Juneteenth Protests Shut Down Ports & Tulsa Braces for a Trump Rally

Published: June 19, 2020, 10 p.m.

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker and John Kiriakou are joined by Eugene Puryear, an author, activist and host of the new program BreakThrough News; and Estevan Hernandez, an organizer with the ANSWER Coalition who has been in the streets helping to organize recent protests.

Today marks the commemoration of Juneteenth. This is a major holiday for the African American community, and it is celebrated as a state holiday in 47 of the 50 states. President Trump, who apparently had never heard of Juneteenth until just a few days ago, tweeted, “I did something good. I made Juneteenth very famous. It’s actually an important event, an important time. But nobody had ever heard of it.” Meanwhile, President Trump’s first post-Covid-19 campaign rally is scheduled to take place in Tulsa, Oklahoma tomorrow. The mayor of Tulsa already has declared a state of emergency and instituted a curfew for today and tomorrow, saying that “stragglers would be arrested.” This was after reports that protesters also would descend on the city. Meanwhile, the White House said that it has no concerns that the 20,000 people expected to pack into the rally venue might be at increased risk of contracting the coronavirus.