The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Lamont resists Trump’s call for Guard to stop ‘lowlifes’
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Tuesday turned up the pressure on governors to quell the violence set off by the death of George Floyd, demanding some states including New York to call up the National Guard to stop the “lowlifes and losers.”
Like many governors, both Democrats and Republicans, Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont said the state’s guard troops are busy working to support the effort to fight the coronavirus.
“They (White House officials) did make a broad request,” Lamont said about whether he was asked to send the Connecticut National Guard to Washington, D.C.
“I think we’ve responded right now that our guard is very busy doing the COVID-related work,” the governor told reporters during his daily news conference in the State Capital in Hartford.
He said some guard personnel are on standby.
“We did offer to provide some transport, air support, which perhaps we’ll be doing that. We need our guard right here in Connecticut.”
On Monday Lamont ruled out the possibility of mobilizing the Connecticut National Guard because of the general peacefulness of protests against racism after the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police.
“It’s the last thing that I want to do. I love having the municipal police and the State Police. They are of the community. They know the community leaders. I know what that represents,” Lamont said. “We kept our guard pretty busy, by the way. You maybe know they were building field hospitals for us until recently, then taking them down as we saw the COVID surge. I hope they can be there helping us on that frontline and we won’t need them in terms of keeping the peace.”
As more demonstrations began taking shape around the country during the afternoon, and cities girded for another round of scattered violence after dark, the president amplified his hard-line calls of a day earlier, in which he threatened to send in the military to restore order if governors didn’t do it.
“NYC, CALL UP THE NATIONAL GUARD,” he tweeted. “The lowlifes and losers are ripping you apart. Act fast! Don’t make the same horrible and deadly mistake you made with the Nursing Homes!!!”
Protests were held in such places as Orlando, Fla., where more than 1,000 people gathered in the afternoon to decry the killings of black people.
“This has to change,” said 39-year-old Aisxia Batiste, an out-of-work massage therapist. “Something has to give. We’re done. This is the beginning of the end of something. It has to be.”
In New York, where crowds of people on Monday night smashed store windows and police made nearly 700 arrests, Mayor Bill de Blasio extended an 8 p.m. curfew all week.
“We’re going to have a tough few days,“he warned, but added: “We’re going to beat it back.” He pleaded with community leaders to step forward and “create peace.”
More than 20,000 National Guard members have been called up in 29 states to deal with the violence. New York is not among them, and De Blasio has said he does not want the Guard. On Tuesday, Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo called what happened in the city “a disgrace.”
“The NYPD and the mayor did not do their job last night,” he said said at a briefing in Albany.
He said the mayor underestimated the problem, and the nation’s largest police force was not deployed in sufficient numbers, though the city had said it doubled the usual police presence.
Monday marked the seventh straight night of unrest around the country.
In Atlanta, police fired tear gas at demonstrators. In Nashville, more than 60 National Guard members put down their riot shields at the request of peaceful protesters. At a demonstration in Buffalo, N.Y., an SUV plowed into a group of officers, injuring three.
An officer was shot and gravely wounded as police tried to disperse a crowd outside a Las Vegas hotel and casino. Four officers were shot in St. Louis; they were expected to recover.
Philadelphia officials described a chaotic night in which one person was killed trying to use explosives to open an ATM, a gun shop owner fatally shot a would-be thief, and a 19-year-old died of injuries during looting.
About a dozen other deaths have been reported around the country over the past week. And more than 5,600 people nationwide have been arrested for offenses such as stealing, blocking highways and breaking curfew, according to a count by The Associated Press.
“We have been sitting on a powder keg for some time and it has burst,” Philadelphia Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw said.
Some protesters framed the burgeoning movement as a necessity after a string of killings by police.
“I fear for my safety every time I get in the car to go for a drive. I fear of getting pulled over. I fear for all 10 of my brothers’ and sisters’ lives, for my parents’ lives!” 19-year-old Amari Burroughs of Parkland, Florida, said Tuesday as she prepared for another protest.
“My goal is to use my voice and my leadership to make this world safer so that one day I can bring children here and won’t have to fear for their safety.”
Outside the Minnesota Capitol in St. Paul, where a youth protest was held Tuesday, 18year-old Joseph Tawah agreed.
“It’s really hard not to feel afraid,” he said.
Meanwhile, governors and mayors, Republicans and Democrats alike, rejected Trump’s threat to send in the military, with some saying troops would be unnecessary and others questioning whether the government has such authority and warning that such a step would be dangerous.
“Denver is not Little Rock in 1957, and Donald Trump is not President Eisenhower. This is a time for healing, for bringing people together, and the best way to protect civil rights is to move away from escalating violence,” Colorado Gov. Jared Polis and Denver Mayor Michael Hancock, both Democrats, said in a statement, referring to Eisenhower’s use of troops to enforce school desegregation in the South.
A senior White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that the president is not rushing to send in the military and that his goal was to pressure governors to deploy more National Guard members.
Such use of the military would mark a stunning federal intervention rarely seen in modern American history.
Minnesota, meanwhile, opened an investigation into whether the Minneapolis Police Department has a pattern of discrimination against minorities.
Floyd died May 25 after a white Minneapolis officer, Derek Chauvin, pressed his knee on the handcuffed black man’s neck for several minutes.
Chauvin has been charged with murder. Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said prosecutors are working as fast as they can to determine if the three other officers at the scene should be charged too. All four have been fired.