Marchers protest the shooting of Jacob Blake, Kenosha, Wisconsin, August 26 (Kamil Krzaczynski/AFP/Getty)
Marches in Kenosha, Wisconsin, over the shooting of Jacob Blake, overtake a Donald Trump Convention trying for a third night to whip up social and cultural division.
Blake, an unarmed Black man, was shot seven times at close range on Sunday by a police officer. The father of six was trying to get into his SUV, with three of his sons inside, after trying to calm down a domestic dispute.
Blake survived after emergency surgery, but is paralyzed from the waist down with almost of his small intestine and colon removed.
Marches in Kenosha and other cities began on Monday night. Most of the rallies were peaceful, but some cars and buildings were set alight, with march leaders denouncing the violence.
Late Tuesday, a 17-year-old man, apparently a member of a right-wing militia, shot at the marchers. As they pursued him, he fell and fired several shots, killing two demonstrators and wounding another.
The teenager, Kyle Rittenhouse, was charged on Wednesday with first-degree murder, and the Justice Department has announced an investigation into Blake’s shooting.
Supporting the protests, the Milwaukee Bucks pro basketball team postponed their playoff game, choosing not to take the court on Wednesday night. The other two playoff games were also called off in solidarity.
Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers, a Democrat, declared a state of emergency and called out National Guard units to maintain order.
Trump Convention Ignores Blake, Whips Up Division
Trump made his first response to the developments on Wednesday. He ignored Blake’s shooting and the marches, instead whipping up the specter of violence and falsely declaring that he had sent federal forces to Kenosha at Gov. Evers’ request.
Evers immediately pushed back Trump’s tweet, which echoed his repeated declarations that he will put military and paramilitary units into American cities — an effort which has largely backfired after his June 1 White House appearance enabled by the tear-gassing of peaceful demonstrators.
As Trump whipped up rhetoric over “looting, arson, violence, and lawlessness”, his campaign distanced itself from Kyle Rittenhouse, saying he had “nothing to do with” them.
But Vice President Mike Pence, the keynote speaker on Wednesday, returned to the theme of fear that has marked the convention. Reinforcing Trump’s depiction of white suburbs overrun by extremists, with the implication that many of them are people of color, Pence pronounced, “America will not be safe again” if Democratic nominee Joe Biden wins in November.
He skipped over the shooting of Blake and Biden’s call for unity and “light over darkness” at the Democratic Convention, to proclaim:
Last week, Joe Biden didn’t say one word about the violence and chaos engulfing cities across this country.We will have law and order on the streets of this country for every American of every race and creed and color.”
Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota, one of the few Republican legislators to make a headline speech this week, talked of Democratic-run cities “overrun by violent mobs”.
With unintended irony, she compared anti-racism marches to the start of the American Civil War, fed in large part by the issue of slavery, with Abraham Lincoln “alarmed by the disregard for the rule of law throughout the country”.
“Late Tuesday, a 17-year-old man, apparently a member of a right-wing militia, shot at the marchers. As they pursued him, he fell and fired several shots, killing two demonstrators and wounding another.”
Only tragedy here is that he didn’t kill the third one, who admitted to having homicidal intent, and footage shows as much. The first victim that started it all was a convicted child rapist. Doubtful young Kyle knew, but nevertheless he did collective humanity a huge favor. Bravo.
I am very much looking forward to seeing the charges dropped.
As Andy Ngo is a well-known disinformation purveyor, I would be careful about giving any credence to this without corroboration.
Skepticism is always good! But given the footage that tells its own story, and I’ve not seen any evidence to the contrary, I’m inclined to believe it’s true. One of the consequences of having the follower count as Andy and being engaged in neurotic American culture wars is that anything you say has no shortage of online fact-checkers putting any tweet of yours under intense scrutiny. With the activist left all-too-well represented on Twitter, I doubt they’d let it slide for even a few hours if someone with Andy’s broad reach spread lies about their comrade, especially since the guy involved is alive and should be able to speak.
Working from the facts, rather than Ngo’s follower count, speculation about the “activist left”, and an attempt to tarnish victims rather than perpetrator….
The only part that I wasn’t able to confirm as factual is the admission of murderous intent. Rosenbaum was on the sex offender registry, thus he tarnished himself, and the footage tells its own story. In the off-chance that the screenshot is fake, I’ll gladly admit I was wrong. Not like the guy with his arm injured comes out looking much better. Charging towards a guy on the ground with a pistol in your hand doesn’t leave much room for interpreting motives.