Police officers in Perth Amboy, New Jersey are under fire after video clips of them appearing to harass a small group of Black teens who were riding their bikes through town went viral. Perth Amboy has a law requiring a bicycle “license tag” but the teens say they live in Edison, and were just riding home.

At one point six police cars were involved. The officers ordered the teens off the bikes, confiscated at least one, and arrested one teen who was arguing they shouldn’t have to give up their bikes.

We can’t even ride bikes now… I’m not surprised. I’m just angry. pic.twitter.com/xcAR8zmnuP

— ⁶Kid (@deep_dab) April 19, 2021

Later, at the police station, one officer told the teen he was lucky to get his bike back, asking if he had the purchase receipt for the bike, and if it is registered with them. The officer also says the teens were told “to stay on the sidewalk,” but they were also told to stay on the road and ride with traffic. She says they did all this for their safety.

Here’s the explanation from a Perth Amboy police officer: pic.twitter.com/8T48DMEgoA

— philip lewis (@Phil_Lewis_) April 20, 2021

Part of Perth Amboy’s extensive bicycle law reads: “An application for a license to own and operate a bicycle shall be made to the Chief of Police in writing upon a form approved by the City Council. Upon approval of an application, the Chief of Police shall provide, at the expense of the city, a proper license tag which shall be attached to the frame of the bicycle in a substantial manner. The removal of such tag, except by proper authority, shall be a violation of this chapter. A license fee of fifty cents ($0.50) shall be charged per year for each bicycle. Such license shall be issued as of the calendar year and shall be effective for such period.”

It also bans “fancy riding”:

“The rider of a bicycle shall not allow it to proceed in a street by inertia momentum, with his feet removed from the pedals, nor remove both hands from the handlebars while riding the bicycle, nor practice any trick or fancy riding in a street or carry another person upon the bicycle.”

Many are outraged:

Riding bikes while black is a crime in Perth Amboy https://t.co/0v6znJ4SkO

— Duty To Warn 🔉 (@duty2warn) April 20, 2021

This is Perth Amboy, NJ. Are the police really arresting kids over bike registrations? Does it really require this many officers to address whatever situation this is? Police CANNOT continue to be our response to EVERYTHING. https://t.co/fcrPfJNKBI

— Amol Sinha (@AmolSinha) April 20, 2021

I rode my bike through Perth Amboy, NJ last year. No one asked me for my bike license. I wonder why. pic.twitter.com/VRsHggDxbv

— Charlie O’Donnell (@ceonyc) April 20, 2021

Municipal bicycle licenses are just registration stickers. And they can be an effective tool to arrest wheelie kids.

Anyone biking in or through Perth Amboy should be outraged. #bikingwhileblack https://t.co/513vdYQBnX

— BCGP Biking The Region (@BikingTheRegion) April 20, 2021

Cops in Perth Amboy, NJ arrest a Black teenager for no reason. They let him go later in the day and gave all the bikes back because they knew how this would look. pic.twitter.com/AQ8FXgCjs4

— Fifty Shades of Whey (@davenewworld_2) April 20, 2021

Now, let’s take a quick second, These guys state they are from Edison, NJ. There is no requirement for a license/registration for a bike. But in Perth Amboy, NJ there is… So this is just profiling by police with classic failure to communicate or listen. #ACAB #BIKE #Cycles https://t.co/x7bGP3UR1P

— Serotonless Graves (@Nopeamine) April 20, 2021

Then she says she could be a real asshole and confiscate the other youths’ bikes that are not registered. Perth Amboy requires they be registered. But, contrary to her first charge, they also prohibit riding on sidewalks in many places around town so… https://t.co/SJohgEibZx pic.twitter.com/FCWphZgR7d

— sahra (@sahrasulaiman) April 20, 2021

Imagine being some miserable police force, like that of Perth Amboy in NJ, who’s latest claim to fame is: trending because you idiotically swarm to confiscate bikes and detain (just the black) boys for lack of a 50 cent registration that proves ownership…#HowItStarts https://t.co/sxxADzeImM

— Gerald Hampton (@VaTechPhiDelt) April 20, 2021

Perth Amboy NJ has an ordinance requiring all bicycles to be licensed. Here is what happens when you live in neighboring Edison NJ and you want to ride through Perth Amboy. This is deja vu of Robert Moses building low bridges on the highways to prevent bus traffic.#FTP #ACAB https://t.co/qbrXsow1Gd

