I don’t think that all of the 217 people charged with rioting will be locked up. But living for a month with that serious felony hanging over your head tends to make people rethink their lives. And putting a few of them in the pokey for a few years will go a long way toward discouraging this kind of behavior we saw so often during the rocky campaign.
One promise Trump made in his nomination acceptance speech is that he’d be the law and order president. These rioters are finding out the hard way that President Trump intends to keep that promise.
There is a clear difference between rioting and protesting. While some on Friday came to protest, others came to inflict damage, cause harm, and worse. Under President Obama, all too often this was allowed. Calling these rioters “thugs” resulted in screams of “racist!” Because we couldn’t hold people accountable for their actions when they were rightly pissed.
But it would appear that law & order is returning. Two hundred seventeen people were arrested on Friday and face up to 10 years in prison and a fine up to $250,000. Hopefully, that will cause them to knock it off.