We, along with @amnestyusa, @humanrights1st and @P4HR, are urging US mayors and city council members to prevent a repetition of recent abuses by law enforcement against peaceful protests during the #Election2020. https://t.co/Cgab6JEwaT pic.twitter.com/zW5JTvwru6
— Human Rights Watch (@hrw) October 21, 2020

City and state officials in the United States should review their laws, policies, and practices ahead of the November 3, 2020 general elections to ensure that they protect the right to freedom of peaceful assembly, five international human rights organizations said on October 20, in letters to over 3,500 mayors and city council members throughout the country, as well as to all governors.

Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International-USA, Physicians for Human Rights, and Human Rights First urged officials to prevent a repetition of recent abuses by law enforcement against overwhelmingly peaceful protests opposing systemic racism and police violence. In a separate letter to governors, also signed by Center for Civilians in Conflict (CIVIC), the organizations cautioned against the deployment to protests of forces without adequate training in crowd control, including from the National Guard.

“The United States holds itself out as a rights-respecting nation that others can look up to, but the police abuses against peaceful protesters this summer were nothing to be proud of,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “When law enforcement officers in the United States commit abuses, they not only violate the rights of people at home but also undermine the US government’s ability to promote respect for rights abroad.”

The organizations have documented that between May and September, federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies in dozens of locations across the country repeatedly interfered with the right of peaceful assembly, resorted to excessive use of force, and conducted mass arbitrary arrests in response to largely peaceful protests.

In 125 separate incidents in 40 states and the District of Columbia, between May 26 and June 5, Amnesty International-USA found police using excessive force against protesters, including beating protesters, misusing tear gas and pepper spray, and inappropriately and at times indiscriminately firing “less-lethal” projectiles against protesters.

“This summer, police in city after city committed widespread and egregious human rights violations against people protesting the unlawful killings of Black people,” said Bob Goodfellow, interim executive director of Amnesty International-USA. “Rather than being a necessary and proportionate response to any specific threat, the use of force became a matter of first resort for any form of resistance, or to enforce a hastily imposed curfew, to end an ongoing demonstration – or clear a park for a photo op. Real, systemic and lasting police reform and oversight is needed at all levels to ensure that people across the country feel safe to walk the streets and express their opinions freely and peacefully without facing a real threat of harm from the very officers that are supposed to protect them.”

At least 115 people suffered head and neck injuries when law enforcement officers shot them with kinetic impact projectiles, such as rubber bullets and bean bag rounds, during the first two months of the George Floyd protests, May 26 to July 27, according to a visual investigation by Physicians for Human Rights. The group also documented how the Portland Police Bureau and federal agents abused crowd-control weapons and obstructed medical care at the Portland protests, resulting in severe injuries and psychological trauma to both medics and protestors.

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