The Daily Signal - Reporter Recounts What He Saw Covering 2020 Riots

Episode Date: May 12, 2022

The corporate media lied that the riots across America during the summer of 2020 essentially were "fiery, but mostly peaceful." Americans, however, watched in horror as places such as Portland, Seattle, and Kenosha, Wisconsin, burned while radical leftists swarmed the streets. Through it all, though, one journalist braved the mobs. Townhall's Julio Rosas spent much of 2020 moving around the country, capturing footage of rioters as they looted stores, fought police, and, of course, burned buildings. Rosas is the author of the new book "Fiery (But Mostly Peaceful): The 2020 Riots and the Gaslighting of America." Rosas joins "The Daily Signal Podcast" to discuss his book and reveal the truth that the media won't tell you about the riots. We also cover these stories: The Labor Department reports that inflation dipped to 8.3% from 8.5% in March, as measured by the the consumer price index, but that Americans likely will continue to see high inflation. Pro-abortion activists make their way to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s home in San Francisco, accusing Democrats of being “complicit” in the likely repeal of Roe v. Wade. Hong Kong’s national security police arrest Cardinal Joseph Zen and several others on charges of colluding with foreign forces to undermine China’s national security. New data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that over 107,000 Americans died last year of opioid overdoses, a record high. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Thursday, May 12th. I'm Virginia Allen. And I'm Doug Blair. The corporate media lied that the 2020 riots around America were fiery but mostly peaceful. Americans watched in horror as places like Portland, Seattle, and Kenosha burned as radical leftists swarm the streets. Through it all, there was one journalist who braved the mobs. Julio Rosas is the author of the new book, Fiery But Mostly Peaceful, the 2020 riots and the gaslighting of America. He joins the show to discuss his book and reveal the truth that the media won't tell you about the 2020 riots.

But before we get to Doug's conversation with Julio Rosas, let's hit our top news stories of the day. Inflation is down, but don't celebrate just yet. The Labor Department reported that the Consumer Price Index for inflation dropped to 8.3% from its high of 8.5% in March. However, that slight decline comes with a few caveats. The report had a few warning signs that high inflation isn't going anywhere. Prices for groceries and restaurants, as well as new cars, airline travel, and apartment rentals all rows. Airline fares, for example, shot up 18.6% in April, marking the fastest rise on record. It's not just the Supreme Court justices who are having their homes protested anymore.

Pro-abortion activists made their way to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's private home in San Francisco on Tuesday, accusing Democrats of being complicit in the likely repeal of Roe v. Wade. Here's some of what that sounded like via storyful news. Where he has been complicit, complicit with the fascist Republican Party that once did not only eliminate abortion rights. Pelosi has previously been supportive of the protests surrounding the leaked document, suggesting that Roe v. Wade would be overturned. On Monday, Pelosi said, while we have seen and heard extraordinary anguish in our communities,

we have been moved by how so many have channeled their righteous anger into meaningful action, planning to march and mobilize to make their voices heard. But not all Democrats have been as enthusiastic about those protests. During a Wednesday interview with CNN, Senator Dick Durbin, Democrat from Illinois, said that protesters showing up to the private homes of sitting Supreme Court justices crossed a line Durbin said, I think it's reprehensible. Stay away from homes and families of elected officials on the court. To go after them in their homes, to do anything of a threatening nature, and certainly anything violent, is absolutely reprehensible.

A Catholic cardinal has been arrested in Hong Kong. Now the White House is calling for his release. Hong Kong's national security police arrested Cardinal Joseph Zen and several others are in charges of colluding with four-en-for-en forces to the detriment of China's national security. White House Deputy Press Secretary Corrine Jen Pierre called on China and Hong Kong officials to immediately release those who have been unjustly detained and charged. The Cardinal is 90 years old and has long been outspoken in his criticism of China. The arrest comes just a few days after Hong Kong's new chief executive, John Lee, was selected. Lee is a former security chief.

