comparemela.com

These are difficult times. I am going to start by talking about an arrest that we had on swan street. Somewas an arrest of significance. It was a mass arrest. We believe we could have a threat to Public Safety. Prior to the arrest that block ofin the 1500 swan street a couple days ago, lever monitoring a group that was exhibiting behavior that was not consistent with behavior that preceded very violent events. The of that behavior was throwing of different projectiles and the burning of a metropolitan police vehicle. We monitored the group for a while. Groupe able to stop that on swan street at about 9 00 p. M. The curfew was very 7 00 that evening. Were givenarrested multiple prior warnings that there would be a curfew in the District Of Columbia. If they did not abide by the curfew, they would be subject to arrest. As you know, the mayor and i held a press conference prior to that morning people that there would be a curfew in effect. There was a mobile alert that was sent out to electronic devices, describing the curfew that would be in effect. Our Police Officers went over the public address to let people know that there could be arrests , in the event that they violated the curfew. While effecting the arrest on swan street, there were reports of some kicking in doors on that block. That is invested visit into a neighborhood. There were several radio transmissions by officers on the kickingat the group was in doors and one call at least from for service from a citizen relating the same , believing to police that there were burglaries occurring. Residences were being entered. Police deployed pepper spray. The specifics of the pepper spray deployment will be investigated thoroughly by the by members of the metropolitan Police Department. Ableber of arrestees were to escape arrest by entering into a home. Police quickly learned the apparent homeowner on the scene had allowed them into the home. The district commander, the commander of the Third District was quickly dispatched to the scene because he has the most familiarity with that community and people who live there. The district commander had multiple conversations with the person, who identified himself as the homeowner. ,hese conversations occurred not facetoface but through the window. Frome officers reported the scene, several officials reported that between 10 and 30 arrestees were able to escape. Nto the home the homeowner has done multiple interviews with the media. Quote in parentheses that people were police were beating people, putting our faces into cement. Another quote on channel four was that he saw protesters decimated and beaten. Everything i know about the metropolitan Police Department and our tactics, that was very disturbing to hear. These are the facts that i have surrounding the arrest. An investigation has been thoroughly completed. On 194 394 arrests arrests on swan street. Many were photographed on the processingt prisoner during the course of the arrest. Were effectuated by all Police Accounts without resistance. There were no visible injuries to any people arrested. This already because of the allegation of excessive force, our internal Affairs Bureau will do a very thorough review to get to the bottom of what exactly happened. I do not have any evidence, at this point, to corroborate the allegations that anybody was decimated and beaten. Protestlk about the yesterday. They were different than what we had seen in prior days. We saw groups assemble safely through the District Of Columbia. Where the lincoln , whichl, u. S. Capitol has been consistent. , wehe evening progressed had a large group remaining. Other groups were marching through the city. Pn, a majority of the groups had remained in the north as northwest quadrant. They continued together peacefully. Many businesses and restaurants previously affected areas such as georgetown city center, the ntown area had boarded boarded up their establishments. I know that the mayor has met with many business owners. I commend her and them for taking proactive measures to ensure that their establishments remained intact. I have talked about this previously. We are urging everyone, including members of the media that if you had any video or images of people involved in people behavior, hurting or violent activities, please share those with us. We are offering a 1000 reward. We put some of those mages out already. A singlee establishing source where people can review those images. At the end of the day, we believe that there was an excess of 5000 Peaceful Protesters in our city. As you know, there were a number of federal resources deployed across the city. Go into the arrests overall, just that you have some sense of how the days have proceeded. The first night, saturday night, we had 19. Sunday night we had 92. Monday night we had 288. Last night we had 19 arrests through the city. Wererrests last night generally individual arrests of people who resisted to abide by the curfew. Else do you all want to know . The persons arrested have home addresses. Dc or someshington association with the District Of Columbia. 30 maryland. And 9 other u. S. States either no fixed address or no known address. 60 were curfew violations. 