[News] What can we learn from the recent wave of state-sanctioned violence?

[Anti-Imperialist News]

*Unveiling the U.S. police state: * *What can we learn from the recent wave
of state-sanctioned violence?*


<https://default.salsalabs.org/T6165ae52-9b94-4076-83e0-64974ca81848/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>

https://afgj.salsalabs.org/report2020?wvpId=27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a
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For over two months, an uprising against police brutality and white
supremacy that followed the murder of George Floyd has persevered in spite
of the violently one-sided political repression spearheaded by both the
state and the extreme right-wing.

*The Alliance for Global Justice (AFGJ) has released a comprehensive report
<https://default.salsalabs.org/Tf6235d9a-4352-4aa1-a248-dc4e232c4daf/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>
detailing the various forms in which political repression of today’s
anti-racist uprising in the U.S. has manifested itself*. The report
discusses findings in four key areas of investigation into deepened
political repression of the uprising at the state and societal level:* a
surge in mass arrests and a significant rise in political imprisonments; an
increase in arbitrary detentions and the militarization of streets; deaths
caused by use of lethal force; and deaths caused by the ignition of racist
violence and right-wing terrorism*. Our findings and conclusions are
summarized below.

By late June, protests had emerged in at least 1,700 cities and towns,
large and small, across all 50 states
<https://default.salsalabs.org/Tf0bde270-705c-43af-a27e-dd487b2a4c88/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>.
In response to this widespread unrest, on June 1, 62,000 National Guard
troops mobilized in at least 25 states
<https://default.salsalabs.org/Tb22275c7-5bbe-4507-b792-16bf5a8d8208/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>,
working in cooperation with police to “dominate the streets,” as President
Trump has described.

Since then, the militarization of police forces and the encroachment of
martial law has enabled the violent repression and mass
politically-motivated arrests of protestors in almost all major cities
<https://default.salsalabs.org/Ta7324b5e-4409-42fc-aeb7-acd0d2fdc25d/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>
across the country, ranging from a few dozen to over a thousand arrests
based on location.

Though statistics on this are very difficult to attain, the National
Lawyers Guild (NLG) has reported on the prominence of largely arbitrary
“protest-related” arrests
<https://default.salsalabs.org/Tf1e22f6e-b5a7-43c2-b917-046141856d8b/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>,
including “disorderly conduct,” “resisting arrest,” and “failure to
disperse.” According to the NLG, police across the country have
arrested protestors,
journalists, legal observers, medics, and bystanders
<https://default.salsalabs.org/T072bedc9-f81b-498f-9332-46c7720a46b7/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>
alike. Charges range from low-level offenses to federal felonies.

We also know that there has been at least a *12% increase
<https://default.salsalabs.org/T6f500e47-88b2-4aaa-bc31-6e878ad2f1f3/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>**
in the number of political prisoners *in the U.S. since the start of the
uprising, according to a statistical analysis from AFGJ. At least seven
<https://default.salsalabs.org/T71846ca2-c848-4f3d-b5b3-41656eee0bd9/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>
of today’s protestors are currently facing long-term prison sentences for
their acts of resistance against the racist criminal justice system.

While the recent mobilization of riot police and deployment of federal
agents to extinguish social unrest isn’t new, additional developments in
the federal government’s role and capacity to violently repress the
uprising have unfolded under the Trump Administration. On June 26, Pres.
Trump issued Executive Order 139333
<https://default.salsalabs.org/T7283e461-8141-471b-9737-c2dd11a065c1/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>,
Protecting American Monuments, Memorials, and Statues and Combating Recent
Criminal Violence. The issuing of this executive order has enabled federal
law enforcement institutions to more freely deploy federal troops “to
assist with the protection of federal monuments, memories, statues, or
property.”