The Cardinal's arrest is the latest in a crackdown on pro-democracy advocates in Hong Kong, led by China. America has just broken a very grim record. New data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday estimates that more than 107,000 Americans died last year of opioid overdoses, a record high. In other words, that means roughly one American overdoses and dies every five minutes. That statistic also means that. that since 2001, more than a million Americans have died from drug overdoses. Drug overdose fatalities rose 15% over 2020, and in 2020, it's estimated that 93,65 people died. Now stay tuned for my conversation with Julio Rosas, as we discuss the 2020 riots.

Conservative women, conservative feminists. It's true. We do exist. I'm Virginia Allen, and every Thursday morning on problematic women, Lauren Evans and I sort through the news to bring you stories that are of particular interest to conservative leaning or problematic women. That is women whose views and opinions are often excluded or mocked by those on the so-called feminist left. We talk about everything from pop culture to politics and policy. Plus, we bring you an exclusive interview with a problematic lawmaker or conservative activists. every second and fourth Tuesday of the month. Search for problematic women wherever you get your podcasts. And we are also problematic on social media.

So be sure to follow us on Instagram. My guest today is Julio Rosas, senior writer at Town Hall and author of the new book, Fiery, but Mostly Peaceful, The 2020 Riots and the Gaslighting of America. Julio, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me, Doug. I am very excited to have this interview because this was a topic that I think was completely botched by the mainstream media,

and it affected so much about how we viewed their coverage of these types of events, but it also viewed how we were trusting this coverage of, like, kind of things in general. So you were at a lot of these riots that happened back in 2020. Can you paint us a picture of what most of these riots looked like? Well, for the riot portion, because usually when it comes to these things, so overall, it's a very fluid situation just no matter what, because we have lots of people out and they're emotional, right? A lot of things can happen.

And so there were protests. And, you know, that's kind of one of the things like, what about the peaceful protests? Like, no, like, no, there were. But, and this is what you were alluding to earlier, is that there were also riots. And so with riots, it was very, it was, I mean, it was unlike anything I'd ever experienced before. And, you know, with my background growing up in Wheaton, Illinois, that's where Wheaton College is at. Suburbs, 45 minutes out of Chicago, you know, it was great. Like, it was good life in terms of that because, you know, it's not like we're in a thorough world country.

But when it came to one of places like Minneapolis, and Minneapolis today, for me, is like the worst ride I covered in terms of scale, in terms of damage, in terms of just chaoticness. Because what I talk about in the book, actually, at the very beginning was I had covered Antifa, a proud boy face-offs in Portland, right? In Portland, Oregon. And that doesn't really, that's not necessarily a riot per se. It's just like a giant street brawl. But you go a couple blocks away and everything's like just kind of going at, kind of going normal.

But with like Minneapolis, for example, I had to figure out, oh, wait, so I flew in from Los Angeles because that's where I was saying during the COVID lockdowns. I was thinking, oh, wait, I had to figure out how am I going to get from the airport to my hotel and how am I going to get from the hotel down to South Minneapolis, which is kind of the epic center was for everything. And so I had a hit up a local contact, and I had a friend, and he helped pick me up. But it just even as something as simple as what we consider a normal society of like, oh, yeah, if you go to an airport, there's going to be, you have public transportation with like a taxi, Uber.

There was none of that. Really? There was nothing running because everyone just didn't, was scared. Everyone didn't. I mean, by the time I got there, that was day three of riots. You know, things calmed down during the day. but then at night things turned up. And so people were really just kind of bracing and preparing for that Thursday night.

And the Thursday night that I was there, that's when the Minneapolis police precinct was ordered to be evacuated and was set on fire. And so really, overall, when riots happened, it's just a free-for-all. Now, you were there, like I said. So could you maybe, like, talk to us about that night that the precinct was burned down? I mean, you were there. I'm assuming you felt the flames. you felt all this stuff.

Like, what was that like? It was so, I mean, like I said, I'd never seen police officers run. And it wasn't even because they necessarily wanted to. I'm sure some did. But we later found out that they were ordered to by the mayor, Jacob Fry. And you can imagine, so George Floyd died on Sunday. The video went viral that Monday, the following day. And then that very first day when, you know, people were protesting and rioting.