11 for felony rioting. Arrests that were either 2 or less. Believe that is everything of significance that i have to share with you at this time. The mayor can take any questions that you might have. I do want to say one additional thing that the Public Safety recommendation has been that we adjust our curfew. We will get out the details of this. The curfew hours will be from 11 00 p. M. To 6 00 a. M. Any questions . We have seen an increased presence of military forces. Over has been reporting the proper role of the Police Department over these troops coming in here. Can you tell us, what is the relationship right now between the district and the federal government over who is in charge of these streets . Where are these tubes coming from . Let me be very clear that the metropolitan Police Department reports to the mayor of the District Of Columbia. There has been some discussion about what the home rule charter would allow the president to do, in the case of an emergency for federal purposes. Attemptedent has not to make that a reality. Let me just be clear about that. The 4000 men and women at the Police Department report to me. Examining every legal question about the president s doherty to send troops, Even National guard, to the District Of Columbia. If he has to make any other legal steps to do that. Another way to put that is this was part of my discussion with the attorney general this morning. Does the president have the guardauthority to request from other states . I have the authority to request guard from other states. I have not requested guard from other states. Close federal partners were present here. They sent Border Patrol officers to the district. Can you explain what their role was last night and whether you had a role in requesting their presence . Only federal the authorities we requested are the d. C. National guard, very limited role, unarmed to help us. The number is 100 d. C. National guardsmen. As well. Federal we also, prior to that, we officers, who we work with and dea officers. What about custom and Border Patrol being present . Mayor bowser i do not know that they were present. Custom and Border Patrol was in the district, but not by request. The perimeter around the white house has been expended dramatically. It is preventing people from moving around. What do you think about the fact that it has expanded . A lot of strong words about what happened. Let me respond to your question. We think that the federal purposes are being stretched. There has to be a determination of the federal purposes being served. That is what we will continue to examine legally, to push back on. Your question for me . Can you explain what happened on swan street . What was the motivation . I was trying to lay that out in my talking point. Thatyou make an allegation Police Officers were beating peaceful people, who were compliant and being arrested, that is a serious allegation. I think it would be irresponsible of me not to share the facts that i have at my disposal because i did not see a lot of those facts out there in the reporting that i saw yesterday. Who exercises jurisdiction is now under federal jurisdiction . Mayor bowser that is a d. C. Street. I think, if i had to understand the argument that the feds are making, it is part of a perimeter to protect the white house complex, but i think that will be a point of contention. Were you finished . Clearly, at some point, a decision was made last night you were not going to try to clear out all the protesters in the cad. You made a decision not to clear the people out. Mayor bowser we did not try to clear them out before. You obviously decided not to. Mayor bowser what do you mean . We let people protest every night. Any point ot at last night you had a curfew and you decided to let people protest, if they were going to protest peacefully. They arrested people last night. I do not want you to be confused. We have allowed peaceful protests every night, but we are concerned about people who are not peaceful, who are destroying our city. Mpd, toew is a tool for make sure that they can put their resources to finding those people and detaining those people. You decided not to enforce the curfew as much last night . Mayor bowser the chief found that there was not destruction abounding in the city. Do you follow what i mean . He just explained that the arrests were to prevent that type of distraction. Destruction. Welcome. I wonder if you have a list of the federal laws, in regards to the protest. Mayor bowser i am not sure if we are keeping a list, but the feds are. They are under their control, not ours. You, mayor and the chief. Is the curfew working the way you intended it . I think the mayor said it very well. The curfew gives the police the ability to stop the violence during the course of this event. The significant violence that we saw. The way we utilize this tool, as we watch groups. Yesterday was a perfect example. If you have large groups that are peacefully protesting and not exhibiting behaviors that we believe have led to the violence city, that ishe the heart of what we do here in washington dc. We allow peaceful protests. If there are indicators within a group that we believe may rise volatility, for example the group that was arrested on swan street, where projectiles were being thrown and cars were being burned. I think it is our responsibility to ensure that Group Behavior is stopped, to prevent the volatility we saw in our city. System, butperfect i believe it was very effective in ramping down the level of violence. 