Local protests over the murder of George Floyd, sometimes called the Minneapolis riotsAizuramay, Aren (May 30, 2020). "A Mask and A Target Cart: Minneapolis Riots" , The New Inquiry. Retrieved January 6, 2022. or the Minneapolis uprising, began on May 26, 2020, and within a few days had inspired a global protest movement against police brutality and racial inequality. The initial events were a reaction to a video filmed the day before and circulated widely in the media of police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on Floyd's neck for several minutes while Floyd struggled to breathe, begged for help, lost consciousness, and died. Public outrage over the content of the video gave way to widespread civil disorder in Minneapolis, Saint Paul, and other cities in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area over the five-day period of May 26 to 30 after Floyd's murder.
Minneapolis sustained extensive damage from rioting and looting during the protests—largely concentrated on a stretch of Lake Street south of downtown—including the destruction of the city's 3rd police precinct building, which was overrun by demonstrators and set on fire. At a cost of $350 million, approximately 1,300 properties in Minneapolis were damaged by the civil unrest, of which nearly 100 were completely destroyed. Saint Paul suffered damages that totaled $82 million and affected 330 buildings, including 37 properties that were heavily damaged or destroyed, with most destruction along the University Avenue business corridor. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives tracked 164 structure fires due to arson in the Twin Cities region during the riots.
Governor Tim Walz activated the Minnesota National Guard in response to civil unrest. The 7,123 troops activated represented the largest deployment of the state's forces since World War II. By early June 2020, violence in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area had resulted in at least two deaths, 604 arrests, and more than $500 million in damage to approximately 1,500 properties, the second-most destructive period of local unrest in U.S. history, after the 1992 Los Angeles riots. Violent protests in Minneapolis–Saint Paul over Floyd's murder largely subsided after May 30, 2020. The Minnesota National Guard and a multi-jurisdiction government command that responded to the riots demobilized on June 7, 2020.
Local protests and unrest over Floyd's murder continued in 2020–2023 and broadened to other issues of racial injustice. On May 2, 2023, the conclusion of the last criminal case for the four Minneapolis police officers responsible for murdering Floyd fulfilled a key demand of protesters that Derek Chauvin, J. Alexander Kueng, Thomas Lane, and Tou Thao all be held legally accountable.
Background Murder of George Floyd
George Floyd was an unarmed African-American man who died while he was being detained by Minneapolis police on May 25, 2020, shortly after 8:00 p.m. CDT, near the Cup Foods grocery store at the intersection of East 38th Street and Chicago Avenue. Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd's neck for nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds, while three other officers, J. Alexander Kueng, Thomas Lane, and Tou Thao, assisted Chauvin with Floyd's arrest and held concerned onlookers back. (video @ YouTube ) Floyd could be heard repeatedly on a bystander's video saying his final words: "I can't breathe", "Please", and "Mama". He appeared unconscious at the scene, and was pronounced dead at 9:25 p.m. after being transported by ambulance to the Hennepin County Medical Center emergency room.
Racial disparities in Minnesota By the beginning of the 21st century, Minneapolis was home to some of the largest racial disparities in the United States. The city's population of people of color and Indigenous people fared worse than the city's white population by many measures of well-being, such as health outcomes, academic achievement, income, and home ownership. The result of discriminatory policies and racism over the course of the city's history, racial disparity was described by author Tom Webber in Minneapolis: An Urban Biography as the most significant issue facing Minneapolis in the first decades of the 2000s.
By 2015, homeownership rates in the Twin Cities were 75 percent for white families, but only 23 percent for black families, one of the largest disparities in the nation. By 2018, unemployment for black people in Minnesota had reached a historic low of 6.9 percent, but it was still three times higher than the rate for white people. Though black residents made up just 6 percent of Minnesota's population, they were nearly 37 percent of the state's prison population in 2016. By the 2020s, generations of the city's black residents had been unable to experience the same levels of comforts and asset accumulation as the white residents.
The Atlantic said that years of disinvestment and abandonment of the area around Lake Street in Minneapolis and city officials ignoring the needs of the community's black residents were some of the conditions that led to civil disorder in Minneapolis.
Prior killings by law enforcement
George Floyd's murder was viewed by some residents as a continuation of a history of police violence in Minneapolis, where 11 people were killed by police officers between 2010 and 2020, including Floyd. In 2015, the killing of Jamar Clark, a black man, by a Minneapolis police officer led to controversy and protests; it was later determined by prosecutors that the officers had acted in self defense and no charges were filed. In 2016, the killing of Philando Castile, a black man, in nearby Falcon Heights resulted in several weeks of protests and unrest; the resulting criminal case ended with a jury acquittal for the involved officer after a 10-month process. In 2017, the killing of Justine Damond, a white woman, led to a 12-year prison sentence for the police officer, a black man, who shot her.
