It was a peaceful protest outside the Ohio Statehouse. Then it was a crowd of Proud Boys wailing on Dejuan Sharp.
The brawl came a few hours later.
Sharp, a Black man, attended the Jan. 6 protest along with other Black Lives Matter activists when, by his account, a Proud Boy in a baseball helmet called him a “n—er.”
At that point, he crossed from the west side of High Street to the east, where the Proud Boys gathered.
Several recordings of events reviewed by the Ohio Capital Journal don’t clearly show who made the first move. Sharp said in an interview he was hit by a whip. Then he swung.
The Proud Boys, a street gang clad in black and yellow with a reputation for starting fights with liberal activists, can then be seen in a chaotic fistfight with Sharp, knocking him to the ground. Multiple members threw punches while he was down.
All this occurred roughly 50 yards from the seat of state government just after noon. The Proud Boys joined supporters of President Donald Trump in baselessly claiming election fraud.
Shortly after the fight subsided, separate footage from the Columbus Dispatch shows Sharp talking to a man in the middle of the street as another large man in a tactical vest approaches from Sharp’s blind side and throws a right hook landing on Sharp’s jaw.
The violent day of protesting ended in a brawl between Proud Boys and Black Lives Matter activists. Mike Linscott-Hill, one activist loosely affiliated with BLM, said his 17-year-old son, who is white, winded up needing stitches in his lip. Separate footage shows a masked Proud Boy throw a left fist at the teenager. He did not appear to be engaged in the rumble.
Watching it all unfurl were throngs of supporters of President Donald Trump, many wielding assault style rifles, shotguns and handguns. Some with the BLM activists were armed but the weapons were much less prevalent.
All the while, a mob of insurrectionists in Washington D.C. was in the process of successfully breaching the walls of the U.S. Capitol as Congress voted to certify the Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election. The violent effort, which left five dead including a U.S. Capitol Police officer, served as a last-ditch effort to overturn the election — an effort fueled on a lie repeated by Trump and his supporters that Biden won by widespread fraud.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2Fjake_zuckerman&dnt=true&embedId=twitter-widget-1&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1349843343698763779&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fohiocapitaljournal.com%2F2021%2F01%2F15%2Fthe-last-statehouse-protests-ended-in-fistfights-now-officials-worry-for-inauguration-violence%2F&siteScreenName=OhioCapJournal&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px
No evidence has substantiated claims of widespread fraud. Courts have dismissed a long spread of lawsuits alleging fraud, and elections officials around the country from both major political parties have dismissed the idea of fraud at enough scale to swing any state’s election.
Staff Lt. Craig Cvetan of the Ohio State Highway Patrol said Thursday no charges have been filed in connection with the fights at the Statehouse last week.
Bracing for impact
Officials fear violent demonstrations at the U.S. Capitol and outside all 50 state Capitols this weekend. This is true in Ohio, though Gov. Mike DeWine declined to detail what evidence is raising this concern.
Along with deploying 700 Ohio National Guard troops to assist in Washington D.C., he said guardsmen will be “out in force” in Columbus, as will the Ohio State Highway Patrol, the force that protects the state Capitol grounds.
Through 2020, guns were a fixture at political demonstrations in Ohio. They were simply everywhere: lockdown protests in spring and racial justice protests in summer were pockmarked with long guns. Three members of the “Ohio State Regular Militia” patrolled the Capitol in November the day networks projected Biden won — they would go on to join the Capitol invasion Jan. 6.
Speaking to reporters, DeWine deflected questions about guns at protests and last week’s fistfights at the Statehouse. He declined to share specific details of the purported threats this weekend but said officials are always concerned about security.
“We have other information, frankly, which I’m not going to talk about,” he said. “So we have a heightened sense of concern, but we’ve always been concerned about security. The focus is always on protecting human life.”
Mary McCord, a Georgetown University law professor and former DOJ official, said it’s difficult to predict right now exactly what will happen this weekend or how real the threat level is. Some on the right say the alleged protests on Capitols are “law enforcement traps” or “antifa” — the go-to boogeyman of MAGA and right-wing extremism.
The law enforcement in Columbus Jan. 6 was perhaps lax because officers sought to avoid the heavy-handed approaches deployed during unrest this summer. McCord said the police response might be more aggressive after the rioters outnumbered and overpowered Capitol Police last week.
“I think in part what you’re seeing now is a realization: ‘We blew it,’” she said.
A reporter received a candid answer from the OSHP chief after asking how many people are expected this weekend.
“We don’t have any idea,” said Col. Richard Fambro.
