An anti-American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) protest in front of the Palmer House in Chicago has taken a turn for the worse as police make violent arrests of protesters gathered to protest the lobbying group’s conference.



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The protest is motivated by a leaked internal document obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy that, according to protesters, reveals new methods to be used by fossil fuel companies, agrochemical interests and corporate lobbying groups to influence future state policies.

ALEC’s annual meeting is taking place in Chicago today, discussing the drafting of new bills with its Environmental Agriculture Task Force on behalf of its members, which include Duke Energy, ExxonMobil, Koch Industries and Peabody, according to Greenpeace.

Greenpeace refers to ALEC as a place “where partisan politics are set aside to focus on the mission of destroying environmental protections, clean energy competition and liability for crimes against both people and the ecosystems sustaining us.”

Police began forcefully pushing back the crowds Thursday afternoon before conducting violent arrests on protesters, much of which were captured and posted to Twitter.

The cops rushed in, slammed me into the concrete, pulled a man by his hair dragged him into the street #noAlec pic.twitter.com/3UstnUuyMr — natalie solidarity (@constantnatalie) August 8, 2013

Photo (@bullhorngirl) from when cops smashed barricades into #noAlec #alecExposed crowd before waded in attacking pic.twitter.com/ooo6ojKtIk — natalie solidarity (@constantnatalie) August 8, 2013

We were backing up! pic.twitter.com/f3VOcvLgGr — natalie solidarity (@constantnatalie) August 8, 2013

Cops rushed in, slammed @constantnatalie into concrete, pulled a man by his hair dragged him into the street #noAlec pic.twitter.com/r4YHI7BeWm — Occupy Chicago (@OccupyChicago) August 8, 2013