“Prayers are not enough. Daunte Wright should still be with us. While an investigation is underway, our nation needs justice and healing, and Daunte’s family needs to know why their child is dead—they deserve answers.” Vice President Kamala Harris said on Twitter amidst protests.
The Twin Cities metro area was under a curfew and hundreds of Minnesota National Guard troops were in the streets to attempt to keep the peace on Monday night, a day after a
Crowds began gathering outside the Brooklyn Center police station Monday afternoon, with hundreds there by nightfall despite the governor’s dusk-to-dawn curfew. A drum beat incessantly, and the crowd broke into frequent chants of “Daunte Wright!” Some shouted obscenities at officers.
Tensions between protesters and police intensified for the second night in a row Monday around the nation, a day after a Brooklyn Center police officer fatally shot Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old Black man, during a traffic stop.
A candlelight memorial for Wright, including a raised fist statue, was also erected where he was shot Monday night.
About 90 minutes after the curfew deadline, police began firing gas canisters and flash-bang grenades in an attempt to drive them away, sending clouds wafting over the crowd and pushing some back at least briefly. Some protesters, wearing gas masks, picked up smoke canisters and threw them back toward police. At least one arrest was made.
In a statement, NAACP National President Derrick Johnson said Wright “should be alive today.”
“Whether it be carelessness and negligence, or a blatant modern-day lynching, the result is the same. Another Black man has died at the hands of police,” Johnson said.
