Demonstrators hold their hands up in the air as they protest in front of a police line on the section of 16th Street that’s been renamed Black Lives Matter Plaza, Wednesday, June 24, 2020, in Washington.

Jacquelyn Martin / AP Photo

After two nights of tense clashes, protesters shut down a major highway as they peacefully marched through the city Wednesday night.

Around 6:30 p.m., dozens of people marched east from Black Lives Matter Plaza, where police had cleared tents and aid stations a day earlier and set up a police line, to Union Station, escorted by police on bikes, according to Washington Post reporter Justin Wm. Moyer’s Twitter account.

The group then headed to Interstate 395, where they blocked traffic for at least the third time since large-scale protests following the killing of George Floyd broke out in the District late last month.

Wednesday’s protests were markedly peaceful, following demonstrations that turned violent on Tuesday, with police deploying pepper spray and flashbangs and arresting nine people for charges including assaulting a police officer and felony rioting.

WTOP’s Ken Duffy tweeted that as protesters marched through Southeast D.C. with police on bicycles accompanying them, an onlooker asked why officers were “giving them an escort.” An officer replied, “It’s a peaceful protest.”

FOX 5’s Tom Fitzgerald reported that city workers later placed concrete barriers in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church. Police had been holding a line and blocking protesters at 16th and I Streets NW, but reopened the area around 7 p.m., according to ABC7’s Heather Graf.

About 10 minutes after police opened the area up, about a half dozen musicians formed a drumline in the middle of the plaza, where they played for a small crowd of onlookers and passersby.

Later in the evening, after making their way through Capitol Hill and Navy Yard, the marchers circled back to BLM Plaza, where they gathered in front of the fence at Lafayette Square. At one point, a man chanted “We gon’ be alright” through a megaphone.

Earlier in the day, officers erected a tall steel fence around St. John’s Episcopal Church, where protesters had spray painted “BHAZ,” for Black House Autonomous Zone, on the columns earlier in the week. Black fencing also once again blocked Lafayette Square, which had been blocked during protests earlier in the month. On Monday, protesters scaled and tried to tear down a statue of Andrew Jackson in the square.

Ahead of the protests on Wednesday, both U.S. Marshals and the D.C. National Guard were told to stand by to assist in protecting monuments. President Donald Trump threatened to crack down on protesters who defaced or damaged them.

Both U.S. Marshals and National Guardsmen, along with other federal law enforcement personnel, were deployed during protests earlier in the month. The aggressive show of force received criticism from local officials and demonstrators, as the protests were largely peaceful.

In front of D.C. Councilmember Charles Allen’s home, a small group of protesters called for him to fully defund the Metropolitan Police Department. Allen, who chairs the Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety, proposed stripping the department of $15 million in funding and for police chiefs to undergo a performance review by the mayor every four years, according to a draft report released Wednesday. The committee is scheduled to vote on the proposal Thursday.

But protesters said that funding cut is not enough. With flashlights and a megaphone pointed at Allen’s house, they shouted, “We are here because the police and the MPD won’t stop killing people,won’t stop harassing, won’t stop assaulting, won’t stop surveilling, Black people in D.C.,” adding “We don’t want 10 percent of the budget, we want no more police.”

Christian Zapata contributed reporting

Filed Under: 2020 BLM Protests, George Floyd,