H-town rappers Bun B and Trae tha Truth joined throngs of people flooding Downtown Houston Tuesday for a march that ended at City Hall. We passed a number of folks brandishing signs, on cardboard cutouts and poster paper and computer sheets and Tupperware. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement (updated as of 1/1/21) and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement (updated as of 1/1/21) and Your California Privacy Rights. L. and I made it out of downtown, sticking to side streets. Ad Choices, Sign up for our daily newsletter and get the best of, George Floyd, Houston’s Protests, and Living Without the Benefit of the Doubt, The Tiny Media Collective That Is Delivering Some of the Most Vital Reporting from Minneapolis, George Floyd’s Death Sets Off a Wave of Protests. 166 talking about this. We hadn’t walked five minutes from the edge of Houston’s East End neighborhood, heading downtown toward the march with George Floyd’s family on Tuesday afternoon, when my boyfriend, L., and I saw the first set of cops, staggered beside trucks, adjusting their gear. Floyd grew up in this city. “This is going to be more like a marathon,” a cousin noted. Even if it wasn’t stated explicitly in the march’s notice, it was understood that local officials had a lot riding on the appearance of peaceful proceedings. Several of Floyd’s family members spoke. At the march on Tuesday, organized by George Floyd’s nephew, it was easy to see why Houston is routinely referred to as the most diverse city in the country. L. and I said that we’d actually just come from the march. All Rights Reserved. Race, Policing, and Black Lives Matter Protests The death of George Floyd , in context. Inside, footage of protests in D.C. and L.A. played on a television mounted in the dining room. NOW: Protestors have began a march along Emancipation Ave in 3rd Ward in honor of #GeorgeFloyd . On social media, people inquired after marchers they hadn’t heard from in hours. We passed several groups of black women handing out face masks to passersby. Really. “People have had enough,” Salazar said. Protesters take a knee outside of a police building during a Black Lives Matter protest in Odessa on May 31, 2020. Ignited by the killing of Floyd by a law-enforcement officer, demonstrations targeting racial injustice and police brutality took place nationwide. All rights reserved. Photograph by David J Phillip / AP / Shutterstock, Who, David Remnick asks, is the true agitator behind the, The Black Lives Matter co-founder Opal Tometi on what it would mean to. News | Black Lives Matter A timeline of the George Floyd and anti-police brutality protests Protests over the US police killings of Black people have spread across the US, and worldwide. Republican President Donald Trump criticized the protests and promised to restore law and order, although opinion polls showed Americans largely supportive of Black Lives Matter. We passed a group of nine or ten cops on horses, each of them heavily armed. As the march swelled far beyond the projected several thousand attendees—accumulating, as one friend put it to me in text, “A super big fucking amount of fucking people” (ultimately in the vicinity of sixty-thousand, according to the Houston Chronicle)—all eyes would be on the city of Houston. What they did to him was wrong. There were many “Brown Lives for Black Lives” signs. © COPYRIGHT BLACK LIVES MATTER HOUSTON 2018 - 2020. Marchers were reportedly being led onto buses. Race, Policing, and Black Lives Matter Protests The death of George Floyd, in context. In April and May of this year, there were six in a span of less than six weeks. But Marlon A. Smith, CEO and founder of Black Greeks Speak Social Justice and Human Rights Council, felt it was important to watch again. “It’s good to be out there. In Southwest Houston, a Vietnamese American businessman received death threats and a boycott when he put up a bilingual Black Lives Matter billboard. Police officers have also been riding horses as a form of crowd control. One man’s sign said that he was there because he had five black children and a black grandchild. On our way back toward East End, around five o’clock, we passed a handful of bars, where occupants were drinking and leaning on the patio gates, wearing jerseys and shades, and eyeing marchers (most of these folks were white), and also a group playing soccer on an indoor court, entirely removed from the proceedings—reminders of just what a massive city we live in. It wasn’t long before most of the crowd began to disperse accordingly, but some folks, entirely peacefully, did not—and this was when the trouble began. Every handful of steps or so, a marcher nearby