MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Clashes, traffic blockades and smashed windows by anti Trump protestors
The various protest groups scattered around the city chanted anti-Trump slogans and carried signs with slogans including “Make Racists Afraid Again” 
The clashes started before Trump was sworn. Police detained dozens of people and said they had charged an unspecified number of people with rioting Black-clad activists smashed store windows and blocked traffic in Washington during US President Donald Trump's inauguration on Friday, and fought with police in riot gear who responded with tear gas and stun grenades. About 500 people, some wearing masks, marched through the city's downtown, using hammers to claw up chunks of pavement to smash the windows of a Bank of America branch and a McDonald's outlet, all symbols of the American capitalist system.
The various protest groups scattered around the city chanted anti-Trump slogans and carried signs with slogans including “Make Racists Afraid Again,” a play on the New York businessman-turned-politician's “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan.
The clashes started about 90 minutes before Mr. Trump was sworn in 2.4 kilometers away. Police detained dozens of people and said they had charged an unspecified number of people with rioting. Some news agencies reported that 90 people had been arrested.
The group of detainees became a flash point after Mr. Trump was sworn in, when a crowd of several hundred that had formed to call for their release turned violent, with some throwing bottles and rocks at police, who responded with tear gas and stun grenades.
Two police officers sustained minor injuries from people who were trying to avoid arrest, police said.
Not far from the White House, protesters scuffled with police, at one point throwing aluminum chairs at an outdoor café. Bob Hrifko, a member of the Bikers for Trump group in town to celebrate the inauguration, was struck in the face when he tried to intervene.
The crowds did, however, slow crowds from entering onto the Mall and, in one spot, stopped them completely.
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Read all commentsI wonder what they hoped to achieve? Such actions are more likely to turn people against their cause than anything else. But maybe they were mostly just troublemakers wanting an excuse for violence?
Jan 21st, 2017 - 11:12 pm +1@FC
Interesting:
“employment in manufacturing fell during [Obama's tenure]. This does not mean U.S. manufacturing is in decline: American auto exports by volume broke records three years running through 2014. Rather, production has been automated to boost cost-competitiveness, making fewer workers necessary. Raising employment in the sector is thus at odds with revitalizing business there.”
It agrees with the article that said automation was the bigger problem for manufacturing jobs than outsourcing. And also suggests that if Trump does succeed in forcing US companies to employ more people it will ultimately make them less competitive. Also:
“Instead, the president-elect signaled with a sudden strike on the pharmaceutical industry that more political intervention in the affairs of individual companies could be in order -- a potential deterrent to economic activity underpinned by a set of uniform rules.”
So far, so CFK.
@ElaineB
Comparison of Trump's crowd with Obama's:
http://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/20/politics/donald-trump-barack-obama-inauguration-crowd-size/index.html
Google it if you don't want to click the link, it's quite striking.
I thought they were civilised.
Jan 21st, 2017 - 12:46 pm 0More people have attended the Women's March in D.C. than attended Trump's Ignorguration.
Jan 21st, 2017 - 05:43 pm 0Commenting for this story is now closed.
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