I mean, literally, that first day outside the police precinct. So for that entire week, a lot of the anger and a lot of the action and rioting was taking place at the precinct. But as time went on and people realize, like, oh, we can start getting away with whatever we want because all the police in this area hold up in this building because they're being preoccupied. That's when it started to kind of spread out. So that Thursday, it really reached a fever pitch. I mean, they were really, they were, I really wish I got it on video, but people were shouting to burn the police station with the officers still inside. I mean, they wanted to kill these officers. And it quickly became very untenable for them to hold their position because not only was the front portion of the police station breach, but also the back portion.

And actually, we later found out that they couldn't open up the gate for, for, for, to let the vehicles out when they were, because someone had like, just like jammed it. So when they had to, when they were getting their vehicles out, they just had to bash the gate out. I mean, that's how dedicated these rioters were to try to kill these guys. But, I mean, you could just feel the jubilation within the BLM crowd once they realized that their actions were really having their desired effect to at a minimum push the cops out of the area. And they did. And, you know, they went as soon as the cops left. I mean, there was no law enforcement presence at all after that point.

And it invigorated them. They said that they wanted to go to the fifth police precinct, which was a straight shot down west about two to three miles so that they could burn that police. I mean, they were just so happy at that moment because they were really like trying to accomplish of this kind of revolution that they wanted. And, you know, when we talk about abolishing the police and like, well, that kind of. have already happened. And it was absolutely disastrous in Minneapolis. And even to the day, and again, talk about it in the book in the aftermath, it was very, very devastating for that, especially in South Minneapolis. I'm curious if you were able to interact with some of the rioters. So I have a two-part question. One, did you talk with any of the writers?

Were they willing to speak with you? And then two, we've seen in certain circumstances where reporters for conservative outlets are recognized by, you know, some of these people of the leftist persuasion, right? Like Antifa will just, generally recognize Andy No when he goes out and does coverage and they'll try and even people who aren't Annie No, they'll still harassing because they're racist. Right, right. But were you ever recognized by any of these rioters and pursued? So it's kind of tricky.

Obviously, I do want to get people's perspective on, hey, why are you writing? Why are you writing? But obviously, the next question is, well, who are you with? And it's kind of hard to say, well, I'm from town hall. And I go on Fox News every once in a while. So please talk to me. So I in those Hectic well even even in like a hectic situation

I'm like a riot it is hard just to talk to anybody Right right because they're too busy rioting And in which case that's fine with me Because I'll just film that But in terms of getting recognized No I I wouldn't Especially at the very beginning because I had only been on Fox News once prior

Prior to that So that's kind of that was kind of the benefit of starting out With not having a super large following already Not being like an 80-no off the bat I covered some Antifa, some proud boy stuff prior to that. But, I mean, I covered Charlottesville back in 2017 during that whole hot mess. But even back then, my coverage, at least on Twitter, didn't gain that much traction because my following was way, way, way smaller. But covering Charlottesville really solidified my desire to cover these types of events.

That's why I started going there in the first place. But I always joke that I'm glad that mask wearing was a thing. because I would always just cover up my face as time went on. And I was starting to, you know, my tweets would go viral and, you know, people were reading my stories and going on Fox News a lot more. I mean, there's literally one point where I was on Fox News every night for a week. And actually I had to say no to them on the last day of that Friday because I already like, look, I need a break. That was probably like my worst interview because like my mind was just like so melted from from everything. But so I haven't been recognized in a bad way.

I have been accosted once or twice, but it wasn't because they recognized me. They just saw that I was a reporter. So they were attacking reporters. They didn't even care if it was a right, left, or center reporter. Yeah. And it was just, I mean, that's the thing. Even if you're someone like CNN, I mean, as a garbage news outlet that is, people still, I mean, that's not just people on the right. A lot of people on the left also hate CNN.

