Black Lives Matter protesters clash with police outside White House

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Clashes erupted between Trump supporters and Black Lives Matter protesters outside the White House on Tuesday night as police struggled to keep crowds under control. 

Video footage from Black Lives Matter Plaza shows tensions overflowing into physical altercations as thousands gathered to demonstrate despite a heavy presence from Metropolitan police.  

According to reports, Black Lives Matter demonstrators were angered when a counter-protester allegedly began to shout: ‘All lives matter, white lives matter’.  

One video shows the man speaking with a protester before he is shoved into one of the barricades and surrounded. He is punched and pushed to the ground before manages to break away and walk off. 

Another video shows a man in a ‘Make America Great Again’ shirt squaring off with a protester and trying to taunt him into a fight. 

Shouting also erupted in a tense stand-off between protesters and cops, forcing officers to pull back from the plaza to restore calm. Protesters have threatened to stay out and force civil unrest around the White House for weeks if Trump is re-elected.  

At least three protesters were arrested in DC Tuesday night, with further arrests made in smaller-scale protests in Minneapolis, Portland and Seattle after fireworks were set off and protesters placed items such as nails in the road to block traffic. 

In Los Angeles, police declared two unlawful assemblies over the course of the night due to ‘large and unruly’ crowds. The LAPD said 40 people were arrested and 30 received citations for blocking traffic and refusing to disperse.  

Other cities including the Big Apple, Chicago, Boston and Philadelphia saw subdued demonstrations under the watchful eye of a law enforcement presence.  

The nation had braced for substantial unrest over Election Night, with the National Guard activated in 16 states. 

But into the early hours on Wednesday scenes were quieter than had been anticipated as the election was left on a cliffhanger with results expected to take days or weeks to reach a clear winner.   

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The various groups of protesters began to gather in front of the White House from Tuesday afternoon, preparing for a night of demonstrations even as many states still had hours to go until polling stations closed. 

As night fell, DC police ramped up patrols around the ‘non-scalable’ fence that was erected on the perimeter of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Cops escorted a truck of musical performers as Shutdown D.C. and Black Lives Matter began their demonstrations to ‘start this next phase of the election cycle in the streets’. 

The groups had planned an eight-hour event at Black Lives Matter Plaza that would include a giant screen showing election results, DJs and performances by bands playing Washington’s signature go-go music. A new report claims that they ‘planned for months’ to launch a new wave of protests from election night. 

The first protester was taken into custody at around 5.15pm after demonstrators failed to comply with police orders to move a vehicle that was illegally parked and charged with resisting arrest and disorderly conduct, according to NBC.  

The second two arrests were made at around 9.30pm as officers on bikes were deployed to break up a major scuffle. It is not known if the arrest was linked to the earlier violence between protesters captured on video.  

Cops were seen loading canisters with crowd control munitions as struggled to remove the man who had been placed under arrest from the crowds. 

While some Trump supporters were present, they were vastly outnumbered by anti-Trump protesters and videos showed them being attacked as protesters began to spread through the city. 

Elsewhere in the city, the president’s fans gathered in a bar to celebrate as the results came in.   

Earlier in the day, the atmosphere remained party-like but quickly descended into tension as the crowds grew and results began to break. 

Two large black banners were unfurled that read ‘Trump Lies All The Time’ and ‘Remove Trump’ in white print.

According to the Shutdown website, the group warned that Tuesday’s protest would ‘not be the time we need to create disruption to stop a coup – yet’ as votes would still be coming in. D.C. 

‘But we’ll be in a good place to respond to whatever might happen. This has been a really long and dark era so we’re going to be together to process our feelings of hope, anger, fear and exhaustion as a community,’ it added. 

‘Regardless of the results, election-night programming will probably wrap up around midnight so we can be energized and ready to hit the streets again on the 4th.’ 

Yet protesters were seen becoming confrontational with cops as the night progressed. One video posted on social media at around 10pm showed a protesters shouting ‘F*ck you. F*ck all you’ as a police car moved through the crowds. 

At results came in, the protests also began to gain momentum followed cops out of the plaza as they retreated after making arrests. 

Protesters were pictured jumping on cars and dancing as they marched through the streets with a moving concert stage. The march was tracked by cops but quickly returned to the area around the White House. 

American flags were burned, a trash can was set alight and firework were set off as the march continued under a sea of black umbrellas.   

Further clashes were seen as demonstrators confronted Trump supporters, ripping flags from their hands and stalking those who tried to film what was happening.  

At midnight, hundreds were still marching near Dupont Circle although their destination was not known.  

Cities around the nation are bracing for election-related unrest as activists get ready for what could be weeks of sustained street actions, depending on how the vote count goes and how President Donald Trump acts after his repeated refusals to say whether he will accept the results.

