On June 1 and 3, 2020, peaceful protesters in Huntsville Alabama were met at the courthouse square with multi-agency troops in riot gear who attacked them with tear gas, mace, flash bangs and rubber bullets, corralling and herding them down the street.

Since then citizens have flooded city council meetings to complain about the trauma and injustice of those two nights as well as other incidents of police brutality in Huntsville. Here, Vivian Battle, whose daughter Army veteran Crystal Ragland was killed by Huntsville police, addresses the council following racially offensive remarks by council member Jennie Robinson.

On June 18 Huntsville Police Chief Mark McMurray gave his version of events at the June 1 and 3 protests. (View the transcript) in a 3-hour spiel that showed little relationship to the experience of the people in the streets. Video: McMurray Special Session June 18 2020. (Note: that is a Facebook Live presentation. You may not be able to access it without a FB login).





In a tedious presentation long enough to stun an ox, McMurray spins a tale of busloads of Antifa and outside agitators with “foreign car tags” descending on Huntsville to disrupt the city, possibly even to torch the town. He doxxes private citizens and contrives a level of organization evoking gang initiations or rebel armies, all “intel” which, he explains, “come off, right off th’Antifa website. It’s where we get this intel; you can document yourself, the Google and little bit of self research.” He claims that Democratic Socialists of America is an Antifa “spin-off group.” You can read more of his claims in the transcript linked below.



“ANTIFA comes from the anarchist movement,” McMurray expounds. “You see those symbols— if you see any of those symbols on somebody’s website, you probably need to have a conversation with that person and see exactly where they’re coming from. And if you hit ‘like’ on their posts, you probably need to think about that, too. Because you’re now being tracked as a sympathizer to another anti-government organization.”



The Tennessee Valley Progressive Alliance and others have called for McMurray’s resignation.



For more of what McMurray had to say to the city council June 18, we have provided the transcript of his comments as captured by volunteer transcriptionist “All-Ears.” We share this in the interest of public information, so please feel free to share it or quote from it if you see fit. McMurray transcript