Right, right. And the example that comes to mind with that was with Brooklyn. center in 2021 after the Dante Wright situation. I can't remember her name, but the female CNN reporter, she was being accosted and heckled by, by, and, oh, and their camera, their security guy got hit and had with a frozen water bottle and knocked him out. So, I mean, and this is why I don't, and this is what's so confusing about why the media, the rest of the mainstream media coddles and, like, makes excuses for left-wing riders and

BLM is, they're not your friends either. They will attack you just as easily as they'll attack someone like me or some of my colleagues. So it's not the fact that even if they're attacking you, you then portray them in an unfair light. It's just you show what's happening. Right. What's happening? And that's what I did. And that's what a few others did.

And obviously they didn't link us for that because we were showing what they were actually up to and what they were doing. But it's then, okay, so especially if they're going to attack you, so you should definitely tell the truth of what's going on. But then, like the title of the book, you know, fiery but mostly peaceful CNN ran in Kenosha. It's just I don't know why. I think it's just because they really believe that the ends justify the means when it comes to that type of coverage. Right. I want to kind of focus on one city in particular. And again, cards on the table.

We talked about this a little bit beforehand. I am from Portland, Oregon. So when I was watching this coverage, it really hurt me because I recognized a lot of the places that were getting destroyed. Did you have the opportunity in writing this book to talk with some of the other residents of these cities, maybe Portland in particular, who just said, I don't know what's going on. What is happening? Why is my city on fire? Yeah.

Yeah. Over the course of during my coverage of the riots and then months afterwards when I went back to like Minneapolis and Kenosha. But with Portland specifically, I mean, I talked to one gentleman and he, he, his business was located right across the street from the immigration customs enforcement station, which is a very common target for the local Antifa groups there. and so because, you know, the ICE officers and the Federal Protective Service, they protect the building. So because after the initial attack, they then get pushed back. And so then they start kind of damaging other property that's left on guard. And so his place has been broken into before windows have been smashed. And he told me, I mean, he was just so beat down from everything because that was, like I said,

that was afar from the first time that he had to be out there to, like, shoo people away. because he said like, all I want is just sleep. I mean, just like this, you know, a very basic human need, and he wasn't getting it because these these punks were just constantly trying to pick a fight with federal officers in the name of anti-fascism. Right, right. And so it's, and so that was one of the hard things with covering the riots. And then in the aftermath, too, because these were, these were ordinary Americans who, in, in first, every case had nothing to do with whatever was causing the riot in the first place and yet they were burying the brunt of this anger and and that's why just I've become a real

a lot of people you would think a lot of people would be against writing but apparently not but for me personally I just I just don't like rioting because I have just seen the negative consequences of it and then again the anger comes when I see again people with bigger platforms saying Oh, well, it's not that big of a deal, or it's just property, there's insurance, and just all this other nonsense. But a lot of that, a lot of people who say that are privileged with having a stable income, especially during, and then, of course, on top of everything was the COVID lockdowns. Right, right. And so the negative effects from the COVID lockdowns was already pronounced for months. And then even if you, even if the business wasn't burned down, if it was still ransacked, I mean, that's still thousands of dollars that they might not already have or they might have had, but they didn't because, well, you know, the government said, no, you can't have your own.

open your business. Yeah, yeah. I mean, that kind of reminds me of like maybe what the day after would look like, right? Obviously, we saw a lot of this rioting happening at night, and then the days would be a little more peaceful. What did it look like as you were wandering around? I'm sure you did coverage of this, but were you wandering around the city streets just in the aftermath a lot of these riots? It was weird because, like, sometimes it was just be like, people would still be out and about and cleaning up and people just looking at the damage and just going about their day of lives. And it was kind of quiet. in some regards.

And it was just kind of, it was really the calm before the storm. And that was really pronounced in places like Kenosha, Wisconsin. But for me, the one that really disturbed me the most was Wadwatosa, Wisconsin, which is about an hour northwest of Kenosha outside of Milwaukee. And that riot happened because there was a, even pre-George Floyd, a black officer shot a black 17-year-old who had fired a gun. It was pointing the gun in the officer's direction. so he shot in self-defense. Right.