At least six groups have made requests for permits for protests in D.C. over the next few days. 

The preparations have brought together a diverse constellation of groups, some decades old and others formed this past summer in the wake of George Floyd’s death.

Demonstrators are gearing up for potential violence, especially after June, when Trump used federal law enforcement to clear the plaza outside the White House that had been filled with peaceful protesters.

‘The police are readying for battle. We should be very clear about that,’ April Goggans, a core organizer with the local Black Lives Matter affiliate, said during an Oct. 26 online training session, according to Associated Press.

Organizer Nadine Bloch has been conducting training sessions (mostly on Zoom but a few socially distanced live ones) for everyone from passionate young street protestors to federal employees seeking methods of professional civil disobedience. 

Black Lives Matter protesters have organized for months to launch a new wave of demonstrations starting outside the White House on election night that could carry on for weeks, according to a new report. 

A collection of activist groups led by Black Lives Matter and Shutdown D.C. have been holding training sessions via Zoom to mobilize thousands in the event of a Biden loss, if the president fails to concede or if Trump decides to contest the results, Fox News claims. 

The report claims to have accessed recordings of some of the training sessions that revealed the aim was to continue civil unrest across the United States from election day until the presidential inauguration in January. 

Fox alleges that they also gained access to documents which showed plans to shut down federal buildings, including the White House, and to ambush members of Congress as they arrived to D.C. via public transport following the election, although were not able to confirm their legitimacy. 

Speaking to Fox, the FBI did not confirm or deny if an investigation was underway into plans by activist groups to cause unrest in the coming days if Trump causes and upset and takes victory. 

It did, however, reveal that it has been working on a federal, state and local level to ‘gather and analyze intelligence to determine whether individuals might be motivated to take violent action for any reason’. 

It added that its aim was to provide a ‘centralized location for assessing election-related threats, tracking status reports and significant complaints from FBI field offices, monitoring for indicators of a coordinated nationwide effort to disrupt the election process, providing guidance to FBI field offices, and coordinating an FBI response to any election-related incident’.

According to Fox, the training sessions included maps displaying police stations, key government buildings, and media outlets in the D.C. area. 

One of the Zoom sessions allegedly featured activist Lisa Fithian from the Sunrise Movement, who outlined ‘what would it take to surround the White House’.

‘We’re facing an administration and a potential coup and a potential insurrection,’ Fithian allegedly said. 

‘Is there going to be a war? Are people gonna get killed? Like is that on anybody else’s mind? I’m guessing it is. We’re going to see potential fighting all over the country or in some hotspots, and we’ve already seen that, so how do we work together across the country to help support each other no matter where we are and to maximize our impact by doing similar things on similar days at similar times?’ 

Fox claims she added that those willing to break windows should do so to gain access to buildings. 

‘We have to be willing to put our bodies on the line and take on some discomfort and sacrifice risk in order to change things.’ 

‘We are going to be in a crisis but we want to make sure it’s one that we are creating. We want them to be responding to us and us not responding to them. In a situation of a coup or an insurrection or an uprising, whoever’s got the guns, often can win. We should be clear. Trump’s gotta go,’ she said, according to the recording of the call posted to the YouTube account SunriseExposed. 

The video has since been removed from the site for violating community guidelines. 

Elsewhere in the country, large NYPD trucks surrounded Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan on Tuesday evening as they prepared for the closing of the polls yet by midnight there were no reports of any mayhem or even heated protests in the Big Apple. 

The NYPD had anticipated unrest Tuesday morning as Chief Terence A. Monahan issued a stark warning to activists, cautioning ‘don’t even try it’. 

‘We know who you are and you will be arrested,’ he said. 

NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea said on Tuesday morning: ‘The police officers are going to be out in force.

‘They’re going to have zero tolerance for it. Zero tolerance. I can’t be any more clear than that.’

The NYPD confirmed on Tuesday evening that they had plans in place to establish car and pedestrian-free zones if large-scale looting began to occur.

Yet despite the criticism leveled against Mayor Bill de Blasio earlier in the day for claiming that there was ‘no reason’ for businesses to board up their windows ahead of election day, he appeared to have been correct. 

Just before 10pm a crowd gathered near Washington Square Park in Manhattan and while Trump supporters were mostly seen outside his former residence on Fifth Avenue. Both locations had a heavy police presence. 

Smaller demonstrations were seen in Brooklyn but nothing close to the extent of the Black Lives Matter protests during the summer. 

According to NBC, more than 1,000 cops were gathered on Tuesday evening on Randall’s Island to be briefed on known agitators and deployed to known protest locations across the city. 

