This story was originally published by the WND News Center.
Leftists rioted violently all across the U.S. during 2020, following the Minneapolis death of George Floyd.
But the riots, which decimated large districts of hundreds of towns and cities with billions in damages, and were in fact, extremely violent despite legacy reporters calling them "mostly peaceful" while standing in front of a burning city block, are now more than riots.
They are a "tactic," according to Christopher F. Rufo, senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and contributing editor of City Journal.
In a column there, he explained those riots have been resurrected by extremists in support of Hamas' terror attack in October in which hundreds of Israeli civilians were butchered.
Those riots, on and off campus alike, reveal "a disturbing truth: the left-wing rioting following George Floyd’s death in 2020 was not an anomaly, but a tactic that activists can repurpose for any cause," he explained.
And, he noted, the presidential race of 2024 is approaching.
"Conservative leaders must prepare for that prospect. To prevent 2020 from repeating itself in 2024, conservatives need to consider what might spark a riot, how it can be prevented, and how to understand and manage the politics of rioting.
"First, what could generate a riot season? Left-wing agitation has some familiar causes: a police-involved death of a black person; an international conflict; an economic crisis. But another threat looms. Former president Donald Trump, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, faces multiple criminal indictments. Trump may well be convicted and imprisoned, likely yielding explosive consequences, including possible violence from both sides of the ideological divide," he warned.
The protest industry already is well-established and well-funded, he noted.
"Protest NGOs, media entities, research centers, black-bloc (Antifa) networks, and bail funds are all finely tuned to mobilize mass movements. The Left carefully manages its licit and illicit factions: progressive political leaders tacitly delegate the dirty work to anarchist and racialist factions, which can change costumes—for example, from a BLM mask to a Palestinian keffiyeh—at any moment," he charged.
Officials in GOP states should start preparing, he said, by having law enforcement set up task forces to monitor violence-prone organizations, to infiltrate them and to disrupt their destructive plans.
Arrest and prosecute offenders, he said.
To disrupt an individual squad often is to disrupt a network, he said.
Penalties for rioting need to be upped and National Guard units need training in anti-riot tactics, he said.
That was proven effective in Florida in 2020, he pointed out, with the state's "zero tolerance" practice for violence holding down the looting and destruction found in other states.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, in fact, built on that agenda when a hurricane hit this year, with his slogan, "You loot, we shoot."
But those involved in preventing such crime need to be alert, as "the Left has mastered the tactic of baiting law enforcement into a reaction, framing any response as 'authoritarian' and using the national media to shift public opinion," he explained.
Also, an "air war" involving airwaves can be launched.
"Whether by choice or necessity, political leaders can enact a policy of containment, leaving the mayhem in certain neighborhoods for local authorities to handle, while waging a battle for public opinion in the media and blaming the political Left for the violence and destruction," he said.
"How might the politics of a riot season unfold next year?" he speculated. "Civil disorder has often benefited the challenger in recent presidential elections. Richard Nixon won the presidency in 1968 following major riots, just as Joe Biden won the presidency in 2020 after similar unrest. Bill Clinton also won as a challenger in 1992, a year that saw the Los Angeles riots. Voters react against disorder, which they lay at the feet of whoever occupies the highest office. If a Trump-Biden rematch takes place in 2024 and violence breaks out, voters might well blame Biden, just as they blamed Trump in 2020."
Conservatives, he said, should organize plans to deter violence, and then adopt rhetorical strategies to condemn the cause of the riots.
"The time to prepare is now."
