Repression at the Republican Convention: The Criminalization of Dissent

Anti-war demonstration in St. Paul, MN, September 4, 2008. photo: Zoe Prinds-Flash

The 2008 Republican National Convention (RNC) in St. Paul, Minnesota produced over 800 arrests and widespread police misconduct: preemptive raids, mass arrests, targeting of journalists and police brutality -- including violence directed against arrestees held in the Ramsey County Jail.

It was a smaller, but much more violent version of the police misconduct during the 2004 RNC held in New York City. By the end of the convention, eight protest organizers had been charged with "conspiracy to commit riot in the second degree in furtherance of terrorism" -- making them the first to be charged under Minnesota's version of the Patriot Act. Officials in the Twin Cities might be pleased the convention is behind them, but the sting of tear gas lingers.

Think Federally, Act Locally

Recent political conventions have been declared "National Special Security Events" by the Department of Homeland Security. An NSSE designation generally means that security becomes the responsibility of an FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) -- a partnership between the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Homeland Security components, and state and local law enforcement. JTTFs typically conduct surveillance and interrogations of individuals the FBI suspects of being linked to "domestic terrorism," which evidently, under their definitions, includes protest activity.

Replicating what they had done in 2004, the FBI and its JTTFs increased activity a year prior to the 2008 RNC, surveilling and interviewing peace activists, and according to City Pages, recruiting paid informants who were asked to infiltrate anti-war organizations.

In the 1970s, after the Church Commission hearings exposed politically motivated spying and obstruction of First Amendment rights by the FBI's COINTELPRO division, regulations were promulgated to limit these abuses. In 2002, the Justice Department removed these regulations. Civil rights advocates argue that unregulated JTTF actions may constitute violations of the First Amendment, pointing to a number of questionable police practices that have emerged over the course of the last decade.

In Philadelphia in 2000, the R2K legal collective learned that undercover state troopers posed as activists during the Republican National Convention protests, infiltrating street demonstrations and engaging in illegal activity -- acting as provocateurs.

In 2003, after the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) protests, according to a Miami Herald report, "a judge presiding over the cases of free trade protesters said in court that he saw 'no less than 20 felonies committed by police officers' during the November demonstrations."{6}

The "Miami Model" described by the judge -- the police response to the FTAA protests -- established a standard procedure for police at the Republican National Convention in New York City in 2004: surveillance, provocateurs, pre-emptive mass arrests, and extended detentions. And despite the fact that NYPD misconduct prompted lawsuits and several legal victories for protesters (NYC has already had to pay over $6 million for violating civil liberties), the NYPD was consulted by authorities planning security for the 2008 RNC in St. Paul.

The RNC Bribed St. Paul to Violate Civil Liberties

St. Paul received a $50 million "security grant" from the Department of Justice for the 2008 RNC. While there were restrictions on how the cash could be spent, the grant did allow for equipment procurement and for what former Minneapolis police chief Tony Bouza called an "orgy of overtime." Three thousand police officers from other jurisdictions were brought in to the Twin Cities.

In addition, according to the Minnesota Independent, St. Paul signed a deal whereby the city's first $10 million in payouts to litigants for civil rights violations would be paid by the Republican Party Host Committee. This meant the police departments in charge didn't have to worry about civil liability for engaging in unconstitutional and aggressive tactics while working the RNC. Together, these factors created a crowd control force that functioned more like Blackwater mercenaries than a legitimate law enforcement entity.

Message to Journalists: Embed with Us, or Face Arrest

Importing a tactic from the Iraq War, the St. Paul police offered local corporate media a deal: journalists who signed a liability waiver were allowed to "ride along," i.e. be embedded, with the police -- after agreeing to not run any stories about police tactics until after the convention. The controversial "ride along" and "embargo" agreement allowed Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) reporter Tim Nelson access to the front lines of the conflict between police and protesters. Unlike many of his colleagues, Nelson was not tear gassed, arrested, or beaten.

Dozens of journalists were arrested. When members of her crew were arrested on "suspicion of rioting" on September 1, Democracy Now anchor Amy Goodman approached police officers to attest to her crew's credentials. Instead of releasing them, police arrested her too and a Secret Service agent confiscated her convention credentials. This act outraged other journalists, and their readers. On September 2, according to The Star Tribune, a number of media representatives delivered a petition with 50,000 signatures to St. Paul's Mayor Coleman demanding that he drop all charges against any journalists arrested during the RNC, many of whom were initially charged with felonies including the vague "suspicion of rioting." On September 19, St. Paul authorities announced they will drop all charges against journalists.

Neither the 2003 FTAA protests nor the 2004 RNC involved the targeting of independent journalists or the bargaining with corporate media to the extent seen in St. Paul. This represents a significant expansion of the Miami Model.

Preemptive Raids

The Glass Bead Collective is a group of filmmakers from New York City who recently released a video documenting the misconduct of an NYPD officer at a Critical Mass bike ride in New York. Early on the morning of August 26, three members of the filmmakers collective were walking in Northeast Minneapolis when they were stopped by police. Officers photographed the three videographers, questioned them individually about their travel plans, and asked what they intended to report on. Police searched their personal belongings and confiscated their video and computer equipment, cell phones, notebooks, clothing, and money. Police did not charge the three with a crime or issue a receipt for the items seized.

