June 9, 2025 • 31 mins
Guest: Dennis P. Zine is a former and retired LAPD Supervisor, former and retired 12-year Los Angeles City Councilman. // Guest: Dennis P. Zine continued....// Guest: Michael Monks, hit with tear gas covering protests over the weekend. // Guest: Michael Monks continued...
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's KFI AM sixty and you're listening to The Conway
Show on demand on the iHeartRadio app AFI Am sixty.
It is The Conway Show. Man, oh man, what a weekend?
Speaker 2 (00:17):
What a weekend? Holy smokes.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
You know Friday on the show, we predicted that this
summer it was gonna be crazy. We didn't think it
was gonna happen two hours later. This is unbelievable to
watch everything happen on Friday night and Saturday Sunday and
then Sunday night downtown Los Angeles. Man, I couldn't stop watching.
I couldn't stop watching, and I flipped over on Sunday morning.
(00:43):
I flipped over, like, Okay, we got the streets on fire,
we got rubber bullets, we got the National Guard here,
people getting arrested, people throwing rocks at cop cars, street signs,
fireworks going off, spray painting everywhere. And so I flipped
over to channel and I'm like, surely they have to
have had canceled the Pride parade. Nope, Nope, not at all, man.
(01:08):
Those Pride parade went on as if they were in France.
I was very proud of the fellas and the gals.
Man they say. They said, effet, we were fighting for,
you know, fifty sixty seventy years to try to get
these parades down the street. We're not stopping for anybody.
We're moving down the street. We're dancing, we're showing off,
(01:29):
We're getting crazy. And that that was crazy. And then
I thought, well, surely they probably canceled the Tony Awards. Nope, Nope,
Tony Awards went on as as scheduled. I know, it
does seem odd that I spent four or five hours
on Sunday, two hours watching the Pride parade and then
(01:51):
three hours watching the Tonys. Seems uncharacteristic. But if you
knew me, you know I'm an ally and you know
I'm right there.
Speaker 2 (01:59):
I'm with the GRIP, all right. Dennis Zine is with us.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
He was with the City Council, LA City Council and
then he was also at the LAPD. I think he
got fired from both, but he's with us. Dennis zign
how you Bob, I'm doing well.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
I did fifty six years and I'm still with LAPD
as a reserve, and i did twelve on the City
Council and I've never been fired, not even as a
paper boy back in the day.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Okay, you know what, when somebody protests too much, you
gotta think there's something going on there, all right, So
Dennis Zin, look, you had to look at this all
weekend in a very different perspective. You are on city council,
you're with LAPD, your reserve man. You probably couldn't even
sit there and watch. You probably wanted to throw the
helmet on and get down there.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Well, I was tempted to do. They didn't call me in,
but I am on standby for that. They've basically gone
on twelve hour shifts. They're going to basically mobilize the
department so they'll have coverage. And we know we've got
demonstrations today. Fortune, there hasn't been any violence. When you
have eight seven hundred and forty six officers that's the
total sworn complement of the LAPD, that's not enough to
(03:07):
police the entire city and to patrol those areas and
respond to calls and provide protection for this situation taking
place now. So fortunately they've gone to mutual aid, which
means allied departments, including the Sheriff's Department, and then now
we've got the National Guard and the United States Marines
are arriving to help maintain control. When you see all
(03:28):
those units that are deployed, those are all units that
would be handling radio calls throughout the city of Los
Angeles for all divisions that we have. So when you
have to scrap that detail, people are going to wait
a long time. If there's any units available to handle
the nine to eleven calls. The other calls, no one's
going to handle those calls. There's no one available. So
what we've come to a process now is how do
(03:50):
we maintain control of the city with our limited resources,
whether it's LAPD or Glendale who's assisting and they bring
communities under the mutual aid with the Sheriff's department. So
people are going to criticize, well, why do we have
to bring in the military. Why if you bring in
that shop, we don't have enough resources to maintain control
of the city and maintain control when you've got the
demonstrations take place as we saw yesterday, taken over the freeway,
(04:13):
causing chaos, burning cars, breaking into businesses last night, and
causing all this disruption of a civilized society. That's why
we see the military coming in because we don't have
the resources available to handle this period. That's the bottom line.
You've got too many protesters and today it's coiled, but
yesterday it was. And we don't know what's going to
(04:34):
happen later in the evening hours and following through the
rest of the week. How long this is going to
go on. But unless we have contingent in place to
maintain order and control, we have businesses that are paying
taxes for protection get broken into and if we know
that's happened last night. Fortunately today it's been quiet, but
we've got a massive show of force because we've got
all these officers that are deployed. This will be taken
(04:55):
over by the military, the National Guard. They will take
over these stationary physics missions and our officers can get
back to doing what they need to do to handle
calls for service from the people throughout the city of
Los Angeles. Right, very simple. We only got so many research.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
Right, Dennis, Dennis, Please, when the Marines show up or
and or the National Guard are are they allowed to
arrest people?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
They're going to be a contingent for us to maintain order.
If there needs to be arrests, they believe they will
call in for officers who will be there. They don't
want to arrest anyone. They just want to keep peace
and tranquility. If they want to protest and a peaceful now,
that's fine, they have the right to do that. But
when they start breaking in and destroying property, we've got
to do something. We can't ignore it. We've got to
make arrests. We can't continue to let public and private
(05:40):
property be destroyed. These are taxpayers that are paying for
a service. They need to get that service. But the
military is they're hopefully going to be in mass to
deter anyone from doing a foolish act of breaking in
or vandalizing or the graffiti that's been sprayed all over
the downtown neighborhood.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
You know, I was watching the CHP when they're getting
rocks and and scooters thrown out their cars, and it
destroyed two or three of them, which, by the way,
seventy five thousand dollars each and now the taxpayers have
to pay for.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
But I was.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
Shocked by how long it took for the cavalry to
come in and help those CHP officers that were stuck
under that bridge.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
Well, remember the protesters went on the surface treets and
then they took over the freeway. They shot on the
freeway and the CHP was prepared for that. And then
when they were overwhelmed by the volume of people and
there was orchestrated activity that people were doing what they
were doing. I mean a lot of people just went
and let's destroy what we can, Let's destroy the police cars,
let's attack officers, let's attack whatever we can attack. Some
(06:42):
people go crazy. Now, the people who are doing the
protests are one issue, but then you got the agitators.
They want to cause destruction and to be very combative
with law enforcement. And law enforcement is not paid to
lose the battle. They're paid to maintain order and discipline.
If people don't cooperate, then there's consequences for them, all right.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
Detisign is with us X City Council. Also LAPD Reserve.
LAPD does not shoot tear gas at citizens.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Is that correct?
Speaker 3 (07:09):
Well, they don't shoot at citizens. In my time, it's
been very, very seldom that we ever use that.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
But is it the highway patrol or is it sheriff or.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
The LAPD had resorted to that because it was getting
out of control. That's normally not deployed. A commander above
has to give the order to do that. They've got
the bullets that aren't deadly bullets that they fire the
forty millimeters. They have different weapons, non leaf the weapons
that they can use to deploy, and they were using those.
But again, you have a Sunday afternoon, which you mentioned
(07:40):
some of the activities taking place. We had a deployee
officers for those activities. At the same time, you've got
this massive chaos taking place, an incredible number of people
and many agitators creating havoc. So the police can't just
turn around a walk away. It's to use the resources
they have. And that's why people may criticize what's happening
with bringing in the National Guard, the military army, whatever
(08:03):
the case may be. But we don't have the resources
and you're going to get property destroyed because we don't
have resources to handle that. And when people call nine
one one, well where are the cops. They're out there
babysitting these people who are causing havoc in the downtown area.
