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On 23 January 2017, The Intercept published a story offering a run-down of legislative bills proposed by various state lawmakers that would increase the potential criminal penalties to be applied persons arrested while protesting: The article's lead-in suggested that proposals for the more severe laws were related to large demonstrations that took place around the country on 20 January and 21 January 2017, the days of and after President Donald Trump's inauguration. However, the laws had started wending their way through state legislatures well before President Trump was sworn in to office. Many of the the proposals instead seemed to have been in response to protests related to the Black Lives Matter movement and Dakota Access Pipeline construction. In Indiana, State Sen. Jim Tomes proposed a bill (SB 285) that would require public officials to dispatch police within 15 minutes of reported mass traffic obstructions with instructions to clear them by any means necessary: Tomes said that the bill was offered in response to protests in the summer of 2016 in which demonstrators blocked thoroughfares. The bill's inclusion of the phrase by any means necessary has caused alarm among critics who believe that any means could include (unnecessary) physical harm or excessive force: The bill failed to move through the Indiana state legislature. In North Dakota, HB 1203 lifts liability from drivers who accidentally hit protesters who are in roadways. The bill was introduced amid demonstrations at Standing Rock against the Dakota Access Pipeline: Although that bill died in session, North Dakota passed four other laws that expanded punishment for protesters, according to the ACLU. The new laws include criminalizing protests on private property where the notice against trespassing is 'clear from the circumstances,' punishing those who wear masks while committing a crime to avoid recognition on both public and private property, increasing penalties for riot-related offenses and allowing the state attorney general to respond to a large protest by appointing out-of-state law enforcement officers as 'ad-hoc special agents.' In protest of the police shooting death of a black motorist Philando Castile, about 300 protesters blocked Interstate 94 in St. Paul for hours in July 2016. While the penalty for obstructing traffic in Minnesota is currently light, lawmakers there sought to make the punishment more severe with HF 55: This bill, along with others that would have both stiffened penalties for protesters who block traffic and held demonstrators responsible for policing costs if they were convicted of unlawful assembly or nuisance charges, failed to advance. A bill in Virginia that would have ratcheted up penalties for protesters who remained at the scene of an unlawful assembly after being told to leave was defeated by state lawmakers, and a Washington state bill that would have labeled protesters economic terrorists has little chance of passing, The Intercept noted. On 23 January 2017, Iowa lawmakers introduced a bill that, if passed, would have mean protesters who blocked highways could be charged with felonies carrying penalties of five years in prison: That bill never advanced and neither did two others meant to expand punishment for blocking traffic during a protest and stiffening penalties for incitement of a riot, per the ACLU. In Colorado, a bill that would have raised the severity of criminal charges for tampering with oil and gas production equipment from a misdemeanor to a felony also died, while in Michigan, the Republican-led state House introduced an anti-picketing bill. (The Intercept reported the latter has been shelved.) A deluge of bills set on criminalizing protest-related activity may appear to be a broad effort to crack down on free speech, but at least some of the proposals seem to be local responses by lawmakers to constituents and businesses who opposed protests that swept across the country in 2016. It is important to note that many of the bills failed in their respective state governments and were never made law.
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