Mike the Mad Biologist

Today the Washington Post, which despite Jeff Bezos, can still commit journalism ran a story about how the Secret Service convinced Trump to surround Lafayette Square with a fence, making it possible to close off the park. While this is small beans compared to, let’s say, ICE murdering a nurse while emptying a clip into his back, it’s not good.

What really sucks about this is Lafayette used to be a place where people could peacefully protest, speak out, and so on. It was literally a town square at least in political terms, where anyone (including some hilariously bonkers people) could engage in free speech. In 2020, it was a primary gathering place for Black Lives Matter activists*.

But Trump, who is intensely disliked and who has lived his entire life in a rich person’s bubble, does not comprehend that being an elected official means the occasional exposure to the public (Trump’s fascism also plays a role here obviously).

A bad day for the spirit of the First Amendment. And when detrumpification occurs, professional Democrats must liberate Lafayette**.

*I would argue that Trump’s closing of Lafayette in 2020 during the BLM protests was a critical factor in their massive expansion in size, at least D.C.. When Trump closed the park, the few hundred protesters moved to the sidewalk surrounding the park, and then when he decided to walk to St. John’s Church for a photo op that one day, our internal security forces cleared the street using excessive force. That angered locals–and remember people were either working from home or out of work due to the height of the pandemic–and many thousands of people the next day in D.C. converged on the White House*** in no small part due to anger over the previous evening’s tear gassing (I was there both days, but left about 90 minutes before the tear gassing). The park does matter.

**Of course, if they take back the House and/or Senate, they attempt could pass legislation to this effect and turn this into an issue, but professional Democrats don’t do this sort of thing.

***As best as I could tell, it was largely locals who walked or took mass transit to join the protests the following day. People were just angry–and many of them were normies, not the usual suspects one saw at the BLM protests until then.