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Tag: civil unrest

Northam warns extremists with “ill intent” to avoid Richmond

Speaking at a news conference Thursday, Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam issued a warning to anyone “with ill intent in your heart” to abandon their plans to come to Richmond as part of an armed protest of the state legislature.

The governor said the state government is prepared for security concerns around the General Assembly’s annual Lobby Day event, which is scheduled for Monday, Jan. 18, Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

On Jan. 11, the FBI warned law enforcement agencies that armed protests and violence by far-right extremists are possible at all 50 state capitals and again at the U.S. Capitol between Jan. 17 and Jan. 20, Inauguration Day for President-elect Joe Biden. In a news release Thursday, the U.S. Secret Service, which is leading security efforts in Washington, D.C., announced numerous road closures starting at 6 a.m. Saturday and concluding 6 a.m. Jan. 21. Closures include Memorial Bridge, which crosses the Potomac River from Arlington Cemetery to the Lincoln Memorial, but the majority of closed streets are in the immediate area of the National Mall.

As for the commonwealth’s capital, “Richmond is aware, and we have been planning for weeks about Lobby Day,” said Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney, noting that the city has declared a state of emergency and also outlawed firearms in certain buildings. “The violence and the insurrectionist activities we saw at the nation’s Capitol will not be tolerated in Virginia’s Capitol.”

Capitol Square in Richmond will be closed through “at least” next Thursday, Jan. 21, said state Secretary of Public Safety Brian Moran and fences are being erected on the Capitol grounds. He also said there will be additional precautions at the Science Museum of Virginia, where the Virginia State Senate is meeting during the General Assembly’s 2021 session, which began this week.

More than 2,400 Virginia National Guard members are in Washington, D.C., assisting with federal security efforts, noted Virginia Secretary of Veterans and Defense Affairs Carlos Hopkins. Guards also are participating in COVID-19 testing and vaccination efforts in the state, and National Guard members will be available in the Richmond area during Lobby Day, Northam said, although he did not have a specific number.

Last year’s Lobby Day brought approximately 22,000 people to the state Capitol area, many of whom were part of a gun-rights protest helmed by the Virginia Citizens Defense League. Because firearms were banned from Capitol Square ahead of the rally, many protestors stayed on the streets and sidewalks downtown. Only one person was arrested — a woman who was wearing a mask, although charges were later dropped. This year, VCDL is planning a “rolling caravan” with demonstrators driving decorated vehicles near the state Capitol, although Richmond police plan to shut down some roads Sunday and Monday.

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Sen. Amanda Chase ‘will absolutely not resign’

UPDATED 4:40 P.M., JAN. 8

Virginia Senate Democrats called Friday for the resignation of Republican state Sen. Amanda Chase, who spoke at the pro-Trump demonstration in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday that turned violent and led to a breach of the U.S. Capitol, but Chase says she “absolutely” will not leave her office.

Facebook placed restrictions on Chase’s Senate Facebook page for 60 days beginning Friday, Jan. 8. The Chesterfield County state senator who is running for this year’s GOP gubernatorial nomination, had posted video and photos from the pro-Trump demonstration near the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday. In December, she made news for a Facebook post calling for Trump to declare “martial law” in order to remain in power after President Donald Trump’s loss to President-elect Joe Biden in the November 2020 election. Based on a live video she posted Wednesday afternoon, Chase was headed back to Richmond during the siege on the Capitol.

However, a statement issued by Senate Democrats Friday says, “As we all watched in shock and disbelief at the insurrection in Washington, D.C., Senator and gubernatorial candidate Amanda Chase was horrifyingly empowering a failed coup d’état. She galvanized domestic terrorists who violated the United States Capitol on Wednesday afternoon through riots, destruction, and desecration, joining them on their march to Capitol Hill. For someone who defends herself and the insurrectionists she calls ‘patriots’ with the Constitution, she either willfully or unwittingly doesn’t understand what her sworn oath to defend it actually means. She has unequivocally committed insurrection, and the Fourteenth Amendment to that same Constitution charges us with the responsibility of holding her accountable.

“Senator Chase has not demonstrated either good judgement or leadership for Senate District 11 or the commonwealth of Virginia. It is in the best interest for the Senate of Virginia and her constituents [for Chase] to resign.”

The Northern Virginia Chamber of Commerce, which disinvited Chase to speak in July 2020, issued a statement Friday in support of the calls for Chase’s resignation: “As we continue to reflect on the attacks on the U.S. Capitol, we are unfortunately faced with the fact that Virginia must also act to prevent similar violence here. We want to state our unequivocal support for the calls for Sen. Amanda Chase to resign. Her rhetoric and actions caused us to cancel her planned appearance before our membership last summer, and she continues to espouse hate, spread lies and, now, incite violence with her presence at the protests of the Electoral College results in Washington, D.C. It is clear to all that Sen. Chase possesses neither the judgement nor composure to hold public office. … Sen. Chase poses a clear threat to the commonwealth and should step down immediately.”

