Trump has turned
Washington into an armed camp. He has built a three-mile-long wall around the
White House and cowered in a basement bunker as protests grew on the streets
outside. But Trump’s threat to use active-duty soldiers to suppress dissent has
encountered some profound pushback from an unexpected source: the United States
military.
It began with a statement by former Secretary of Defense James Mattis in
reaction to the use of force, including National Guard soldiers, to clear
peaceful demonstrators from a street near the White House so Trump could make
his now-infamous “walk” to St. John’s Church for his Bible-waving photo-op. “I
have watched this week’s unfolding events, angry and appalled,” Mattis wrote in
The Atlantic:
When I joined the
military, some 50 years ago, I swore an oath to support and defend the
Constitution. Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be
ordered under any circumstance to violate the Constitutional rights of their
fellow citizens — much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected
commander-in-chief, with military leadership standing alongside. The protests
are defined by tens of thousands of people of conscience who are insisting that
we live up to our values — our values as people and our values as a nation. We
do not need to militarize our response to protests. We need to unite around a
common purpose. And it starts by guaranteeing that all of us are equal before
the law.
And then something
extraordinary happened. Mattis’ clarion call was joined by more senior military
figures, beginning with Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, who had been the
object of strong criticism for standing next to Trump during his Bible
photo-op. Esper held a press conference at the Pentagon on Wednesday and
announced that he was against invoking the Insurrection Act, which would
(hypothetically) authorize the deployment of active-duty military on the
streets of America.
Trump is said to be very, very unhappy with Esper and
reversed his order for elements of the 82nd Airborne Division to return to
their base in North Carolina. By week’s end, however, Esper had prevailed, and
the 82nd was on the way home. Retired Adm. Mike
Mullen, who served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Barack Obama,
was next. He wrote a piece for The Atlantic entitled, “I cannot remain silent.”... read more:
A veto-proof majority
of Minneapolis City Council members committed Sunday to disbanding the city’s police
department and “replacing it with a holistic model of public safety” in the
wake of the killing of George Floyd, which sparked a nationwide uprising
against law enforcement brutality and galvanized demands for sweeping change.
The Appeal‘s Jay Willis first reported the move, noting that “for years, activists
have argued that MPD has failed to actually keep the city safe, and City
Councilmembers echoed that sentiment today.” Minneapolis City
Council President Lisa Bender told The Appeal that disbanding
the police department is necessary because “our efforts at incremental reform
have failed.” “We are here today
because George Floyd was killed by the Minneapolis Police Department,” Bender
said. “We are also here because, here in Minneapolis and in cities across the
United States, it is clear that our existing system of policing and public
safety isn’t working for so many of our neighbors.
“Our commitment is to
do what is necessary to keep every member of our community safe and to tell the
truth that the police department has not done that,” Bender added. “Our
commitment is to end our city’s toxic relationship with the Minneapolis Police
Department and to work toward ending policing as we know it, replacing it with
a holistic model of public safety that actually keeps us safe.”...
