On the recordJuly 23, 2020
I thank my colleague from Connecticut for bringing his experience in the legal world to bear on this extraordinary development of secret police being deployed on the streets of America. As we heard from the President, he wants to expand this model. It was first in DC. Then it was Portland. Now he is talking about Philadelphia and Baltimore, Chicago and Detroit, Oakland. In other words, all across America, as the President says, where there happens to be Democratic mayors, he wants to go create that same mayhem. Thank you for bringing your expertise to bear on this. I had just read the story from Krista about the moms and the protesters all getting, as she put, it ``GASSED BAD.'' She said, ``It was brutal. . . . coughing and burning 4 hours later.'' Then she closes with, ``C'mon dads . . . we have [to have] meaningful change. Don't give up. . . . `' I was thinking about what I am describing, as I read these stories, or what these women are describing is the transition from this setting, where women are dancing; they are holding flowers; they are singing; they are chanting; they are eating ribs; and what unfolded a few moments later. And what unfolded? Two of these stories, so far, have described the sudden appearance of large men in camouflage, armed with sidearms, who shortly started to shoot them, gas them, spray them, throw flashbang grenades, tackle them--in one case, hogtie a woman who was a few feet away.…