— #DefundThePolice 🌻🌹 (@Tom4CongressNY6) April 20, 2021

Need an annual license to ride a bike in Perth Amboy, NJ AS A FUCKING KID… but, we can’t figure out how to require licensing and common sense legislation for firearms. Amerikkka! https://t.co/Kk1oDXgLKd

— Stephen G. Friend (@StephenGFriend) April 20, 2021

i looked it up, f’in wild. you gotta register your bike with the cops. they can steal your bike for ANY infraction & throw you in jail for up to TEN days. this is such a blatantly bullshit law meant to target black kidshttps://t.co/8KCuzvQmtg

— nick still wears his mask 😷 (@NickKramarev) April 20, 2021

FIFTY CENTS per year to license your bicycle in Perth Amboy, N.J. – this is nothing but a pretext to harass

(this is not an archaic law – dated 2011) pic.twitter.com/XFpMny8Tjf

— Brian (@FinallySock) April 20, 2021

I broke this law last summer when I stopped in Perth Amboy’s waterfront ice cream shop on my ride back from New Brunswick

1. Biking laws shouldn’t change from one town to the next

2. Cops apparently only apply this law to people that are Black.@NJGov, fix this. Both counts. https://t.co/5aKU89wSVX

— Brian Hedden (@BriHedden) April 20, 2021

The U.S. Secret Service will protect former President Donald Trump and more than a dozen members of his family, including extended family members, after the 45th President, defying usual agency regulations, ordered the expanded protections.

“Trump issued a directive to extend post-presidency Secret Service protection to 14 members of his family who were not automatically entitled to receive it,” The Washington Post reports.

Taxpayers will be on the hook for the millions of dollars the additional protections will cost, even after the Trump family decimated the protective agency’s budget over the past four to five years.

Once a president leaves office he or she, their spouse, and children up until they reach the age of 16 are entitled to Secret Service protection. Protection for the president and spouse is for the rest of their lives.

But Trump has demanded every family member who has ever been covered to continue receiving protection, for the next six months.

“That means the expensive, taxpayer-funded security will continue for his daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner, their three children, his son Donald Trump Jr. and his five children, his son Eric Trump and his wife Lara and his daughter Tiffany Trump,” the Post explains.

In just the first two years of his presidency Trump and his family members who are protected by the Secret Service took more than 4500 trips.

Citizens for Ethics (CREW) on Wednesday noted that “the Trump family took more trips that required Secret Service protection in one year than the Obama family took in seven.”

Is President Donald Trump building a moat around the White House? That’s just one of several questions some are asking after a White House press pool report Friday morning.

“A crew is digging a trench outside the briefing room, on the lawn between the driveway and the sidewalk,” the pool report reads. “And as noted previously, there’s lots of fencing around Lafayette Square Park.”

Trump over the past few weeks did have “unscalable” fencing installed around the White House before the November 3 election, leading many to wonder if he planned on barricading himself in if he lost.

Those questions still exist, as does the fencing.

Trump going full dictator look, barricading himself in the palace:

“A crew is digging a trench outside the briefing room, on the lawn between the driveway and the sidewalk. And as noted previously, there’s lots of fencing around Lafayette Square Park,” WH pooler @toddgillman

— Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) November 13, 2020

From the White House press pool this morning: *A crew is digging a trench outside the briefing room, on the lawn between the driveway and the sidewalk.* Landscaping or the natural culmination of four years of animosity?

— Robert Delaney (@RFDelaney) November 13, 2020

Digging a trench in front of the briefing room and more fencing I thought the protesters tomorrow are supposed to be pro-trump. He scared of his own people now

— Laura Di Bella (@LauraDiBella15) November 13, 2020

The campaign can afford only ill-tempered sea bass to stock that moat.

— Kevin C. McGee (@bankrlawimp) November 13, 2020

A moat? Shouldn’t someone be worried about this?

— Je suis dégoûté!😷 LauraInWonderland (@LauraBergerol) November 13, 2020

Maganot

— Jim Boyd (@bjamesboyd) November 13, 2020

A moat? Shouldn’t someone be worried about this?

— Je suis dégoûté!😷 LauraInWonderland (@LauraBergerol) November 13, 2020

He’s

Building

A

Moat https://t.co/KmGjWiQkIr

— Chester Scoville (@ChesterScoville) November 13, 2020

It’s a moat. WH going medieval. https://t.co/eVE8h3rPO1

— Lara (@CaliGirlinMI) November 13, 2020

It’s not a trench it’s the burn pit, to burn the evidence https://t.co/JQN75O8DUX

— Bill Collins👀 (@wmjcollins) November 13, 2020

Image: White House photo by India Garrish via Flickr