The Riot Beat

Everyone's debating what happened in Minnesota. Few are talking about the real problem: what these "protests" are really like

Two people are dead in Minneapolis.

The nation is now locked in a familiar and dark debate: Were the killings justified? Who’s to blame? The arguments will simmer for weeks, undoubtedly along partisan lines, litigated on cable news and social media until the next crisis distracts us.

But lost in the back-and-forth is a more basic question that almost no one is asking: What is actually going on at these protests?

The left has its answer ready. New York magazine put a masked protester on its cover under the headline “Your Friendly Neighborhood Resistance.” The image is striking, the title heroic. The subhead promises a story about everyday people “watching out for ICE at every corner, crosswalk, church, and school.”

It’s a compelling piece of mythmaking.

The truth is something much less glamorous. I’ve spent years covering left-wing protests and riots across America, from 2020 through the present. What I’ve witnessed on the ground looks nothing like the noble resistance portrayed in legacy media.

The reality: Chaos. Violence. Dishonesty. Truly, the street activists are among the most dishonest people I’ve encountered.

If you rely solely on their videos (the ones that feed the outrage machine on social media) you will be systematically and intentionally misinformed. Whether through misleading captions or selectively edited footage, left-wing activists are masters at manipulating sympathetic national media. This, in turn, feeds mainstream outlets more than happy to take their material and craft their preferred narratives.

The recent unrest in Minneapolis is a textbook example. Claims of “legal observers” being “brutalized” by federal agents are routinely disproven when other video evidence from the same scenes emerges. But by then, the narrative has already been set.

Of course, much has been made in recent weeks about the insurgent behavior of these groups: the “terror cell” comparisons, the accusations of organized resistance networks.

There is truth to that.

Unlike 2020, the dynamics of covering leftist violence have changed. I’ve raised my profile since covering those riots for my book. The downside of notoriety: Antifa knows exactly who I am, and it doesn’t take long for their networks to spread the word when I arrive.

I experienced this recently after covering Jake Lang’s rally in Minneapolis. Lang was chased out of the area, and the Antifa crowd started hunting for anyone who might have supported him. Minneapolis police had already left when someone in the crowd spotted me.

“Turning Point is here!”

The shout cut through the noise. In that moment, you’re presented with a few options.

You can run, but that instantly draws more attention. You can walk, but that gives people more time to notice the commotion. Or you can stand your ground, hit record on your phone, and roll the dice.

Getting surrounded by leftists on camera makes for compelling content. But I’d just watched this crowd attack Lang and others. I was alone. If I needed help, it would be tough luck.

I decided the best thing to do was to continue my work another day. I managed to separate from most of the crowd before the shouting spread. A few people followed, but they lost interest when I told them I wasn’t there for Turning Point. They eventually wandered off.

Later, I learned that Antifa networks on Bluesky had already notified their followers of my presence in Minnesota. The coordination is real. The infrastructure is real. These aren’t spontaneous gatherings of friendly concerned citizens, they’re organized operations with communication networks, reconnaissance, and target lists. I’m on the target lists.

So why do it? Why keep showing up to places where people want to hurt you?

Because the debate America is having right now is the wrong one.

We’re arguing over whether two deaths were justified—poring over body camera footage like sports referees watching the instant replay, assigning blame, sorting ourselves into teams. That argument will never be resolved. It’s not meant to be. It’s meant to be a distraction.

The real question isn’t whether federal agents were justified in Minneapolis. The real question is what kind of organized resistance has taken root in American cities and what it will take to uproot it.

These aren’t protesters. They’re not even rioters, not in the traditional sense. What I’ve witnessed over the past five years is the emergence of something else entirely: networked, coordinated, ideologically committed groups that operate more like cells than citizens. They have communication infrastructure, reconnaissance capabilities, and target lists. They can mobilize in hours and coordinate across state lines.

The New York cover wants you to see a friendly neighbor in a gas mask. What I see is something the country isn’t ready to confront.

The justified-or-not debate is comfortable. It lets us stay in familiar left versus right, cops versus protesters territory, the same worn-out arguments we’ve been having for decades.

But that debate is a luxury we may not be able to afford much longer. What’s building in Minneapolis, in Portland, Austin, Chicago, in cities across the country, isn’t going away after the news cycle moves on.

The only question is whether we’re willing to see it clearly.

Julio Rosas is an acclaimed journalist who has worked at The Blaze, Townhall, Washington Examiner, Mediaite, and the Independent Journal Review. One of Chris Rufo’s initial Manhattan Institute Logos Fellows, Julio is author of Fiery But Mostly Peaceful: The 2020 Riots and the Gaslighting of America, a book based on his nationally recognized field reporting that year. He now works as a Field Reporter at MostlyPeaceful.media.