288 and 19. And 19. 288 tomorrow, i hope there are zero arrests. Believe that he harbored criminals in his home . You could get into that technicality and talk about one of the Police Departments i am most proud of is ours. The level of restraint that our police showed, when you had people running into a home, where they had some belief that it could have been a serious felony, breaking into someones home. To use the judgment to not even go into that home at the end of the day, violating a curfew is not a violent offense. Some would say it is not a serious offense, so for the police to not exacerbate that situation, that is something that we will look back on and be proud of our agency for. A quick continuation on that. Were you able to make arrests for everybody in the home . We did not arrest anybody in the home. Interrupt thet arrests that you needed to make . It did not interrupt anything. The numbers are in dispute as to how many people ran in there. My Police Officials said somewhere between 10 and 30. Somewhere in between those numbers. Beene who could have arrested for curfew, who violated the law of the District Of Columbia were welcomed inside buddys home. Exercised department judgment, not trying to make an arrest for harboring or whatever the technical arrest could be. Those did not occur. It did not negatively impact our operation. These are the individuals that were responsible for burglary . Violators. Re curfew ,eople could have been involved but we have no information to suggest that. Protesters he this is the mayors decision. The conversation i had with the ofor is the Largest Group protesters we have seen to this point have been doing a little bit of self policing. There was one indication of a sign that was pulled down. The person who pulled the street among someas Peaceful Protesters. Think the behavior suggests that we should push the curfew back. We anticipate peaceful protests. Out of an abundance of caution, you have to consider that actors in the city bad actors in the city. If we have to come in here, we probably will. The number of arrests would probably be zero. Instancethink in this that it does. I think it was a sound, reasonable decision to go to 11 00. Say that thereu was a large crowd outside the headquarters. Out side an arrest mpd . That were probably some individual arrest. That was the last group that remained in the city. They exhibited the same behaviors that we thought could lead to violence. Munitions were deployed to disperse that group. They were able to disperse. Why not the mass arrests . Saweems like swan street 200 arrests. If we could have executed a mass arrests, we would have, but there are a lot of challenges, which i will not go into, for executing that kind of arrest. That is not something that we could have successfully done. Im guessing the officers on the scene had body cameras. Will that footage be made available to the public . Process to a requesting body camera footage. You make the request and we will make a determination on whether that can released. As of right now, because this is an ongoing investigation, we will have to wait until the investigation is completed. I have no issue with transparency. To the body cameras, i would assume that many of the cameras have private cameras. I know for sure that there was media on the scene. If you look at the media footage, it was consistent with the way that i described it. Me to be very under control and calm. I would like to ask a couple of questions about yesterday. Mayor bowser any other questions on the demonstration . We are comfortable with the agents that we mentioned and have great familiarity working with. They include many members that we work with all the time. Say more about the other agencies and about who is directing them. That is what we should all concerned about is who is giving the orders . The thing for is whoe concerned about is giving the orders. Not we are not giving orders to federal police. Is there any coordination . We had directing the federal assets that we have. We have not directing any beyond that. One last. Ok. 2 30, mpdrning about responded to a fire. Are you familiar with this incident . I have omitted information. There was an attempt of robbery for some personnel in the sixth district. That is an active investigation. Questionve a specific reports are anecdotal that these were actually rioter i have heard those same reports, but i cannot say with certainty. If you want to followup, i would be happy to give you what weve got. Steve expect the curfew to be do you expect the curfew to be more effective . Asyor bowser we regard this something very serious. We make that decision based on Public Safety needs. [indiscernible] mayor bowser no. Teeth . Chief . I know that is something that they wanted to do. That is something that they wanted to do, to increase their perimeter. There are obviously going to be questions on if they can do that. I know you did not have the full information yesterday. I did