You can't continue to do that. You've got to bring
in additional resources to quell that and at the same
time let those officers handle the calls for service. Because
(08:24):
while this has taken place downtown. Other areas of the
city have to be police. There's robbers, there's burglars, there's
all kinds.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Of right, they're going to take advantage of stuff like this.
All right, hold one second, that design is well, US
may put you on hold. Right now, we're looking at
about I don't know about three four maybe five hundred
people outside the Federal Building. And if you're familiar, list look,
I was here in ninety two for the riots, I
was here in twenty twenty, and I've been through this before.
(08:52):
These really aren't I wouldn't call that a riot.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
You know.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
What we had in ninety two was a ribe.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
What we had in twenty twenty where the entires you know,
city was burning, Especially back in nineteen ninety two, that
was a full blown riot. Schools closed for a week
or two, stores burning all over the place, fires out
of control, people in Koreatown with guns on top of
their stores, shooting at looters.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
That was a riot. This is not city wide.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
It's in a very small area in downtown Los Angeles
maybe nine city blocks, you know, city nine cities square blocks.
But it is a major problem though, And if I
were on the Olympic Committee.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
I'd be looking at.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Alternative cities for the Olympics in a couple of years
because we ain't ready.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
We ain't ready for the Olympics. Hell, we're not ready
for anything we got.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
We got people going downtown Los Angeles, breaking crap up,
graffiti all over the place. It's going to be a mess.
It's going to be a mess. And I have a
prediction that it might be happening again tonight. As soon
as that sun goes down, people get crazy and al
I think we're going to see it again tonight. Hopefully
we don't, but I don't know. Got a hunch.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
You're listening to Tim Conway Junior on demand from KFI
AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
It is The Conway Show.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
We're keeping an eye on downtown Los Angeles and Dennis
Zion is with us, a former LA City Council member,
former full time LAPD and on LAPD reserve right now. So, Dennis,
when you watch this again, you're watching them with a
different eye than I am. What do you are you
seeing anything that's done improperly on either side? And what
(10:37):
would you do if you were down there?
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Well, what I would do is have my officers arrest
those who are committing violations of the law. Whatever they're
doing that is illegal. Have an officer make that arrest.
I'd have jail buses there. I'd put them to the
jail buses. I'd take them down, book them, let them
go through the criminal justice system. But we can't tolerate
when people take over the freeways and vandalize and tag
(11:02):
the entire neighborhood of downtown Los Angeles. I mean, the
T Mobile store was broken into, They stole god knows
what from the T Mobile store, and all the activity
that they do that is illegal. I'm not talking about
legal I'm talking about illegal activity. People are paying tax
dollars for protection. They're not receiving protection when you've got
this type of activity taking place widespread in that concentrated
(11:23):
area of downtown Los Angeles playing Temple, We're either going
to enforce the law or we're not going to enforce
the law. You can't have anarchy, and that's what happens
if it doesn't get controlled, it becomes anarchy.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
But and I'll this is not me talking, this is LAPD.
A LAPD will say to you, But if you have
an officer arrest a guy that that takes him off
the street for three hours.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Well, that's the problem. We don't have sufficient personnel. That's
why we need to bring in the National Guard or
bring in the Marines. We're talking about the Marines and
National Guards. One thousand personnel that will be deployed. That's
going to be a force that can contain anything and everything.
Instead of all those police units you see there, every
single one of those is being pulled from a geographic
division in the city of Los Angeles, which they can't
(12:07):
handle the calls that the people, the taxpayers are paying
for because they're there, whether it's the Valley or San Pedro,
they're all being deployed down there. The motor officers. You're
not going to see any motor officers except those that
are there handling this situation. So you take all your
resources and you put them in this one pot downtown
Los Angeles. The rest of the city has a token
force and if it's not an emergency call, no one's
going to respond. So those taxpayers are not receiving the
(12:30):
benefits that they're paying for because you've had to move
all these resources. I have no complaint and no concern
about the Marines coming in, the National Guard, the Air Force,
whatever branch of the military, because we can't maintain control
of the city safety with the resources that we currently have.
It's just impossible. So you can't let downtown go to
hell and the rest of the city have protection when
(12:53):
you have to maintain control. So what they've done is
they've gone on a mobilization. They're working these extended shifts,
but they have to be relieved eventually, And that's why
it's important. Everybody's complaining about the military. Who else is
going to come in? We can't take all the units
from Glendale and Burbank and Pasadena. We've got some, but
the bottom line is you're going to get a thousand
personnel which will be a contingent to maintain that control.
(13:16):
And I'm looking right now on TV. You've got a
lot of people, Yeah, a federal exactly, a lot of people.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
So and wait till the sun goes down.
Speaker 3 (13:25):
When the sun goes down, we don't know what's going
to happen. We know what happened last night. They continued
to the've broken the stores, they' vandalized. But the bottom
line is this is about public safety. The immigration issue
is totally separate public safety needs to maintain and if
the President hadn't called or the governor hadn't called, someone
needs to step up and say we need to have
enough resources to maintain public safety. And fortunately, between the
(13:48):
Marines and the National Guard, we're going to have that.
Because your local law enforcement is not geared for this
type of activity, we can't maintain the control of the
entire city when we have eight thousand and one hundred
and forty six officers. It's impossible, that's the bottom line.
So we have to resort to what we can resort
to to maintain safety and order in the city of
Los Angeles. Again, we've got major issues coming down the line,
(14:11):
and I don't know if people are going to look
and say, wait a second, can you maintain order and
safety when you've got this influx of people throughout the world.
I mean, we've had problems in the past, that's right.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
See the Olympics, we got the World Cup, we got
a lot going on. Bunny. I appreciate you coming on.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
I wish you were back on City Council, one of
the sane guys down there, and we'd love to have
you on later this week to catch up I'll.
Speaker 3 (14:32):
Be back with you anytime.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
All right, Thanks a bun it, thank you all right.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
Denti Zine LAPD formal councilor former council member, and Belly O.
You know we've we've been working together for I don't
know what ten years, twelve years or so. And when
you first came on, I told you the one thing
that I expect out.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Of you is consistency.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Remember that I said consistency, and you've always been very consistent.
So I have a question for people downtown who are
throwing crap and destroying cars and graffitiing everything up and
throwing rocks, if they're old enough, and I understand if
they're kids, if they're nineteen twenty twenty one doing stupid crap.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
I did stupid crap as well.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
But if you're in your thirties or forties, I have
one question for you. If you're downtown, what was your
reaction when Barack Obama threw two point five million people
out of this country? It was that your same reaction
to throw rocks at cop cars and graffiti and light
fires and fireworks and put cops in danger. What was
(15:32):
your reaction when Barack Obama deported two point five million people,
and some say it's closer to four million. What was
your reaction to that? I'd like to get some of
the older rioters or unrested er ers to answer that question.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
What did you do?
Speaker 1 (15:50):
Was that your same reaction or did you just ignore it?
This is all about politics, all of it.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
You're listening to Tim Conway jun Demand from KFI AM
six forty, watching TV all weekend with the protest and
then the unrest and the craziness, and then listening to
KFI and Michael Monks Man, you got monks he was
down there all weekend.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Well you live down there, right?
Speaker 5 (16:16):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (16:16):
I live down there?
Speaker 1 (16:16):
Which is another weekend in downtown Los Angeles. How far
are you from the Federal Building and the and all?
Speaker 2 (16:21):
They am? About four blocks?
