Trump Administration Plans Crackdown On Protests Outside White House

The admin­is­tra­tion has sug­gest­ed it could charge ‘event man­age­ment’ costs for protests and close 80% of the sidewalks

Donald Trump has fre­quent­ly and false­ly crowed about the idea of so-called paid protesters, includ­ing most recent­ly the sex­u­al assault sur­vivors who con­front­ed sen­a­tors in the lead up to the Brett Kavanaugh con­fir­ma­tion. Now his admin­is­tra­tion may be try­ing to turn that con­cept on its head, by requir­ing cit­i­zens to pay to be able to protest, among oth­er affronts to the first amendment.

Under the pro­pos­al intro­duced by Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke in August, the admin­is­tra­tion is look­ing to close 80% of the side­walks sur­round­ing the White House, and has sug­gest­ed that it could charge “event man­age­ment” costs, for demonstrations.

Currently the National Park Service is able to recoup costs for spe­cial events, but not spon­ta­neous protests like the ones that typ­i­cal­ly take place in Lafayette Park across from the White House. These charges could include the cost of erect­ing bar­ri­ers, clean­ing fees, repairs to grass, per­mit fees and the salaries of offi­cial per­son­nel on hand to mon­i­tor such demon­stra­tions, all tal­lied at the dis­cre­tion of the police.

Naturally, civ­il lib­er­ties groups con­sid­er the pro­pos­als an affront to the rights guar­an­teed under the first amend­ment. As the ACLU notes, such fees “could make mass protests like Martin Luther King Jr’s his­toric 1963 March on Washington and its ‘I have a dream’ speech too expen­sive to happen”.

During the Vietnam War the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment attempt­ed to impose sim­i­lar bar­ri­ers to cit­i­zens freely assem­bling in protest and were sued by the ACLU. In their rul­ing the courts reassert­ed the fact that “the use of parks for pub­lic assem­bly and air­ing of opin­ions is his­toric in our demo­c­ra­t­ic soci­ety, and one of its car­di­nal values”.

The White House side­walk, Lafayette Park, and the Ellipse were unique sites for the exer­cise of those rights, they ruled, and there­fore they could not “accord def­er­ence to an exec­u­tive approach to the use of the White House side­walk that is root­ed in a bias against expres­sive conduct…”

The National Park Service has attempt­ed to jus­ti­fy the pro­pos­al by point­ing out that large protests, like the Women’s March, over­tax their abil­i­ties, and place a heavy cost on the gov­ern­ment. One might argue when it comes to pre­serv­ing our right to protest no cost is too high.

The pub­lic has until 15 October to com­ment on the plans. https://​www​.the​guardian​.com/​u​s​-​n​e​w​s​/​2​0​1​8​/​o​c​t​/​1​2​/​t​r​u​m​p​-​a​d​m​i​n​i​s​t​r​a​t​i​o​n​-​p​l​a​n​s​-​c​r​a​c​k​d​o​w​n​-​o​n​-​p​r​o​t​e​s​t​s​-​o​u​t​s​i​d​e​-​w​h​i​t​e​-​h​o​use