As the state continues to militantly protect racist monuments and private
property, *law enforcement agents continue to exercise deadly force and
intimidation against human beings with impunity*. *Legal observers have
consistently reported accounts of law enforcement agents attacking people
<https://default.salsalabs.org/Tad185c6c-36ce-4efc-bca9-2e100e3efdeb/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>**
with batons and bicycles, running protestors down with horses and police
vehicles, and freely deploying tear gas, pepper spray, rubber and bean bag
bullets, and flash-bang grenades*. A plethora of documented evidence has
made evident the serious injuries and fatalities caused by the use of
state-sanctioned violence against anti-racist protestors and most
particularly people of color.

Under the Trump Administration, the federal government continues to play
its facilitating role in the persistence of police brutality and right-wing
terrorism amid today’s uprisings. Yet another historical moment has shed
light on the U.S. political system’s permissiveness of and capacity to
inflame racist violence in U.S. society. *President Trump has repeatedly
encouraged his supporters to take action against protestors in the name of
restoring “law and order.”* In doing so, the administration has
strengthened the narrative of neo-fascists by evoking a sense of imminent
danger and providing the militant far-right a platform.

Not only has the Trump Administration proven complicit of today’s violent
repression in its own words, but it has also proven to be proactive in its
deed. Since the passing of Executive Order 139333 and the unilateral
deployment of federal troops in Portland in mid-July,* the Trump
Administration has given the Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) elite
force, the Border Patrol Tactical Unit (BORTAC) the green light to enter
major cities in order to crack down on protests*.

The CBP, now stronger than ever after decades of border militarization and
investment in immigration patrol forces under the leadership of neoliberal
governments, has forged a very close relationship with the federal
government. BORTAC agents,* the “**marine corps of the U.S. federal law
enforcement community
<https://default.salsalabs.org/T02d7e889-0940-4539-8e1c-f32ae7ffafa3/27675529-0108-4c23-a3cb-5403675a518a>**”,
are specially trained to treat civilians as “enemy combatants.”* The rise
in arbitrary detentions and forced disappearances of protestors and people
of color today have made evident the everyday reality undocumented people
of color face in the hands of U.S. law enforcement. It also sheds light on
the fundamental role of the U.S. police state: to repress people of color
for their actions undertaken in defense of their survival.

It is not uncommon for local, statewide and federal law enforcement
agencies in the U.S. to intervene in response to mass civil unrest. From
the civil rights movement of the 1960s, to the first Black Lives Matter
wave in 2014, to today’s surge of mass resistance against police brutality
and our racist criminal justice system, history shows time and time again
that this is indeed the norm. Federal law enforcement institutions have
assigned undercover police, riot teams and agent provocateurs to violently
repress resistance, infiltrate organizations, frame activists for crimes
and ultimately sabotage any attempts at unified movement-building against
the racist criminal justice system.

We recognize that these practices of state-sanctioned violence aren’t new,
and the repression of anti-racist resistance movements transcends U.S.
borders. T*he intentional and systematic role the U.S. state has played in
providing training, sponsorship and arms to right-wing militaries and
paramilitaries in the global south is an issue that should concern all of
us committed to anti-racist movement-building*.

>From the creation of the School of Americas in 1946, to the bolstered
financial and military support of right-wing militaries and paramilitaries
in Central and South America during the Cold War, to the continued
sponsorship of right-wing client states and plans for regime change in
Venezuela and Nicaragua today—*U.S. foreign policy has facilitated the
repression of colonized peoples globally. *The egregious human rights
abuses committed against Indigenous and Afro-descendent community leaders
today in Honduras and Colombia are the legacy of U.S. imperialist foreign
policy.

With local, statewide and federal law enforcement as well as the militant
right-wing making its presence known throughout this nationwide uprising, *the
U.S. anti-racist resistance movement will need more than just its numbers
to overcome its repression. In order to succeed, an unwavering commitment
needs to be made--to expose human rights violations, mobilize against
racial oppression and in solidarity with all anti-colonialist struggles,
support victims of state and societal violence, organize for power and be
prepared to seize it*.
Contact Us

Alliance for Global Justice
225 E 26th St Ste 1

Tucson, Arizona 85713-2925
202-540-8336
afgj at afgj.org
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