No Kings

 No Kings

I saw my first NO KINGS sign 22 years ago. It was at the FTAA Protests in Miami. I had a front row seat as my office was in the Miami Dade County Government Center, aka the Stephen P. Clark Center in downtown Miami. That “King” was George W. Bush in 2003, and the protests were decrying the Free Trade Area of the Americas meeting in Miami. The so-called FTAA agreement was proposed to establish a free trade zone for 34 Western Hemisphere democracies that would eliminate trade barriers and tariffs.

Now, two decades later we have another Republican president facing backlash for trying to do just the opposite. He too is trampling the free speech of those who would disagree with him.

In 2003, those protests were met with an overwhelming heavy-handed police presence.

Those police tactics became known as “The Miami Model” and exhibited distinctive features of crowd control techniques used in 2003 Miami, which included large scale pre-emptive arrests, heavily armed sometimes unidentifiable law enforcement, the collection of intelligence from protesters, and the "embedding" of corporate media with the police.

Using “The Miami Model,” the police successfully quashed the civil rights of American citizens. Free speech was not allowed and many protestors with permits were prohibited from even entering the area. Miami-Dade County and the City of Miami admitted wrongdoing in an out of court settlement agreement with the ACLU and Amnesty International.Amnesty International.

A suit was filed in 2006 by the ACLU of Florida in federal court, alleging that police officers from Miami-Dade and the City of Miami prevented members of the human rights organization from exercising their constitutional right to assemble and protest, despite having obtained a permit from the City of Miami Police Department. Members of Amnesty International's Miami Chapter had a permit to assemble, but police officers prohibited anyone from gathering or entering downtown Miami that day. While 300 people were there to attend, only 15 people made it through.

Whatever your feelings about free trade and tariffs, peaceful protest is protected under our constitution. The protests in 2003 didn’t end peacefully and that was in part because of The Miami Model of not allowing it a chance, spurred unrest. Both sides were to blame.

In 2003, I took video and stills and put together movie set to music.