By Melissa Byrne August 23 at 6:00 AM
Melissa Byrne is a political strategist living in Philadelphia.
Trump at his Trump Tower news conference last week. (Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images)
Like
many events that end up with a person in handcuffs, my story begins in a
bar. I was in Atlanta earlier this month for Netroots Nation, the
annual meeting of progressive organizers and writers, when I overheard
friends discussing how to resist President Trump’s first visit to Trump
Tower. I jumped into the conversation: “Well, you call me, of course.”
Twenty minutes later, we had a rough plan that we would unfurl a banner
inside Trump Tower the following week. I have been to many protests
since the inauguration, and I was proud to do my part.
Together
with Ultraviolet and the Working Families Party, we commissioned a
painted banner that simply read “Women Resist White Supremacy.” Through
sheer luck, not only would Trump be in Trump Tower during my act of
resistance, but he would be giving a news conference about 3:30 p.m. I
knew from my previous work as a campaign advancer that the Secret
Service would begin sweeps to clear the space about an hour before he
spoke, so the best possible time for the action was 2 p.m.
Unlike
previous presidents, Trump’s home is in a public space. You don’t have
to sneak into Trump Tower. You enter via an atrium next to a Nike store.
Then you pass through airport-style security run by the Secret Service.
I wore my banner as a slip of sorts under my flowy dress. It was made
of fabric, so it didn’t set off the metal detector.
Protesters gathered outside Trump Tower in
Manhattan on Aug. 14, as Trump arrived back for the first time
since being inaugurated into office.
(evilevestrikesagain/Instagram)
Like every good political operative — I worked
for Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-Vt.) 2016 campaign and then the MoveOn
super PAC supporting Hillary Clinton’s campaign — I run on coffee.
Conveniently, the Starbucks inside Trump Tower is located on the second
floor and overlooks an atrium — exactly where I’d want to hang the
banner. I sipped a flat white and waited for the right moment, when
uniformed NYPD wouldn’t be nearby. Then I unfurled the banner. A
security officer grabbed it almost immediately. I ended up on the
ground.
Since
Starbucks is a public place and I was a paying guest, I knew I hadn’t
violated any laws. At worst, I could be banned from the building. I
expected from past protest actions that I’d be given a warning and a
request to leave. I clearly and politely explained to the NYPD officers
who detained me that the protest was done and I was heading out.
They had other ideas.
A
detective grabbed my wrist and cuffed me. A gaggle of officers from
multiple law enforcement agencies escorted me to a room near the atrium.
A few chairs had Trump campaign materials plastered on them. Inside the
room with me were more than 10 officers from the NYPD and the Secret
Service.
Then the questions began, and they were bananas. A young
woman from the Secret Service began the questioning; male NYPD officers
tagged in and out. They never asked me whether I understood my rights,
and I wasn’t actually sure at that moment what rights, if any, I had. I
was focused on not getting put in a car and being whisked away.
It
was clear right away that these officials wouldn’t see me the way I see
myself: as a reasonably responsible, skilled nonviolent political
operative who works on a mix of electoral and issues campaigns. To them,
I was clearly a threat to national security. It felt like an
interrogation on “Homeland.” Here are my favorite parts of the
conversation, as I remember them.
NYPD: “Why would you come to the president’s home to do this?”
Me: “It was wrong for the president to support white supremacy.”
NYPD: “Don’t you respect the president?”
Me: “I don’t respect people who align with Nazis.”
Secret Service: “Do you have negative feelings toward the president?”
Me: “Yes.”
Secret Service: “Can you elaborate?”
Me: “He should be impeached and should not be president.”
They
were concerned with who bought my train ticket, once they saw the
receipt on my phone. The NYPD officers didn’t seem to believe me that
some organizations work for justice and organize these legal protests.
Each time they touched my phone, I said I don’t consent to the search of
my phone. (They held my phone during the interview, and I can only hope
they didn’t poke around it — although they wouldn’t have found much to
interest them, unless they like Bernie GIF's.)
Secret Service: “Have you ever been inside the White House?
Me: “Yes.”
Secret Service: “How many times?”
Me: “Many. I was a volunteer holiday tour guide for the White House Visitors Center.”
Secret Service, eyes wide: “When was the last time you were there?”
Me: “December.” I explained that I probably wouldn’t be invited back until we have a new president.
The
officers ran through a raft of predictable questions about firearms. (I
don’t own any, and they seemed puzzled by my commitment to nonviolence
as a philosophy.) They asked whether I wanted to hurt the president or
anyone in his family. Obviously not. Then came the mental health
questions.
Secret Service: “Do you have any mental health disorders?”
Me: “No.”
Secret Service: “Have you ever tried to commit suicide?”
Me: “No.”
Secret Service: “Have you ever had suicidal thoughts?”
Me: “No.”
I
was trying very hard not to roll my eyes at the repeated questions when
an NYPD detective suggested my protest could be charged as a felony. In
the next second, the Secret Service agents asked me to sign Health
Insurance Portability and Accountability Act waivers so they could
gather all my medical records. My mind was still focused on the f-word:
felony. But I didn’t want to sign the waivers.
I
meekly asked whether I should talk to a lawyer. I was told it was my
prerogative but also that it might mean I’d be held longer. Being in a
room with that many enforcement agents hurt my ability to reason
dispassionately, and I was now looking at a criminal record from a
basic, even banal, nonviolent protest. I signed the forms.
Trump
was about to start his now-famous news conference, and the Secret
Service needed to resume patrols. They let me go with just a ban from
the building.
Trump on Aug. 15 said that “there’s blame on both sides” for the violence that erupted in Charlottesville on Aug. 12.
(Bastien Inzaurralde/The Washington Post)
But a few days later, I heard they were
canvassing my neighborhood, in West Philadelphia, looking for
information about me, including from people I’ve never met. One woman
they approached found my contact information online and told me about
this exchange in a Facebook Messenger request. They asked her whether
she knew me and whether I was a threat to the president. Since I live in
West Philly, she replied that the only threat lives in the White House
and that the president is racist.
Secret Service: “Do you know Melissa Byrne?”
Neighbor: “No.”
Secret Service: “Why would she protest President Trump?”
Neighbor: “Because he’s a fucking racist.”
Thanks, neighbor!
In
the end, I couldn’t stop wondering why they were devoting so much time
to me when they could be pursuing neo-Nazis. I was treated as a national
security threat when all I’d done was exercise my First Amendment right
to free expression. This isn’t normal, and it shouldn’t be how
nonviolent protesters are treated by armed agents of the government.
