Senate Republicans have just killed a bill in the Courts of Justice Committee that would have criminalized the presence of paramilitary groups, like those seen during the tragic Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville last August. For those who were on the ground, the presence of heavily armed men and women wearing tactical gear, body armor, and in some instances uniforms, while carrying kitted-out AR-15s became one of the defining features of the rally. And over the course of the chaotic rally, the ability to distinguish between militia, law enforcement, and National Guard became increasingly muddled only adding to the confusion of what was happening.
The bill, SB 987, sponsored by Louise Lucas (D-Portsmouth) and Attorney General Mark Herring, states that a person is “guilty of unlawful paramilitary activity” if more than two people assemble to intimidate by “drilling, parading, or marching with any firearm or explosive or incendiary device or any components or combination thereof.” According to the stipulations set forward in the bill, this kind of paramilitary activity would be punishable as a Class 5 felony – punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Attorney General Mark Herring has been pursuing an aggressive agenda against bad-actors that were present in Charlottesville during the past summer, including white nationalists, supremacists, and paramilitary groups. On Jan. 19, he filed legislation with Del. Marcia Price (D-Newport News) which would provide Virginia law enforcement the legal tools to label violent white supremacists terrorists. Speaking before the Courts of Justice Committee, Lucas echoed that sentiment saying, “And part of that means giving our law enforcement community the tools they need to identify and pre-empt acts of violence and threat.”
In a Facebook post from yesterday, Herring said, “We should never see this scene on Virginia’s streets again,” signaling his disappointment with the bill being killed in committee.
When asked about what led to the bill being killed in committee, Lucas’s staff declined to comment.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, as of 2017, there are 276 active militias throughout the US. According to a lawsuit filed after Unite the Right by The Georgetown Law Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection last October, paramilitary groups and militias pre-Unite the Right not only coordinated with the organizers but were seen to be carrying, “between 60 and 80 pounds of camouflaged, military-style equipment. Among their paraphernalia were semiautomatic AR-15 assault rifles, with spare 30- round magazines; sidearms; tactical shooting glasses; kevlar helmets; combat shirts and pants; AK-47-resistant Level III body armor…”
The lawsuit went on to claim, “…it is critically important that the Commonwealth’s duly constituted armed forces and peace officers be immediately recognizable. Private individuals need to know whose orders they must follow and to whom to report emergency information; state actors need to know that military personnel answer to them and will follow their commands to protect public safety. Private militia activity in Charlottesville obliterated this critical clarity for both private citizens and state officials alike.”
This was another point made by Lucas when speaking at the committee, claiming the militias, “were operating as unregulated, uncontrolled, unaccountable, self-controlled so-called security forces.” She went on to say that these groups increased the chances of armed conflict between “legitimate law enforcement authorities.”
Reports have Republican Senator and committee chair Mark Obhenshain, who also declined to comment, (R-Harrisonburg) claiming that SB 987 made him, “wonder about the constitutionality… and whether this implicates the right to free assembly”.
Photos by Landon Shroder
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