Continued from part I.

Leaving the Xcel Center, I walk outside and search for whatever gate will spit me out of the security zone the closest to the State Capitol. Riot police are shadowing a march organized by the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign and that march is scheduled to pass by the Capitol building and pick up some of the crowd from the Ripple Effect concert, where it is rumored Rage Against the Machine will be playing. It’ll be a convergence of sorts and things will either go well or they won’t.

A band called Anti-Flag is playing in front of the Capitol building when I show up. They’re playing a song called “Fuck Police Brutality” — but the mood is not heavy. There are riot police strolling around almost casually. One emerges from a portable bathroom and offers his hand to a partner with a grin. Another uses his long baton as a walking stick.

I’m getting reports of a robust police presence alongside the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights march, which is getting closer. I go out to find it and don’t. What I do find is riot police gathering at every intersection I can see along a street out of sight of the concert-goers. And they’re moving in.

I walk a wide perimeter around the Capitol area and find police gathering everywhere.

Behind the Capitol building, well out of view, bike-mounted police have gathered.

And now Rage Against the Machine is ready to go on. The sheriff is saying no. Riot police have taken positions behind the stage. The crowd is becoming angry. “Let them play! Let them play!”

The band finds its way into the crowd and a made-for-YouTube moment ensues: The band is leading the crowd in chanted renditions of its songs. Culminating in a roaring rendition of a song that climaxes with the chant: “Fuck you I won’t do what you tell me!” And somehow, this has seemed to calm people. They are getting their show. Suddenly the band members run towards the closest street, their entire crowd following them just as the marchers are arriving on the scene with their massive police escort.

Early lore already has the band leading the march. Not so. They ran directly to three idling blue Ford Expeditions. Drivers with coiled cables entering their ears like the Secret Service jumped into drivers seats and the bands motorcade honked its way through the marchers before speeding off.

The march looks and feels different from the others so far. There are familiar elements, to be sure. But it’s also a much more ethnically diverse group than the other marches and gatherings. Also, there are children in strollers and people in wheelchairs. And though they do not know it, they are marching into what, to my eyes, is the biggest single army of riot police since the convention began. I count exactly 100 riot police waiting for them several blocks away where the march is supposed to turn right.

When that right-hand turn goes off smoothly there are more riot police at the next intersection — and the one after that.

Just ahead of the Poor People’s Campaign organizers leading the march are four young men, dressed mostly in black, with black bandannas tied behind their heads in the fashion of cowboy bandits. This is the uniform of some of the protesters who did damage and became violent on Monday. A woman carrying a pink flag with a peace symbol on it comes up from behind them. There is no indication they were planning anything other than to finish out the march, but she is not convinced.

WOMAN: (referring to the black-clad riot police) Don’t become them!

YOUNG MAN IN BLACK: (to friend) What is this lady complaining about?

WOMAN: You’re taking their bait! What would have been a better headline today? What does your violence say?

YOUNG MAN IN BLACK: It says we can take back the power — and if more people would be fucking with us…

WOMAN: (pointing to the young men and yelling to the marchers) They’re trying to define us!

The march reaches its end at the walls of the Xcel’s security zone. Riot police stand behind the cage-like walls with pepper-spray canisters drawn.

Cheri Honkala, one of the organizers of the march, takes a bullhorn and gets a boost on a friend’s shoulders.

“Listen up! … we want to thank all of you for a peaceful march today (cheers) … We wanna show what kind of disciplined army we’ve got to put an end to poverty, hunger and homelessness!”

Next she orders the crowd to repeat her words–which they do:

“I promise …

“To be peaceful …

“Because we are nonviolent …

“We have people who are in wheelchairs …

“We have little, tiny, newborn babies …

“And children in strollers …

“So I promise not to do any dumb shit!”

Honkala also announced her intention to walk into the RNC security zone to deliver a giant American flag and notice of a citizen’s arrest for “crimes against humanity.” She did not name names.

And with that, she walked to the gate, escorted by supporters who sang: “I went back to the rich man’s home and took back what the rich man stole…”

She slipped the flag under the security wall and stuck the notice of arrest through a slot. “I want to practice my First Amendment rights,” she said through a bullhorn. “But not through a cage.”

