Police said they took action after Mayor Jenny Durkan (D) issued an executive order calling for the area to be vacated, aiming to end the weeks-long occupation around a police precinct. Officers made dozens of arrests as they carried out her directive, they said, and warned that anyone who remained in the area or returned could be taken into custody.

As demonstrations against police violence and racial injustice spread across the country in the wake of George Floyd’s killing in Minneapolis, the situation in Seattle took shape in a way distinct from other protests. Activists took over an area in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood that would become a scene of peaceful gatherings but also tense faceoffs with police and violence visited on demonstrators.

The occupation has drawn considerable attention and repeatedly been highlighted on cable news, and President Trump has tweeted about it, decrying the demonstrators and the local and state leaders responding to them. Activists have said that media coverage has focused only on the violence, rather than the calmer aspects that included documentary screenings and concerts.

But gunfire in the area known as the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest, or CHOP, had increased scrutiny on the gathering. (The region has also been called the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, or CHAZ.) In the latest incident, police said that a 16-year-old was killed and a 14-year-old wounded in a shooting early Monday at or near the barriers surrounding the zone.

Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best speaks inside the protest area in front of the police force’s East Precinct on Monday.
Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best speaks inside the protest area in front of the police force’s East Precinct on Monday. (Lindsey Wasson/Reuters)

Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best issued a statement early Wednesday saying that she supports peaceful protests and would continue her department’s work to engage with activists.

“But enough is enough,”…

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