The truth about Gov. Walz and the National Guard
In the Summer 2020 edition of our magazine Thinking Minnesota, my colleague Tom Steward and I wrote an article outlining how state and city leaders — particularly Governor Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey — failed in their duty to protect the lives and property of the citizens of the Twin Cities by allowing rioters free run for four nights in May that year. Subsequent revelations have only added to this picture of dysfunction and paralysis, but the essential story remains much as we told it four years ago.
The issue has bubbled to the surface again. Former President Trump said recently:
Every voter in Minnesota needs to know that when the violent mobs of anarchists and looters and Marxists came to burn down Minneapolis four years ago — remember me? I couldn’t get your governor to act. He’s supposed to call in the National Guard or the Army. And he didn’t do it. I couldn’t get your governor. So I sent in the National Guard to save Minneapolis.
Several “fact check” outfits have labelled this “false.” Some commentators have gone beyond this to defend Governor Walz’ handling of the National Guard, arguing that it was he who “activated” it. But, as a closer look at the record shows, that is a very partial version of events.
Day One: Tuesday, May 26
George Floyd died at 9:25pm on Monday, May 25, 2020. Tensions built through the following day, Tuesday, May 26. As Tom Steward and I wrote:
During the afternoon, hundreds of protesters blocked traffic at the intersection of 38th and Chicago Avenue South, near the Cup Foods store that called in the original police complaint against George Floyd. By that evening, the crowd of protesters, now numbered in the thousands, marched to the Minneapolis Police Department’s Third Precinct station at Minnehaha Avenue South and Lake Street East. It began peacefully, but as the evening wore on, some protesters tore down fences, smashed windows, attacked squad cars, and threw water bottles at officers. After police responded with rubber bullets and tear gas and rain began to fall, demonstrators eventually fell back.
Day Two: Wednesday, May 27
Tensions continued to rise through Wednesday, May 27. As Tom Steward and I wrote:
The protest continued through the day, again starting at 38th and Chicago Avenue South and moving on to the Third Precinct. There, the crowd became more violent. Bottles and rocks rained down on the Third Precinct building. Around 6:00 p.m., officers used rubber bullets, tear gas, and flash-bang rounds to disperse the rioters, but the violence simply escalated. Somebody set fire to the AutoZone on East Lake Street, and a crowd of at least 100 people started looting a nearby Target store. Video circulated of looters punching a woman in a wheelchair. A pawnshop owner shot and killed a man who he allegedly thought was burglarizing his business. The violence continued throughout the night. Rioters ignited fires and looted stores all the way to Uptown. Arsonists set at least 30 fires along the way, including a towering blaze that gutted a six-story affordable housing apartment building still under construction.
In August 2020, the Star Tribune reported:
On Wednesday, May 27, the second evening of unrest around the Third Precinct, Frey said Police Chief Medaria Arradondo called him at 6:23 p.m. to say that the Target store near the police station was being looted and that he needed the National Guard.
Frey said he immediately telephoned Walz, at 6:29 p.m., relayed information, and asked him to send in the National Guard. “We expressed the seriousness of the situation. The urgency was clear,” Frey said.
“He did not say yes,” Frey said of Walz. “He said he would consider it.”
Frey insisted that he explicitly asked whether his verbal requests constituted a formal request, and the governor’s staff confirmed that they did. The governor’s office disputes that.
The documents, released by the city late last week, corroborate this sequence of events.
They show that at 6:28 p.m. Wednesday, Frey’s spokesman, Mychal Vlatkovich, texted a small group of employees in the mayor’s office: “Mayor just came out and said the chief wants him to call in the national guard for help at Third Precinct. Mayor appears intent on doing.” Frey’s policy director, Heidi Ritchie, later updated the group: “He called the governor just now.”
In a separate text conversation later Wednesday night, Vlaktovich said Frey indicated “Walz was hesitating.”
…
At 9:11 p.m. Wednesday, Arradondo sent an e-mail to [Public Safety Commissioner John] Harrington that included an attachment requesting “assistance of the MN National Guard for immediate assistance with significant civil unrest occurring in the City of Minneapolis.”
