Republicans in 34 states have introduced legislation to crack down on protestors.

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

Tweet text:
Reid J. Epstein
@reidepstein
NEW: Republicans in 34 states have introduced legislation to crack down on protestors. They'd bar people from student loans & state aid, boost penalties for unlawful assembly and immunize drivers who strike protesters in the streets.

w/@PatriciaMazzei
Demonstrators marched through downtown Minneapolis on Monday as jury deliberations started in the trial of Derek Chauvin for the murder of George Floyd.
How the G.O.P. Is Creating Harsher Penalties for Protesters
As the nation reacts to the guilty verdict a jury handed to Derek Chauvin in the killing of George Floyd, Republican-led states are introducing punitive new measures governing protests.
nytimes.com
5:04 AM · Apr 21, 2021

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/21/us/politics/republican-anti-protest-laws.html

Republican legislators in Oklahoma and Iowa have passed bills granting immunity to drivers whose vehicles strike and injure protesters in public streets.

A Republican proposal in Indiana would bar anyone convicted of unlawful assembly from holding state employment, including elected office. A Minnesota bill would prohibit those convicted of unlawful protesting from receiving student loans, unemployment benefits or housing assistance.

And in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed sweeping legislation this week that toughened existing laws governing public disorder and created a harsh new level of infractions — a bill he’s called “the strongest anti-looting, anti-rioting, pro-law-enforcement piece of legislation in the country.”

The measures are part of a wave of new anti-protest legislation, sponsored and supported by Republicans, in the 11 months since Black Lives Matter protests swept the country following the death of George Floyd. The Minneapolis police officer who killed Mr. Floyd, Derek Chauvin, was convicted on Tuesday on murder and manslaughter charges, a cathartic end to weeks of tension.

But while Democrats seized on Mr. Floyd’s death last May to highlight racism in policing and other forms of social injustice, Republicans responded to a summer of protests by proposing a raft of punitive new measures governing the right to lawfully assemble. G.O.P. lawmakers in 34 states have introduced 81 anti-protest bills during the 2021 legislative session — more than twice as many proposals as in any other year, according to Elly Page, a senior legal adviser at the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law, which tracks legislation limiting the right to protest.

*snip*

[Boomerproud]

1. They are always one step ahead in their perfidy.

It's exhsusting.

[Bayard]

2. Challenging the First Amendment

Can't imagine these will stand in court.

[live love laugh]

3. More free labor for the prison pipeline.