seemed to note that their social-media postings weren’t going through. Archbishop Welby's comments follow an eruption of Black Lives Matter protests across the world following the death of George Floyd, a black man from Minneapolis man who was killed by police. To revisit this article, select My⁠ ⁠Account, then View saved stories. Texas Legislature 2021 session: 5 things to watch, New season of 'The Rookie' returns after May cliffhanger, George Floyd's daughter receives bedroom makeover, Potential jurors in George Floyd case asked if they support BLM, Woman charged after leading deputies to car with body inside, Here's how strong the cold wind will gust Friday, Biden unveils $1.9T COVID relief plan with new stimulus checks, Houston father hopeful for Biden's $1.9T COVID-19 plan, Dog involved in attack on 3-year-old girl now in custody, New York City bus left dangling from overpass after crash, 8 injured, 'Do you need help?' ... Texas, grew frustrated by a void of activism in their affluent Houston suburb. One sign simply read “Black Mama.” Many signs listed only names: Tamir Rice, Sandra Bland, Tony McDade, Atatiana Jefferson. Yes. But, whereas the officers we’d seen before had been languishing, these were adjusting their mikes and fastening their helmets. HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- Black Lives Matter Houston held a second protest and march for George Floyd in Emancipation Park on Saturday. Black Lives Matter Houston is an organization that addresses the issues that affects Black folks and collaborates with partners to build a healthy, educated and financially stable Black community. Once our segment of the crowd made it to City Hall, the pace stalled, and then stopped, and the marchers immediately took up chanting. Like no other news outlet, Unicorn Riot brings an intimacy and intensity to its coverage of the protests against police brutality following the killing of George Floyd. (“If they bust their asses out here, who the fuck is gonna come save them?” a woman beside us said.) I saw several “Black Trans Lives Matter” signs. Bad faith comparisons between the attack on the Capitol and the Black Lives Matter protests over the summer ignore that only one of those has a legitimate complaint. Tomorrow we will be joining March for Our Lives Houston in rallying and protesting the injustices done to Breonna Taylor and the injustices being perpetrated in our courts. Live report at 6 #Abc13 pic.twitter.com/JgF8WwQIEN, Powerful moment during protest for #GeorgeFloyd in his 3rd Ward neighborhood. Activist gets on the ground in the very position Floyd lost his life as officer kneeled on his neck. They had spray-painted a clenched black fist on it, with the words “Black Lives Matter.” A crowd of young protesters surrounding it whooped and cheered. Our makeshift group increased our pace a half step quicker. Will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy. Before the march started, Bun B had called for participants to kneel for thirty seconds of silence, in memory of Floyd. We watched several cruisers and trucks inch along. HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- Black Lives Matter Houston held a second protest and march for George Floyd in Emancipation Park on Saturday. In June, U.S. Park Police and National Guard troops, clad in riot gear, used pepper spray to clear the area outside the White House of protesters so Trump could walk to St. John's Church and pose for a photo holding up a … Some marchers, many of them black, rode in on horseback, gently ambling along. He repeated calls for a peaceful walk: “We ain’t gonna shed a drop of blood in Houston, Texas.” The march was already well on its way by the time L. and I slipped into the stream, pushing onto Walker Street, hooking just past Discovery Green and farther into the city. In the course of the evening, information making it out of the city’s downtown grid was scarce at best, but some details filtered through, in videos of marchers in the area: the police presence had fully solidified, and routes outside of the downtown had been blocked off. The event, however it went, would have international visibility. A handful walked alone, carrying signs and adjusting face masks and hopscotching across the toasting pavement. June 10 Black Lives Matter protests By Melissa Macaya, Mike Hayes, Meg Wagner , Joshua Berlinger , Steve George and Peter Wilkinson , CNN Updated 12:44 a.m. In the midst of mass unrest all over the States, Houston’s protests thus far had seemed considerably calmer: no curfew had been enforced; no mass destruction or disruption had taken place downtown; arrests had been made, three hundred and fifty in total, but they