Late Tuesday, a Democrat state senator from Milwaukee, Wisconsin was mauled by a bunch of rioters at the Wisconsin State Capitol during a violent clash that included two statues being toppled, according to a report.
State Senator Tim Carpenter told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that he was beaten after taking a photograph of some of the protesters.
I took this pic- it got me assaulted & beat up. Punched/kicked in the head, neck, ribs. Maybe concussion, socked in left eye is little blurry, sore neck & ribs. 8-10 people attacked me. Innocent people are going to get killed. Capitol locked- stuck in office.Stop violence nowPlz! pic.twitter.com/Zw2hdfYG66
— Tim Carpenter (@TimCarpenterMKE) June 24, 2020
“I don’t know what happened,” he told the paper. “All I did was stop and take a picture and the next thing I’m getting five-six punches, getting kicked in the head.”
Video footage captured by the senator shows hundreds of protesters chanting in the street, before two white female activists break from the pack and charge towards Carpenter’s direction.
‘Hey, you’re not recording,’ one of them shouted, throwing her hand towards the senator’s phone, to block the camera lens.
As the senator pleaded with the woman to not damage his phone, she could be heard ordering him to delete the video, while the two of them fought to control who had the phone.
A reporter posted a picture of Carpenter while he had to kneel by his car.
He’s currently kneeling on the ground next to his car pic.twitter.com/jo1ZNwE3FN
— Lawrence Andrea (@lawrencegandrea) June 24, 2020
Folks, this means that the rioters aren’t picking sides among us, the humans who are just trying to get through all of the chaos and mayhem they’re bringing to cities all across the country.
Social media posts from the scene early Wednesday indicated that police in riot gear had been warning protesters and rioters to leave the area after reports that some of them had been trying to break some of the windows of the capitol building.
NBC 15 reported that rioters toppled the two statues. We reported that Black Lives Matter toppled one of the statues that was of Col. Christian Heg, an immigrant from Norway who died fighting for the Union army against slavery. They defaced the statue, beheaded it, then threw it into a nearby lake.
Protesters are discoursging camera use & filming tonight to protect identities. Almost no active live feeds like there have been before. As I’ve noted the past week, the energy has shifted. 2 statues down at the Capitol. This is just the beginning I expect. https://t.co/rg5knAPJI3
— Sami Schalk (@DrSamiSchalk) June 24, 2020
The Hans Christian Heg statue is lying headless in lake Monona. #wkow pic.twitter.com/0grawivgtf
— Michelle Alfini (@MichelleAlf) June 24, 2020
Rich Lowery, the editor of the National Review, took to social media and tweeted, “It’s now open season on abolitionists who recruited troops for the Union army, ably led them, and died courageously on the battlefield.”
It’s now open season on abolitionists who recruited troops for the Union army, ably led them, and died courageously on the battlefield https://t.co/uZaDONnx4P
— Rich Lowry (@RichLowry) June 24, 2020
The violence on Tuesday began after a black man was arrested at a restaurant after police said he brought a bat and a megaphone into the restaurant, the report said.
