Destroying property is a crime. That’s true if the culprit is a single vandal, or a group of people involved in rioting. However, peaceful protesting is a protected right under the First Amendment. Maybe.
A Republican Washington state senator who supported Donald Trump is proposing a bill that would slap an “economic terrorism” label on protest activities already prohibited by law and dramatically intensify their penalties.
Those activities earning a “terrorism” label go way beyond the kind of violence you might expect.
The proposed bill would allow police to charge protesters who “block transportation and commerce, cause property damage, threaten jobs and put public safety at risk” with a class C felony.
Blocking traffic is a tactic often used to bring attention to protests. Currently, protesters who are arrested are charged with a misdemeanor and released, but a felony charge would bring significant fines and jail or probation. It can also result in at least temporary loss of voting rights and limit rights of association.
Terms like “threaten jobs and put public safety at risk” provide for an extremely wide interpretation. If protesters march past a store, are they “blocking commerce”? Is marching in any street potentially putting public safety at risk?
And if you think that you’re not at risk because you don’t get out and protest, think again …
The Republican state senator said similar charges would apply to those who “fund, organize, sponsor” such protests, and the bill would force such individuals to “pay restitution up to triple the amount of economic damage” done.
The bill would make it possible to charge anyone who ever participated in a protest, or anyone who ever funded an organization that was involved in a protest, on the vaguest hint of “impeding business” or affecting “public safety.”
Yes, blocking traffic—either of vehicles or customers—is already a crime, but it’s one that’s rarely enforced and which results in relatively minor charges.
In Washington state, intentionally interfering with or obstructing pedestrian or vehicle traffic can result in a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $1,000 and/or imprisonment of up to 90 days. Under Ericksen’s proposal to make these activities a class C felony, the same activity could result in five years in prison, a $10,000 fine or both.
It’s no surprise that the author of this bill also contends that protesters against Trump have been secretly funded by “wealthy donors.”
When they’re characterizing the size and nature of whole protests, how hard would it be to destroy the lives of individual protesters?