On the evening of August 29, police raided a St. Paul convergence center run by the "RNC Welcoming Committee," a group of protest organizers who were providing logistical support for activists. Police removed computers and other evidence from the building while they searched, identified, photographed, and interviewed occupants, none of whom were arrested.

On the morning of Saturday, August 30, the Minneapolis Police Department, led by Sheriff Bob Fletcher of the Ramsey County Sheriff's Office, raided a home occupied by Food Not Bombs (FNB) activists. Fletcher, armed with a very broad and vague search warrant, found three buckets of alleged urine. Feces and urine had been listed on the search warrant and these items were confiscated.

Later it was revealed that Fletcher had secured only one bucket of urine -- the other two buckets contained what the police described as a "gray liquid." The National Lawyers Guild (NLG) issued a press release stating that the bucket of urine was retrieved from an illegal apartment, unconnected to the FNB house.

The apartment lacked a functioning toilet and the bucket was serving as a urinal. Additional raids were conducted across Minneapolis. Six activists arrested in the various raids were held on "probable cause."

The I-Witness collective is a team of videographers from New York City who document police misconduct. On the morning of Saturday, August 30th, the house they were staying in was surrounded by police from St. Paul, a Wisconsin sheriff, and the FBI. The I-Witness team members were searched and had their equipment seized but they were not charged with a crime. Two days later police appeared at the office the team was using -- with a battering ram and some incorrect information about "hostages" being held in the office. The National Lawyers Guild intervened and the police left the scene, apparently assured that no hostages were being held by the journalists.

Police Brutality

Video clips and first hand accounts of police behavior chronicle widespread use of tear gas, pepper spray, concussion grenades, and other non-lethal weapons -- and widespread brutality. Before the convention, Chief Harrington told The Star Tribune that $1.9 million of the DoJ security grant was being spent on chemical irritants -- and other $1 million would be spent on gas masks. Numerous videos of riot police indiscriminately gassing protesters would seem to indicate that once the weapons had been purchased, police didn't want them to go to waste.

Supersizing Charges and Supermaxing Incarceration

Ramsey County Attorney Susan Gaertner, whose website indicates her desire to run for Governor next year, charged eight RNC Welcoming Committee organizers under the Minnesota version of the Patriot Act. The specific charge, "conspiracy to commit riot in the second degree in furtherance of terrorism," followed the pre-emptive raid on the group's convergence center. Evidence seized includes political literature and personal computers. The Welcoming Committee did not plan specific actions but provided logistical support to groups who were planning to protest.

In an interview on the radio program Democracy Now!, National Lawyers Guild attorney Bruce Nestor objected to equating the planning of civil disobedience with conspiracy to commit terrorism. In addition to supersizing charges for protest organizers, Ramsey County apparently supermaxed the conditions of confinement. Eileen Clancy of I-Witness Video reported that, "the treatment of arrestees in the jails has been shockingly bad, even grisly. Medical care has been withheld from many arrestees. In one instance a hemophiliac was offered gauze as treatment for a wound. Elliot Hughes, a 19-year old arrested while bicycling, was forced to wear a bag over his head while being gagged and beaten. The punishment of arrestees did not end at the jailhouse door. In almost every instance, the Sheriff's Department did not return any personal belongings to arrestees upon their release. […] Some were dropped off as far as five miles away from the jail without their house keys, car keys, cell phones, identification, or money. In some instances this meant that they were not able to access critically needed medication," said Clancy.

The tactic of falsely arresting protesters to clear the streets of dissent, the model that prompted so many lawsuits in New York, now has a legal-sounding prefix: "probable cause." Jason, a Movement for a Democratic Society organizer from Chicago, told Next Left Notes that "police round[ed] up anyone they could to silence dissent by holding people on ridiculous charges until the end, or near the end, of the convention. Police infiltrators picked a fight so they would have an excuse to do so. I've seen the raw video footage, and personally saw police plants at every march -- including all publicly peaceful ones."

Amnesty International Calls for an Investigation

On September 5, 2008, Amnesty International called for an investigation of all allegations of ill-treatment and other abuses, with a review of police tactics. The human rights group also urged that an inquiry be carried out promptly. While the mayors of the Twin Cities made public statements in support of the police, Gary Schiff and Cam Gordon, members of the Minneapolis City Council, called for an independent investigation. This call died in committee. The same council members who approved the police plan in a meeting held on June 6, 2008, voted down the call for an investigation.

On September 15, Susan Gaertner announced on her campaign website that the Ramsey County Attorney's office will not be prosecuting felony charges against Amy Goodman and her staff, however, "the Police Department will submit the cases to the St. Paul City Attorney's Office for consideration of possible non-felony charges."

On September 19, St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman's office issued a statement announcing that the City Attorney's Office won't prosecute journalists who were arrested at the RNC for "presence at an unlawful assembly," a misdemeanor charge.

And so the cleanup from the convention begins. If the New York City model holds, the vast majority of charges against nonviolent protesters arrested in the Twin Cities will be quickly dropped. Lawsuits are probable but the Republican Host Committee insurance plan should indemnify St. Paul. With no day in court forthcoming, protesters will not be allowed to face their arresting officers. Litigants will receive some payouts. And in 2012 it will begin again.