Trigger warning, this video is violence pretty much from beginning to end.

This is video shared with us today of an alleged attack in Teller County last Friday on a protest caravan demonstrating against Teller’s controversial policy of providing active assistance to federal immigration authorities. According to the group Abolish ICE Denver in a Facebook post Monday, Teller County Sheriff Jason Mikesell, another of our state’s high-profile “political sheriffs” increasingly approaching enforcement of the law according to their political agenda, was actually involved with organizing the counterprotest that resulted in the violence in the above video:
This video was cut from a livestream taken during the Abolish ICE car rally to free Pablo, an immigrant man who was taken from his family, imprisoned at the GEO Aurora Ice Processing Center and then illegally transferred to the Teller County Sheriff’s Office county jail without notifying his family or his lawyer…
When [Teller County Sheriff Jason] Mikesell found out about the protest, the County Sheriff’s facebook page released a call for counter protesters to stand against the Abolish ICE protesters. Militia members with guns and confederate flags convened across the town to coordinate an assault on protesters, with multiple images captured of police collaborating.
Officers were seen chatting with counter-protesters SECONDS before the assault took place, and were there to witness the assault, however no arrests were made despite ample video evidence and multiple eye-witnesses calling for the men involved in the violence to be removed. [Pols emphasis]
The assault began with counterprotestor marching over and hitting a female protestor and then throwing her to the ground. Another woman was also hit and as the video shows, more counterprotestors ran up to pull people out of the car and physically engage them (seen in the video). Officers were approached by both women following the assault and shown their bruised faces, but refused to take any actions. All the MAGA counterprotesters were openly armed when they assaulted peaceful protesters.
Abolish ICE Denver says that despite their complaints no charges were initially filed against the attackers, which would obviously make sense if they were there on the suggestion of the county sheriff! And in an update, the Teller County Sheriff confirmed they did indeed put at least an implicit call out for thugs counterprotesters to meet this protest caravan:
On Friday July 17, 2020 the Teller County Sheriff’s Office (TCSO) released information to the public concerning a “car rally” protest that would occur at our Detention Facility that day. The protest was apparently organized by a relative of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) inmate who is detained at the facility and it was advertised to be against Teller County’s agreement to house ICE inmates.
TCSO learned that the protesters were planning to possibly shut down a public roadway. This could be very dangerous to the innocent motoring public on such a busy weekend-traffic day along US Highway 24. It has been and will continue to be a practice of TCSO to let our community know about such events that may affect their travel plans and safety…
But thanks to the presence of all those pesky smartphones, says the sheriff, they’re reluctantly going to “investigate” these very fine local Teller County people whose names they of course already know. At this point, we’re not even sure the Teller County Sheriff can conduct this investigation fairly:
[A]fter viewing video of the incident from multiple sources including video taken by TCSO, we have opened an investigation into what happened during the incident. If appropriate, criminal charges will be brought to the local district attorney for consideration of prosecution, and if so, arrest warrants will be issued.
Although this violence against left-wing protesters runs counter to the desired narrative for conservatives today of leftist mobs flooding the streets, it obviously deserves every bit as much attention and condemnation. If it doesn’t get as much attention as other acts of political violence in the news headlines today, it’s necessary to ask why. And some possible answers to that question are troubling.
Until we hear differently, in the interest of safety you may want to stay out of Teller County.
Who knows what the wrong bumper sticker or T-shirt might get you.
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