watch your bike officers. What were they doing . I am a fairly intelligent person, some might say and some might disagree. Every instance of Police Interaction that occurred, i do not have at the top of my head. Locationve a specific or instance of time, i can look into that. That is not ringing a bell. Will that with me and i answer any questions that i possibly can. Bowser, [indiscernible] word, okser in a maybe i cannot do it in a word. Based on mythis experience as a voter. In my reflection, have not been briefed by the board chair or any of the board staff. I know that the voters spent hours at the polls yesterday. Of failedthing short inter failed execution. Two majorere components. One was the issue of the absentee ballot sent out by the board of elections. Was online. Sue ballots,d to absentee were you aware of any of the planning that the board of elections did . Are you aware that the board of elections did not engage a mail order to mail out the ballots, and tried to do it with the inhouse staff and antiquated machinery that they have . Mayor bowser i can tell you this. Allowed the chairman of the board of elections to at our the boards plans press conferences. On at least two occasions. I believe the Council Invited the board chair to also make a presentation on his plans to the councilmembers. Keep in mind that this is an independent body. The executive does not run elections in the district. We have an independent board chair, so that there is no political influence. Offeredthat in mind, we assistance to the board on a number of occasions, as it relates to the physical buildings. Assigned staff to work with them. We assisted with volunteers, and i assigned to recruit volunteers, to provide coverage. We provided ppe and Sanitation Equipment to the board, so that they would have what they needed at that level. It would be inappropriate to get involved with who they contract with. I think we did make them an offer, when i first heard that people were saying that they were not getting their ballots. Answer to your question. What vendors that they used. Two followup questions. Than whatttle more you just enunciated, in terms of, didnt you direct the department of Information Services to be your eyes and years over the board of ears over the board of elections . Mayor bowser i directed tommy to be a communication arm with the board, so that any of their needs that they communicated with would be elevated through our administration. That is exactly what he did. At this point in time, what assurances can you give to the d. C. Residence and voters that the same problems will not occur in november, for the president ial primary and general election. General election . I am veryer concerned about it. I want to make sure that i am doing what is legally appropriate, and getting a download from the board chair about what has happened. The plan is to fix it. I can assure d. C. Voters that we will have the appropriate action plan from the board, and understand that from our level. I expect the council will require the same thing. If you get a download from the board and senior staff at the board of elections, and you ask it, are you prepared to . Mayor bowser i could not tolerate continued failed execution. I need to know more. On coronavirus. There are concerns about another spike, given on given what has been happening in the city the past few days. Police officers have had a lot of close contact with people. Talks abouten any planning for what should happen, should we see a spike among Police Officers, when we are in a time period of their critical the on the streets and for district . Have there been any conversations with dr. Nesbitt about what we are seeing in the next what we will be staying weeks . Ng mayor bowser we have been preparing for a surge. We continue to have that Surge Capacity in place. I think our best thinking suggests that anything that happened over the weekend, we may not see for two to three weeks. I want to emphasize to people the Testing Capacity that we have, and the facilities we have made available in the district, one thing that dr. Nesbitt is concerned about this should not surprise any of us. The numbers of people seeking tests have dipped over the past week. I want to emphasize that we made a news site available downtown. We have had at least a couple people go through that site. That site is available. I am not sure we have discussed this yet, but because we have been working out the kinks, we are going to make Testing Available across the city, as well as a number of fire stations. Two have operated that have served largely people in the neighborhood. And a rollout plan. I know you will ask me which ones, but i do not have that on the top of my head. We have trained fire and ems personnel. We will make more sites available. Part of we opening, none of us asked acted we would have large protest activity on the day after our stayathome order was lifted. Part of reopening is the expectation that more people will get tested. We are continuing to work on making those tests more widely available throughout the city. I know you have been very busy. Do you have any idea when you will be able to tell us the metrics for getting into phase two . I suspect well be able to focus