It said the department has “expended all available resources within our Department as well as all available law enforcement assistance from our neighboring jurisdictions.”
It listed a four-point mission plan: “Area Security and Force Protection Operations,” “Area Denial Operations,” “Transportation assistance for law enforcement officers,” “Logistical assistance for the overall security operation.”
Arradondo asked for 600 National Guard soldiers “along with compliment [sic] of command and control,” as well as vehicles. The National Guard would report to police department supervisors, who would coordinate with the National Guard’s leaders.
…
Frey said he received no confirmation the National Guard was coming the rest of Wednesday night or the following morning.
A city news release about his request for the Guard was drafted Wednesday but never sent.
Frey first revealed to the Star Tribune that he had asked for the Guard at 11:30 p.m. that night.
Day Three: Thursday, May 28
“A thick curtain of smoke lingered over Lake Street as dawn broke on Thursday morning,” Tom Steward and I wrote. In April 2023, the Star Tribune reported:
“After last night’s violence, things have been accelerated by the state Director of Public Safety,” Adjutant Gen. of the Minnesota National Guard Jon Jensen wrote to the Pentagon at 8:30 a.m. that day.
Walz wanted to set up a meeting with the Secretary of Defense that morning. In the meantime, Jensen said, he’d just mobilized 50 members of a quick reaction force to support Minneapolis police. Soldiers were setting up command stations in Monticello, Stillwater and Arden Hills. Jensen said they were still waiting on orders from Minneapolis police and Walz, and they were storing guns and ammo in the Arden Hills armory.
“We have worked with Minneapolis PD before — we supported them extensively during super bowl 52 in 2018 — we know their leadership and they know us,” Jensen said.
He said state police and other departments were already supporting Minneapolis through mutual aid agreements, “so we are the reserve of the reserve.”
“Once we get our mission set from MPD I’ll follow up,” he said. “Right now: anticipate 200 [military police] for multiple days.”
…
On the morning of May 28, 2020, U.S. Gen. Joseph L. Lengyel warned two of the Pentagon’s highest-ranking officials that the situation in Minneapolis was about to get a lot worse.
Minneapolis police were expecting as many as 75,000 protesters to converge on the city that weekend in response to George Floyd’s murder three days prior, Lengyel wrote in an email to Deputy Sec. of Defense David Nordquist and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley. The Minnesota National Guard had 200 military police officers standing by to assist, he wrote. “They are prepared to be armed should MPD and the Governor request it.”
Back in Minneapolis, the Star Tribune’s August 2020 report noted:
At 10:55 a.m. Thursday, Frey’s office followed up with a written request for the National Guard, noting “widespread looting and arson” and that protesters and first responders had been injured.
“The ongoing situation is well-beyond the capability of our police and fire departments to respond,” Frey wrote.
…
At 12:23 p.m…Arradondo sent Harrington an e-mail that included a list of “critical infrastructure sites to be protected,” listing the five police precincts and other government and medical buildings and businesses along Lake Street and other areas.
It also included a list of resources they thought the department might need the next week.
…
Walz spokesman Teddy Tschann said more information was needed to deploy the soldiers.
“As a 24-year veteran of the Minnesota National Guard, Governor Walz knows how much planning goes into a successful mission,” Tschann said in a statement. “That’s why he pushed the City of Minneapolis for details and a strategy. He ordered the Minnesota National Guard to start preparing Thursday morning which allowed them to deploy to both St. Paul and Minneapolis that evening, per the Mayors’ requests.”
The governor’s office disputed several of Frey’s assertions. According to the office: The Governor’s staff told Frey a verbal request cannot be considered an official request for the National Guard; the city’s request did not focus on protecting the Third Precinct; and the National Guard mobilized Thursday morning and was on the ground in the Twin Cities within 24 hours of Frey’s informal request.
Walz activated the National Guard at 2:30 p.m. Thursday May 28. But eight hours later, only 90 National Guard soldiers were on the ground across the Twin Cities. By that time, officers had already evacuated the Third Precinct after it was besieged by protesters.
