At least 50 vehicle-ramming incidents targeting Black Lives Matter protesters have taken place since protests erupted across the US following the death of George Floyd, NPR reported earlier this week.
According to the public media outlet, at least 18 of the rammings are categorized as deliberate attacks, with another two-dozen rammings currently under investigation. The 20 people currently facing charges for the attacks reportedly include a state leader of the Virginia Ku Klux Klan.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center – a legal advocacy nonprofit monitoring hate groups – 36-year-old Harry Howard Rogers drove his truck into protesters in Henrico, Virginia.
According to Henrico Commonwealth Attorney Shannon Taylor, Rogers "was driving recklessly down Lakeside Avenue on the median, drove up to the protesters, revved the engine and drove into the protesters." The man reportedly claimed he was the "leader of the Ku Klux Klan" in Virginia when arrested by authorities following the ramming.
Similar to tactics popularized by ISIS in 2016 and Al-Qaeda in 2010, a movement calling to carry out car ramming attacks against Black Lives Matter under the slogan "Run Them Over" reportedly began gaining popularity with a Minnesota police sergeant calling to car-ram protesters on Martin Luther King Day in 2016.
"Run them over. Keep traffic flowing and don't slow down for any of these idiots who try and block the streets," Saint Paul police Sgt. Jeff Rothecker wrote on Facebook, according to CBS Minnesota. "You continue to drive and if you hit someone...you can justify stopping further away because you feared for your safety."
Rothecker was reportedly placed on administrative leave, eventually announcing his resignation as St. Paul's Black Lives Matter movement threatened to protest if authorities did not take action against the man.
According to Vox, a similarly-organized wave of attacks took place in the years 2015-2017 in Israel, with Palestinian nationalists carrying out lone-wolf rammings during a brief period of insurgency commonly referred to as the "Knife Intifada."
The most significant car-ramming attack in the US in recent years took place during the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, when white-supremacist James Alex Fields Jr. drove his vehicle into a crowd, killing a 32-year-old woman and injuring at least 19 others, according to USA Today.
Protests broke out in Minneapolis, Minnesota in late May following the death of Floyd, an African-American killed by Officer Derek Chauvin. A video circulating social media and news showed Chauvin kneeling on Floyd's neck for eight minutes while the latter was saying he could not breathe. Floyd was later pronounced dead at the hospital.
According to the Associated Press, dozens of businesses across the Twin Cities boarded up their windows amid the spreading racial riots in order to prevent looting. Minneapolis-based Target announced it was temporarily closing two dozen stores in the area, AP reported.
In addition to the spreading riots, thousand of peaceful protesters reportedly marched through the streets of Minneapolis calling for justice, as other rallies are organized across the US. According to AP, local leaders urged demonstrators to refrain from using violence.
As protests spread across the US, Colorado State Representative Leslie Herod said night shots had been fired toward protesters at a demonstration in Denver's Capitol. "We just got shot at. Capitol," Herod said on Twitter. "Someone shot into the rally."
Someone intentionally ran over a protestor. https://t.co/zVFUEo7z7r
— Leslie Herod (@leslieherod) May 29, 2020
A video re-tweeted by Herod in May showed a car driving into protesters in the city. "Someone intentionally ran over a protester," she said.
According to Ari Weil, a terrorism researcher at the University of Chicago's Chicago Project on Security and Threats cited by NPR, at least fifty vehicle-rammings occurred from May 27 to June 17. Some 45 attacks were reportedly carried out by civilians, five being by law enforcement.
Only four attacks have reportedly been ruled incidental with 23 remaining under investigation. At least 18 involved malice, Weil's analysis of police and court records concluded.