Cancel culture
Whether unrest will emerge this weekend is unclear.
What’s evident is many are taking the threat seriously enough to cancel a spread of different political demonstrations — a gut punch given the upcoming MLK day and the traditionally celebratory-turned-militant Inauguration Day.
The Columbus Dispatch reports several demonstrations to honor Andre Hill, an unarmed Black man recently killed by police, as well as an MLK Day event have been canceled.
Speaking earlier this week, Sharp said he was thinking he’ll probably stay home and urging his friends to do the same.
“They’re gonna try to put on a show for the cameras, or whatever Parler posts,” he said. “Me going down there and fighting them isn’t gonna change any laws in Columbus.”
In a text Thursday, he said he’s planning to come demonstrate, but not right in front of the Statehouse.
Linscott-Hill said he and some other BLM activists will be buzzing around the Capitol.
Franklin County Clerk of Courts Maryellen O’Shaughnessy closed county court buildings through Jan. 20.
Judi Phelps, a conservative activist seldom seen without a pistol holstered to her thigh, said “that’s a big no” when asked whether she’s planning any demonstration.
“This is all a false flag, it’s not something that any one of the groups that I’m associated with has any knowledge of,” she said. “To my knowledge, the Proud Boys are not coming out either.”
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Also from Ohio Capital Journal:
DeWine starts working with incoming Biden administration on coronavirus
As officials scramble to work out kinks in getting the covid vaccine into Ohioans’ arms, Gov. Mike DeWine on Thursday said he’s started talks with members of the incoming administration of President-elect Joe Biden.
DeWine, a Republican, stressed that he’s had a good working relationship with the administration of outgoing President Donald Trump — and particularly with Vice President Mike Pence, who headed up Trump’s Coronavirus Task Force.
However, Trump has long been criticized for checking out of the fight against a pandemic that will have killed around 400,000 Americans by the time he leaves office next Wednesday. As the number of vaccinations administered has fallen far short of promises, the administration was criticized for supplying states with vaccines and largely leaving them to figure out the hugely complex task of distributing and administering them.
Days after Biden announced plans to release all of the vaccine supply — instead of holding half back for second doses — the Trump administration on Tuesday announced its own sweeping revisions, including by releasing the entire supply. READ MORE
Ohio congressmen, including Bob Latta, take issue with U.S. Capitol metal detectors; supported them in schools
Three Ohio congressmen have reportedly taken issue with new metal detectors installed outside the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives, objecting to increased security measures put in place after insurrectionists stormed the U.S. Capitol building just a week ago.
All three of them — Reps. Steve Stivers of Upper Arlington, Bob Gibbs of Lakeville and Bob Latta of Bowling Green — previously supported efforts to install metal detectors in school buildings as a method of preventing school violence.
The U.S. House of Representatives met Tuesday evening to debate a resolution asking Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove President Donald Trump from office. The body convened again Wednesday morning to consider a vote to impeach the president for his actions related to the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol which left five people dead, including a police officer.
Metal detectors were recently installed within the building.
Rebecca Card Angelson, Latta’s deputy chief of staff, said in a statement the representative did trigger the metal detector.
“(Congressman Latta) has the utmost respect for the Capitol police and the work they do to keep the Capitol grounds and all who are on it safe,” Angelson wrote. “This is a new procedure in place and the Congressman did display his phone and keys as he went through the metal detectors so the police officers could see why the alarm was triggered. The Congressman did not hear anything further from the Capitol Police as he went through the metal detector, so the Congressman proceeded to the House floor to vote.” READ MORE
Walters elected new chair of Ohio Democratic Party
Elizabeth Walters, a member at-large of the Summit County Council, was elected the new chair of the Ohio Democratic Party.
Walters is the first woman ever to lead the state party. She replaces David Pepper, who stepped down after six years as chairman at the end of 2020.
Andre Washington, the president of the Ohio A. Randolph Randolph Association, was elected vice chair.
Speaking via Zoom conference, Walters and party leaders spoke of the need for the Ohio Democratic Party to move forward in a different direction. Walters inherits a party seeking a change of fortune at the ballot box following back-to-back 8-point victories in Ohio by President Trump; Republicans also hold all six statewide executive offices, supermajorities in both chambers of the Ohio General Assembly and a narrow majority on the Ohio Supreme Court.
“We’re going to be in an exciting time to evolve this party to something new, something that is responsive to the needs of our activists and our voters and our candidates,” Walters said shortly before being elected, “and make it sustainable for the long run so we can elect Democrats statewide from precinct committees all the way up to the federal level.” READ MORE
