Local law enforcement holds ‘civil unrest’ drill at Acrisure Arena

We are less than 70 days away from the presidential election. Reuters reports that two-thirds of Americans fear that violence could follow the election.

Here in the Coachella Valley, officers say political violence is not expected, but preparedness is critical.

On Wednesday, more than 150 officers were out at Acrisure Arena as they trained and learned different communication strategies for handling potential civil unrest as a result of the presidential election.

“We’re out here at the Acrisure Arena doing some crowd management training with all of the local agencies here in the Coachella Valley,” said Ken Reichle, Chief Deputy with the Riverside County Sheriff's Office.

According to the study by Reuters, 68% percent of respondents said they agreed with a statement that they were concerned that extremists will resort to violence if they are unhappy with the election outcome.

“So with the election upcoming, there’s always some concerns here in Coachella Valley. We really don’t see any of those major events like they do in the LA, Orange County areas are we prepared? We don’t want to worry the day of the event so we’re here preparing for that in case,” Reichle said.

The Sheriff's Office and a number of police departments like Palm Springs, Cathedral City, Desert Hot Springs, Indio, and CHP collaborated Wednesday morning, preparing for what could occur ahead or after the election.

“There is a point where freedom of speech is no longer freedom of speech becomes an unlawful assembly and people need to disperse and we want to be very clear that that line is so that they don’t let it go too far,” Reichle said.

To prepare officers for unexpected civil unrest, they are trained in communication skills, crowd dispersal, and down officer rescue drills. local community watch groups came to the training to learn about their role in this scenario, and they also participated in civil unrest simulations.

“So today we’re agitators, so we’ll go down there since the officers are ready. It will agitate them and will stand in front of them. It tries to get them in a real-life scenario,” said Lloyd Dolittle of Palm Desert Citizens on Patrol.

The Sheriff's Office is ready to deal with unexpected situations from their mobile command post, a control center on wheels that can travel to the scene.

“Your instant commander would likely be inside of the command post making operational decisions as well as any other cooperators or people that are close to the instant that need to be our decision-makers," said Jason Sexton, RSO lieutenant.

Officers here are encouraging the community to keep calm and to stay peaceful ahead of this 2024 election