Cars have hit demonstrators 104 times since George Floyd protests began
Grace Hauck, USA TODAY•September 27, 2020
Dozens of people had gathered in Albuquerque, New Mexico, for a third night of protests demanding justice for Breonna Taylor when a car barreled through the crowd, hitting several protesters.
"It just went straight into the middle of the crowd and veered off toward the left," said Samantha Colombo, 25, an Albuquerque resident who said they've been protesting with dozens of other people for three nights at the same intersection. No one appeared to be injured, Colombo said. Video of the incident began to circulate on Twitter on Friday.
"For the first two nights, the police blocked off the streets. Today they did not, so we had a couple cars blocking the streets for us and people lining up their bikes," Colombo said. "There was this one car that for a few minutes was just beeping for a minute or so straight, so a few people went up to the car to get them to move, and they eventually just started going."
Amid thousands of protests nationwide this summer against police brutality, dozens of drivers have plowed into crowds of protesters marching in roadways, raising questions about the drivers' motivations.
New York, Denver, Minneapolis: Disturbing videos show vehicles plowing into George Floyd protests across USA
Grace Hauck, USA TODAY•September 27, 2020
Dozens of people had gathered in Albuquerque, New Mexico, for a third night of protests demanding justice for Breonna Taylor when a car barreled through the crowd, hitting several protesters.
"It just went straight into the middle of the crowd and veered off toward the left," said Samantha Colombo, 25, an Albuquerque resident who said they've been protesting with dozens of other people for three nights at the same intersection. No one appeared to be injured, Colombo said. Video of the incident began to circulate on Twitter on Friday.
"For the first two nights, the police blocked off the streets. Today they did not, so we had a couple cars blocking the streets for us and people lining up their bikes," Colombo said. "There was this one car that for a few minutes was just beeping for a minute or so straight, so a few people went up to the car to get them to move, and they eventually just started going."
Amid thousands of protests nationwide this summer against police brutality, dozens of drivers have plowed into crowds of protesters marching in roadways, raising questions about the drivers' motivations.
New York, Denver, Minneapolis: Disturbing videos show vehicles plowing into George Floyd protests across USA
Two protesters climb onto the hood of a moving Detroit police SUV before being thrown off.
Witnesses, law enforcement and terrorism experts said some of the vehicle incidents appear to be targeted and politically motivated; others appear to be situations in which the driver became frightened or enraged by protesters surrounding their vehicle.
"There are groups that do want people to take their cars and drive them into Black Lives Matters protesters so that they won’t protest anymore. There’s an element of terrorism there. Is it all of them? No," said J.J. MacNab, a fellow at George Washington University's Program on Extremism. "I look at it as an anti-protester group of acts, some of which are white supremacists, some not."
There have been at least 104 incidents of people driving vehicles into protests from May 27 through Sept. 5, including 96 by civilians and eight by police, according to Ari Weil, a terrorism researcher at the University of Chicago's Project on Security and Threats who spoke with USA TODAY this summer. Weil began tracking the incidents as protests sprung up in the wake of George Floyd's death in police custody.
There have been at least two fatalities, in Seattle and in Bakersfield, California.
At least 43 incidents malicious and 39 drivers charged
Weil said that by analyzing news coverage, court documents and patterns of behavior – such as when people allegedly yelled slurs at protesters or turned around for a second hit – he determined that at least 43 of the incidents were malicious, and 39 drivers have been charged.
Most of the incidents happened in June, in the weeks following Floyd's May 25 killing, Weil said, and half of the incidents happened by June 7. While incidents continue to happen, they've trended downward since then, he said
"While these incidents were clustered in the beginning of the protest period, they continue to occur," Weil said on Twitter on Thursday. "As violent rhetoric intensifies in the lead up to the election, I worry about an uptick in these incidents."
New York, California, Oregon and Florida have seen the greatest number of incidents, according to Weil's data.
Just this past week, drivers struck protesters in Denver, in Laramie, Wyoming, and in Los Angeles, where one person was hospitalized, according to local news reports.
On Saturday, in Yorba Linda, California, south of Los Angeles, a woman believed to be supporting Black Lives Matter with the group Caravan4Justice drove through a crowd of protesters and counterprotesters, injuring two people who were transported by ambulance, according to the Orange County Sheriff's Department. A man had possible broken legs, and a woman had "multiple injuries all over her body," according to Carrie Braun, director of public affairs for the department.