And she walked back to her marchers, who began to turn around. Many — maybe 100 — remained. It is difficult to say how many of those people joined the march at the Capitol building. One protester, betraying dashed hopes for a clash, struck a street sign with his open hand and stormed off. An uncertain but still protest-inclined crowd remained.

Riot police were spilling into position from behind a building — the Dorothy Day Center (a homeless shelter). Playing on a giant screen fixed to the side of the Xcel there were photos, one after another, of John McCain’s war days.

The police began their march on the marchers — attempting to flush them out from the dead-end street where they had concluded their march.

People moved — some quicker than others.

Two women just ahead of the police line tried to unlock their bikes. The police line descended on them and one officer gave the women a hard shove with his baton. A protester yelled out: “This shit is sick, dude!” Another cried out: “Leave the bikes!” The police relented somewhat and the bikes were freed.

An officer announced the imminent use of chemical agents.

As the remaining protesters chanted “Whose streets!? Our streets!”, another line of riot police could be seen running into position behind them. Best anybody could tell in the early darkness, they were being surrounded, although I could see no indication of the kind of violence that might prompt such a tactical maneuver.

And that’s what it was from that point on: tactical. Like a military exercise. The display of law enforcement resources was staggering. Riot police could be seen in all directions, some with rifles for firing non-lethal “impact rounds” pointed at the protesters.

By now some of the protesters had left the dead-end street and were headed toward the Capitol. Then came the explosions and the smoke bombs. They sounded like sound grenades — or concussion bombs. They made an incredible sound. Screams could be heard and smoke seen rising. I ran with others to the scene of the explosions, but we were blocked by police.

Somebody shouted: “Which way do you want us to go?” There was no clear answer. Then suddenly the police parted a small bit and one of them yelled “Go now or be arrested. Go! Go! Go! Go!”

Once we turned the corner the police were quick to create another wall behind us. In front of us, a spectacle: a street lined with riot police — shoulder to shoulder — that stretched for blocks.

It was an exceptionally uneven response to what I and others had witnessed of the march. There were rogues, sure. But rogues of the insult-spitting variety. And occasionally there was a protester inspired to merely stand still or lay down before the police. Those incidents were limited and brief. Mostly, as police advanced, protesters retreated.

It went on like this — it seemed at times to go on forever. Watching the protesters and the police make their moves, both ever so slowly, was like watching a newborn’s eyes as its brain works out the world in front of it.

The police formed their final line alongside Babani’s Kurdish Restaurant, where blinds were mostly drawn and worried faces could be seen peeking through them.

Finally, after the charging, the shooting, one squirt of pepper spray and the unspoken threat of a small army heavy with gear and weaponry, an officer walked ahead of the crowd and gestured for members of the ever-present Minnesota Peace Team — self-selected nonviolent observers at the protests.

I stepped in on the conversation. Out of the gas mask and through the visor came a small, high voice: “We’d really like to collapse this line. If we can get people to go westbound we’d really appreciate it. Thank you.”

The Minnesota Peace Team members communicated the message to a dozen or so protesters and onlookers:

It was a process repeated one more time and then it was over. People stood for a few moments — shocked, confused, wondering which direction was west — and then cleared out. Police removed their gas masks and marched back the way they came.

All photos by Jeff Severns Guntzel. Contact him at jsguntzel at gmail dot com.

Though thousands marched through the streets of St. Paul today without incident, it was difficult to ignore a roving group of protesters who were sometimes marching and sometimes dashing their way through a parade route they reinvented by the minute.

The police gave chase from the beginning, even as less ambitious protesters gathered on the State Capitol lawn for the sanctioned march. Cell phones were abuzz with word of law enforcement officers in riot gear gathering at multiple intersections. There were early reports of pepper spray.

I left the State Capitol before the marchers did, alternately shadowing riot police and the roving protesters. For hours the game was the same: mostly black-clad protesters would round a corner chanting and dancing. The black-clad riot police would form columns. There would be a tense standoff and then, as quickly as they came, the protesters would disappear around another corner. It went on and on like this and eventually I gave up and went for water.

