The last day of the DNC. And honestly, I’m not sure I could handle another day. I’ve been taking over 20,000 steps every day, getting home late, and feeling the pull to do at least a one-through of my photos of the day.
The organization March on the DNC, a coalition of some 200 groups participating in protests for the week, had two scheduled events: one on the opening day (Monday) and one on the closing day (Thursday) at 5:00 PM.
I started the day with photos in my neighborhood: Streeterville and the Gold Coast (near the Water Tower).
The schedule for today included a Pro-Palestinian protest at Union Park, the primary park permitted for protests, and a Pro-Israeli protest at the park down the street where the fence was breached on Monday. I couldn’t imagine how this would work. It seemed like a major mistake in permitting.
I arrived via the Green Line for the third day in the mid-afternoon. There wasn’t much going on at Union Park. Just the usual people setting up and lines and lines of police. So I walked over to the other park, which was also designated as a permitted protest site, to see if anything was happening there.
A woman was speaking on a megaphone to an audience of a few. She was surrounded by cardboard tombstones of people who had died from drug overdoses. I remembered the group from the RNC as well. A couple of people unrolled a huge banner that read
The only protest on the schedule for Day Two was at 7 PM involving the Pro Palestinian group outside the Israeli Consulate. So I slept in.
Before the evening’s protest, I headed to Union Park, the designated spot for any and all protests near the convention site, at about 3:30 PM. Surprisingly, nothing was going on there. I wandered around for a bit, trying to decide where to go next when a man approached me asking if I was a photographer here at the DNC (the camera giving that away).
Yes, I replied. Then he asked a favor. He was standing in front of a wall of Kamala street posters. Apparently, the photographer he had hired to take photos of the installation didn’t show, and he wondered if I could take some photos for him. He would be willing to pay.
Needless to say, I said YES! I took the photos and we exchanged info. When I sent them to him, I was pretty dang excited that he responded with this:
“These photos are SO good. This is exactly what I was looking for. You’re an amazing photographer, and I’m grateful …. I hired two photographers for this campaign and these are the best quality photos I’ve received back.”
After that, I headed over to the main entrance to the convention. When I was at the RNC, this proved to be a great place for photos. But this entrance had nothing going on. It was also quite different because there was really nothing on the street where the entrance was located. In MIlwaukee, the street was filled with bars and restaurants.
I got on my phone to see the closest bar where I could get a drink to kill some time. The nearest one was a few blocks away, and I headed over. I ended up chatting with a couple of men at the bar who were attending the convention when I was ordering my beer. Very interesting conversation, for sure. We talked about the attempt on Trump’s life, the Palestinian protests, and Los Angeles (where they currently live and where I lived for thirty years).
The conversation ended when one of the men said that he had an ex-girlfriend whose goal for her contribution to society was to have ten sons and raise them all as feminists. I replied that I already have a son, and my goal would never be to raise him as a feminist. My goal was to raise him to be a man.
After hugs all around, I returned to the main entrance. Now people were lining up for the evening slate of speakers. Which meant that the crazies with signs and costumes had also gathered.
I hung around for about an hour, taking photos, and quite frankly, laughing a lot. So many of the people were completely absurd. So many were trolls. So many were irrationally triggered and angry. It was hilarious.
There was the guy dressed up with antlers pretending to be a Trump supporter who was disappointed that more Trump supporters hadn’t shown up. There were the holy rollers preaching to the crowd. I had a friend comment on a Facebook post about these guys, disgusted that this is the face of Trump supporters. That isn’t accurate. These street preachers have nothing to do with Trump. They were also at the RNC every day preaching with the exact same signs. They are there to be provocative, and it works.
There were others who I saw at the RNC too.
There was Vermin Supreme (shoe on head). There were veterans asking for support. There was the progressive group who is anti-abortion. There were the (menopausal) women dressed up as the abortion pill. There were Palistianians reading the names of the children killed in Gaza.
And then there were all the people screaming back and forth.
Time was passing, and I knew I was going to be late for the protest at the Israeli Consulate, but I couldn’t tear myself away!