The department released a statement late Friday saying the driver would be booked for attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon, and that the investigation is ongoing.
Many of the incidents have been captured in photos or videos shared on social media: Earlier this summer, two New York police vehicles plowed into demonstrators as the crowd pushed a barricade against one of them; a woman in a black SUV drove through a crowd in Denver; a Detroit police vehicle accelerated away with a man flailing on the hood.
One of the more "clear-cut" cases of malice, MacNab said, was in early June in Lakeside, Virginia. An "avowed Klansman" drove up to protesters on a roadway, revved his engine, then drove through the crowd, wounding one person, Henrico County Commonwealth's Attorney Shannon Taylor said in a statement.
The 36-year-old man was "a propagandist of Confederate ideology," Taylor said. He was charged with four counts of assault with hate crimes, two counts of felonious attempted malicious wounding and one count of felony hit and run.
Witnesses, law enforcement and terrorism experts said some of the vehicle incidents appear to be targeted and politically motivated; others appear to be situations in which the driver became frightened or enraged by protesters surrounding their vehicle.
"There are groups that do want people to take their cars and drive them into Black Lives Matters protesters so that they won’t protest anymore. There’s an element of terrorism there. Is it all of them? No," said J.J. MacNab, a fellow at George Washington University's Program on Extremism. "I look at it as an anti-protester group of acts, some of which are white supremacists, some not."
There have been at least 104 incidents of people driving vehicles into protests from May 27 through Sept. 5, including 96 by civilians and eight by police, according to Ari Weil, a terrorism researcher at the University of Chicago's Project on Security and Threats who spoke with USA TODAY this summer. Weil began tracking the incidents as protests sprung up in the wake of George Floyd's death in police custody.
There have been at least two fatalities, in Seattle and in Bakersfield, California.
At least 43 incidents malicious and 39 drivers charged
Weil said that by analyzing news coverage, court documents and patterns of behavior – such as when people allegedly yelled slurs at protesters or turned around for a second hit – he determined that at least 43 of the incidents were malicious, and 39 drivers have been charged.
Most of the incidents happened in June, in the weeks following Floyd's May 25 killing, Weil said, and half of the incidents happened by June 7. While incidents continue to happen, they've trended downward since then, he said
"While these incidents were clustered in the beginning of the protest period, they continue to occur," Weil said on Twitter on Thursday. "As violent rhetoric intensifies in the lead up to the election, I worry about an uptick in these incidents."
New York, California, Oregon and Florida have seen the greatest number of incidents, according to Weil's data.
Just this past week, drivers struck protesters in Denver, in Laramie, Wyoming, and in Los Angeles, where one person was hospitalized, according to local news reports.
On Saturday, in Yorba Linda, California, south of Los Angeles, a woman believed to be supporting Black Lives Matter with the group Caravan4Justice drove through a crowd of protesters and counterprotesters, injuring two people who were transported by ambulance, according to the Orange County Sheriff's Department. A man had possible broken legs, and a woman had "multiple injuries all over her body," according to Carrie Braun, director of public affairs for the department.
The department released a statement late Friday saying the driver would be booked for attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon, and that the investigation is ongoing.
Many of the incidents have been captured in photos or videos shared on social media: Earlier this summer, two New York police vehicles plowed into demonstrators as the crowd pushed a barricade against one of them; a woman in a black SUV drove through a crowd in Denver; a Detroit police vehicle accelerated away with a man flailing on the hood.
One of the more "clear-cut" cases of malice, MacNab said, was in early June in Lakeside, Virginia. An "avowed Klansman" drove up to protesters on a roadway, revved his engine, then drove through the crowd, wounding one person, Henrico County Commonwealth's Attorney Shannon Taylor said in a statement.
The 36-year-old man was "a propagandist of Confederate ideology," Taylor said. He was charged with four counts of assault with hate crimes, two counts of felonious attempted malicious wounding and one count of felony hit and run.
A screengrab of a Jeep hitting Black Lives Marchers at a Visalia protest on Saturday.
"We lived through this in Virginia in Charlottesville in 2017," Taylor said, referring to when a neo-Nazi plowed his car through a crowd of counterprotesters at a Unite the Right rally, killing Heather Heyer. The driver was sentenced to life in prison on hate crime charges.