Speaker 5 (16:23):
Wow?
Speaker 2 (16:24):
Okay, yeah, so you're writing the action, yeah, right, in
the action.
Speaker 6 (16:27):
And what I've I've been telling folks is that this
is extreme, obviously with the protest, but this is the
type of chaos we have to deal with all the
time down there because there's no enforcement of basic laws
or just general neighborliness you know that you would expect
from folks in your neighborhood. It's always covered in spray paint.
It's always covered in trash. There's always lunatics running about
(16:49):
down there, and nobody does anything about it.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Right now, we're all get to watch it over the weekend. Now,
welcome to my hood. You're from Kentucky, I would say,
I'm not, you know, hugely liberal regionally can conserve. I
think you lean a little left in your in your
private life, but since you've been living downtown, you've turned
into Donald Trump.
Speaker 6 (17:12):
Nothing will run you into the arms of MAGA faster
than stepping in some pooh.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
You're like third term, fourth term. I don't care. Gotta
get this problem. I say that jokingly, but what it does.
Speaker 6 (17:23):
What it does is it raises your attention to the
ineffectiveness of this particular government and the lack of urgency
with which they approach these problems. I watch every city
council meeting and I think, well, somebody please talk about
just the general Say, we got the Olympics coming, We
know that right three years from now?
Speaker 2 (17:42):
Why is it? Why does it look like this downtown? Right?
Speaker 1 (17:45):
And if you're on the Olympic committee, aren't you sniffing
around maybe at a possible and an alternative sitting you.
Speaker 6 (17:50):
Know, we've got softball in the canoeing event in Oklahoma
City already, and it all deprives me of the whole
thing is if we're not all in your.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Case for this event. All right, let's talk about you
with Chris Merrill on a show yesterday. You got tear gassed. Yeah,
And and I thought, well, that's monks. He's kind of
an odd it's probably his own tear gas. He probably
does that sort of thing on weekends. And then I thought, nah,
maybe that's rude to say, but you got you got gassed.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
You got gassed.
Speaker 6 (18:19):
I did, other members of the press, and obviously a
lot of the protesters did too. We were on Alameda
Street outside the Federal Building where the National Guard was
stationed to protect that facility and the personnel there. And
when the time came for about two dozen federal vehicles
to make their way into the parking garage behind the guard,
the guard gave no warning. They just mobilized and they
(18:42):
put their shields down, pushed everybody out of the way,
and then deployed that tear gas. And let me tell you,
zero out of ten do not recommend.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Okay, now you do, you have a press pass or
do you have press on you written?
Speaker 6 (18:55):
I was in full KFI guarb. I looked like KFI
superhero yesterday. The backpack at hoodie on I had the
mic flag and I of course I do have the thing.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
I even wear around the office here.
Speaker 6 (19:06):
It's my my press passage you have to get from
the LPD and the Sheriff's office, so that that denotes
me as press.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
My guess is that the people, and I call them rioters.
It wasn't necessarily a riot, but I like to call
them rioters. My guess is that the rioters probably didn't
know what KF I was.
Speaker 7 (19:23):
You.
Speaker 6 (19:23):
Honestly, people were taking selfies with me. No, they thought
I was Tim Conway. Love it say hello to HANDLEF
and it was like, we really get them all.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
I guess.
Speaker 6 (19:32):
I mean, I think people have an idea that we
have a certain type of audience, right, it's not true.
I mean we do, we have all and we are
able to engage with people from all stripes.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
And let's be honest, it's good radio. Okay, So what
time of day did you get gassed? I gotta get
back to this because I got it. We're gonna play
the audio.
Speaker 6 (19:51):
Yeah, it was just after one o'clock, so about an
hour and a half into this thing.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
Okay, well a strong message with that, with that substance,
huh get away.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Yeah, but what does it do?
Speaker 1 (20:02):
It affects your nose, your your throat, your eyes, everything.
Speaker 6 (20:05):
No, I never you hear tear gas all the time,
or you know, as there's a standoff or somebody's hold
up somewhere and they've thrown tear gas in and the
guy will come running out and like, okay, well what
does it actually do to you?
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Well, now I know, and you always look at those
guys like, oh what a whoos? You can't handle?
Speaker 6 (20:19):
No, so it immediately makes you cough immediately, and you
cannot cough it out. It is just so irritating in
your throat, and then moments later it starts to burn
in your eyes. And then right after that, just like
you're at a funeral, you're crying.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
Song man.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
All right, Okay, when we come back, we're gonna play
the entire piece with Michael Monks on the air, like
yesterday Live getting tear Gas. Yeah, you were Live with
Chris Mary right on the air as it happened.
Speaker 6 (20:45):
He was just checking in with me and all of
a sudden, this un you know, this unexpected turn of
events took place.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Okay, this we're gonna come back and play it live.
You're gonna have to stay through the commercial breaks. Throw
it you know, it's uh, it's a tease here, but
we're gonna play the whole thing when'll come back. And
if you haven't heard it, it's great, it's great. Sorry Monks,
it's great. And by the way, I've seen a lot
of people go to unrest and riots whatever you want
to call it, Rocks thrown, you know, graffiti all over
(21:11):
the place, fires, fireworks.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
And all that stuff.
Speaker 1 (21:14):
I've never seen a guy spend a day and a
half or two days at a riot and come out
looking better.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
You got a tan, I look great, you look great.
I'm a total stud right now. All right, we'll come
back and play it.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Michael Monks, getting tay, I'm sorry, getting gassed live.
Speaker 4 (21:31):
You're listening to Tim Conway Junior on demand from KFI
AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
You got Monks on Saturday nights seven and nine pm. Yes,
Michael Monks, you've been here, what two years? A little
year and a half, almost.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Year and a half.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Okay, all right, and you're downtown in La The unrest
is going on. There's mayhem everywhere, and these National Guard
troops they want to clear the street to get the
ice vehicles, and they hit you with tear guests.
Speaker 6 (22:02):
Yeah, and I would have happily moved out of their
way had they start. Hey, some cars are coming, why
don't you move? But I was in the midst of
the agitators and some protests. There really wasn't a whole lot.
I just want to set the scene. There was not
really anything unordinary going on. It was just a little
bit of chanting, right, and just the protesters kind of
yelling a little bit. The National Guards standing there in
their skirmish line stoic, unmoved by the shouting, and then
(22:25):
just like that, it.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Hit the fan.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
All right, Stephus has the audio, Let's play it. This
happened yesterday right here on kfive.
Speaker 5 (22:33):
Michael Monks has been covering the simmering protests. I'm gonna
call it a simmering protest, Michael at the Federal building
off Alameda.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
Is that a fair We have action right now?
Speaker 7 (22:44):
The National Guard is now pushing this protest into the street.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Let me get over here. So there's some smoke. I
don't know who's thrown that.
Speaker 7 (22:51):
But this scored this. But there are protesters being pushed
right now. I am mere feet from these soldiers pushing
these guys masked men down the fort.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
Oh, oh, are you okay? Yeah, I don't know what
that was. I got a little whipp of that.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
Oh.
Speaker 7 (23:11):
Both water bottles now being thrown at the National Guard.
We are all in the middle of Alameda Street at
this point.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Michael, we heard all kinds of chaos, and then we
lost your signal. And now Michael Monks joins us via phone.
Are you okay, my friend?
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I got a little.
Speaker 7 (23:27):
Tear gassy, definitely burning in the eyes, choking a little bit,
but I think it cleared up pretty fast.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
But all of us got to your gas.
