New York: Streets in countless cities and towns across America filled with demonstrators again on Sunday as largely peaceful protests over systemic racism and police brutality, sparked by the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, headed towards a third week. The scenes were markedly different from the previous weekend, which saw police beating back protesters with teargas and batons, and a non-violent gathering in a Washington DC park on Monday forcibly cleared in military-style assault ahead of a photo opportunity for Donald Trump.
Meanwhile, the body of Floyd, 46, whose killing on Memorial Day when a Minneapolis police officer kneeled on his neck for almost nine minutes was captured on a now infamous video, arrived in his hometown of Houston on Sunday for a public viewing and a private funeral on Tuesday.
Thousands of marchers gathered close to the White House on Sunday afternoon, mirroring Saturday’s peaceful demonstration in Washington DC in which more than 10,000 people poured into the streets and coalesced at the feet of Abraham Lincoln at his giant marble memorial. The words Black Lives Matter had been painted in bright yellow letters along a street near the White House.
In the capital, Utah’s Republican senator Mitt Romney – a critic of Donald Trump – was seen among the roughly 1,000 demonstrators marching in a faith-based protest to the White House. In New York, an estimated 1,600 protesters stopped outside Trump International Hotel in Manhattan chanting “Throw him out” on their way to Central Park. A day earlier in Harlem demonstrators shouted “Get off our necks” and “Racism is America’s original sin” as they marched uptown from the National Black Theatre.
Elsewhere, sizeable protests in cities including Los Angeles, Chicago, Austin, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington DC also appeared to be passing off peacefully. In Compton, California, there were protests on horseback and a caravan of cars driving past Los Angeles police headquarters. Crowds were also back on the streets in Minneapolis, despite the arrest and charging this week of the four now fired officers involved in Floyd’s death.
More cities announced they were dropping or relaxing their curfews with Philadelphia and New York, which saw late-night violence earlier in the week, joining Atlanta, Chicago, and Buffalo. Bill de Blasio, the mayor of New York, announced he was canceling the city’s curfew with immediate effect, after two days of relatively calm protests.
Others announced restrictions on police tactics that have come under scrutiny. Portland, Oregon, became the latest to ban the use of teargas, joining cities including Denver and Seattle, while California state and municipalities including Minneapolis, where Floyd died, have outlawed chokeholds and neck restraints. In Washington DC, federal troops that Trump insisted he could use to quell riots and looting, were sent back to their barracks.
