bring up so that way, we meet, you know, it’s a much easier process.” And I was like, “Well, sometimes democracy is a little messy, Mayor Duggan, and you get paid enough. So I mean, sure, what else are you doing?” So that was, in a nutshell, our exchange. They were like, “Oh, I agree with a lot of these demands. So I’m sure we can drop these charges. But what about some of the outside agitators…”—because that was the theme, of course, across the country.

There was someone from the Department of Neighborhoods who was like, “Yeah, someone was trying to hand me like rocks and stuff to throw at people.” And my response is, “What does that have to do with brutalizing a whole fucking march?” Like, whatever you said some individual did, that has nothing to do with what the police did to the whole fucking march. You have a problem with individuals shooting, you apprehend those individuals, but that doesn’t justify anything. And they were like, “Oh, well, let’s continue this conversation, let’s get into committees.” And long story short, the meeting just showed how determined the administration was to not engage and instead get us to commit to these endless committee meetings. We made clear we weren’t interested in any of that. And [since that meeting,] they’ve been pushing against every single demand.

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