I got to the formal protest at around 7: 30 or 7: 45 PM. About a block away from the Israeli Consulate, maybe twenty protesters with Israel flags were cordoned off by police and not allowed to get any closer.
When I turned the corner to get to the consulate, bike cops were blocking the road. I could see the protest was about a half block away, and it looked like I was too late, that the cops had already sealed off the location.
The only thing I could think of doing was to go around the block to the other side and see if that was also blocked off (even though I assumed it had to be). An alley cut through before the next street, so I hurried down the alley. Only to come out at the other end faced with a group of protesters who had broken through the police line and were running in my direction to get away!
The next thing I saw was police throwing people down. A line of cops in helmets immediately closed ranks to separate the police tackling protesters from the rest of the protesters, their backs to me. That meant, I found myself behind the police line standing by the paddy wagon as people got control of person after person, handcuffed them, processed them, and took them into custody. I saw onl;y one other photographer who had the luck to end up where we were.
I simply could not believe my luck or the photos I was able to capture.
Once that was under control, the line of cops loosened up and moved over to block the intersection.
At this point, my adrenaline was so heightened. I actually Facetimed with my son. I just needed to tell someone what the hell I just witnessed. And I wanted him to see the large presence of riot cops surrounding the intersection.
I was able to get around that line and closer to the mass of protesters still chanting. One cop in plain clothes was apparently in charge of keeping the press out of the way, and he screamed over and over for press to stay on the sidewalk, threatening anyone who stepped into the street with stripping them of their press pass. At times, he was downright aggressive, pushing photographers, resulting in a domino effect for the tightly congested press – with me often finding myself in the middle of the mess. What was I doing???
We could see that police were preparing another kettle, this time by pushing protesters onto the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street that we were on, and then compressing them against the storefronts. I couldn’t see what was going on in the kettle, but I had a front row view of protesters who were handcuffed being led away toward the paddy wagon (I don’t know if that is the accurate term, but I assume that is clear).
This time, one of the photographers jumped into the street to get a close up of those in custody. The plainclothes cop screamed at her to get back. For some stupid reason, she decided to argue with him. Next thing I know, he yelled, “Arrest her.”
She took off running, but she was quickly surrounded and in custody, the plainclothes cop holding her press pass.
Then the woman next to me yelled, “Oh shit! That’s my roommate!”
What craziness.
I noticed that Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department Larry Snelling, who was appointed in September 2023, was right in the middle of the action. He was calling out orders and supervising arrests. I have to say, that impressed me so much. To have the head guy out of the streets with the rank and file when things got hairy is unusual. Mad respect (which only increased as the week went by).
After getting as many pics as I could of people being arrested, I looked over to where the rest of the protest group had been. And they were gone. I didn’t see a single protester left. Then a commotion started down the street and the chase was on.
A group of die hard protesters had locked arms and were pushing through the police line and down the street. Police kept jumping ahead of them to block them off, but then they would just change directions, leaving the cops scrambling. This went on for a few blocks. At one point, a taxi got caught up in the crowd. I got very nervous as I have seen what often happens to cars that find themselves in the middle of a mob. Luckily, after some taunting of the driver, people got out of the way and directed him on how to back out. Phew.
At this point, it was nearly impossible to get any photos. There were more photographers than protesters. And more cops than photographers. So as people were taken down and arrested, hoards of people were gathered around, and I no longer felt the desire to fight my way into the center of it, probably thanks to the cover of darkness now enveloping the city. But it didn’t take long for the police to break up the last handful of protesters.
Honestly, I was so ready to go home. I really needed to process what I had just been a part of. I ended up walking home, which took about 40 minutes. I don’t normally like walking that far when it is dark out, but police were everywhere, so I felt pretty comfortable. And truthfully, I needed to walk off some of the energy coursing through my body.
I had just completed two days of photos and experiences I never thought I would have.
Before I get started on this post, I need to apologize for not following through with my plan to post after each day of the DNC. So much was going on each day that I didn’t get home until pretty late and was absolutely exhausted. I did little more than upload my photos to my computer each night before collapsing in bed. And then Friday morning, I left town for a family memorial, meaning I didn’t do any writing while away. So now is my chance to catch up!
