MILWAUKEE — As delegates gathered for the second day of the Republican National Convention under the theme of “Make America Safe Once Again,” prominent speakers made the plight of American military veterans a recurring theme.
“They give illegal immigrants free hotel rooms while homeless veterans sleep on the streets,” Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) said during his speech on Monday night. “Disgusting.”
But on Tuesday afternoon, in a park about a mile west of the Fiserv Forum, where Republicans have gathered for their convention, visiting officers from the Columbus Police Department fatally shot homeless veteran Samuel Sharpe Jr., 43.
Republicans made no public mention of Sharpe during the four hours of speeches Tuesday night — a night when Republicans, under the theme of “Make America Safe Again,” accused President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris of prioritizing illegal immigrants at the expense of military veterans.
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All the while, Republican speakers and delegates pledged their support for law enforcement officers, Republicans at the GOP convention lauded police officers and chanted “back the blue” while former President Donald Trump pumped his fist in support.
Memorialization of Sharpe, who lived in a tent that was part of a larger encampment sprawling across a nearby vacant lot, was left to some 300 demonstrators who gathered Tuesday evening in King Park for a candlelight vigil.
“A homeless veteran — isn’t that the narrative that the RNC paints that they care for its veterans?” Alan Shavoya, an activist with Milwaukee Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, said. “Yet they brought their circus to our city and killed a homeless veteran.”
Maria Hamilton, whose son, Dontre Hamilton, was killed by Milwaukee police 10 years ago in a different park, said the fight between Sharpe and another man that prompted police attention was a confrontation among two friends “in this community.” She accused police of mishandling the situation.
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“The first thing they want to do is take lives, she said.
Hamilton and others gathered at King Park to remember Sharpe tried to make sense of what the Columbus Police were doing one mile from Fiserv Forum in a neighborhood separated from the convention by an interstate highway.
“They came here for these f***ing politicians,” Hamilton said. “They had no business in this park. Milwaukee Police Department, the city of Milwaukee should have had a space [near the convention perimeter] for them to meet, not in our community. We’re not involved with that.
“I know we still have another 72 hours of this invasion,” she added. “Please be safe…. We do not condone the invasion. Do what you came to do, and get the hell out of our town.”
Protesters chalk messages to remember Samuel Sharpe Jr. at King Park in Milwaukee.(Jordan Green / Raw Story)
The Columbus Police Department is one of roughly 140 law enforcement agencies from across the country to augment convention security this week in Milwaukee.
Shavoya noted that a larger coalition of far-left groups organized a march with about 3,000 people that protested the Republican National Convention on Monday — without incident.
Shavoya said activists expressed concern to city officials in the runup to the convention that added law enforcement from across the country would cause problems for the Milwaukee community at large.
“When [the city] tried to put it on us that we would be the ones causing violence, we told them: ‘It’s going to be your law enforcement coming from out of state, or your own from Milwaukee that’s going to cause issues,’” Shavoya said. “So we warned them. They tried to flip it on us, and today shows that we were right, and that the city was wrong. That the city cannot control its own law enforcement, let alone law enforcement from outside the city.”
Police body-camera video released by the Columbus Police Department shows that the officers staged in King Park observed Sharpe wielding two knives during an altercation in the middle of West Vliet Street.
In the video, about nine officers can be seen debriefing on a previous incident involving protesters on opposite sides of the abortion issue.
An officer then announces: “He’s got a knife!”
“Stop! Drop the knife! Police!” the officers shout as they run toward Sharpe with guns drawn. The video shows that 15 seconds elapse from when officers observed the knife to when they began firing at least eight gunshots.
Milwaukee Police Chief Jeffrey B. Norman defended the officers’ actions during a press conference on Tuesday, saying that Sharpe “charged” at the other man with knives.
“This was an incident where somebody’s life was in immediate danger,” he said. “Again, two knives were recovered from this particular situation. Someone’s life was in danger. These officers who are not from this area took upon themselves to act to save someone’s life today.”
Norman said the Greenfield Police Department in Milwaukee County will lead an investigation into the incident.
After the vigil on Tuesday night, protesters marched past the spot where Sharpe died. They left votive candles behind to honor his memory. Two employees with the U.S. Justice Department Community Relations Services, a federal agency that provides mediation services to communities to communities experiencing racial tension, tagged along with the march.
Marching behind a banner that read, “End the war on Black America,” the protesters chanted, “The police at the RNC — ain’t no good. The police in Milwaukee — ain’t no good.”
Maria Hamilton, whose lost her son to police violence, speaks at a vigil for Samuel Sharpe Jr. on Tuesday. roar-assets-auto.rbl.ms