Speaker 7 (23:34):
I mean we were back over in a media huddle,
all of us just sympathizing with one another about getting
caught up in the middle of this and temporarily blinded
and choking.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Wow, that's unbelievable, man, you could hear it in your voice.
I hate you like that. Yeah, that was what was interesting.
Speaker 6 (23:51):
It lingered in the air for a long time, so
I would just we all kind of collected ourselves. You know,
you can apparently dump milk on your face to help
get rid of this. A lot of people dousing themselves
in water. I was able to kind of wait it out.
I just stopped thinking about it and found some shade.
Getting out of the sun helped, and then it evaporated
for the most part, and you know, all of us
(24:12):
journalists headed right back into the fray. But throughout the
rest of the afternoon, sometimes you'd get a little whiff
of it, like it was still kind of in the air,
and it would choke you up a little bit.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
They said, it's still down there.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
You can still smell it in the air, you know,
like when you get near trees or bushes or something.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
It's still in the bushes.
Speaker 6 (24:28):
BTLA has a certain natural scent to it that lingers
throughout the days anyway, so people may be confused.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
But I guess that's the message that they want to
send with tear gas, get out.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Yeah, and it's effective.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
But because they say, and I've talked to some cops
who've you know, run into that tear gas. When you
get tear gas, you can't think of anything else other
than getting away from that.
Speaker 6 (24:50):
You're completely irritated and you can't get away from it
once it's in you, so you have to just wash
it out or wait it out, so you're only running.
You're basically running at that point. It's like putting tape
on a cat, you know, when they're like trying to
just bounce all over the place, but it's stuck to you.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
You know, they can't get it off.
Speaker 6 (25:08):
This worked because they wanted that street clear for these
vehicles to make their way in, and it was good
and immediately everybody ran. And I've learned from covering protests
like this, the Palestine campus protests at UCLA. I spent
about ten hours at UCLA last year overnight one night.
During all of that, the tear gas is very effective.
The flash bangs are pretty scary, if I can tell
(25:30):
you that. I mean, they are very loud when you're
up close. I mean we've all hear them, maybe in
the news reports that we play, and it's not the
same as being next to them. It is like gunshots
and it's startling, so it does force you to back up.
And then they also just use some general smoke to
kind of blind the scene a little bit and to
get you moving, and you can't see what their next
move is all of these devices are very effective, and
so were the shields when they're using them on you.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Right.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
I also saw Michael Monks was with us with the
KFI newsroom. I also saw, you know, I've seen the
pass they rubber bullets and also the foam bullets. The
rubber bullets are really I mean, you know, they call
them rubber like you know, you would think of a
like a rubber ball you play with, but they're not.
Speaker 6 (26:08):
They're really I mean, they can knock you out and
they're coming at you at a pretty high speed. So
it's not like if I flicked a rubber band at
you right now, it might sting for a second. We'd
have a good laugh about it. I would hope not
that I would do that to you. But if I
shot one at you like a pellet sized rubber band,
waded up in a ball and shot at the speed
that a gun can do, that you're gonna feel.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
That it's unreal, all right?
Speaker 1 (26:27):
So what is Obviously you live down there, you get
a vibe for what's going on down there. Did you
see most of the protesters down there. I've heard first hand,
secondhand that they're not downtowners these are people who've come
from outside of downtown.
Speaker 6 (26:44):
Yeah, downtown is the place to protest in Los Angeles,
so that's where the seat of government is. All levels, county, city, state, federal,
they all have big offices and big presences there, so naturally,
and also this happens to be where the detainees are
being held, so that's that's bringing people down.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
We'll also note that when you see.
Speaker 6 (27:02):
Thousands and thousands like we saw yesterday, thousands and thousands
of people, it was mostly inoculous. It was just people
who came down to uh, who came down to say
I'm against this, I want my voice heard, I want
my presence scene, and when the dispersal order came, they left.
But LA has an inordinate amount of people who are
(27:24):
very gifted at protesting, sure, and they will show up
no matter what the issue is. If it's involving the police,
they're ready to fight. They know how to fight, they
know how to get the tear gas back in the
direction of law enforcement, and they bring equipment. They bring equipment,
and they have tactics and they have plans. And so
when you see these things irrupt into violence like we
(27:45):
saw last night, and like we could possibly see today,
because they're still out there in the streets as we
speak in downtown Los Angeles. These are folks who love
to antagonize the police, who love to engage with the police,
and who love seeing downtown buildings covered in graffiti because
they think that's what's sending the right message.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
What's the mentality there? Why do you think that they
have so much hostility towards the cops?
Speaker 6 (28:06):
You know, I think on both sides of the political spectrum,
the extreme sides, there's this motivation just burn it all down,
whatever it is. It's just that this side is smaller,
I think, than the right side, this leftist side that
we see here in Los Angeles. But they are so
loud and they are so well organized. You heard police
Chief Jim McDonald's say during a late night press conference
(28:29):
yesterday that they could not get to the Fashion district
that initial ice raid that started all of this right
until like thirty eight minutes after the call came because
they needed to stop, they needed to get equipment.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
The protesters didn't need that much time, did they.
Speaker 6 (28:41):
Yeah, they got their breakin. They were there in an instant.
That's how fast and effective those networks are.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Yeah, and I think it's you know, now it's cell phones,
you know, back in nineteen ninety two for the riot
back in twenty twenty, actually twenty twenty is not to
per example, but there were no cell phones back in
nineteen ninety two. Now everything is sent over with you know,
with lightning fast and you can get people together quickly.
(29:06):
And I think that's going to be I think downtown
LA is going to be for the next two or
three weeks the center of everybody's attention. And we don't
need this kind of attention. We're still trying to rebuild
the fires and COVID. Yeah, and I mean downtown has
not recovered since COVID. It's been a mess down there.
And even just in the past several days, some businesses
that I like have gone away. And you brought up
the you know, the protests with you know, the Gaza
(29:28):
in Israel, and we're still still dealing with those as well.
Speaker 6 (29:31):
Yeah, I mean, and this is just an area that
is full of people that love to antagonize and get
involved in this sort of behavior and make it as
violent as possible. And I've mentioned this before, the imagery
that is coming out of Los Angeles right now is
serving a couple of different ideologies, right. I mean, President
Trump and his team are loving images of people who
(29:51):
are disruptive, throwing heavy scooters over the freeway overpass onto
the cop cars below. They're loving that because it lends
credence to the that LA is unlawful and a mess.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
That's right.
Speaker 6 (30:02):
Meanwhile, if you're the organizers who don't like the police,
forget about the immigration message, which is supposed to be
at the center of this. If you're just people who
don't like the police, and you love taking a shield
to the chin, you love being tear gased, you love
being roughed up, because that is an image you can
use to rally your team as well.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
Yeah, I think you're right. I did feel horrible for
an inanimate object. I think maybe for the very first time.
Didn't shed a tear, but I got very emotional when
I saw the Weaymo's on fire, five of them. Yeah,
these port cars and honestly anything they get.
Speaker 6 (30:32):
Graffeited all the time, they get destroyed all the time.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
And it's well also real quickly we got to go here.
The one thing that the people don't understand with the
waymo cars, every car has seventy four cameras on it,
So whoever did that is on seventy four different cameras
and they're gonna find the guys that did that.
Speaker 6 (30:50):
Google owns Waymo, do you think Google can't find I
basically give Google everything about me.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
When I'm on the run, it is over for me.
That's great, Monks. I appreciate it. I'm sorry you had
to go through that. I'm happy, but you took one
for the crew. Happy to do it. You're the best buddy,
all right. Michael Muggs every Saturday seven and nine pm
right here on k f I A M six forty
It's KFI AM sixty and you're listening to The Conway
Show on demand on the iHeartRadio app AFI Am sixty.