In an exclusive interview with Virginia Business on Friday, Chase said she “will absolutely not resign.” She added that she left the rally at the end of President Trump’s address, during which he told the crowd to march on the U.S. Capitol. Chase said the head of her security team told her they needed to leave to get ahead of the crowds that they expected to disperse at the end of Trump’s speech, adding that she didn’t feel unsafe and did not hear the president encouraging people to go to the Capitol building.

Back at a hotel room Chase and her team had reserved, she says, “we turned on the TV, and that’s when we saw the press reports” of a breach at the Capitol, as well as the declaration of a 6 p.m. Wednesday curfew in D.C. At that point, Chase said, her team decided it was best to head back to Richmond.

Chase said she does not “approve of any violence that took place” at the Capitol and characterized the crowds that entered the building as “desperate people because their voices weren’t being heard.” She also continued to say without evidence that Antifa activists were possibly behind the breach at the Capitol.

In posts on Facebook, Chase claimed without evidence that anti-fascist, or antifa, activists had “infiltrated” the crowd breaching the Capitol. “Antifa is the culprit. Listen to Patriots who told them to stop,” Chase posted Thursday afternoon, the most recent post on her official Senate page. Facebook tagged a link to a tweet on the post as “False Information.”

Chase said Friday that she still has doubts about the legitimacy of Virginia’s 2020 ballots and said that “until we do a full audit here in Virginia, we’ll never know.” In November, Virginia Deputy Commissioner of Elections Jessica Bowman said in a statement that the state was “not aware of any substantiated allegations of widespread voter fraud in Virginia.”

According to a screenshot provided to Virginia Business by Chase, Facebook has restricted her state Senate Facebook page from going live or advertising for the next 60 days, and Chase has been banned from posting or commenting on the page for seven days.

Her personal Facebook page, however, is still active, and she spread the news of her restriction in a public post there Friday, saying, “Facebook continues to restrict free speech. Because what I have to say does not fit their narrative, my Senator Amanda Chase page has been silenced for 60 days. We no longer have free speech here in America.”

She said Friday that Facebook had removed two videos she had posted Wednesday, which she provided to Virginia Business. Both appear to be on the Washington Mall, with the Washington Monument in the background; the first features Chase speaking about the “Save America March” event, and the second shows fellow Trump supporters among the crowd, cheering. However, other videos from the event remained on her Senate and personal Facebook pages on Friday.

Chase said that she has emailed Facebook for a response and says that their earlier communication with her about the two removed videos indicated they “did not meet their community standards” and that her Senate page “was at risk of being unpublished.” As of Friday afternoon, Chase said she had not received a further response from Facebook, but that she had been busy fielding press calls since the morning.

The restrictions on Chase’s page come after Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced Thursday that President Donald Trump has been indefinitely blocked from posting on his Facebook and Instagram accounts out of concern for public safety. “His decision to use his platform to condone rather than condemn the actions of his supporters at the Capitol building has rightly disturbed people in the U.S. and around the world. We removed these statements yesterday because that their effect — and likely their intent — would be to provoke further violence.”

On both her personal Facebook page and her Senate page, Chase posted videos from Washington, D.C., during Trump’s “Save America March” event, which drew about 30,000 supporters of the president. Trump addressed the crowd for about an hour and encouraged them to march to the Capitol building, where Congress was starting the certification of Biden’s Electoral College ballots. Chase’s postings on Facebook indicate that she left either shortly before or during the breach of the Capitol building that led to evacuation and lockdown of legislators, staffers and journalists before control was regained around 6 p.m. Wednesday.

In a two-minute live video Chase posted on her Senator page at 3:32 p.m. Wednesday, Chase speaks from inside a vehicle saying she is being “taken to safety” after Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser “has put the city on lockdown,” referring to a curfew that went into effect at 6 p.m. Wednesday. Chase mentions “people who are storming the Capitol right now” and that she has heard about shots being fired.

“Everything that I saw earlier today was very peaceful,” Chase said in the video, adding that she spoke around 10 a.m. at the rally. After seeing the president speak in the early afternoon, she says in the video that her team told her they needed to leave for safety reasons, although in her interview with Virginia Business, she says they left just to get ahead of the crowds after Trump’s speech. In the video, Chase asked her viewers to “say a prayer” for those in the crowd that entered the Capitol.

In the interview, Chase said “it’s very tragic what happened” regarding the death of a U.S. Capitol Police officer who was taken off life support Friday after sustaining critical injuries during the breach. Officer Brian D. Sicknick, a Northern Virginia resident, was a military veteran and an officer for 12 years. “My thoughts and prayers go to their family,” Chase added.

Earlier Friday, Gov. Ralph Northam issued a statement about Sicknick’s death, which occurred after someone struck him on the head with a fire extinguisher, according to a release from the U.S. Capitol Police.

“Officer Sicknick died as a result of injuries sustained during the insurrection at the Capitol on Wednesday. He was 42 years old and a military veteran who had served with the United States Capitol Police for 12 years,” Northam said in his statement. “Officer Sicknick was killed while doing his job — defending those trapped in the Capitol building amid a violent attack on our democracy. His death is a tragedy, and those responsible must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

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Va. National Guard dispatched to U.S. Capitol, under siege

Updated, 8:45 a.m. Jan. 7

Gov. Ralph Northam declared a state of emergency in Virginia Wednesday evening and ordered a 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew for Alexandria and Arlington County at the localities’ request, after crowds of supporters of President Donald Trump breached and took over the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate chambers for about four hours Wednesday afternoon, disrupting the certification of electoral college votes for President-elect Joe Biden.

