Series: Black Lives Matter protests in Orange County
Thousands of protesters have converged in Orange County to speak out about the death of unarmed Black man George Floyd while in the custody of Minneapolis police, as well as other Black men, women and children who have died at the hands of police.
There have been Black Lives Matter demonstrations in Newport Beach, Huntington Beach, Costa Mesa, Laguna Beach, Fountain Valley, Santa Ana, Irvine, Anaheim, Garden Grove, Laguna Niguel, San Juan Capistrano, Yorba Linda and other parts of the county. Below is the Daily Pilot and TimesOC’s coverage of these protests.
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After weeks of protests in Orange County demanding an end to police brutality, activists are now faced with what’s next in the movement and how to make lasting change in their communities. OC Protests, which has been organizing and collaborating with protest organizers throughout Orange County, is helping usher in that next step.
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Black Lives Matter protests were held at the Huntington Beach Pier and Bonita Creek Park in Newport Beach on Saturday.
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Teenagers, who organized peaceful protests in Orange County, are seeking educational and cultural change beyond police reform. Arnold O. Beckman and Huntington Beach High School students share their experiences.
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Local artist Albert Lopez Jr. and his family put together a rooftop project supporting Black Lives Matter that will be visible from the sky long after the current wave of protests.
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The demonstration started in Heisler Park, but protesters marched down to Main Beach at around 1 p.m. where the protest continued.
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Irvine Councilwoman Farrah Khan was sent a “legal letter” reprimanding her for “demanding” that Irvine police Chief Mike Hamel take a knee during a Black Lives Matter protest last week, Irvine Mayor Christina Shea said during a recent phone interview.
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About 200 people gathered outside of the Huntington Beach Police Department on Sunday. The event featured speakers like Rep. Harley Rouda and former MMA star Chuck Liddell.
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Hundreds of protesters knelt in silence for for 8 minutes and 46 seconds outside the Orange County Sheriff’s Department headquarters in Santa Ana to protest the death of George Floyd as Police Officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck.
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Irvine Mayor Christina Shea has been deleting criticisms and blocking users from those who support the movement on her Facebook page.
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Protests in the name of George Floyd and the “Black Lives Matter” movement were held in Huntington Beach and Newport Beach on Saturday.
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On what would have been Breonna Taylor’s 27th birthday, dozens of people sang for her on the side of a bustling Harbor Boulevard in Costa Mesa Friday. The demonstrators said her name, and George Floyd’s name, and the names of other black men, women and children who have died at the hands of police.
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The Friday protest at Main Beach was organized by a group of 20-year-olds who had left but grown up in Laguna Beach.
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Police say the suspect, Travis Patrick White, pulled a black handgun from his backpack and held it aloft as a handful of demonstrators backed off and one took cover behind a parked car.
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A Black Lives Matter protest was held in Fountain Valley on Thursday, a continuation of the nationwide protests that have followed the death of George Floyd.
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The “Irvine Bubble” is usually shielded from social controversy. But as Cessa Heard-Johnson stood in front of hundreds of protesters at the Irvine Civic Center on Wednesday, she urged the crowd to play a role in the national movement to reform the country’s justice system.
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Meep Shows and Garden Grove High School’s Black Student Union led a crowd of approximately 4,000 people down the streets of Garden Grove in a march against police brutality.
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Moved by the death of George Floyd, residents peacefully protested against police violence in Laguna Niguel and San Juan Capistrano on Wednesday afternoon.
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The worldwide civil unrest caused by George Floyd’s death — by suffocation, as one officer knelt on his neck for nearly 9 minutes — largely did not slide into violence in Newport Beach, where four demonstrations were planned around the city Wednesday.
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The online panel held Wednesday afternoon was in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the Black Lives Matter protests that have broken out across the country.
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The Orange County Sheriff’s Department is reviewing the conduct of a deputy working at a Costa Mesa protest Tuesday seen wearing a badge supporting the far-right militia organization, the Three Percenters.
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Caleigh Cobb, 21, hoped she and her friends might be able to get 50 people out to their protest on Yorba Linda’s Main Street. Over 500 people showed up.
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Newport Beach is set to see four protests Wednesday as the nationwide movement continues in response to police brutality and the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
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About 200 people, most of them young, peacefully assembled across from Costa Mesa City Hall and the city’s police department before proceeding past Orange Coast College toward the 405 Freeway.
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An hours-long standoff between protesters and police took place Monday night at South Coast Plaza, with demonstrators asking police to “take a knee.”
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Despite fears of rioting and violence, thousands of protesters marched peacefully through Anaheim Monday evening to protest the death of George Floyd.
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Fears of anticipated civil unrest at Costa Mesa’s South Coast Plaza, following reports a protest was being planned there for Monday evening, delayed a June 1 reopening.
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Many businesses in downtown Huntington Beach were boarded up Sunday night, when no major looting was reported during a protest, which was deemed an unlawful assembly by the Huntington Beach Police Department.
