Update: Five people have been charged with class a felonies.
The corridor from Bellingham, WA to Eugene, WA remains plagued by near daily rioting by Antifa and other far-left militant groups. Recently, Antifa and their allies staged a multi-day occupation of a motel in Fife, WA. They demanded that the city turn the motel into public housing. Shortly after that a protest encampment outside the Bellingham, WA city hall turned into a violent riot. Antifa insurrectionists broke into the hall city, forcing the mayor and staff to be evacuated. The rioters were demanding that the city pay for free hotel rooms for homeless people.
Meanwhile, there are large numbers of homeless shelters in this region who have ample room. This region of the country has more resources to provide for the homeless than most. Antifa and other far-left activists oppose having homeless people transported to shelters, instead demanding that hotels in the area be converted to free housing.
Radical leftists booked 17 rooms at the Red Lion in Olympia on Saturday, January 30th. Around noon on Sunday, they mobbed the front counter and assaulted a hotel employee. They announced they were seizing control of the hotel, until the city met a list of demands. The hotel staff fled and locked themselves in a basement laundry room. Hotel staff and guests remained trapped for six hours while they waited for police. The thugs were armed with metal batons, hatchets, and knives.
Olympia police initially responded to the scene, conducted recon, and then allegedly left the area. After about six hours, Olympia police arrived in large numbers and began evacuating trapped hotel staff members and guests. Police used flash bang grenades against the rioters. The city of Olympia is offering free transportation to local homeless shelters for the alleged homeless people who were brought to the hotel.
About forty-five people were involved in the violent take-over of the hotel on Sunday. Dozens more stood across the street to scream profanity at police and journalists. While police were trying to end the violence, the “Oly Housing Now” Twitter account urged more people to come to the Red Lion and participate in rioting. Twitter has taken no account against their account for promoting violence. Local tv stations, KOMO and NBC King 5, treated the violent rioters with absolute kid gloves, calling them “homeless activists.”
Between three and twelve people were arrested, depending on what source you use. The statement from police just says “several” were arrested. Multiple people were treated by paramedics at the scene. The militants had apparently transported an unknown number of homeless people to the hotel on Saturday. They have been offered free transportation to shelters.
The David Ross Radio Show conducted a live stream on location of the police response:
Statement from hotel employee to the David Ross Radio Show:
“I was working when this happened. It started at about 6 minutes to noon. They had this all planned out. It was not a result of a rally in the park across the street: Most of them were in the hotel already. They had stayed there the night before and came down and said they were not leaving. They started yelling at us and putting signs on the windows. There was probably a hundred people coming and going. They even had a room set up for medical.They were blocking the hotel driveway and they had guards posted on each corner of the block. There were people with gas masks at each corner and they had the whole building surrounded. They were walking around with machetes, knives, and hatchets hanging off of them. They were threatening us and one of them assaulted my coworker. I stood on the parking garage for the time that we were locked down until I said ‘screw it’ and went home at 3:00 PM. My co-workers sat in the small, stuffy laundry room with no windows for 6 hours waiting for police.”
Statement from the Olympia, WA police department:
At about 11 a.m. today, people inside the Red Lion began calling 911 to report a group was attempting to forcibly take over the hotel. OPD received reports that the employees felt under threat from the group, and that an employee was allegedly assaulted.
Employees reported that some members of the activist group inside the hotel were armed with items such as hatchets, batons, knives and had gasmasks, helmets and goggles apparently in preparation for a confrontation. OPD estimated about 45 members of the group inside and outside of the hotel.
At the time of the occupation, approximately 40 rooms in the hotel were booked with guests who were bystanders to the incident. Those guests sheltered in their rooms during the occupation, and OPD is providing a safe place for them as the hotel is cleared.
Breaking: Police in Olympia, Wash. have responded to the #antifa siege of the Red Lion hotel after several hours. They’re making arrests. Video by @jasonrantz: pic.twitter.com/UxKEDenQ2R
— Andy Ngô (@MrAndyNgo) February 1, 2021
Local District Attorneys, as well as the Oregon Attorney General’s office, seem completely unwilling to prosecute people for far-left violence. Many of the people being arrested in Washington now, have been arrested previously but never prosecuted. Despite violence against Federal facilities and Federal employees in Portland, the US Department of Justice seems to be missing in action as well. A large percentage of elected officials in this area still refuses to condemn them.
