“I’m not going to stand up and make a promise,” Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan said to a crowd of people protesting police violence demanding she cease the use of tear gas.
The City also gave no promise to give fair warning when deploying tear gas. Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best said the law requiring a dispersal order before using tear gas only applies when “it’s not feasible” to do so. Apparently, it wasn’t feasible to warn people in the line of fire.
The New York Times reported tear gas makes people more susceptible to respiratory illness, making them more vulnerable to Covid-19 and potentially encouraging a second wave of infection. It’s banned in war as chemical warfare, but it used routinely by police forces–the past five days of protest a prime example. On Monday night, police finally lost their patience and doused much of Capitol Hill in a giant plume of tear gas, affecting both protester and resident alike. Police used tear gas on people gathered in Capitol Hill again last night, with the Mayor’s refusal to make a “no tear gas” commitment very foreboding.
Brandy Grant of the Seattle Community Police Commission criticized the police response and said “it’s open season on Black lives” during their meeting this morning. “It’s time for [White people] to stand in the gap for us. If you don’t, your silence speaks volumes.”
Yesterday was the first time the Mayor had directly addressed protesters and it happened after a sit-in organized outside the City’s Emergency Operations Center. Two protest leaders, identified as David Lewis and Rashyla Levitt, reached out to Mayor Durkan and extended the invitation to speak. Acting as MC’s, Lewis and Levitt urged their fellow protesters not to boo or interrupt her so that they could hear what the Mayor was saying.
The Mayor did stand out there among the masses for maybe half an hour (thank to the protester who livestreamed it) and boos still came intermittently as she refused to commit to much beyond promising to meet with them again the next day. That meeting will apparently happen at 3pm outside the Emergency Operations Center. After the meeting with protesters, Mayor Durkan held a press conference and mostly stuck to her talking points that Seattle Police Department (“SPD”) was on the right track and had built trust in the community.
The lack of commitment and absence of remorse on the part of the Mayor, combined with the fact that she was negotiating with two leaders who weren’t well known in the social justice community led some Black, Indigenous and People of Color (“BIPOC”) leaders to speak out. Black Lives Matter King County issued a statement saying they didn’t have any affiliation with Rashyla Levitt nor David Lewis. Nikkita Oliver, who ran against Mayor Durkan on an platform that including sweeping police reform, criticized their organizing tactics and promised a response.
1:30pm Rally at Cal Anderson Park
Oliver and other BIPOC activists with deeper ties in the community began spreading word of a “Defund Seattle Police Rally for Black Lives” at Cal Anderson Park at 1:30pm today for the BIPOC leaders to announce their self-identified demands rather than having two leaders they didn’t recognize as such speak for them. Their number one demand, as the name belies, is cutting police department funding to invest in equitable people-centered alternatives.