It is The Conway Show. Man, oh man, what a weekend?
Speaker 2 (00:17):
What a weekend? Holy smokes.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
You know Friday on the show, we predicted that this
summer it was gonna be crazy. We didn't think it
was gonna happen two hours later. This is unbelievable to
watch everything happen on Friday night and Saturday Sunday and
then Sunday night downtown Los Angeles. Man, I couldn't stop watching.
I couldn't stop watching, and I flipped over on Sunday morning.
(00:43):
I flipped over, like, Okay, we got the streets on fire,
we got rubber bullets, we got the National Guard here,
people getting arrested, people throwing rocks at cop cars, street signs,
fireworks going off, spray painting everywhere. And so I flipped
over to channel and I'm like, surely they have to
have had canceled the Pride parade. Nope, Nope, not at all, man.
(01:08):
Those Pride parade went on as if they were in France.
I was very proud of the fellas and the gals.
Man they say. They said, effet, we were fighting for,
you know, fifty sixty seventy years to try to get
these parades down the street. We're not stopping for anybody.
We're moving down the street. We're dancing, we're showing off,
(01:29):
We're getting crazy. And that that was crazy. And then
I thought, well, surely they probably canceled the Tony Awards. Nope, Nope,
Tony Awards went on as as scheduled. I know, it
does seem odd that I spent four or five hours
on Sunday, two hours watching the Pride parade and then
(01:51):
three hours watching the Tonys. Seems uncharacteristic. But if you
knew me, you know I'm an ally and you know
I'm right there.
Speaker 2 (01:59):
I'm with the GRIP, all right. Dennis Zine is with us.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
He was with the City Council, LA City Council and
then he was also at the LAPD. I think he
got fired from both, but he's with us. Dennis zign
how you Bob, I'm doing well.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
I did fifty six years and I'm still with LAPD
as a reserve, and i did twelve on the City
Council and I've never been fired, not even as a
paper boy back in the day.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Okay, you know what, when somebody protests too much, you
gotta think there's something going on there, all right, So
Dennis Zin, look, you had to look at this all
weekend in a very different perspective. You are on city council,
you're with LAPD, your reserve man. You probably couldn't even
sit there and watch. You probably wanted to throw the
helmet on and get down there.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Well, I was tempted to do. They didn't call me in,
but I am on standby for that. They've basically gone
on twelve hour shifts. They're going to basically mobilize the
department so they'll have coverage. And we know we've got
demonstrations today. Fortune, there hasn't been any violence. When you
have eight seven hundred and forty six officers that's the
total sworn complement of the LAPD, that's not enough to
(03:07):
police the entire city and to patrol those areas and
respond to calls and provide protection for this situation taking
place now. So fortunately they've gone to mutual aid, which
means allied departments, including the Sheriff's Department, and then now
we've got the National Guard and the United States Marines
are arriving to help maintain control. When you see all
(03:28):
those units that are deployed, those are all units that
would be handling radio calls throughout the city of Los
Angeles for all divisions that we have. So when you
have to scrap that detail, people are going to wait
a long time. If there's any units available to handle
the nine to eleven calls. The other calls, no one's
going to handle those calls. There's no one available. So
what we've come to a process now is how do
(03:50):
we maintain control of the city with our limited resources,
whether it's LAPD or Glendale who's assisting and they bring
communities under the mutual aid with the Sheriff's department. So
people are going to criticize, well, why do we have
to bring in the military. Why if you bring in
that shop, we don't have enough resources to maintain control
of the city and maintain control when you've got the
demonstrations take place as we saw yesterday, taken over the freeway,
(04:13):
causing chaos, burning cars, breaking into businesses last night, and
causing all this disruption of a civilized society. That's why
we see the military coming in because we don't have
the resources available to handle this period. That's the bottom line.
You've got too many protesters and today it's coiled, but
yesterday it was. And we don't know what's going to
(04:34):
happen later in the evening hours and following through the
rest of the week. How long this is going to
go on. But unless we have contingent in place to
maintain order and control, we have businesses that are paying
taxes for protection get broken into and if we know
that's happened last night. Fortunately today it's been quiet, but
we've got a massive show of force because we've got
all these officers that are deployed. This will be taken
(04:55):
over by the military, the National Guard. They will take
over these stationary physics missions and our officers can get
back to doing what they need to do to handle
calls for service from the people throughout the city of
Los Angeles. Right, very simple. We only got so many research.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
Right, Dennis, Dennis, Please, when the Marines show up or
and or the National Guard are are they allowed to
arrest people?
Speaker 3 (05:17):
They're going to be a contingent for us to maintain order.
If there needs to be arrests, they believe they will
call in for officers who will be there. They don't
want to arrest anyone. They just want to keep peace
and tranquility. If they want to protest and a peaceful now,
that's fine, they have the right to do that. But
when they start breaking in and destroying property, we've got
to do something. We can't ignore it. We've got to
make arrests. We can't continue to let public and private
(05:40):
property be destroyed. These are taxpayers that are paying for
a service. They need to get that service. But the
military is they're hopefully going to be in mass to
deter anyone from doing a foolish act of breaking in
or vandalizing or the graffiti that's been sprayed all over
the downtown neighborhood.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
You know, I was watching the CHP when they're getting
rocks and and scooters thrown out their cars, and it
destroyed two or three of them, which, by the way,
seventy five thousand dollars each and now the taxpayers have
to pay for.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
But I was.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
Shocked by how long it took for the cavalry to
come in and help those CHP officers that were stuck
under that bridge.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
Well, remember the protesters went on the surface treets and
then they took over the freeway. They shot on the
freeway and the CHP was prepared for that. And then
when they were overwhelmed by the volume of people and
there was orchestrated activity that people were doing what they
were doing. I mean a lot of people just went
and let's destroy what we can, Let's destroy the police cars,
let's attack officers, let's attack whatever we can attack. Some
(06:42):
people go crazy. Now, the people who are doing the
protests are one issue, but then you got the agitators.
They want to cause destruction and to be very combative
with law enforcement. And law enforcement is not paid to
lose the battle. They're paid to maintain order and discipline.
If people don't cooperate, then there's consequences for them, all right.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
Detisign is with us X City Council. Also LAPD Reserve.
LAPD does not shoot tear gas at citizens.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Is that correct?
Speaker 3 (07:09):
Well, they don't shoot at citizens. In my time, it's
been very, very seldom that we ever use that.
Speaker 2 (07:14):
But is it the highway patrol or is it sheriff or.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
The LAPD had resorted to that because it was getting
out of control. That's normally not deployed. A commander above
has to give the order to do that. They've got
the bullets that aren't deadly bullets that they fire the
forty millimeters. They have different weapons, non leaf the weapons
that they can use to deploy, and they were using those.
But again, you have a Sunday afternoon, which you mentioned
(07:40):
some of the activities taking place. We had a deployee
officers for those activities. At the same time, you've got
this massive chaos taking place, an incredible number of people
and many agitators creating havoc. So the police can't just
turn around a walk away. It's to use the resources
they have. And that's why people may criticize what's happening
with bringing in the National Guard, the military army, whatever
(08:03):
the case may be. But we don't have the resources
and you're going to get property destroyed because we don't
have resources to handle that. And when people call nine
one one, well where are the cops. They're out there
babysitting these people who are causing havoc in the downtown area.