In June in Visalia, California, occupants of a Jeep displaying a "Keep America Great" flag hit two protesters in the road, causing minor injuries, according to Visalia police. Witnesses said those inside the car mocked protesters by cupping their ears as if they couldn't hear their chants. The protesters started chanting profanities and throwing items before they approached the Jeep, which accelerated, hitting the protesters before driving off.
"We lived through this in Virginia in Charlottesville in 2017," Taylor said, referring to when a neo-Nazi plowed his car through a crowd of counterprotesters at a Unite the Right rally, killing Heather Heyer. The driver was sentenced to life in prison on hate crime charges.
In June in Visalia, California, occupants of a Jeep displaying a "Keep America Great" flag hit two protesters in the road, causing minor injuries, according to Visalia police. Witnesses said those inside the car mocked protesters by cupping their ears as if they couldn't hear their chants. The protesters started chanting profanities and throwing items before they approached the Jeep, which accelerated, hitting the protesters before driving off.
Protesters peacefully gathered outside the Tulare County Superior Court in California Monday morning to call for the prosecution of occupants of a Jeep that struck two Visalia activists during a Saturday demonstration.
County prosecutors didn't charge the driver, saying the protesters involved weren't "seriously injured" and the driver and his passengers felt threatened. Other civilians and police officers have similarly claimed that they drove through protesters because they were afraid of them and wanted to escape the situation.
MacNab noted that "some of that fear is going to come from racism and bigotry."
Officials in Minnesota said in June that a 35-year-old semitruck driver who drove through a crowd of thousands of protesters on a bridge did not deliberately target the group.
A lawyer for a man who hit two protesters in Seattle, killing one, said the crash was a "horrible, horrible accident." Prosecutors filed three felony charges against the man.
Videos of vehicle rammings have become 'a meme in white supremacy circles'
Video of many of the vehicle rammings has circulated on social media, including white supremacist websites, according to MacNab, who said she has seen "revolting" commentary on videos shared to white supremacist accounts on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.
"This has become something of a meme in white supremacy circles. There’ll be a picture of a car driving into a crowd, and then there will be a humorous remark about it. It’s definitely part of the discourse," said Daniel Byman, a senior fellow at Brookings who researches counterterrorism and Middle East security. "They’re doing a lot of kidding-not-kidding sort of humor ... which is the modern white supremacist world."
Drivers striking protesters with cars: Indiana has seen at least 3 cases
Byman said earlier this summer that he's seen a meme shared by the Charlottesville killer circulating in white supremacist circles. Right-wing extremists turned the man into "a bit of a saint" after the killing, MacNab said.
County prosecutors didn't charge the driver, saying the protesters involved weren't "seriously injured" and the driver and his passengers felt threatened. Other civilians and police officers have similarly claimed that they drove through protesters because they were afraid of them and wanted to escape the situation.
MacNab noted that "some of that fear is going to come from racism and bigotry."
Officials in Minnesota said in June that a 35-year-old semitruck driver who drove through a crowd of thousands of protesters on a bridge did not deliberately target the group.
A lawyer for a man who hit two protesters in Seattle, killing one, said the crash was a "horrible, horrible accident." Prosecutors filed three felony charges against the man.
Videos of vehicle rammings have become 'a meme in white supremacy circles'
Video of many of the vehicle rammings has circulated on social media, including white supremacist websites, according to MacNab, who said she has seen "revolting" commentary on videos shared to white supremacist accounts on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.
"This has become something of a meme in white supremacy circles. There’ll be a picture of a car driving into a crowd, and then there will be a humorous remark about it. It’s definitely part of the discourse," said Daniel Byman, a senior fellow at Brookings who researches counterterrorism and Middle East security. "They’re doing a lot of kidding-not-kidding sort of humor ... which is the modern white supremacist world."
Drivers striking protesters with cars: Indiana has seen at least 3 cases
Byman said earlier this summer that he's seen a meme shared by the Charlottesville killer circulating in white supremacist circles. Right-wing extremists turned the man into "a bit of a saint" after the killing, MacNab said.
Since the grand jury indictment in the Breonna Taylor case Wednesday, and the protests that have erupted in the ensuing days, the use of particular Twitter hashtags referencing such memes has more than doubled, according to Weil.
