Inauguration Day protest on Caltrain tracks in SF prompts arrests

Just after 8:30 a.m. the group blocked the trains at 16th and Mississippi streets and no train tracks were operating in the area, according to Caltrain. Later in the morning, police issued two dispersal orders and the protesters collapsed on the ground as Caltrain workers broke their chains. Eleven people were arrested by the Transit Police Bureau. San Francisco Police Department officers, who were assisting the San Mateo County Sheriff’s department to make the arrests, shoved anyone not part of the human chain off to the side and began working to untangle the row of men and women on the ground chanting, “No justice no peace.” Plans were put in place to disrupt traffic and “business as usual” as part of an ongoing national resistance to the President Donald Trump’s incoming administration, said Cat Brooks, co-founder of the Anti-Police-Terror Project. On either side of the intersection, people were holding a large, pink fabric signs that read “Resist Fascism Protect Civil Liberties #120Hours #Ungovernable” and “Resist The War On The Poor Protect Dignity #ReclaimMLK #J20.”