Saturday night's chaotic scenes follow a day of rallies that brought crowds of Trump supporters to town. In late afternoon, police said that beyond minor scuffles, there had been no major acts of violence or criminal activity as of late afternoon.
After sunset, however, tense moments began to unfold, with sporadic clashes breaking out between Trump supporters and counterprotesters. Officers attempted to keep members from opposing groups separated.
D.C. police tell News4 that the 33 arrests made Saturday in Downtown Washington amounted to the most protest-related arrests in a single day since August 13, during the George Floyd protests.
Newsham said that while Saturday night involved conflict between "mutual combatants," there were "large numbers of folks who self-identified as Proud Boys" and "smaller numbers, in my estimation, of folks who I would describe as anti-Trump groups."