Dodd calls her previous statement on protests ‘damaging’
Milwaukee Ald. Nikiya Dodd on Wednesday walked back a statement from earlier this week regarding “protest parties” outside Police Chief Alfonso Morales’ home, calling her previous statement “damaging, dangerous and inaccurate.”
She said in a statement Wednesday that she had the opportunity the day before to engage with activists, who have protested for more than 60 days since George Floyd died in the custody of Minneapolis police.
“Just as I stood before my constituents to hear their concerns about what troubled them when the activists visited their neighborhood, I made myself available to listen to the activists, some of whom are constituents, to hear their stories of how some of them lost their loved ones after encounters with police,” she said in Wednesday’s statement.
For days, protesters held “protest parties” outside his home in the 5th District, which Dodd represents. The protests included music, dancing, cornhole and the chant directed at the police chief that “You about to lose your job.”
Dodd had said earlier that the targeted protests at homes were in some cases “illegal nuisance events or activities” that the city needed to address.
On Wednesday, though, her statement was headlined, “Keep Marching!”
“The movement was not meant to be convenient for anybody, nor was it meant to harm those standing up for change,” she wrote Wednesday. “Protests are a first amendment right, and no one has any right to tell someone how to participate in civil disobedience.”
She called the protests “peaceful and filled with love.”
“We are all growing and learning through these experiences,” she wrote. “I am no exception.”