had looked nothing like the violent scenes of police playing out in other cities. A number of current and former public health officials also expressed concerns that mass protests would lead to a spike in COVID-19 clusters, including Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Robert R. Redfield, U.S. After taking our order, the woman behind the register noted, offhand, that the damage done to those cities was a shame. The woman asked why we’d gone, and we told her. Simon Kent 26 Jul 2020. The civil-rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson examines the frustration and despair behind the protests. An official page dedicated to linking activists and supporters of the #BlackLivesMatter movement in Houston. A woman’s sign said that she’d attended because black women need to be protected. Trae tha Truth spoke. https://t.co/VxVBjbhxZv pic.twitter.com/WkDzsenJ7t, HPD Chief speaks after marching in Third Ward. Something has to change.”. Protesters in at least four cities have ridden horses during protests to cheers from the crowd. One person was killed after shots were fired Saturday night at a Black Lives Matter protest in Austin, Texas, local police said. Others began congregating at intersections leading out of the city, nearly a mile away from the Discovery Green park, where the march would officially begin, winding its way from there through the city until it reached City Hall. On Wednesday morning, the Houston police department announced that it had arrested more than two hundred people the previous night. The march swelled to nearly sixty thousand attendees, according to the Houston Chronicle—far more than the projected several thousand. The Black Lives Matter movement became an international phenomenon in 2020. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast. The city’s mayor, Sylvester Turner, was said to be making an appearance. His grieving family members would be participating in the march. Our ultimate goal is to pave a path for Black power and liberation where it is understood that ALL BLACK LIVES MATTER. The afternoon’s march had been coördinated by Floyd’s nephew Brandon Williams, alongside the local rappers Bun B and Trae tha Truth. We passed one set of cops after another and then a set of city buses lounging under a bridge, with more police in riot gear bunched up beside them. Eventually, clusters of walkers began to merge—two became four, who became nine, who became fifteen, who became thirty. A few hours later, we’d learn that—literally moments after we’d left the march’s epicenter—the police had notified everyone remaining, on loudspeakers, that the event was over. Police say waitress saved abused boy, Katy ISD football player hurt in crash will go home soon, Check out these FREE Houston-area events this weekend, ABC13's Art Rascon shares his COVID-19 experience, FBI Houston tracking down threats ahead of Inauguration Day, Novavax COVID-19 vaccine trial underway in Houston, Houston leaders call for peace as George Floyd protesters gather for 2nd day, Derek Chauvin, police officer accused in George Floyd's death, charged with murder, Mayor Turner asks residents to report anyone intending to do violence while protesting, Family members of George Floyd speaks out after protests in Houston. “The one downtown?” the woman asked. Copyright © 2021 KTRK-TV. She pursed her lips, frowning, and I braced myself for what she was going to say. The civil-rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson examines the frustration and despair behind the protests. We passed a man in a Joker mask waving from a stop sign, imploring passersby to watch where the money was flowing. The weather was hot and humid in the way that Houston gets this time of year, and the heat emanating from the crowd increased in tandem. A group of motorcyclists made its way through the crowd blasting chopped-and-screwed rap, at one point pausing to stand on the bikes. Despite the city’s lack of a curfew, it was, apparently, time to go home. The White Lives Matter protest comes at a tense time for Houston and the country. The mass protests occurred during the global COVID-19 pandemic and officials and experts warned they could facilitate an accelerated or rebounding spread of COVID-19. Naturally, the public conversation has turned to the question of what this moment means, and where we will go from here. But she only nodded. Everyone remaining in the area would be in violation of the law. But, at the end of the day, a man is dead. Lil Nas X, of "Old Town Road" fame, retweeted a video of a group of people riding on horses to a Houston Black Lives Matter protest on Tuesday. 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