The leftist group Shut Down D.C. is organizing “protests” for Election Day and the days afterward. While the group’s pitiful attempt to “shut down” the nation’s capital city for a climate protest in 2019 barely resonated, the rise of antifa and Black Lives Matter riots in the wake of the death of George Floyd over the summer has energized leftist agitators. As rioters have ravaged cities like Portland, Seattle, and Kenosha, Shut Down D.C. has new life — and it is planning to target conservative organizations after Election Day.
Mainstream conservative organizations like the Heritage Foundation, the Leadership Institute, the American Enterprise Institute, Americans for Prosperity, Americans for Tax Reform, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, and even the Republican Jewish Coalition appear on Shut Down D.C.’s target list. The group released an interactive map with the names, addresses, and phone numbers of “Trump boosters.”
Shut Down D.C.’s election week festivities begin with a rally at Black Lives Matter Plaza on Nov. 3, agitating in the streets from Nov. 4-7, and targeting members of Congress when they return to the capital on Nov. 8.
The agitators justify their tactics by accusing President Donald Trump of working to undermine democracy, suggesting that the president is using militia groups to intimidate voters into pulling the lever for him and even attempting to desroy the postal service.
“For months, Donald Trump and his enablers have waged an attack on the democratic process. They’re mobilizing an army of thugs to intimidate voters at the polls, they’re trying to limit access to early voting, and they even tried to dismantle the US Postal Service,” Shut Down D.C. claims. That’s one massive conspiracy theory, based on Iranian misinformation to harm Trump.
The agitators plan to target conservative groups on November 4. “Trump will only be able to successfully launch a coup if his donors, the media and the Republican Party establishment goes along with his attack on democracy. On November 4, we’re going to put Trump’s enablers on notice: We hold you accountable for facilitating Trump’s historic attacks on democracy,” the website warns.
Antifa Mob Throws Rocks, Pepper-Sprays, and Assaults Jews for Trump in New York
The agitators plan to “disrupt business as usual for some of the intuitions that are most complicit in Trump’s attack on Democracy.”
The list includes official Republican groups along with conservative think tanks and even the Leadership Institute, which trains conservatives for political activism.
Washington, D.C., is shutting down streets in anticipation of protests. In a statement to The Daily Signal, Metropolitan Police Department spokeswoman Alaina Gertz insisted that the police deparment’s “Special Operations Division is equipped to handle First Amendment assemblies of any stature.”
Shut Down D.C. barely succeeded in blocking traffic and angering commuters at a climate change protest last September, but considering the riots this summer, the agitators may pose a real threat, especially if the forces behind antifa are involved.
Millions of Americans peacefully took to the streets to protest after the death of George Floyd, but many of those protests devolved into violent riots, which have proved the most destructive (in terms of insurance claims) in U.S. history. While Democratic nominee Joe Biden has condemned violent looting and arson, he refused to call out antifa or Black Lives Matter agitators, instead attacking “right-wing militias” as if they were the true instigators of violence.
While leftists repeat claims of “institutional racism,” the riots have victimized the black community. The destruction disproportionately hit black communities in Kenosha, Wisc., Minneapolis, and Chicago. The riots destroyed black lives, black livelihoods, and black monuments. At least 26 Americans have died in the riots, most of them black.
This map of conservative groups also seems particularly ominous considering the fact that after the scandal-plagued smear factory the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) listed the Family Research Council (FRC) as a “hate group” along with the Ku Klux Klan and plotted it on a “hate map,” an attempted terrorist used that “hate map” to target FRC, intending to shoot everyone in the building and place a Chick-fil-A chicken sandwich by their heads. The SPLC condemned the attack, but still lists FRC as a “hate group.”
Let’s pray that any post-Election Day protests don’t devolve into riots, and that none of those riots involve deadly threats like FRC faced.
The Daily Signal provided a full list of the organizations on the map.
- American Enterprise Institute
- American Petroleum Institute
- Americans for Prosperity
- Americans for Tax Reform
- Campaign for Working Families
- College Republican National Committee
- Competitive Enterprise Institute
- DC Republican Committee
- Empower America Project
- FreedomWorks
- GOPAC
- The Heritage Foundation
- House Freedom Fund
- International Republican Institute
- Leadership Institute
- National Republican Club of Capitol Hill
- National Republican Congressional Committee
- National Republican Senatorial Committee (Ronald Reagan Republican Center)
- National Taxpayers Union
- Republican Governors Association
- Republican Jewish Coalition
- Republican Main Street Partnership
- Republican National Committee
- Republican State Leadership Committee
- Republican Youth Majority
- UrbanCURE
- Young Republicans
Editor’s Note: Want to support PJ Media so we can keep telling the truth about the riots and attacks on law enforcement? Join PJ Media VIP and use the promo code LAWANDORDER for 25% off your VIP membership.
Tyler O’Neil is the author of Making Hate Pay: The Corruption of the Southern Poverty Law Center. Follow him on Twitter at @Tyler2ONeil.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member