Much Of California Under Curfew As Unrest Continues

By Emily Hoeven, from CalMatters:

There are now two official states of emergency in California — one statewide due to the coronavirus pandemic and one in Los Angeles County in response to protests following the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police a week ago today.

Gov. Gavin Newsom proclaimed Los Angeles to be in a state of emergency shortly before midnight Saturday, deploying members of the National Guard to help the county respond to arson, looting, vandalism and violent clashes between protesters and police.

As peaceful daytime protests gave way to violent night disruptions across California over the weekend, urban centers like Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, Beverly Hills and Santa Monica instituted curfews — some starting as early as 1 p.m. and others lasting indefinitely. Nevertheless, protests — some violent — continued in a number of cities on Sunday night.

• Newsom in a Saturday statement: “There are indications that violent actors may be attempting to use these protests for their own agendas. To those who seek to exploit Californians’ pain to sow chaos and destruction, you are not welcome.”

The extent of the damage incurred on Saturday night — both fiscal and personal — is unclear but clearly staggering. A federal officer was shot and killed in Oakland. Protestors and police were injured. One San Francisco jeweler whose business was looted said, “I can’t put a dollar estimate on it. My wife is devastated. She’s been here since 1991. She built this over almost 30 years.”

Sunday saw community members and leaders gather in cities across the state to clean up broken glass, scrub away graffiti, fix broken doors and support business owners facing hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage and stolen merchandise on top of losses incurred by the coronavirus pandemic.

• Noel Jones, a Jamaican-American Pentecostal bishop at Los Angeles’ City of Refuge Church: “This is an all-too familiar experience, and our suffering is real. But violence is not the solution. Coming across the aisle of our separation and the paradoxes that create the problems that fuel these types of outbursts, that is the remedy that we have to find that sustains peace.”

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