“The violence we saw at the U.S. Capitol today was nothing short of an armed insurrection and a humiliating assault on American democracy. The President incited this mob with his refusal to accept the lawful results of a fair and secure election. And the members of Congress who have enabled him — and continue to encourage and praise his efforts — bear just as much responsibility,” Northam said in a statement issued shortly before 9 p.m. Wednesday. “This did not come about overnight. When elected leaders purposefully reject facts and fan the flames of conspiracy theories, all in pursuit of power, they are taking dangerous steps. And now we are seeing where those steps can lead. God forbid we experience anything worse.”

Earlier in the afternoon, Northam said he would send Virginia National Guard members and 200 Virginia State Police troopers to Capitol Hill to assist with efforts to dispel what Biden and former President George W. Bush both referred to as an “insurrection.”

According to CNN, police regained control of the Capitol just before 6 p.m. after nearly four hours of chaos in the legislative building, while legislators and staffers were placed on lockdown.

Northam tweeted at 3:30 p.m. that he was “working closely” with D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer “to respond to the situation in Washington, D.C. Per the mayor’s request, I am sending members of the Virginia National Guard along with 200 Virginia State Troopers.” In a 5:30 p.m. tweet, Northam said he was declaring the state of emergency “so we can continue to respond.”

The Capitol building was placed on lockdown Wednesday after hundreds of people, some armed with weapons and holding pro-Trump signs, broke windows and entrances to gain access to the legislative chambers. A woman was shot by a Capitol Police officer and later died; she was identified by The Washington Post as Ashli Babbitt, a 35-year-old Air Force veteran who was there as part of the crowd.

Multiple Trump supporters were photographed sitting in the presiding officer’s seat in the Senate and occupying legislative offices.

As of 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, more than two hours after the breach began, Trump released a video on Twitter — still falsely alleging that he had won the presidential election, claiming it was stolen — saying, “Go home, go home in peace.” He told protestors, “We have to have peace. So go home. We love you. You’re very special.” Twitter and Facebook eventually removed the video.

The crowd did not appear to heed the president’s advice to go home.

Before Trump’s video was released, Biden delivered brief remarks via a national televised address from Wilmington, Delaware, where he called on Trump “to demand an end to this siege” and tell his supporters to go home. Biden called the storming of the Capitol a “godawful display.”

Wednesday evening, former President George W. Bush released a strongly worded statement, calling the incident “a sickening and heartbreaking sight. This is how election results are disputed in a banana republic — not our democratic republic.”

Decrying “reckless behavior of some political leaders since the election,” Bush said that the “violent assault on the Capitol … was undertaken by people whose passions have been inflamed by falsehoods and false hopes. Insurrection could do grave damage to our nation and reputation.”

He concluded: “Our country is more important than the politics of the moment. Let the officials elected by the people fulfill their duties and represent our voices in peace and safety.”

Trump has claimed since just after Election Day that he won in a “landslide,” despite all evidence to the contrary, including dozens of lawsuits filed by his lawyers being rejected by state and federal judges, several of whom were appointed by Trump.

Just after 1:45 p.m. Wednesday, U.S. Rep. Elaine Luria, D-Fairfax, tweeted, “I just had to evacuate my office because of a pipe bomb reported outside. Supporters of the president are trying to force their way into the Capitol, and I can hear what sounds like multiple gunshots. I don’t recognize our country today and the members of Congress who have supported this anarchy do not deserve to represent their fellow Americans.”

A pipe bomb found at the Republican National Committee headquarters in D.C. was detonated by a bomb squad Wednesday and the Democratic National Committee was evacuated following a report of a suspicious package.

Although U.S. legislators and Vice President Michael Pence began to be evacuated around 2:15 p.m., President Trump did not immediately call for the D.C. National Guard to take action at the Capitol, despite a request from Pelosi. White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany tweeted at 3:36 p.m. that Trump had called for the National Guard to take action, along with “other federal protective services. We reiterate President Trump’s call against violence and to remain peaceful.”

Because of Washington’s status as a district, its mayor cannot activate the National Guard as governors can. The U.S. Department of Defense must approve the activation of the D.C. National Guard.

According to reports, 1,100 Washington, D.C., guardsmen were reporting for duty after Washington Mayor Muriel E. Bowser requested that guardsmen already on duty be dispatched to the Capitol. According to The Washington Post, the Pentagon instead offered to replace police in other capacities to allow more Washington city police officers to respond at the Capitol.

Bowser announced a 6 p.m. citywide curfew, with all Metrorail and Metrobus service ending early, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority said. Rail service ended at 8 p.m. and bus service at 9 p.m.

The president spoke earlier in the day to thousands of protesters who came to the nation’s capital to oppose the certification of electoral college votes affirming Biden’s victory as part of a planned “Save America March” that attracted a reported 30,000 Trump supporters.

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