Let’s Be Clear: The Rioting In LA Is By The Cops, Not The Protestors

Say That Again

from the firing-back dept

I already wrote about the GOP’s bloodthirsty desire to use the military on Americans. They manufactured a nonsense “crisis” by over-aggressively sending in ICE agents to grab people off the streets, leading to protests, which were focused on provoking protestors into violence, which would then be used to justify an even more violent crackdown.

Given that, it’s crucial to get actual reports from what’s actually happening on the street, rather than relying on questionable media framing by those not actually there. Laura Jedeed, at The Nation, reports from the actual protest itself that the only “riot” happening is by the cops looking to provoke a response to justify their initial volley of violent activity:

I spent Sunday from about 4 pm until very late inside the LA protests, and this is what I saw. Yes, cars were set on fire in one part of the sprawling, multi-block protest. Yes, fireworks were launched at cops—a handful, sporadically. But it should be noted that these were launched long after these police officers began unloading flash bang after flash bang, rubber bullet after rubber bullet, into a largely peaceful crowd. (Flash bangs are stun grenades that produce a flash of light and deafening noise.)

The idea that cops were just reacting to protester provocation is absurd. Cops occupied intersections in an attempt to split the protest, then occasionally charged the protest lines that surrounded them to force the crowds to temporarily retreat. These assaults seemed unrelated to protester action or lack thereof. At one point, while the cops were unloading round after round of blue-tipped rubber bullets into a crowd hunkered down behind a barricade, a different group of protesters approached from the side and threw a firework into the center of the police line. The cops turned their fire against the group, which ran off, but did not pursue them. Thirty seconds later, the cops were back to shooting at the barricade.

We have heard a lot about the assault of police officers during these protests. Why haven’t we seen it? Where’s the body cam footage showing protesters injuring cops, striking them, putting them out of commission? I saw a police officer struck by a water bottle thrown by protesters in a barrage launched around 7:30 pm after those protesters spent hours absorbing “less lethal” rounds and being deafened by flash bangs, but that’s about it. Meanwhile, we’ve got drone footage of a mounted officer using his horse to trample a protester, who lies prone on the ground, surrounded by mounted police. We’ve got cops beating protesters with truncheons, cops deploying tear gas, cops bringing box after box of ammunition to the line so they could fire again and again and again into crowds of protesters exercising tremendous restraint throughout the day.

This pattern—police initiating violence, protesters responding minimally, police escalating further—isn’t accidental. It’s that fascist playbook all over again: manufacture the violence to justify the violence you initiated.

We should all be calling it out for what it is.

Tragically, most of the media are failing at that and are instead accepting the narrative the administration wants. Jadeed details how badly the media is failing:

“Pockets of LA descending into chaos,” an ABC news anchor declared in an extremely typical news segment on Monday. “Protesters setting cars on fire, dumping bikes and scooters on police cruisers on the highway. Law enforcement firing hundreds of flash bangs and non-lethal projectiles and making dozens of arrests.” In the background, footage of these atrocities: cops beating protesters with truncheons, tear gas, a car on fire. A shirtless masked man waving a Mexican flag atop a wrecked Waymo, cops firing into a crowd at close range. The only active violence in these clips comes from the cops, but no matter. That fire is what you should be worried about: the fire and nothing else.

While some organizations reported from inside the protest itself, most did not: They set up camp behind the police line, or reported using drone footage, or simply asked the cops what to say. “Dozens of people were arrested Sunday and accused of attempted murder, arson and other crimes during a day of violence and protests in Los Angeles,” NBC Los Angeles declared in an article based exclusively on LAPD sources. It’s an understandable decision on their part. Just look at Lauren Tomasi, a reporter for the Australian Channel Nine news service who got “caught in the crossfire” and struck with a rubber bullet while reporting—by which I mean an LA police officer aimed directly at the reporter from close range and shot her. She reports being “sore, but OK,” which is more than photographer Nick Stern can say: The day before, a “less lethal” round punctured his leg and required emergency surgery. As of Tuesday morning, the LA Press Club documented over 30 injuries to members of the press. Easier and safer to parrot police talking points than face down their guns.

The systematic targeting of journalists isn’t incidental—it’s designed to control the narrative by ensuring that most coverage comes from behind police lines, where reporters can only see what law enforcement wants them to see.

One of the most egregious examples of this that I saw was the NY Times posting an image of a shopping cart on fire and claiming that “the police are firing back”—as if a burning shopping cart constitutes such a direct threat to heavily armored officers hundreds of yards away that it justifies “returning” fire into crowds of people.

The Trump regime is manufacturing a fake riot to justify their own actions. They’re pushing for violence to justify more violence. The violence and attacks we’re seeing are almost entirely initiated by the cops, and yet are being falsely framed as protesters “rioting” despite the lack of evidence to support it.

The media’s willingness to amplify this manufactured narrative isn’t just journalistic malpractice—it’s complicity in the very authoritarianism they should be exposing.

So let’s be clear about what’s happening. If it’s a riot, it’s the police who are rioting. If there’s an “invasion” of LA, it’s the US military that is invading. Kudos to Jedeed and The Nation for calling this out while so much of the media is rewriting history in real time.

As the driver pointed out—as protesters around me would later point out—the president’s not wrong: LA is under invasion. But the invading force isn’t the immigrants who live and work here. It’s ICE attempting to abduct children from elementary schools by claiming their parents authorized the pick-up, or rolling up to Home Depot to abduct people doing the most American thing imaginable: pulling themselves up by their bootstraps, hiring themselves out as day laborers to make a better life for themselves and their families. It’s the Marines deployed against their fellow citizens by an administration that’s fantasized about quelling First Amendment activity by force for half a decade now. These are the un-American hordes descending on Los Angeles.

Trump can call these protests invasions all he wants: I know what I saw. As the sun began to set, riot cops from the LA county sheriff’s department showed up on trucks, fully kitted out with shields and gas masks. The rapidly shrinking protest saw the writing on the wall and, rather than confront these militarized enforcers, turned and walked away, into the night and into the city. For hours they marched, blasting mariachi music and old-school West Coast rap and chanting their simple, reasonable demand: “No ICE in LA!”

As the protesters marched, they chanted something else: “Whose streets? Our streets!” It wasn’t a declaration of war or a challenge to others who might lay claim to the city, but a statement of obvious fact. As these several hundred protesters marched the wrong way up a one-way street, completely stopping traffic, an overwhelming number of drivers honked and cheered. They rolled down their windows to fist-bump the protesters and take pictures and shout their approval.

From the very beginning of this regime, we’ve been saying over and over and over again that the most important thing is telling the truth. As Mike Brock keeps saying, “two plus two equals four” and you can’t let them get away with telling you otherwise.

This isn’t just about getting the facts straight for their own sake. When media coverage systematically misrepresents who is initiating violence and who is responding to it, it provides cover for further escalation. Each cycle of distorted coverage makes the next round of police violence more politically palatable.

The people are not rioting. The police are. Immigrants are not invading. The US military is.

We have to be clear on what ground truth is, and that requires that the media stop accepting propagandist framing.

Filed Under: california, ice, invasion, la, lapd, manufactured crisis, media, national guarde, propaganda, protests, riots, truth