And so the Milwaukee district attorney didn't charge the black officer with any wrongdoing because it's like, well, he's justified. Well, because this was happening post-George Floyd, everyone, you know, there was a riot. Right. Right. So there was literally a caravan, a BLM caravan from Milwaukee where they started the protest and made their way to Wadwitosa. And as soon as they under the city limits, that's when they started attacking buildings, started, they attacked people's homes where people were at home at night. I mean, it was really bad in that regard, but I'd never been to Wadotosa before, and I had gotten there at night. Like, I got there just as things started to unravel.

And so the next morning, when I went to go out and cover the damage and see, you know, people do, you know, the rinse and repeat of people repairing and trying to get interviews with all that, Wadotosa is very similar to Wheaton and where that it's a suburb. And when I was walking the street, like, these neighborhoods, I was just, like, shocked that, you know, I could have been back home in Wheaton. Like this literally could have been my hometown if the circumstances just apparently happened just south of here. And that was really jarring. There were homes decorated for Thanksgiving and Halloween and just like all this stuff. And yet just a night prior, people were going crazy because of a justified police action. And that was really kind of the start of being blackpilled.

Yeah, yeah. In the sense of like, because I was thinking, I was starting to think that, well, it's starting to get colder now. You'd think they don't like rioting when it's cold, but it was still going, it was still happening. Like we were past the summer of love. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We were into this now fall and into, like, so it was like, is this ever going to stop? And it was really, I was getting really concerned about with the election, because the election was just before that and how that was going to turn out. And so I was just really worried about is there going to be, not even just riots, but is there going to be like a civil war of some kind or like an insurg, like, I don't know.

And so obviously we didn't have that because the election turned out differently and Derek Chauvin was found guilty. But there was all these points where I was thinking that we were going to just, we were going to fall off a cliff. And we haven't done that. And, you know, we've kind of pulled back from it a little bit. But we're in such a worse spot than we were in terms of like national unity than prior to 2020. And part of the reason for the book is to talk about here's what happened in 2020 and here's his aftermath. And if we continue down this path, it's not going to be, it's not going to be good. I mean, I think that this book is so timely, especially since we are still reflecting on the aftermath of those types of things.

Are we seeing any data to suggest that the American people are buying that media narrative, that these riots were isolated incidents over a sort of, massive sea of peaceful protesting? A little bit. It's a little difficult now because this is now all on the aftermath in January 6th, right? Yeah. And so it was really frustrating covering that because right away, as soon as people started going crazy in January 6th, the media is like, oh, yeah, this is a riot. They had no problem using the riot, but then they took a step further, right? They're using insurrection.

And now we have people saying it's worse than 9-11 and Pearl Harbor and all these other things combined. It's like, no, you idiot. It's a riot, yes. And it's wrong, yes. but it's not 9-11. Right, right. But so now, now the media finally, like they just finally got the thing that they wanted for all of 2020, which was Trump supporters rioting.

And so now they just, you know, even today, that's the only thing with Democrats heading into the midterms. That's the only thing that they have is just this investigation. They have nothing else because everything else has just turned terrible under this administration. And so thankfully, a lot of people see through the nonsense that the media was for, trying to sell them in 2020. But the January 6th riot has been used by the media to kind of retcon a lot of what happened the year prior. And probably one of the best examples of that was actually, it was shortly after January 6th. It was the New York Times story.

I referenced it in the book. And there was a New York Times story about how, oh, Republicans are what about it or like what about January 6 with the BLM riots. but the author of the piece wrote it as such as highlighting isolated incidences of property damage. We're talking about a minimum, $2 billion worth of damage across the country over many months, sometimes in the same cities, multiple times like Portland. That's far from being just these isolated examples of just property damage. And also people died. I mean, we had over, I think, I mean, the official death tolls like puts it over 20.