You can't continue to do that. You've got to bring
in additional resources to quell that and at the same
time let those officers handle the calls for service. Because
(08:24):
while this has taken place downtown. Other areas of the
city have to be police. There's robbers, there's burglars, there's
all kinds.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Of right, they're going to take advantage of stuff like this.
All right, hold one second, that design is well, US
may put you on hold. Right now, we're looking at
about I don't know about three four maybe five hundred
people outside the Federal Building. And if you're familiar, list look,
I was here in ninety two for the riots, I
was here in twenty twenty, and I've been through this before.
(08:52):
These really aren't I wouldn't call that a riot.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
You know.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
What we had in ninety two was a ribe.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
What we had in twenty twenty where the entires you know,
city was burning, Especially back in nineteen ninety two, that
was a full blown riot. Schools closed for a week
or two, stores burning all over the place, fires out
of control, people in Koreatown with guns on top of
their stores, shooting at looters.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
That was a riot. This is not city wide.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
It's in a very small area in downtown Los Angeles
maybe nine city blocks, you know, city nine cities square blocks.
But it is a major problem though, And if I
were on the Olympic Committee.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
I'd be looking at.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Alternative cities for the Olympics in a couple of years
because we ain't ready.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
We ain't ready for the Olympics. Hell, we're not ready
for anything we got.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
We got people going downtown Los Angeles, breaking crap up,
graffiti all over the place. It's going to be a mess.
It's going to be a mess. And I have a
prediction that it might be happening again tonight. As soon
as that sun goes down, people get crazy and al
I think we're going to see it again tonight. Hopefully
we don't, but I don't know. Got a hunch.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
You're listening to Tim Conway Junior on demand from KFI
AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
It is The Conway Show.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
We're keeping an eye on downtown Los Angeles and Dennis
Zion is with us, a former LA City Council member,
former full time LAPD and on LAPD reserve right now. So, Dennis,
when you watch this again, you're watching them with a
different eye than I am. What do you are you
seeing anything that's done improperly on either side? And what
(10:37):
would you do if you were down there?
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Well, what I would do is have my officers arrest
those who are committing violations of the law. Whatever they're
doing that is illegal. Have an officer make that arrest.
I'd have jail buses there. I'd put them to the
jail buses. I'd take them down, book them, let them
go through the criminal justice system. But we can't tolerate
when people take over the freeways and vandalize and tag
(11:02):
the entire neighborhood of downtown Los Angeles. I mean, the
T Mobile store was broken into, They stole god knows
what from the T Mobile store, and all the activity
that they do that is illegal. I'm not talking about
legal I'm talking about illegal activity. People are paying tax
dollars for protection. They're not receiving protection when you've got
this type of activity taking place widespread in that concentrated
(11:23):
area of downtown Los Angeles playing Temple, We're either going
to enforce the law or we're not going to enforce
the law. You can't have anarchy, and that's what happens
if it doesn't get controlled, it becomes anarchy.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
But and I'll this is not me talking, this is LAPD.
A LAPD will say to you, But if you have
an officer arrest a guy that that takes him off
the street for three hours.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Well, that's the problem. We don't have sufficient personnel. That's
why we need to bring in the National Guard or
bring in the Marines. We're talking about the Marines and
National Guards. One thousand personnel that will be deployed. That's
going to be a force that can contain anything and everything.
Instead of all those police units you see there, every
single one of those is being pulled from a geographic
division in the city of Los Angeles, which they can't
(12:07):
handle the calls that the people, the taxpayers are paying
for because they're there, whether it's the Valley or San Pedro,
they're all being deployed down there. The motor officers. You're
not going to see any motor officers except those that
are there handling this situation. So you take all your
resources and you put them in this one pot downtown
Los Angeles. The rest of the city has a token
force and if it's not an emergency call, no one's
going to respond. So those taxpayers are not receiving the
(12:30):
benefits that they're paying for because you've had to move
all these resources. I have no complaint and no concern
about the Marines coming in, the National Guard, the Air Force,
whatever branch of the military, because we can't maintain control
of the city safety with the resources that we currently have.
It's just impossible. So you can't let downtown go to
hell and the rest of the city have protection when
(12:53):
you have to maintain control. So what they've done is
they've gone on a mobilization. They're working these extended shifts,
but they have to be relieved eventually, And that's why
it's important. Everybody's complaining about the military. Who else is
going to come in? We can't take all the units
from Glendale and Burbank and Pasadena. We've got some, but
the bottom line is you're going to get a thousand
personnel which will be a contingent to maintain that control.
(13:16):
And I'm looking right now on TV. You've got a
lot of people, Yeah, a federal exactly, a lot of people.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
So and wait till the sun goes down.
Speaker 3 (13:25):
When the sun goes down, we don't know what's going
to happen. We know what happened last night. They continued
to the've broken the stores, they' vandalized. But the bottom
line is this is about public safety. The immigration issue
is totally separate public safety needs to maintain and if
the President hadn't called or the governor hadn't called, someone
needs to step up and say we need to have
enough resources to maintain public safety. And fortunately, between the
(13:48):
Marines and the National Guard, we're going to have that.
Because your local law enforcement is not geared for this
type of activity, we can't maintain the control of the
entire city when we have eight thousand and one hundred
and forty six officers. It's impossible, that's the bottom line.
So we have to resort to what we can resort
to to maintain safety and order in the city of
Los Angeles. Again, we've got major issues coming down the line,
(14:11):
and I don't know if people are going to look
and say, wait a second, can you maintain order and
safety when you've got this influx of people throughout the world.
I mean, we've had problems in the past, that's right.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
See the Olympics, we got the World Cup, we got
a lot going on. Bunny. I appreciate you coming on.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
I wish you were back on City Council, one of
the sane guys down there, and we'd love to have
you on later this week to catch up I'll.
Speaker 3 (14:32):
Be back with you anytime.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
All right, Thanks a bun it, thank you all right.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
Denti Zine LAPD formal councilor former council member, and Belly O.
You know we've we've been working together for I don't
know what ten years, twelve years or so. And when
you first came on, I told you the one thing
that I expect out.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
Of you is consistency.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
Remember that I said consistency, and you've always been very consistent.
So I have a question for people downtown who are
throwing crap and destroying cars and graffitiing everything up and
throwing rocks, if they're old enough, and I understand if
they're kids, if they're nineteen twenty twenty one doing stupid crap.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
I did stupid crap as well.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
But if you're in your thirties or forties, I have
one question for you. If you're downtown, what was your
reaction when Barack Obama threw two point five million people
out of this country? It was that your same reaction
to throw rocks at cop cars and graffiti and light
fires and fireworks and put cops in danger. What was
(15:32):
your reaction when Barack Obama deported two point five million people,
and some say it's closer to four million. What was
your reaction to that? I'd like to get some of
the older rioters or unrested er ers to answer that question.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
What did you do?
Speaker 1 (15:50):
Was that your same reaction or did you just ignore it?
This is all about politics, all of it.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
You're listening to Tim Conway jun Demand from KFI AM
six forty, watching TV all weekend with the protest and
then the unrest and the craziness, and then listening to
KFI and Michael Monks Man, you got monks he was
down there all weekend.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Well you live down there, right?
Speaker 5 (16:16):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (16:16):
I live down there?
Speaker 1 (16:16):
Which is another weekend in downtown Los Angeles. How far
are you from the Federal Building and the and all?
Speaker 2 (16:21):
They am? About four blocks?
Speaker 5 (16:23):
Wow?
Speaker 2 (16:24):
Okay, yeah, so you're writing the action, yeah, right, in
the action.
