DC Mayor Muriel Bowser, along with mayors of Seattle, Atlanta, Chicago, Kansas City and Portland, called on the Donald Trump administration to pull federal authorities from their cities.
“We write to express our deep concern and objection to the deployment of federal forces in our cities,” the mayors said in a letter addressed to Attorney General William Barr and Department of Homeland Security Acting Secretary Chad Wolf.
Bowser and the other mayors complained that federal forces in cities were operating without coordination or authorization of local law enforcement officials.
“The unilateral deployment of these forces into American cities is unprecedented and violates fundamental constitutional protections and tenets of federalism,” said the letter, citing President Trump’s threat to deploy federal forces in Seattle to “clear out” a protest area and in Chicago to “clean up” the city, and the objection of the authorities in both cities.
“In Washington, DC outside Lafayette Park, extreme action was taken by federal law enforcement against protesters without the Mayor of DC’s approval. Acting Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Ken Cuccinelli said in recent days that the administration intends ‘to continue not just in Portland but in any of the facilities that we’re responsible for around the country.’ This abuse of power cannot continue,” read the letter.
The mayors went on to call the establishment and deployment of the US Department of Homeland Security Rapid Deployment Unit and sending federal forces for crowd control on city streets “unacceptable and chilling.”
Claiming that the move was for “political purposes, the letter said: “The President and his administration continually attack local leadership and amplify false and divisive rhetoric purely for campaign fodder. Their words and actions have created an environment of fear and mistrust.”
Federal police had forcibly cleared hundreds of protesters from DC’s Lafayette Square, in front of the White House, on June 1, using tear gas, rubber bullets, and sound cannons, drawing public backlash.
The controversial police intervention took place right before President Trump and other officials walked to St. John’s Episcopal Church across the street from the White House and posed for photos with a Bible outside the church.
The demonstrators were protesting against the death of George Floyd, a 46-year-old African American man, in police custody in Minneapolis.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) later sued President Trump, Attorney General William Barr, and other federal officials for violating protesters’ constitutional rights.