Cops told NBC that they planned to allow protesters to get their message across but would have no tolerance for any violence or looting, stating that they were ready to take action if peaceful demonstrations begin to change or if any crimes are committed. 

Hundreds of protesters took to the streets in Portland and Seattle on election leading to multiple arrests and continuing months of civil unrest in both cities. 

In Portland, demonstrators vowed to continue protesting the coming weeks regardless of who wins the presidential election. 

Several Portland protesters were opening carrying firearms in the open-carry state, according to the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office, as the National Guard stood on standby.

In Seattle, police gave one group of of protesters a warning not to block the streets and two marches merged.  

Police said they arrested eight people, including one person who attacked a parking meter with a hammer, another who put nails in a road and a third who drove over a barricade and into a police bike lane. No one was injured.

The atmosphere was just as tense in Los Angeles where an unlawful demonstration was declared downtown near the Staples Center due to the gathering of a ‘large and unruly crowd’. 

According to ABC7, a large police presence responded after reports of individuals wearing all black marching through the area. Officers stopped several people wearing helmets and kneepads.  

‘Due to a large and unruly crowd, the LAPD has declared an unlawful assembly & issued a dispersal order in the area of Pico & Figueroa northwest corner,’ LAPD tweeted. ‘At this time, anyone in the area is to leave immediately and follow all orders from any police officer. This area is now closed.’ 

In a subsequent tweet the LAPD wrote: ‘Approximately 30 individuals were cited for being in the intersection. Approximately 40 individuals were arrested for blocking the train tracks and failing to disperse after an unlawful assembly was declared. This is preliminary information and subject to change.’ 

A second unlawful assembly was declared after midnight around 18th Street and Figueroa and protesters were ordered to leave the area. 

The day before, Ava DuVernay gave a passionate speech at a Black Lives Matter event at Staples Center on Monday, where she urged voters to participate in the 2020 election. 

‘Thank you for holding space for this resistance, for this power, for this voice, for demonstrating who we are, that we can proclaim what we want, that we can exercise rights that are given to us and rights that we take that are not given to us, that we can declare what we want,’ she said in a video captured by BLM Los Angeles. 

She continued: ‘This moment is not an end all be all. This vote, this election is not even the half of what is ahead of us and what needs to happen tomorrow and the next day and the next day. But it is a tool, it is a weapon in our arsenal and we are going to fight. We are in a war.’ 

The LAPD announced earlier Tuesday evening that they had ‘declared a citywide tactical alert to ensure sufficient resources to address any incidents that may arise as a result of Election Day activities’. 

However they cautioned that it had not been implemented as ‘a result of any specific incident’.

In Beverly Hills, the 130-officer equipped police force has gone into maximum deployment from October 31 to November 7, according to Deadline. Officers are being asked to put in 12-hour shifts and the department has sub-contracted a S.W.A.T. team and 80 private security guards.

In Minnesota, multiple people were taken into custody as following protests near Uptown Minneapolis, according to CBS Local. 

Police were monitoring a group of about 30 people through the night but the protests cleared by about midnight after the arrests were made. 

Scenes were quieter in Chicago where the group ‘Refuse Facism’ gathered only 20 people to watch the results at Federal Plaza although other there is other protest activity planned for Wednesday. 

Yet earlier in the day, officials had raised the Wabash Avenue bridge in a preemptive move against any unrest.  

Gatherings were also subdued in Philadelphia yet activists there vowed to hold daily protests in LOVE Park if Trump were to claim an early victory, according to WHYY.  

The bridge has been shut down ‘as part of a precautionary measure to ensure the safety of residents,’ said Mary May, spokeswoman for the Office of Emergency Management and Communications. 

Illinois Governor J. B. Pritzker asked National Guard troops in his state to go to Chicago in anticipation of riots and looting.

A National Guard spokesman said the troops have not yet been given any specific directions.

‘Obviously, people can see Illinois National Guard trucks and troops moving.

‘This is to be ready to respond if needed, but we have not been given any missions. We, along with most other Illinoisans and Americans, hope we are not needed,’ Barb Wilson, the spokesman, said.

Every major city in America is preparing for some form of unrest after a year of unprecedented violence and unrest.

National Guard troops are patrolling the streets of Philadelphia and Chicago, including Target parking lots, ahead of Tuesday’s election that is expected to trigger violence in major cities across the country.

Troops reported to Philadelphia on Monday night, arriving in armored trucks, a day before Americans went to the polls to decide on who will be the next President. It comes after weeks of unrest in Philadelphia over the police shooting of black man Walter Wallace Jr.

In total, about 3,500 National Guardsmen have been put on active Election Day duty today in America.