In instances where Minneapolis police officers attempted to justify the aggressive use of force against residents, a pattern emerged in which the police department would release officer statements that were later contradicted by video and other evidence, as revealed by several civil rights and wrongful death lawsuits. Some felt that the judicial system was inconsistent in that it did not hold white police officers who killed black men accountable for their actions; the video of Floyd begging for relief while being pinned by Chauvin generated further concern and anger from both white and black residents in the city.Bunn, Curtis and Charles, Nick (30 May 2020). "Black men in Minneapolis outraged over Floyd killing, distrustful of judicial system" . NBC News. Retrieved on 7 July 2020. Floyd's murder was also the third in a string of widely reported and highly publicized incidents in which unarmed black Americans were killed in 2020, including Ahmaud Arbery in Glynn County, Georgia on February 23 and Breonna Taylor in Louisville on March 13.
Distrust of Minneapolis police
By 2020, the relationship between the Minneapolis Police Department and the community, particularly the city's black residents, had deteriorated significantly. Several killings of residents by police officers and alleged displays of racial insensitivity by police leaders contributed to the tension. In the city's Powderhorn Park neighborhood, where Floyd was murdered, some argued there had been a persisting distrust between the police and black community.
The head of the police union representing Minneapolis officers, Bob Kroll, was a continuing source of controversy, having called Black Lives Matter a "terrorist organization" in 2016 after the officers involved in Clark's death were cleared of wrongdoing. His appearance at a political rally for Donald Trump's presidential campaign in 2019 generated controversy when Kroll said that Trump would "let cops do their job, put the handcuffs on the criminals instead of [on] us". Controversy had also erupted when police officers put up a "ghetto" Christmas tree at the fourth police precinct station in 2018.
The police department had a history of not holding officers accountable for complaints and disciplinary actions. Of the 80 officers fired for misconduct in the 20 years prior to the murder of Floyd, around half were reinstated. As a police officer with the department, Chauvin had received 17 complaints, but only faced discipline once.
Initial events
Tuesday, May 26, 2020 Initial reactions to Floyd's murder At 12:41 a.m. on May 26, Minneapolis police released a statement about the arrest and murder of Floyd several hours earlier. They said that a suspected money forger had "physically resisted" arrest and suffered "medical distress" after being handcuffed by officers, leading to his death. The statement made no mention that Floyd was unarmed or that Chauvin had kneeled on his neck for over nine minutes. At about the same time the police released their initial statement, Darnella Frazier, a bystander at the scene of Floyd's murder, uploaded a 10-minute video of the incident to Facebook and Instagram. The graphic video captured Floydwhile laying face down, handcuffed, and pinned by Chauvin's kneesaying he could not breathe and begging for his life as he lost consciousness. The video quickly went viral.
Official reaction came early in the morning. By 3:11 a.m. the police department said that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) would join local officials in the investigation of the incident. Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey held a 6:45 a.m. press conference and said of the bystander video he had seen: "What we saw was horrible. Completely and utterly messed up." By mid-morning several public officials released statements condemning what they saw in the bystander's video. Saint Paul Mayor Melvin Carter said it was "vile and heartbreaking" and all the officers present at the scene of Floyd's arrest should be held accountable. U.S. senator Amy Klobuchar called for an independent investigation. Minnesota governor Tim Walz said, "We will get answers and seek justice." The four officers at the scene of Floyd's murder were placed on paid administrative leave, a standard protocol, pending further investigation.
The Minneapolis police department's initial statement, which mis-characterized the circumstances of Floyd's death, was perceived as being radically different from what was recorded on bystander videos, and fueled public outrage.
Organized protests emerge
By late morning on May 26, a makeshift memorial had been set up in Minneapolis outside the Cup Food store at East 38th Street and Chicago Avenue, the street intersection where Floyd was killed the previous day. The first organized protests emerged at the same location by midday. Some of the gathered protesters chanted, "I can't breathe", words repeated multiple times by Floyd in the viral video. Many people carried homemade signs that read, "Black Lives Matter," "Stop Killing Black People," and "I Can't Breathe." By the afternoon, as more details about the May 25 incident between Floyd and the police were known, thousands more rallied at the street intersection, and organizers emphasized keeping the gathering peaceful. Police estimated the size of the crowd at approximately 8,000 people.
Police officers fired Frey and Minneapolis Police chief Medaria Arradondo held an afternoon press conference on May 26 to express solidarity with the community's growing sense of anger. Frey called for charges to be filed against the involved officers who killed Floyd, and said, "Whatever the investigation reveals, it does not change the simple truth that he should be with us this morning." Arradondo added, "Being Black in America should not be a death sentence."