But, I mean, you kind of have to think of like, you know, who died, you know, maybe as a, in kind of the aftermath weeks afterward. But it's just, it's just so aggravating, again, about where because Trump supporters rioted January, for one day January 6th, and all the other stuff doesn't matter anymore. And I knew, and I knew that. And that's why I was kind of angry at the Trump supporters on January 6th. Because I, and that moment I knew, like, oh, my gosh, like, they just gave this to them on a silver platter in all the work I did prior to that on the national stage and national conversation. Because before they were trying to ignore it, now not only can they just like, now they can say, yes, this happened, maybe. Right. But it doesn't matter because January 6th.

And it's just, it's just, there's just so much hypocrisy and just so much, just double standards with everything. And again, for me, it just goes back to just rioting is just, it's bad. It's bad. It's bad. Don't riot. Just don't riot. And, you know, it's very, very frustrating. Sure.

I haven't seen a lot of it. As we wrap here, I want to get your opinion on this. As the media is going to clearly be in the tank for these rioters on the left, it seems like we already saw this through the fiery but mostly peaceful, sort of weird trying to whitewash it. That's always going to be a thing. How do we as conservatives respond to that effectively? By my book. There you go.

Well, I say that, but you, I mean, now more than ever, it's really important to support media and media companies like Town Hall and others who are actually going to be willing to actually just tell the basic truth about these things. And it's really sad. And I'm not saying this to, like, brag, but I've had people come up to me saying, like, oh, you're a hero and you're like, you're so awesome. And I like, I appreciate it, but like, I'm not a hero. I'm just a reporter. but it speaks to just doing the bare minimum of what journalism used to be today is now all of a sudden this kind of saint almost in people's eyes. And that's because the rest of the media has to base themselves.

And, you know, it's far from just the rise. It's the Trump presidency and all the scandals and all this other stuff. It happens in big and small ways. So, I mean, people's faith, understandably, in the rest of the media is very, very lost and for some reason the people here in the DC bubble just think that they're the stupid they're the ones that are wrong and they're going to continue doing it. But even today, I mean, really, it's just you have to support the news outlets. And now it's not even just news outlets.

I mean, people support people on Substack. I mean, there's a reason why those people are popular. It's no longer about the companies. It's now more about the individual reporters because you literally now, today, unfortunately, You have to seek out these individual people who are willing to actually tell the truth about whatever topic it is. And if that's where the media is going to go, okay, I mean, I'll be fine because, you know, I've worked really hard to make sure that what I report's been accurate. And if it's not, then correct it and take responsibility for that. Thankfully, it hasn't happened too much.

Right, right. Because it's very simple when you cover a right. It's like, hey, here's a writer. Here's a writing. But when it extends to even just like something like I've been focusing on the southern border, the crisis and doing that. there's independent people who do that and are supported because, again, outside of Fox News, there's no, like, mega big companies that are really focusing on telling the daily stories. They pop up every once in a while and say, hey, okay, now, here's a number or something.

Right. So really, I know it's tough, but, I mean, you have to support, you have to support the people who are actually going out and doing the work. Well, if we want to support it, where can we purchase your book? So Amazon, understandably, if you don't want to give it to Amazon, you can also Barnes & Noble, also, I think, Thrift Books, I think, but you can also go to my website, Julio Rosas.com. There's some links there to, it's also an audiobook version and an e-book version. If you do buy the audio version, you'll hear my voice because I was one that narrated it. I didn't want to, just because I knew, like, it was completely new.

But it was a slog, it was a slog, but at the same time, well, this is my story. It's your story. It only makes sense to do it. Now, if Morgan Freeman wanted to narrate it, We'll keep Mr. Freeman in our minds here. That was Julio Rosas, senior writer at townhall.com, and author of the new book, Fiery, but Mostly Peaceful, The 2020 Riots and the Gaslighting of America.

Julio, thank you so much for your time. Thanks for me. And that'll do it for today's episode. Thanks so much for listening to The Daily Signal podcast. And be sure to subscribe to the Daily Signal podcast wherever you listen, Google Play, Apple Podcast, Spotify, and IHeart Radio. And if you have not done so before, take just a moment to leave us a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts.

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