As the Star Tribune’s April 2023 report relates:
Public Safety Commissioner John Harrington said in an interview Monday that the city’s early requests for assistance from the National Guard were “rather vague” and not detailed enough to activate the soldiers.
“They weren’t specific about what they wanted or any details on what the mission would be,” Harrington said. Then, when they received a list of areas they needed help with, “the list was so all-encompassing we could not possibly staff all the things they wanted.”
…
The National Guard was not on scene that afternoon.
Soldiers were sent to other locations, including the Capitol in St. Paul, but the Guard didn’t arrive to the south Minneapolis area of the Third Precinct until almost 4 a.m. By then, most of the rioters were gone, and the precinct had been burning for hours.
Asked about the delay, National Guard Bureau spokesman Rob Perino said Walz was in charge of the deployment timeline. “The governor’s office directs the National Guard to respond — when and where,” he said. “That’s how any state will tell you it goes.”
Incredibly, the Governor’s daughter seemed to have knowledge of these operational discussions and tweeted out updates containing sensitive information:
As Tom Steward and I wrote:
…Frey and Arradondo decided early that afternoon to “significantly reduce our footprint in the Third Precinct,” Frey said later. “We also decided early that the option to vacate the Third Precinct needed to be on the table as a way to both help de-escalate and prevent hand-to-hand combat.”
Walz later confirmed that he had received real-time briefings on Thursday that Frey was openly considering abandoning the Third Precinct station…
…As the day progressed, looting and rioting spread along University Avenue into St. Paul. The St. Paul Police Department said that thieves and arsonists looted and damaged more than 170 businesses. Fires continued to burn early on Friday morning, with the largest one at Big Top Liquor near Snelling and University avenues. As with Lake Street the previous night, lower-income, minority neighborhoods bore the brunt of the rioters’ assault.
…
Rioters repeated the previous day’s pattern in south Minneapolis. They massed at the Third Precinct building, and that evening torched nearby buildings on two sides. When they tore down fencing surrounding the facility, police responded with tear gas. “[A]t roughly 9:25 p.m.,” Frey explained later, “when it became clear we needed to divert resources from the Third Precinct to help provide a response to activity downtown, I made the decision [to abandon the Third Precinct]. I notified the Chief, then the Governor shortly after.”
The Star Tribune‘s April 2023 report notes:
“No joy,” Milley wrote in an email as the police precinct fell. The general said he’d just met with President Donald Trump and Secretary of Defense Mark Esper. “Need you to call me ASAP,” he told Lengyel.
…
The emails don’t provide details of the meeting between the generals and Trump that night, and several of the Pentagon officials on the email chain did not respond to requests for interviews. But public accounts from Esper and Milley show they disagreed with the president around this time over invoking the Insurrection Act — a federal law that grants the president authority to deploy the U.S. Army domestically against Americans.
Day Four: Friday, May 29
“The morning after the precinct burned,” the Star Tribune reported in April 2023:
Trump said in a tweet that the military was ready to take over. “Any difficulty and we will assume control,” he said. “When the looting starts, the shooting starts.”
Esper, Milley and Attorney General Bill Barr strongly advocated against using the Insurrection Act, according to Milley’s sworn testimony to Congress during hearings over the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Milley said he didn’t think the unrest sparked by Floyd’s killing amounted to an insurrection, and the situation didn’t meet the high bar of usurping the control of state governors and calling in active military.
Esper expressed his opposition to the Insurrection Act publicly at a news conference a few days later. “I knew this sounded presumptuous, but Trump couldn’t do it, and wouldn’t do it even he could,” wrote Esper in his 2022 memoir, a “A Sacred Oath.” “He was in a fever about law and order and fixated on not appearing weak. He reflexively looked to the military to solve this problem, which likely meant invoking the Insurrection Act and sending in federal troops. This was the wrong answer, and one that would make things dramatically, if not indelibly, worse.”