Then I received a Twitter message on my phone from user RNCo8announce:

We are now at the reconvergence time 3:15. There is confirmed activity of a group marching north on wabasha from 4th

Rushing to the spot, I passed this:

It was a Minneapolis Police Department squad being hauled away on a flatbed. The game had changed. Throughout downtown a handful of the day’s protesters had become much more aggressive, even violent. By the time I found the “reconvergence” it was at Kellogg Boulevard, where its participants were dragging newspaper boxes and trash receptacles into the street to block traffic — delegates or otherwise. Riot police looked on, but made no move. A few of the inconvenienced drivers left their cars to clear the roadblock themselves.

The mood among the protesters was still somewhat festive at this point. The Dead Kennedys were blaring from a stereo strapped to a wagon.

The protesters moved up the road until they were in front of the Crowne Plaza Hotel — RNC home to Texas delegates. Smooth-jazz-infused pop music was playing from speakers mounted in the hotel’s awning.

Nearby, a wall of National Guard troops with shields and batons stood two deep behind a row of police in riot gear. An officer with a bullhorn announced “This is your final chance!” — the crowd control chemicals were next. The police began marching forward, their rhythmic chanting (”Move! Move! Move!”) hushed by their gas masks.

They stopped to give the protesters one more chance to move along, which the energetic mob had done reliably all day. The riot police made a hole and horse-mounted police — horses and police wearing gas masks — approached the protesters and brushed up against them:

The protesters stayed where they were. The riot police advanced again and stopped. A woman confronted them, yelling: “I hope your parents see you on YouTube!”

An Associated Press photographer stood ready — very ready:

As most people — protesters, reporters and curious onlookers — watched from the sidewalks and green space along Kellogg, one protester pleaded from the street in a hoarse voice: “Get off the sidewalks and into the streets! These are our streets!”

In the distance, a lone drummer beat a snare drum at a heartbeat’s pace.

With voices made nasal and hushed behind their gas masks, the riot police yelled:

“Hold up!”

“Watch your line!”

“You guys tighten this up in here! Hold the line!”

Soon there was another advance, this one a bit faster. An officer took the red pepper spray canister from its thigh-holster and sprayed — sweeping from the protester in front of him to the reporters, myself included, at his side (all of us wore our press passes in plain view). We were just 20 minutes into the “reconvergence.”

In a fleeting moment of complicated levity a protester matched that initial burst of pepper spray with his own burst of Silly String, yelling: “You’ve been shot!”

Public Enemy’s “911 is a Joke” played from the wagon.

Now they were spraying in earnest, entangled as they were in Silly String. The cans were routinely misfiring and being tossed to the ground. There were sirens.

An observer for the National Lawyers Guild, clearly marked, was sprayed extensively from a roughly two foot distance just after this photo was taken:

Next it was a blue smoke canister. The AP reporter with the mask can be seen running from the street at the right:

After that, it was the “impact rounds” — fired from a 40mm rifle. Riot police fired these repeatedly during the Kellogg Boulevard incident and at other points during the day.

At one point a young male, one of the protesters, charged the line of riot police. He was tackled and struggled a bit against the force of four fully-uniformed riot police.

Finally, there were the exploding tear gas canisters. A few seconds after they are tossed by law enforcement they explode, creating a fog of tear gas and sometimes a torch-like flame.

At one point, an officer looked in my direction (there were others behind me) and tossed a canister that landed at my feet. I jumped as it exploded and ran back to snap this picture:

This guy, a photojournalist with official RNC press credentials, was soaked with pepper spray and collapsed at the feet of protester-medics once the chaos had ended.

I witnessed only two arrests when it was all over, which meant the roving protesters were roving again. The riot police stayed in formation — a line covering the entire width of Kellogg, its sidewalks, and its green space. One officer left the line to clear out yet another roadblock, assembled from, among other things, this:

With the air clear but the riot police still in formation, a bus lumbered up next to where the soaked photojournalist had collapsed just a few minutes earlier. It was a bus chartered by the Humphrey Institute. Two riders exited and paid no mind to the grimacing reporters and onlookers all around them.

From the bridge behind the bus, you could see — and hear — this:

The tear gas below was quick to waft up to onlookers on the bridge, with children among them. It was another brutal burn and a first taste for people who had simply wandered onto the scene. This riverside game of cat and mouse ended with the largest number of arrests of the day — bringing the total to at least 284 by late evening.

All photos by Jeff Severns Guntzel, who can be reached at jsguntzel at gmail.com

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