"These 'Run Them Over' memes continue to circulate. Twitter said they were going to block the hashtag All Lives Splatter, but it still remains in use," he said.
Vehicles have a history of being used for terror, and 'ISIS made it a science'
Vehicles have been used as tools of terror for decades, but it's become more common in the past 10 years, experts said. The Islamic State disseminated information about how to use the tactic, said Lorenzo Vidino, director of George Washington University's Program on Extremism.
"Between 2014 and 2017, we saw several attacks, and ISIS was very meticulous in a variety of languages that gave clear instructions about what trucks to use, how to rent a truck and how to hit a group," Vidino said. "ISIS made it a science."
Most of those attacks were in Europe and the Middle East, Vidino said. Terrorists influenced by the Islamic State used vehicles to kill people in Nice, France, in 2016 and on London Bridge in 2017. That year, a man influenced by the Islamic State killed eight people when he drove a pickup about 1 mile in Lower Manhattan.
Other extremist groups borrowed the tactic, Vidino said. In 2018, a member of a misogynist online subculture drove a van into downtown Toronto, killing 10 people.
The vehicular attacks have been "the trademark of the affiliated wannabes that are at times extremely deadly," he said. The tactic is cheap and doesn't take much coordination or organizational support. It's also "camera-friendly," Vidino said.
"The Charlottesville attack, it killed one person, but it stuck in everybody’s mind because you have the spectacle of bodies flying. It’s catchy. And that’s what a lot of extremists pursue. It terrorized people," he said.
In the U.S., the tactic was introduced by the far-right around 2016 to attack Black Lives Matter protests and demonstrations against the Dakota Access Pipeline, Weil said in a Twitter thread. That's when "the right began creating memes to celebrate" the attacks, he said.
"I would be very careful in the middle of the street," MacNab said. "There's a significant amount of people who think that any protester hit in the street has it coming, and that’s a dangerous mindset."
Contributing: Sheyanne N. Romero and Kyra Haas, Visalia (California) Times-Delta
Follow Grace Hauck on Twitter at @grace_hauck
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Cars hit people 104 times at BLM protests since George Floyd's death
"These 'Run Them Over' memes continue to circulate. Twitter said they were going to block the hashtag All Lives Splatter, but it still remains in use," he said.
Vehicles have a history of being used for terror, and 'ISIS made it a science'
Vehicles have been used as tools of terror for decades, but it's become more common in the past 10 years, experts said. The Islamic State disseminated information about how to use the tactic, said Lorenzo Vidino, director of George Washington University's Program on Extremism.
"Between 2014 and 2017, we saw several attacks, and ISIS was very meticulous in a variety of languages that gave clear instructions about what trucks to use, how to rent a truck and how to hit a group," Vidino said. "ISIS made it a science."
Most of those attacks were in Europe and the Middle East, Vidino said. Terrorists influenced by the Islamic State used vehicles to kill people in Nice, France, in 2016 and on London Bridge in 2017. That year, a man influenced by the Islamic State killed eight people when he drove a pickup about 1 mile in Lower Manhattan.
Other extremist groups borrowed the tactic, Vidino said. In 2018, a member of a misogynist online subculture drove a van into downtown Toronto, killing 10 people.
The vehicular attacks have been "the trademark of the affiliated wannabes that are at times extremely deadly," he said. The tactic is cheap and doesn't take much coordination or organizational support. It's also "camera-friendly," Vidino said.
"The Charlottesville attack, it killed one person, but it stuck in everybody’s mind because you have the spectacle of bodies flying. It’s catchy. And that’s what a lot of extremists pursue. It terrorized people," he said.
In the U.S., the tactic was introduced by the far-right around 2016 to attack Black Lives Matter protests and demonstrations against the Dakota Access Pipeline, Weil said in a Twitter thread. That's when "the right began creating memes to celebrate" the attacks, he said.
"I would be very careful in the middle of the street," MacNab said. "There's a significant amount of people who think that any protester hit in the street has it coming, and that’s a dangerous mindset."
Contributing: Sheyanne N. Romero and Kyra Haas, Visalia (California) Times-Delta
Follow Grace Hauck on Twitter at @grace_hauck
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Cars hit people 104 times at BLM protests since George Floyd's death
