Republican National Committee urges moving protest area farther from Milwaukee RNC venues

As protest organizers in Milwaukee push to be closer to the downtown Republican National Convention venues, GOP party officials are urging the U.S. Secret Service to move them farther away.

A letter from an attorney for the Republican National Committee states that if the designated protest area were at Pere Marquette Park on the west side of the Milwaukee River, convention attendees would have to walk right by the park on State Street or Kilbourn Avenue to reach the venues.

"The effect of this selected Park location for the demonstrators, when coupled with the USSS’s creation of the pedestrian traffic flow necessitated by the location of the Security Perimeter and the associated selection of the two primary pedestrian access points, is that the USSS will be creating, in effect, a mandated confrontational area, where the pedestrians will be funneling into the direct (planned) vicinity of the demonstrators," attorney Todd R. Steggerda wrote.

"The RNC is deeply concerned that these logistical proposals by the City and the USSS—as they currently stand—constitute a significant and unacceptable safety risk to the attending public," Steggerda wrote.

"Packing demonstrators into a Park essentially boxed in by the two streets that thousands of attendees will be using to enter the Convention site will only serve to heighten — rather than prevent and diffuse — any tension," he added.

The letter, addressed to Secret Service Director Kimberly A. Cheatle, was first reported by the Washington Post.

A Secret Service spokesperson said in a statement that the agency had not officially received the letter and that security plans for national special security events like the RNC are "based on a variety of thorough security assessments established in coordination with our partners, with the express mission being to ensure the highest level of safety and security for the convention."

The city has not released the route demonstrators will be allowed to march or the location of a speaker's platform, though in the early March meeting, Mayor Cavalier Johnson's Chief of Staff Nick DeSiato said Pere Marquette Park would be a "likely candidate" for the speaker's platform.

No location has been formally identified, DeSiato told the Journal Sentinel on Friday.

He said the city is responsible for providing the speaker's podium and march route that is within "sight and sound" of the RNC under the U.S. Constitution and the RNC framework agreement to which city leaders signed on in 2022.

The Secret Service has the exclusive responsibility to create the security zone and, based on the federal agency's analysis, the city must then find a location that is within sight and sound of the convention, he said.

"In many ways, it's a very simple analysis: Find fence line and then identify closest area that we could have our demonstration areas," DeSiato said.

The "security footprint" downtown is expected to extend from Cherry Street to the north to West Clybourn Street on the south and from North Water Street on the east to North 9th Street on the west.

Within that footprint will be a fenced-in area around the main convention venues that will not be accessible to anyone but credentialed attendees. The July 15-18 event will take place at Fiserv Forum, the UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena and the Baird Center.

The letter comes as protest organizers have sought to be closer to the inner, secure perimeter that will surround the convention venues and have argued that Pere Marquette Park at 900 N. Plankinton Ave. would not be close enough.

The Coalition to March on the RNC 2024 is also pushing for a demonstration march route that would travel up Sixth Street right next to the three convention venues. That route would also take them up Vel. R. Phillips Avenue from West Wisconsin and through the tunnel where the Baird Center spans West Wells Street.

Alison Dirr can be reached at [email protected].

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: RNC urges moving protest area farther from Milwaukee convention venues