Coverage has been extensive of last weekend’s violence in Atlanta following law enforcement shooting and killing a person referred to as environmental activist. The official statement of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation has consistently been that the so-called activist fired first on the state trooper.
Rioting, as opposed to protesting, has been inflicted upon Atlanta since that shooting. As reported, “Gov. Brian Kemp has declared a state of emergency in response to the weekend’s violent protests over a public safety training facility. The declaration allows kemp to call up to a thousand Georgia National Guard members over the next 15 days.”
A video embedded in this article presents a brief statement quoting the governor as saying that the declaration of the State of Emergency is “to help subdue riots and unlawful assembly.” Governor Brian Kemp issued the Executive Order declaring the state of emergency as a pre-emptive action “ahead of potential anti-police protests in Atlanta” over the weekend.
Shown in the article was 5-page Executive Order signed by the Governor. The Executive Order began with this clause: “State of Georgia Executive Order: Whereas in the evening of January 21, protests in downtown Atlanta turned violent as masked activists threw rock, launched fireworks and burned a police vehicle in front of the Atlanta Police Foundation office building and..” The Order continued with dozens of additional ‘Whereas” clauses.
The FOX 5 Atlanta Digital Team news coverage expressed the risk that there may be future Atlanta demonstrations and violence causally linked to the death in Memphis, Tennessee of Tyre Nichols, a Black motorist who died three days after a traffic stop confrontation. Further enflaming the “anti-police movement in Atlanta could be the charging of five former Memphis police officers with second-degree murder and other crimes in the arrest for Nichols’ death.