This morning, journalists, citizens and supporters called upon the City of St. Paul Minnesota to drop the charges against the journalists arrested at the RNC convention. Our friends at Free Press helped organize the delivery of over 50,000 petition signatures collected online in 2 days to St. Paul City Hall calling on Mayor Chris Coleman and local law enforcement officials to drop all charges against journalists arrested while covering protests outside the Republican National Convention.

The arrest of obvious journalists is a crime against our democracy. It was clear from the videotape and other evidence that the people arrested were members of the press and were not involved in rioting. Their arrest was either an attempt to intimidate the press into not covering protests or it was incompetency on the part of the police force. I am not sure which is worse.

Not only should all charges be dropped, the police chief and the mayor owe these journalists an apology.