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Day One of the DNC was promised to be the day with the largest protest, led by the Coalition to March on the DNC which represented over 200 groups. They advertised that they were expecting tens of thousands. Not quite. But thousands did show up.
Time to check out of the hotel to start my final day in Milwaukee at the RNC.
I drove to my regular parking spot and began with Red Arrow Park, the designated protest area. Once again, no one was there. So I made my way to the main entrance of the convention, the spot where the real crazies are lingering. Not much was going on, so I sought out a coffee shop to get an iced latte and get some things done on my computer.
Who knew finding a coffee shop would be so difficult? I finally found a place in the lobby of a bank building, not exactly the environment I was looking for, but it would have to do. And surprise, surprise, the iced coffee was one of the best I’ve ever had (besides the ones I make myself!).
I had nothing planned today. My photographer friend texted me in the morning to let me know that he was bailing. He was taking the train back to Chicago. I don’t blame him. The city is deserted. But I’m stuck here until Thursday night.
Before I started photographing protests, a lot of my photos were of street art and graffitti. So I did a quick search for street art in Milwaukee, and I found an area called Black Cat Alley, an “outdoor art gallery” in an alley. I think I got some great photos!
The text from my photographer friend came in at 10:30 AM.
Neither of us had heard any word or could find any information about anything going on during Day 2 of the RNC. But surely there was something, right?
Before I got here, I had assume I would take public transportation to the convention area, thinking having a car would be a serious hinderance. But since I found an empty parking lot that cost $10 for the day, I figured I could park there again.
I got to downtown at about noon. And dang. My parking lot now had a sign out front: $30 event parking. I didn’t want to do that. I drove around the block to find a place to pull over to look on my phone for parkiing, but lucky me! I found a 10 hour parking meter that would cost $5. Bingo!
I never expected to be in Milwaukee for the RNC, but here I am. I always planed on photographing the DNC since it is taking place in Chicago. My feeling is that the DNC is going to be ugly, based on the rhetoric in Chicago, based on the anger at the city’s handling of the whole thing, and based on the large protest culture currently on the ground. So thinking about thrusting myself into the middle of it all made me just a bit nervous. My solution was to come to the RNC so that I would have a better idea how things might go.
I dropped my dog Captain off at my daughter’s and drove the hour and a half to Milwaukee on Monday morning. The March on the RNC planned a press conference at 10, a rally at 11, and a march at noon. I had been approved for a press pass, so I needed to pick that up at 9. I left Chicago early enough to arrive by 8 because I had no idea what the city would look like in terms of blocked off streets and parking.
What started as a single exercise to get me out of my comfort zone has grown into a regular gig photographing protests here in Chicago. Over the past two years, I have improved my skills dramatically, I have found the courage to photograph people unapologetically, I have claimed the authority to record what is going on out in the streets, I have befriended a handful of photographers who are doing the same thing as I am, and I have learned a LOT about people, politics, and propaganda.
We are about to embark on what is likely to be a crazy timeline to be living through (as if the past four + years haven’t already been insane!) as we count down the days to the 2024 presidential election.
I have been taking photos of protests here in Chicago for a couple of years now. And I am addicted! One reason I love it is because the opportunity for creative, interesting photos is unlimited at these events. Another reason is that as someone who used to teach journalism, and assigned a book in my classes that was specifically about fake news (Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News by Bernard Goldberg) even over twenty years ago, long before Trump coined the term. I only bring that up because I have had people explain to me that there is no such thing as fake news, that Trump made it up because he didn’t like the coverage about him. I always try to explain that no, the news has always been “fake.” So I really love the opportunity to witness a newsworthy event in person and then compare it to the news coverage. I don’t think there has been a single time when I have felt that the coverage was objective and/or fair.
For those who think I’m exaggerating, I would ask you to think about a time you were involved in what became a news event. How did the media coverage compare to your experience? How accurate were the stories with basic facts? Knowing that the media struggle to report the stories that you actually know something about accurately, you have to ask yourself what evidence there is that would make you assume they get all of the other stories right. But I digress…
The Writing Life 