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A socialist “Never Trumpers” protester blamed “conservative provocateurs” for a tense confrontation with police that resulted in multiple arrests just outside the Republican National Committee’s midterm convention in Dallas.
Videos posted on social media Thursday afternoon showed what appeared to be hundreds of Never Trumpers confronting Dallas police just blocks from where the president was set to deliver his convention-closing speech. Authorities responded with a strong show of force that included officers in apparent riot gear.
The Dallas Police Department confirmed with Fox News Digital that two protesters were arrested on charges related to their actions during the protest. The department said that officers assigned to the area arrested the two protesters after it said they “assaulted a counter-protester” and “obstructed a road.”
The department said the suspects’ names and specific charges will be released after they are booked into jail.
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Fox News Digital spoke with a protester named Rick Majumdar, who was wearing a shirt with the initials for the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO), which, according to its website, is a “national organization of revolutionaries fighting for socialism in the United States.”
Majumdar said that the protest was organized by the Dallas Against the Trump Agenda Coalition, which, he said, consists of 16 “faith-based organizations, pro-immigrants’ rights groups and labor organizations.”
“We’re here to protest the Republican agenda, the Trump agenda and all its policies that it has enacted over the last few years,” he explained. “The march is an important event, we feel, against this convention that’s happening for the last two days.”
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He said that, during the group’s march, “we encountered some street closures by the police” and that officers arrested a couple of protesters who “were at the front of the group.”
Pressed on why the protesters were arrested, Majumdar said, “Those people were trying to draw people away from rioting provocateurs, and I think the police heard something. And they immediately tackled two of them and arrested them, and some of them even pulled out their guns as well.”
The protest came amid heightened concerns over political violence and the targeting of public figures. It also coincided with the first anniversary of the assassination of conservative activist and Turning Point USA co-founder Charlie Kirk.
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Majumdar did not answer whether the protesters blocked any roads but said the confrontation occurred at the “closest entry point” to the convention.
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Asked whether he had any message directly for President Donald Trump, Majumdar paused, smiled and said, “Thank you.”
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