A large array of media outlets are reporting on the decision to remove the massive “Black Lives Matter” mural from a street near the White House. Tracing the history of this famous marker, many of the reports claim that Washington, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser created the mural and renamed the area to “Black Lives Matter Plaza” as an “act of defiance” against President Trump.
The fact of the matter, however, is that the mural and plaza are rooted in a brazen fraud committed against Trump.
On June 1, 2020, the U.S. Park Police and the DC Police Department dispersed a violent BLM protest that had been going on for days near the White House. As rioters burned cities across the nation, protestors surrounded the White House, injured 60 Secret Service officers, and tried to breach security barriers while hurling “bricks, rocks, bottles, fireworks and other items.” This reportedly led the Secret Service to move Trump to a bunker designed for emergencies like terror attacks.
Shortly after the protest was cleared, President Trump walked from the White House to a historical landmark church that was boarded up due to the cleared protest. He then stood in front of the church, held up a Bible, made a few remarks about the greatness of America, and gathered his staff around him for pictures.
Within a few hours, many Democrats and media outlets accused Trump of ordering federal troops to “tear-gas peaceful protestors for a photo op.” For example:
- Senator Elizabeth Warren claimed, “The President of the United States tear-gassed peaceful protestors in order to clear the way for a useless photo-op outside the White House.”
- Senator Kamala Harris alleged, “Donald Trump just tear-gassed peaceful protesters for a photo op.”
- New York Governor Andrew Cuomo declared that Trump “used the military to push out a peaceful protest so he could have a photo op at a church.”
- NPR reported that the “U.S. Park Police and National Guard troops” used “tear gas” against “people nonviolently protesting police brutality” to clear the way for a “Trump church photo-op.”
- A New York Times headline stated, “Protesters Dispersed With Tear Gas So Trump Could Pose at Church.”
- A headline on Slate proclaimed, “Peaceful Protesters Tear-Gassed and Beaten Outside White House to Clear Space for a Trump Photo-Op.”
Within four days, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser had “Black Lives Matter” painted in giant yellow letters on the street near the protest and announced that she was renaming the area to “Black Lives Matter Plaza.”
Two months later, Bowser took the stage at the DNC Convention and boasted that she created “Black Lives Matter Plaza” because Donald Trump deployed “troops” and “tear gas” against people who “peacefully protested the death of George Floyd.”
Ten months later in June 2021, the Inspector General of the Department of the Interior released the results of an investigation which found that every aspect of the allegations against Trump were false. Specifically, the investigation documented with videos and witnesses that:
- the protestors were not peaceful but had injured “at least 49” Park Police officers, “vandalized” federal and private property, wore “ballistic vests,” carried “baseball bats,” and “threw projectiles like rocks.”
- the Park Police “did not use CS gas” (i.e., tear gas) to clear the protestors.
- the DC Police Department—which was under the authority of Mayor Bowser—used tear gas in the area without “the control or direction” of the Park Police.
- the Park Police “did not know about” Trump’s visit to the area until “hours after it had begun developing its operational plan” to quell the violence and after the “fencing contractor” they requested had already “arrived in the park.”
Even after the results of the investigation were released, Bowser campaigned for reelection in 2022 with a mailer that stated, “When Trump sent federal officers to the streets of DC to stop peaceful protestors, Muriel painted BLACK LIVES MATTER across 16 Street NW to send a bold message.”
In summary, the protestors were far from peaceful, the protest was cleared because of their violence, the timing had nothing to do with Trump, and it was the DC Police who deployed the teargas. Yet, leading Democrats and the media blamed all of this on Trump.
Five years later, the media is still whitewashing the history of BLM Plaza, and publications like the New York Times are quoting people who allege that the decision to rename it and remove the mural is an attempt to “destroy history.”
James D. Agresti is the president of Just Facts, a research and educational institute dedicated to publishing facts about public policies and teaching research skills.
