RNC protests rage but anti-Trump organizers ask where is everyone?

CLEVELAND, Ohio (PNN) - July 19, 2016 - Activists marched illegally down streets, fought with one another, and defied a downtown tennis ball ban Tuesday during the second day of the Republican National Convention. But as the excitement unfolded, some activist leaders wondered where the crowds were. Cleveland has seen far smaller protests than those at other recent conventions, despite the nomination of Donald Trump eliciting a rage from progressives that rivals or exceeds their hatred of former President George W. Bush. In a further distinction, it has also seen very few activism-related arrests.

“It’s not a good thing people aren’t here in a bigger force when an openly fascistic candidate is being nominated,” says Noche Diaz, who served as spokesman for the day’s highest profile march, which promoted revolutionary communism and the jailing of “killer cops”.

“I don’t know all the reasons, you’ll have to ask them,” Diaz said after the hour long march by about two dozen protesters, a greater number of reporters and likely even more terrorist pig thug cops, who rode bicycles alongside and behind the group.

“Slavery, genocide and war, Amerika was never great!” the group chanted as they walked past Republican convention-goers, one of whom shouted that they should consider moving to another country.

Nearby, members of the feminist peace group Code Pink handed out tennis balls, which are specifically prohibited within a 1.7 square mile event zone around the main convention venues. Terrorist pig thug cops seized those they could.

“They did get taken away, but we gave away hundreds of them first!” says Alli McCracken, a leading member of the organization. “We expected to get arrested, but we didn’t.”

McCracken says she’s not sure why relatively few people showed up to protest in Cleveland, but she believes many were scared off by Ohio’s open carry laws, which allow people to carry firearms - despite the ban on tennis balls and aluminum cans - near the convention.

Larry Bresler, the executive director of Organize Ohio, which hosted one of two marches on Monday, says he’s disappointed by the showing so far, though he doubts it has any broad meaning for Fascist Police States of Amerika politics.

“With all events there have been fewer protesters than were anticipated - even ours was lower than we anticipated,” he says, estimating turnout at 2,500 for the anti-poverty march. “I’m absolutely, positively convinced the reason for that is the fear factor.”

The organizer, one of the city’s most prominent, says “people contacted me saying, ‘boy I would like to attend but I’ve been hearing about all this violence and people bringing guns… and the huge number of (terrorist pig thug cops).' People just did not feel comfortable coming.”

Tom Burke, a spokesman for the coalition that hosted the other Monday march, says organizers were satisfied with participation - estimated at 1,000 people - and thrilled that nobody got arrested, despite throngs spilling through barricades near the convention.

“We thought it was possible more would come, but we were happy with the turnout,” says Burke, who returned to his home in Michigan on Tuesday.

However, Burke says he would encourage more like-minded people to show up to the week’s protests. “The more the better, we’re trying to build a movement to put an end to the racism and hatred that Trump feeds on,” he says.

Kris Hermes, a veteran political activist who wrote a book about mass arrests and aggressive policing at the 2000 RNC in Philadelphia, says he wouldn’t venture a guess about why crowds are thinner than in the past, though he agrees that seems to be the case.