A statue of George Washington that dates back to 1926 was toppled by an angry mob of Black Lives Matter demonstrators on the evening of Juneteenth in Portland, Oregon.
The protest had a few hundred demonstrators and a few angry men split out of them. They threw hot dogs at the police and cut the fence surrounding the Justice Center. Another group of protesters became wild as they overturned the statue of George Washington and set fire around it. The responsible participants also set the American flag alight and draped it around the statue.
Nationwide protests have erupted after the murder of George Floyd at the hands of a White cop in Minneapolis. The demonstrators have been demanding justice for all of the members of the Black community around the country who undergo racial discrimination and injustice in their everyday lives.
This happened on Thursday night as footage and scene pictures circulating on social media shows the graffiti on the pedestals of the statue that reads ‘Genocidal colonist’.
George Washington is known for owning several Black slaves and his long-run fight with the Natives on a piece of land. He also supported bills passed by Congress for protecting slavery. However, he freed all of his slaves on his plantation in his 1799 will.
Originally it was supposed to be a sit-in rally of two groups, Rose City Justice and Lavender Caucus, at Jefferson High School where members of Black community were to share their experiences of racial injustice in a crowd of hundreds of listeners.
Nonetheless, a group of around 20 people separated from them and created a mess at the site. The outrage has risen to another height in BLM protests as the demonstrators have started targeting the statues of the fathers of the nation and the colonists.
Amidst the new trend of tearing status, such as Thomas Jefferson’s near Jefferson High School, the California lawmakers have decided to move the statue of Christopher Columbus from the state Capitol.