Militarized response to George Floyd protests nationwide worries Ohio experts

On some level, University of Akron professor David Cohen wasn’t surprised.

He had heard rumors President Donald Trump might try to send U.S. Army troops into the streets of America to tamp down protests that have gripped the nation for the last week.

But seeing Trump announce at least a threat to do so, in a speech delivered in the Rose Garden at the White House Monday night, was nonetheless jarring, Cohen said.

“Just the fact that President Trump would verbalize that threat is something that really violates civil/military traditions in the United States,” said Cohen, who on Tuesday was named the interim director of UA’s Bliss Institute for Applied Politics.

Protests come shortly after Kent State anniversary

Sending a militarized response to try to control a protest also hits home for Ohio, he said.

“Obviously what happened 50 years ago in Kent is a really good reminder of the risk of that,” Cohen said.

It was only a month ago Kent State University held remembrances for the four students who were were killed on May 4, 1970, by the Ohio National Guard, which opened fire during a Vietnam War protest.

More:'They are shooting students!': Kent State massacre 50 years later

Just weeks after those remembrances, a black man named George Floyd was killed by police in Minnesota, and the video of his death sparked national protests that are ongoing. While the majority of protests have been peaceful, some resulted in violent clashes between police officers and protesters, and others in vandalism and looting.

In some cases, including in Atlanta, officers have been fired and charged for their violent responses to protesters. One of the four officers present in Minnesota when Floyd was killed, face-down on the pavement with an officer’s knee to his neck for eight minutes, has been charged in his death.

With the National Guard already called in to assist police in several states, Cohen said, there was already a level of militarization to the protest responses. Gov. Mike DeWine activated the Ohio National Guard to aid in the response to protests in Columbus. Even in places where the Guard was not brought in, police officers responding to protests have often been outfitted in military gear.

More:Tracking protests across the USA in the wake of George Floyd's death

The impacts of a military response to protests

“It’s understandable that governors and the president want to use that option because looting and vandalizing and general law breaking can get out of hand,” Cohen said.

But that can also escalate the situation, he said.

“You risk squashing dissent,” Cohen said. “You risk violating the First Amendment. And you risk agitating and inflaming an already inflamed situation.”

Trump’s threat to bring in the U.S. military — though it’s unclear whether he would have the authority to do so — threw “gasoline” on the fire, Cohen said.

He said experts around the country were worried by the statement and what it could mean if enacted.

“And if that happens, is a national lockdown next, is martial law to be declared?” Cohen said.

“There’s all sorts of things that could happen after that are very destabilizing to democracy.”

The alarm was further reinforced, he said, when law enforcement used tear gas to clear out a park next to the White House ahead of the 7 p.m. curfew in Washington, D.C., Monday night, just minutes before Trump left the grounds to walk to a nearby church.

“It goes against so much of what our country stands for, in terms of free expression,” Cohen said.

In a Washington Post story, former Trump adviser Jason Miller was quoted defending the president’s walk and the clearing of the protesters in advance.

“You’re going to have to go and knock some of the bad guys around a little bit,” Miller said, according to the Post. “Once they get tear gassed or pepper sprayed, they don't want it to happen again.”

The comments echoed those of President Richard Nixon in response to May 4 in a recorded conversation dug up just last year by journalist Bob Woodward.

In a conversation with his chief of staff H.R. Haldeman in September 1971, Nixon suggested shooting prisoners at New York’s Attica Prison riot in a reference to the Kent State tragedy.

“You know what stops them? Kill a few,” Nixon said on the tape. “Remember Kent State? Didn’t it have a hell of an effect?”

How can tensions be safely de-escalated?

For Kent State University assistant professor Johanna Solomon, a member of the Peace and Conflict Studies department, the question posed to her much of the last week is how to de-escalate the tension and violent aspects of protests around the country.

But solving the perceived problems of the protests without addressing the reasons behind them would only suppress the anger, she said.

“There’s a lot of people in power that want things to kind of go back to normal,” Solomon said. “That’s part of the problem. We don’t just need life to go back to normal. We need actually to have systemic change. We need people to have equity and equality and justice.”

The best way for people in power to de-escalate the situation? Listen, she said.

“Show that you are in solidarity and you understand,” Solomon said.

Solomon said she and some of her Kent colleagues walked with protesters in Akron this week to lend their voices to the cause of racial justice.

As a Kent professor, she said, she of course couldn’t stop thinking about the events of 50 years ago.

“In the last couple days, the events of May 4 have been first and foremost in my mind,” she said. “That we haven’t learned the lesson of May 4.”

Contact education reporter Jennifer Pignolet at jpignolet@thebeaconjournal.com, at 330-996-3216 or on Twitter @JenPignolet.