Speaker 6 (16:27):
And what I've I've been telling folks is that this
is extreme, obviously with the protest, but this is the
type of chaos we have to deal with all the
time down there because there's no enforcement of basic laws
or just general neighborliness you know that you would expect
from folks in your neighborhood. It's always covered in spray paint.
It's always covered in trash. There's always lunatics running about
(16:49):
down there, and nobody does anything about it.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Right now, we're all get to watch it over the weekend. Now,
welcome to my hood. You're from Kentucky, I would say,
I'm not, you know, hugely liberal regionally can conserve. I
think you lean a little left in your in your
private life, but since you've been living downtown, you've turned
into Donald Trump.
Speaker 6 (17:12):
Nothing will run you into the arms of MAGA faster
than stepping in some pooh.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
You're like third term, fourth term. I don't care. Gotta
get this problem. I say that jokingly, but what it does.
Speaker 6 (17:23):
What it does is it raises your attention to the
ineffectiveness of this particular government and the lack of urgency
with which they approach these problems. I watch every city
council meeting and I think, well, somebody please talk about
just the general Say, we got the Olympics coming, We
know that right three years from now?
Speaker 2 (17:42):
Why is it? Why does it look like this downtown? Right?
Speaker 1 (17:45):
And if you're on the Olympic committee, aren't you sniffing
around maybe at a possible and an alternative sitting you.
Speaker 6 (17:50):
Know, we've got softball in the canoeing event in Oklahoma
City already, and it all deprives me of the whole
thing is if we're not all in your.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Case for this event. All right, let's talk about you
with Chris Merrill on a show yesterday. You got tear gassed. Yeah,
And and I thought, well, that's monks. He's kind of
an odd it's probably his own tear gas. He probably
does that sort of thing on weekends. And then I thought, nah,
maybe that's rude to say, but you got you got gassed.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
You got gassed.
Speaker 6 (18:19):
I did, other members of the press, and obviously a
lot of the protesters did too. We were on Alameda
Street outside the Federal Building where the National Guard was
stationed to protect that facility and the personnel there. And
when the time came for about two dozen federal vehicles
to make their way into the parking garage behind the guard,
the guard gave no warning. They just mobilized and they
(18:42):
put their shields down, pushed everybody out of the way,
and then deployed that tear gas. And let me tell you,
zero out of ten do not recommend.
Speaker 1 (18:50):
Okay, now you do, you have a press pass or
do you have press on you written?
Speaker 6 (18:55):
I was in full KFI guarb. I looked like KFI
superhero yesterday. The backpack at hoodie on I had the
mic flag and I of course I do have the thing.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
I even wear around the office here.
Speaker 6 (19:06):
It's my my press passage you have to get from
the LPD and the Sheriff's office, so that that denotes
me as press.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
My guess is that the people, and I call them rioters.
It wasn't necessarily a riot, but I like to call
them rioters. My guess is that the rioters probably didn't
know what KF I was.
Speaker 7 (19:23):
You.
Speaker 6 (19:23):
Honestly, people were taking selfies with me. No, they thought
I was Tim Conway. Love it say hello to HANDLEF
and it was like, we really get them all.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
I guess.
Speaker 6 (19:32):
I mean, I think people have an idea that we
have a certain type of audience, right, it's not true.
I mean we do, we have all and we are
able to engage with people from all stripes.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
And let's be honest, it's good radio. Okay, So what
time of day did you get gassed? I gotta get
back to this because I got it. We're gonna play
the audio.
Speaker 6 (19:51):
Yeah, it was just after one o'clock, so about an
hour and a half into this thing.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
Okay, well a strong message with that, with that substance,
huh get away.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Yeah, but what does it do?
Speaker 1 (20:02):
It affects your nose, your your throat, your eyes, everything.
Speaker 6 (20:05):
No, I never you hear tear gas all the time,
or you know, as there's a standoff or somebody's hold
up somewhere and they've thrown tear gas in and the
guy will come running out and like, okay, well what
does it actually do to you?
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Well, now I know, and you always look at those
guys like, oh what a whoos? You can't handle?
Speaker 6 (20:19):
No, so it immediately makes you cough immediately, and you
cannot cough it out. It is just so irritating in
your throat, and then moments later it starts to burn
in your eyes. And then right after that, just like
you're at a funeral, you're crying.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
Song man.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
All right, Okay, when we come back, we're gonna play
the entire piece with Michael Monks on the air, like
yesterday Live getting tear Gas. Yeah, you were Live with
Chris Mary right on the air as it happened.
Speaker 6 (20:45):
He was just checking in with me and all of
a sudden, this un you know, this unexpected turn of
events took place.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Okay, this we're gonna come back and play it live.
You're gonna have to stay through the commercial breaks. Throw
it you know, it's uh, it's a tease here, but
we're gonna play the whole thing when'll come back. And
if you haven't heard it, it's great, it's great. Sorry Monks,
it's great. And by the way, I've seen a lot
of people go to unrest and riots whatever you want
to call it, Rocks thrown, you know, graffiti all over
(21:11):
the place, fires, fireworks.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
And all that stuff.
Speaker 1 (21:14):
I've never seen a guy spend a day and a
half or two days at a riot and come out
looking better.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
You got a tan, I look great, you look great.
I'm a total stud right now. All right, we'll come
back and play it.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Michael Monks, getting tay, I'm sorry, getting gassed live.
Speaker 4 (21:31):
You're listening to Tim Conway Junior on demand from KFI
AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
You got Monks on Saturday nights seven and nine pm. Yes,
Michael Monks, you've been here, what two years? A little
year and a half, almost.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Year and a half.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Okay, all right, and you're downtown in La The unrest
is going on. There's mayhem everywhere, and these National Guard
troops they want to clear the street to get the
ice vehicles, and they hit you with tear guests.
Speaker 6 (22:02):
Yeah, and I would have happily moved out of their
way had they start. Hey, some cars are coming, why
don't you move? But I was in the midst of
the agitators and some protests. There really wasn't a whole lot.
I just want to set the scene. There was not
really anything unordinary going on. It was just a little
bit of chanting, right, and just the protesters kind of
yelling a little bit. The National Guards standing there in
their skirmish line stoic, unmoved by the shouting, and then
(22:25):
just like that, it.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Hit the fan.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
All right, Stephus has the audio, Let's play it. This
happened yesterday right here on kfive.
Speaker 5 (22:33):
Michael Monks has been covering the simmering protests. I'm gonna
call it a simmering protest, Michael at the Federal building
off Alameda.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
Is that a fair We have action right now?
Speaker 7 (22:44):
The National Guard is now pushing this protest into the street.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Let me get over here. So there's some smoke. I
don't know who's thrown that.
Speaker 7 (22:51):
But this scored this. But there are protesters being pushed
right now. I am mere feet from these soldiers pushing
these guys masked men down the fort.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
Oh, oh, are you okay? Yeah, I don't know what
that was. I got a little whipp of that.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
Oh.
Speaker 7 (23:11):
Both water bottles now being thrown at the National Guard.
We are all in the middle of Alameda Street at
this point.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Michael, we heard all kinds of chaos, and then we
lost your signal. And now Michael Monks joins us via phone.
Are you okay, my friend?
Speaker 2 (23:26):
I got a little.
Speaker 7 (23:27):
Tear gassy, definitely burning in the eyes, choking a little bit,
but I think it cleared up pretty fast.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
But all of us got to your gas.
Speaker 7 (23:34):
I mean we were back over in a media huddle,
all of us just sympathizing with one another about getting
caught up in the middle of this and temporarily blinded
and choking.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Wow, that's unbelievable, man, you could hear it in your voice.
