Federal Agents Being Sent To Cleveland To Quell 'Violence'

CLEVELAND — President Donald Trump has vowed to send federal agents to cities around the U.S. to quell "violence." Cleveland is on the president's list of cities targeted for a federal surge.

Trump said federal agents were being deployed to stop the "vilifying" of law enforcement.

"In recent weeks, there has been a radical movement to defund, dismantle, and dissolve our police departments. Extreme politicians have joined this anti-police crusade and relentlessly vilified our law enforcement heroes. To look at it from any standpoint, the effort to shut down policing in their own communities has led to a shocking explosion of shootings, killings, murders, and heinous crimes of violence. This bloodshed must end. This bloodshed will end," the president said in a news conference this week.

Police fired tear gas at protesters in Cleveland during a George Floyd protest on May 30. In response, the protests turned violent, destroying property and burning police cruisers. Since that protest, there has been little political violence in Northeast Ohio.

Protesters have been calling for politicians to divert funding from police budgets to other services, like mental health and suicide prevention.

"We will never defund the police. We will hire more great police. We want to make law enforcement stronger, not weaker," Trump said.

Federal agents have already been sent to Portland and will next be sent to Kansas City, Chicago and Albuquerque. An expansion into Cleveland, Detroit and Milwaukee will follow. Nearly all of the cities targeted by the president are led by Democrats.

Cleveland officials said on Wednesday evening they had not been made aware of any "additional federal law enforcement resources coming into the city." However, Cleveland police said they would partner with any federal agents sent to town.

Gov. Mike DeWine said the federal help Cleveland will receive is different than the "help" Portland officials received.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler has demanded federal agents be removed from the city. Portland Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, said Trump is looking for a confrontation in the hopes of winning political points elsewhere. It also serves as a distraction from the coronavirus pandemic, which is causing spiking numbers of infections in Oregon and the nation.

Brown's spokesman, Charles Boyle, said Friday that arresting people without probable cause is "extraordinarily concerning and a violation of their civil liberties and constitutional rights."

Reporting from the Associated Press was included in this article