From Twitter
Racist vigilantes gathering with bats and guns at the statue of Christopher Columbus at Columbus Square in South Philadelphia, some of them just assaulted our reporter
Several guns, bats and sticks carried by white vigilantes here at Columbus square in South Philly to “protect” the Columbus statue. Police have been visibly quite friendly with this group
This man in first photo is who initiated the group assault on our reporter – he noticed he was being filmed and instantly bee-lined for us to demand we stop filming him. As he left, police passively watched him strike our reporter’s bike with a metal bat.
About 100 almost exclusively white vigilantes our by Columbus Statue at Marconi Plaza in Sourh Philly. When police arrived after we were assaulted, one cop accused us of instigating the crowd.
This man by the Columbus statue at Marconi Plaza is armed with some kind of rifle
The crowd of aggravated South Philly Italian Columbus statue defenders applaud and cheers for the police as some officers leave the area
More agitated white men with bats and sticks are continuing to arrive at Marconi Plaza outside the Columbus statue. Philly Police faced some backlash recently after they appeared to tolerate and endorse similar activity in Fishtown on the north end of the city recently.
South Philly Columbus statue enthusiasts got very upset once again when police told them they aren’t allowed to physically stop us from filming them
Most of the all-white crowd at Marconi Plaza now seems mostly interested in confronting our lone reporter on the scene. Many invitations have been given to engage in hand-to-hand combat. As journalists we are obliged to decline!
We are no longer able to document the ongoing, escalating Marconi Plaza South Philadelphia vigilante incident after @PhillyPolice ordered us to leave or be arrested. We were told we no longer had the right to document this event.
Before incidents shown in this thread, we spoke w some ‘statue defenders’ about why they were there. Many said the statue represented Italian heritage. Some justified Columbus’ rape and slavery etc by saying “the natives were savages”. Others denied these atrocities took place.
Many people present at the statue who confronted our reporter accused him of being from out of town/not from South Philly and of being racist against Italian people. Ironically, our Philly reporter Chris Schiano lives in South Philadelphia and comes from an Italian family.
Shortly before @PhillyPolice ordered us to cease our on-site reporting under threat of arrest, the crowd was cheering as a man with a Trump 2020 flag arrived. Police were also shaking hands with some of the white vigilantes as this was happening.
Going back over our footage and stills of this incident – we observed at least 2-3 open carried long rifles, and overheard that many present were concealed carrying. Some showed up with improvised weapons, like this man who was standing alone with a golf club.