Esper’s opposition to deploying troops into American cities would be cited widely in news stories about the president firing him in a tweet five months later…
The fall of the Third Precinct revealed how totally government had collapsed in Minneapolis. As Tom Steward and I wrote:
As Thursday turned into Friday, worried Minnesotans were glued to continuous live local television coverage of the mayhem. They watched as a mob of thieves and arsonists now apparently governed the streets of Minneapolis. They were hard-pressed to find any police or the fire department anywhere on the scene, undoubtedly forced to abide by the Mayor’s dictate that they run away. The coverage was interrupted by an early-morning news conference convened by the haggard-looking Minneapolis mayor.
One reporter asked Frey, “What’s the plan here?” Frey struggled to answer.
…
Walz began his Friday morning press conference by validating anger towards the police: “The very tools that we need to use to get control, to make sure that buildings aren’t burned and the rule of law collapses, are those very institutional tools that have led to that grief and pain.”
He then launched a stinging attack on Frey’s “abject failure” in handling the crisis.
Major General Jon Jensen, adjutant general of the Minnesota National Guard, explained that guardsmen under his command had been mustered that evening and were awaiting orders—which should have come from Frey—but no orders came. Walz explained that he deferred to local officials, stressing his fears that the sight of the Guard—soldiers with Humvees in combat fatigues—might further inflame the situation.
“That was the turning point,” Walz said of the fall of the Third Precinct, “where we were prepared, and that’s where we moved in, and we did not believe the Third should be given up and that area was taken back.” He went on: “If this would have been executed correctly, the state would not lead on this.”
The governor did accept some responsibility for the mayhem:
“I will assume responsibility,” Walz admitted…“I, if the issue was the state should’ve moved faster, yeah, that is on me.”
He assured Minnesotans that things would now be different:
Looking to Friday night, Walz adopted a Churchillian pose: “You won’t see that tonight,” he promised. “There will be no lack of leadership and there will be no lack of response on the table.” When asked if he would consider imposing martial law, he said, “Certainly, all those tools are there.” That afternoon, Walz declared an 8:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. curfew for both Minneapolis and St. Paul that would be in effect on Friday, May 29 and Saturday, May 30.
The Governor’s deeds did not match his bravado. Charges of third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter brought against Chauvin that afternoon did nothing to calm the protests and crowds assembled as they had on previous days. When the 8 p.m. curfew arrived, no one attempted to enforce it. Rioters quickly repeated the pattern of previous nights. “Heaping violent contempt on an 8 p.m. curfew declaration and on widespread pleas for forbearance and peace, rioters rampaged across Minneapolis for a fourth night Friday and into early Saturday, creating unprecedented havoc as they set towering fires, looted and vandalized businesses and shot at police officers,” the Star Tribune reported.
A crowd gathered outside the Fifth Precinct, chanting and throwing fireworks at the building. Fires erupted across the city’s south side, including at a Japanese restaurant, a Wells Fargo bank, and an Office Depot. Many burned for hours, with firefighters unable to reach them because the areas weren’t secure.
“This is a very difficult night for everybody in Minnesota, everybody in Minneapolis and St. Paul,” WCCOTV reporter Pat Kessler said on the air. “We’ve watched these protests grow, and I think one of the big questions is why isn’t the city of Minneapolis and St. Paul stepping in, why isn’t the state stepping in to stop this violence?”
As the violence spiraled, the authorities’ ability to coordinate a response collapsed. State Representative Aisha Gomez tweeted that she and a fellow state representative had “spent 90 minutes trying to get a gas station fire put out. A basic city service. When I have time and our community isn’t burning I will explain the dizzying game of jurisdictional hot potato we experienced.” Minneapolis City Council member Jeremiah Ellison tweeted: “I did not want to defy curfew, but I also do not understand the plan and no one can explain it to me.” And later: “Communication among officials is not fluid, to say the least. I am trying to get answers re: national guard/MPD. MFD is over north successfully putting out fires.”
The government had collapsed in Minneapolis once again, this time under the leadership of Governor Tim Walz.
Day Five: Saturday, May 30
Policy now changed dramatically. “Finally,” Tom Steward and I wrote:
…just before midnight and into early Saturday, hundreds of police officers, state troopers, and National Guard troops, some in armored vehicles, fanned out into troubled areas, confronted rioters with mass force, tear gas, and orders to disperse, issued via bullhorn. Their efforts belatedly restored some order, but not before rioters exacted much more damage.