I hate you like that. Yeah, that was what was interesting.
Speaker 6 (23:51):
It lingered in the air for a long time, so
I would just we all kind of collected ourselves. You know,
you can apparently dump milk on your face to help
get rid of this. A lot of people dousing themselves
in water. I was able to kind of wait it out.
I just stopped thinking about it and found some shade.
Getting out of the sun helped, and then it evaporated
for the most part, and you know, all of us
(24:12):
journalists headed right back into the fray. But throughout the
rest of the afternoon, sometimes you'd get a little whiff
of it, like it was still kind of in the air,
and it would choke you up a little bit.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
They said, it's still down there.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
You can still smell it in the air, you know,
like when you get near trees or bushes or something.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
It's still in the bushes.
Speaker 6 (24:28):
BTLA has a certain natural scent to it that lingers
throughout the days anyway, so people may be confused.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
But I guess that's the message that they want to
send with tear gas, get out.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Yeah, and it's effective.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
But because they say, and I've talked to some cops
who've you know, run into that tear gas. When you
get tear gas, you can't think of anything else other
than getting away from that.
Speaker 6 (24:50):
You're completely irritated and you can't get away from it
once it's in you, so you have to just wash
it out or wait it out, so you're only running.
You're basically running at that point. It's like putting tape
on a cat, you know, when they're like trying to
just bounce all over the place, but it's stuck to you.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
You know, they can't get it off.
Speaker 6 (25:08):
This worked because they wanted that street clear for these
vehicles to make their way in, and it was good
and immediately everybody ran. And I've learned from covering protests
like this, the Palestine campus protests at UCLA. I spent
about ten hours at UCLA last year overnight one night.
During all of that, the tear gas is very effective.
The flash bangs are pretty scary, if I can tell
(25:30):
you that. I mean, they are very loud when you're
up close. I mean we've all hear them, maybe in
the news reports that we play, and it's not the
same as being next to them. It is like gunshots
and it's startling, so it does force you to back up.
And then they also just use some general smoke to
kind of blind the scene a little bit and to
get you moving, and you can't see what their next
move is all of these devices are very effective, and
so were the shields when they're using them on you.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Right.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
I also saw Michael Monks was with us with the
KFI newsroom. I also saw, you know, I've seen the
pass they rubber bullets and also the foam bullets. The
rubber bullets are really I mean, you know, they call
them rubber like you know, you would think of a
like a rubber ball you play with, but they're not.
Speaker 6 (26:08):
They're really I mean, they can knock you out and
they're coming at you at a pretty high speed. So
it's not like if I flicked a rubber band at
you right now, it might sting for a second. We'd
have a good laugh about it. I would hope not
that I would do that to you. But if I
shot one at you like a pellet sized rubber band,
waded up in a ball and shot at the speed
that a gun can do, that you're gonna feel.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
That it's unreal, all right?
Speaker 1 (26:27):
So what is Obviously you live down there, you get
a vibe for what's going on down there. Did you
see most of the protesters down there. I've heard first hand,
secondhand that they're not downtowners these are people who've come
from outside of downtown.
Speaker 6 (26:44):
Yeah, downtown is the place to protest in Los Angeles,
so that's where the seat of government is. All levels, county, city, state, federal,
they all have big offices and big presences there, so naturally,
and also this happens to be where the detainees are
being held, so that's that's bringing people down.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
We'll also note that when you see.
Speaker 6 (27:02):
Thousands and thousands like we saw yesterday, thousands and thousands
of people, it was mostly inoculous. It was just people
who came down to uh, who came down to say
I'm against this, I want my voice heard, I want
my presence scene, and when the dispersal order came, they left.
But LA has an inordinate amount of people who are
(27:24):
very gifted at protesting, sure, and they will show up
no matter what the issue is. If it's involving the police,
they're ready to fight. They know how to fight, they
know how to get the tear gas back in the
direction of law enforcement, and they bring equipment. They bring equipment,
and they have tactics and they have plans. And so
when you see these things irrupt into violence like we
(27:45):
saw last night, and like we could possibly see today,
because they're still out there in the streets as we
speak in downtown Los Angeles. These are folks who love
to antagonize the police, who love to engage with the police,
and who love seeing downtown buildings covered in graffiti because
they think that's what's sending the right message.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
What's the mentality there? Why do you think that they
have so much hostility towards the cops?
Speaker 6 (28:06):
You know, I think on both sides of the political spectrum,
the extreme sides, there's this motivation just burn it all down,
whatever it is. It's just that this side is smaller,
I think, than the right side, this leftist side that
we see here in Los Angeles. But they are so
loud and they are so well organized. You heard police
Chief Jim McDonald's say during a late night press conference
(28:29):
yesterday that they could not get to the Fashion district
that initial ice raid that started all of this right
until like thirty eight minutes after the call came because
they needed to stop, they needed to get equipment.
Speaker 2 (28:39):
The protesters didn't need that much time, did they.
Speaker 6 (28:41):
Yeah, they got their breakin. They were there in an instant.
That's how fast and effective those networks are.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Yeah, and I think it's you know, now it's cell phones,
you know, back in nineteen ninety two for the riot
back in twenty twenty, actually twenty twenty is not to
per example, but there were no cell phones back in
nineteen ninety two. Now everything is sent over with you know,
with lightning fast and you can get people together quickly.
(29:06):
And I think that's going to be I think downtown
LA is going to be for the next two or
three weeks the center of everybody's attention. And we don't
need this kind of attention. We're still trying to rebuild
the fires and COVID. Yeah, and I mean downtown has
not recovered since COVID. It's been a mess down there.
And even just in the past several days, some businesses
that I like have gone away. And you brought up
the you know, the protests with you know, the Gaza
(29:28):
in Israel, and we're still still dealing with those as well.
Speaker 6 (29:31):
Yeah, I mean, and this is just an area that
is full of people that love to antagonize and get
involved in this sort of behavior and make it as
violent as possible. And I've mentioned this before, the imagery
that is coming out of Los Angeles right now is
serving a couple of different ideologies, right. I mean, President
Trump and his team are loving images of people who
(29:51):
are disruptive, throwing heavy scooters over the freeway overpass onto
the cop cars below. They're loving that because it lends
credence to the that LA is unlawful and a mess.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
That's right.
Speaker 6 (30:02):
Meanwhile, if you're the organizers who don't like the police,
forget about the immigration message, which is supposed to be
at the center of this. If you're just people who
don't like the police, and you love taking a shield
to the chin, you love being tear gased, you love
being roughed up, because that is an image you can
use to rally your team as well.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
Yeah, I think you're right. I did feel horrible for
an inanimate object. I think maybe for the very first time.
Didn't shed a tear, but I got very emotional when
I saw the Weaymo's on fire, five of them. Yeah,
these port cars and honestly anything they get.
Speaker 6 (30:32):
Graffeited all the time, they get destroyed all the time.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
And it's well also real quickly we got to go here.
The one thing that the people don't understand with the
waymo cars, every car has seventy four cameras on it,
So whoever did that is on seventy four different cameras
and they're gonna find the guys that did that.
Speaker 6 (30:50):
Google owns Waymo, do you think Google can't find I
basically give Google everything about me.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
When I'm on the run, it is over for me.
That's great, Monks. I appreciate it. I'm sorry you had
to go through that. I'm happy, but you took one
for the crew. Happy to do it. You're the best buddy,
all right. Michael Muggs every Saturday seven and nine pm
right here on k f I A M six forty
Tim Conway Jr. on Demand News
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