Rioters in Washington, D.C., tried to tear down a statue of former President Andrew Jackson near the White House on Monday while others set up a new “autonomous zone” nearby.
The attack on the Jackson statue comes after rioters have destroyed other presidential statues including statues of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Ulysses S. Grant. On Sunday, the American Museum of Natural History in New York City announced that they were removing a statue of Theodore Roosevelt.
Rioters are pulling down the statue of Andrew Jackson in Lafayette Square in DC.
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) June 23, 2020
Daily Caller reporter Shelby Talcott was on scene and took video of the rioters trying to destroy the statue as law enforcement officials arrived on scene to stop the destruction of property.
Police have arrived at the White House where protesters were trying to tear down a statue and build an autonomous zone. Tensions are high: pic.twitter.com/TFnkOR8cs6
— Shelby Talcott (@ShelbyTalcott) June 23, 2020
Not far away from the statue, “protesters had pushed construction barriers and sections of metal fence into the street in the area to create roadblocks,” The Washington Post reported. “Someone had posted a sign spray-painted on plywood: ‘BHAZ: Black House Autonomous Zone.'”
New York Post reporter Ebony Bowden tweeted a video showing the area, writing: “Looks like another autonomous zone is springing up — this one outside the White House. Protesters are fortifying barricades in what they’re calling ‘BHAZ’ – Black House Autonomous Zone. Wonder how long President Trump will allow this to last on his doorstep.”
Looks like another autonomous zone is springing up — this one outside the White House. Protesters are fortifying barricades in what they’re calling “BHAZ” – Black House Autonomous Zone. Wonder how long President Trump will allow this to last on his doorstep. pic.twitter.com/60jK7Qj3iM
— Ebony Bowden (@ebonybowden) June 22, 2020
On Friday, President Donald Trump called out Washington, D.C., Democrat Mayor Muriel Bowser after rioters destroyed a statue of Confederate general Albert Pike in Judiciary Square.
“The D.C. Police are not doing their job as they watch a statue be ripped down & burn,” Trump tweeted. “These people should be immediately arrested. A disgrace to our Country!”
The D.C. Police are not doing their job as they watch a statue be ripped down & burn. These people should be immediately arrested. A disgrace to our Country! @MayorBowser
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 20, 2020
Washington Post columnist Henry Olsen wrote on Monday:
The United States’ frenzy of statuary iconoclasm has taken a turn into the theater of the absurd. Knocking down or defacing statues of national founders or heroes not only displays ignorance of history but also assaults the principles of Western civilization that allow for racial progress to continue.
…
Protesters who tear down statues to brave warriors who fought to more fully implement that principle mock and dishonor the idea that enables us to become a more perfect union. George Washington owned slaves, but he also founded a nation dedicated to the idea whose incompatibility with slavery made its eradication inevitable. Defacing or toppling his monuments dishonors the country. More than any man save Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant destroyed the Confederacy with his magisterial generalship. As president, he tried to extend the Civil War’s purpose by presiding over the Reconstruction of the South, an effort that was abandoned only after he left office. Toppling his statue — as protesters did in San Francisco, citing a slave whom Grant was gifted and later freed before the war — is ahistorically ludicrous.
Even far-left New York Times columnist Paul Krugman called out what was going on, tweeting: “As it happens, here’s the book I started reading a few days ago. I’ve long been a Grant groupie; he was imperfect, but without him there would have been no emancipation — and he fought the Klan. Leave his statues alone!”
As it happens, here's the book I started reading a few days ago. I've long been a Grant groupie; he was imperfect, but without him there would have been no emancipation — and he fought the Klan. Leave his statues alone! pic.twitter.com/s4l3apyP0D
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) June 20, 2020
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