At 1:30 a.m., Walz and Frey held an emergency press conference. Gone was the confidence of the morning. Frey and Walz—who had been lauded for his leadership by CNN just that morning— looked and sounded like broken men, baffled that their repeated statements in support of the protests had brought them no goodwill on the streets. They begged rioters to stop wrecking the cities. “You need to go home,” Walz pleaded. “If you have a friend or a family member that is out there right now, call them and tell them to come home,” Frey implored. “It is not safe. It is not right,” he added, leaving immediately after finishing his remarks and before any journalists could question him.
Sounding a desperate note, Walz repeatedly said that the sheer size of the crowds and intensity of the violence had been so shocking that there was no way for authorities to anticipate or prepare for such an onslaught—this, after three nights of rioting. With the force on the streets now three times what it was during the 1960s race riots in Minneapolis, Walz wailed: “There are simply more of them than us.” In a far cry from the bullishness of a few hours previously, “What you see tonight will replicate tomorrow unless we change something in what we’re doing.” Minnesotans watching at home understood the reality that their state government wasn’t going to protect them. Indeed, in armed groups in affected areas, many had already decided to defend themselves.
Minnesota’s media, usually a sympathetic audience for its politicians, was unimpressed. Ryan Faircloth of the Star Tribune tweeted: “Lots of wishful comments from Gov. Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey. But no clear plan of action detailed for how they will stop riots in the coming days, other than saying they are doing everything they can.” David Montgomery of MPR News tweeted, “The thought that I can’t get past: this is the *fourth* night of protests in Minneapolis. Despite having a huge coordination edge over the decentralized crowds, and despite being able to learn from past nights, government forces have been repeatedly unable to get an edge.”
“By the next morning,” the Star Tribune reported in April 2023, “President Trump was threatening to send in the military as a show of strength.” Indeed, as Tom Steward and I wrote:
Early Saturday morning, the Guard announced it had just enacted the most massive domestic deployment in its 164-year history: More than 1,000 additional citizen-soldiers and airmen would now join the 700 that had been on duty the day before. That number was soon increased to a mobilization of 2,500 personnel by midday on Saturday. “The governor just announced the full mobilization of the Minnesota National Guard for the first time since World War II,” Jensen said. “What does that mean? It means we’re all in.”
It had taken four nights of unprecedented rioting to force this decision on the Governor. His action came too late to save the destroyed homes and livelihoods for many in south Minneapolis or St. Paul. Protests continued, but the night of Saturday/Sunday passed in relative calm, demonstrating what Walz could have accomplished had he acted earlier.
At a hearing at the state capitol on July 9th, Gen. Jensen was asked if earlier mobilization of the National Guard would have prevented rioting and damage. His response:
“My unprofessional law enforcement position: yes. My professional military position: yes.”
Conclusions
There is still more to come out about the collapse of government in the Twin Cities in May 2020. But we can say, based on Gen. Jensen’s testimony, that an earlier deployment of the National Guard in the areas worst affected would have saved much violence and destruction.
The blame for the delay in that deployment is widely shared. City leaders appear to have recognized and communicated the need for assistance from the National Guard as early as Wednesday evening, though this communication appears not to have been “by the book,” so to speak. The city claims to have submitted plans; the state argues that these plans were not detailed enough.
Walz “activated” the Guard at 2:30pm on Thursday, some 20 hours after Frey’s initial request. After activation, the subsequent deployment was slow, which National Guard Bureau spokesman Rob Perino noted was Gov. Walz’ responsibility, and not directed at the worst affected areas.
We know that the Pentagon had been discussing the issue for six hours by the time Gov. Walz activated the Guard and that President Trump proposed military intervention on Friday morning. We know that, despite some tough talk that morning, the violence continued unabated into the early hours of Saturday when there was a sudden discovery of backbone by the Governor and the level of law enforcement increased. And we know that after a day of escalating law enforcement and Guard presence, the Twin Cities saw their first night of peace in nearly a week on Saturday night.