on that this week. To dr. Nesbitt determine those metrics already . They are looking at the data every day. Not because she is not ready, i am quite sure that we will get to it this week. Can i go back to the election and ask for your reaction . Like brandon may not be returning to the council. Just your reaction. Mayor bowser people are voting and the voters have spoken. All of us in this business know that when the voters speak, we have to listen and work with the people that they send down to city hall to do their business. Ifsounds like i do not know the ward two race is too close to be called. I know that there are ballots to be counted. It looks like we have a new democratic nominee for ward four. I know brandon todd very well and i know the great work he has done in four. He should be very proud of his service. He will be able to hand off the progress that he has led to the next councilmember. Towhat is your reaction calls to decrease funding for the Police Department . Mayor bowser decrease funding for the Police Department . You have my budget. My budget invests in making sure that we have the officers around the city that we need to keep d. C. Residence safe. Residents safe. If you look at many cities, including d. C. , it takes one act. Er to carry out a bad what matters is recruitment, training and accountability. One of the elements is recruiting locally, so in the budget, we want one of the investments is expanding our cadet program, continuing to have High School Graduates come out of high school and enter the academy. That is one element in the budget. Rather than look at budget numbers, the discussion should be about recruitment training, policies and practices. Yes . Bowser one more question about the protests. What was your response to the lowflying helicopters in the district . Did you deploy them . Bowser i can tell you that we think it was potentially a very dangerous scare tactic that was meant to intimidate and residence residents holy in approach it in an urban setting. I will say two things about the helicopters. One is that the asset can be very valuable in monitoring crowd movement. Lowflying helicopters was unhelpful. You asked what agency . It was a federal resource. One more about the event on monday night. That there were Credible Threats against police to clear the park . Do i believe that . I know that throughout the days preceding that and on monday, there were projectiles being thrown at Law Enforcement officers in that area. There were attempts to breach the perimeter in that area. I was not on the ground at that time when they decided to move the president. That is a federal decision. It is the responsibility of the secret service to move the president of the u. S. Anywhere in the country or the world. The primary reason to do all that was to put a fence around the park. Do you find that as well . I am losing you as to what we are talking about. It did not happen until well after the movement of the president. What is the question . Have you seen the park Police Statement . I have not seen the park Police Statement on this, no. Andiven all the protests pandemic, are you encouraging those protesting to get tested . Mayor bowser i think they need to call the testing site and get tested if they were asked those or if they have reason to think that they need to be tested. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Every day, we are taking your calls live on the air on the news of the day and we discussed policy issues that impacted. A discussion of the role and history of the u. S. Military and a civil unrest with kevin bearing. We will talk with Vince Williams , democratic mayor of union city, georgia about cities impacted by protests and covid19. North Dakota Republican congressman Kelly Armstrong joins us to talk about the review of the fbi russia investigation. Spent watch cspans washington journal. Heres a look at alive coverage thursday. The Senate Judiciary committee continues its review of the pfizer application process by sa application fi process. On cspan2, the senate is back at 10 00 a. M. To consider the michael pack to be ceo of the u. S. Agency for global media, which operates various Government Act International Broadcast outlets. On cspan3, the head of the centers for Disease Control and prevention, dr. Robert redfield, testifies before a House Appropriations subcommittee about the federal response to the coronavirus. That gets underway at 11 00 a. M. Eastern. At the pentagon wednesday, defense secretary mark esper talked about the response to nationwide protests, saying he did not support the use of active duty forces in a Law Enforcement role. He also spoke about events earlier this week outside the white house, including his involvement in a photo op within the president at st. Johns Episcopal Church after demonstrators were t dispersed. This runs 20 minutes. Well, good morning, everyone. Over the past couple of days there has been a fair share of reporting, some good, some bad, about what is transpiring in our great nation. And the role that the department of defense and its leaders. I want to take a few minutes to address the issues in person to make clear the facts and o

© 2025 Vimarsana

comparemela.com © 2020. All Rights Reserved.