Officials in Minnesota, New York state and Chicago want a federal investigation into the riots that occurred in their cities and states.
Officials believe they have evidence, some of which is circumstantial, that the riots were organized and planned.
In Chicago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot said she is working with federal agencies to assess what went down.
Lightfoot said:
“There is no doubt. This was an organized effort last night,” Lightfoot said in a weekend press conference, referring to Friday’s unrest. “There were clearly efforts to subvert the peaceful process and make it into something violent.”
“There’s no question that both the people who were fighting and brought the weapons, that was absolutely organized and choreographed. It seems also clear that the fires that were set, both of the vehicles and buildings, that that was organized and that was opportunistic, as well as the looting.”
In New York, terrorism experts said that there is that there were “strong indicators” that rioters “planned for violence in advance.
NBC News New York reported Sunday:
“Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence and Counterterrorism John Miller said there is a high level of confidence within the NYPD that these unnamed groups had organized scouts, medics, and supply routes of rocks, bottles, and accelerants for breakaway groups to commit vandalism and violence.”
Although NYC officials have not named any particular groups they believe are associated with violence, Miller referred to “anarchists” in his briefing.
“Before the protests began, organizers of certain anarchists groups set out to raise bail money and people who would be responsible to be raising bail money, they set out to recruit medics and medical teams with gear to deploy in anticipation of violent interactions with police,” Miller said, per NBC New York. “They prepared to commit property damage and directed people who were following them that this should be done selectively and only in wealthier areas or at high-end stores run by corporate entities.”
Rioters “developed a complex network of bicycle scouts to move ahead of demonstrators in different directions of where police were and where police were not for purposes of being able to direct groups from the larger group to places where they could commit acts of vandalism including the torching of police vehicles and Molotov cocktails where they thought officers would not be,” according to Miller.
