MSNBC’s The Weekend: Primetime did a shoddy job of reporting the facts about the Los Angeles riots Sunday. Hoping to push the narrative that the events were nothing more than a peaceful protest, MSNBC national correspondent David Noriega outright denied the violence already known to have occurred over the weekend. Of course, that meant jumping through hoops to make sure not to misspeak and acknowledge the reality of the situation.
Noriega described the events around him as such:
Look, I think this ranges from everything from a sort of spontaneous, angry reaction to these large scale immigration enforcement operations in L.A. in a not necessarily fully or clearly articulated way to much clearer demands being made by some of the more organized elements in these protests.
This wasn't a riot, according to Noriega, it was just people acting spontaneously and angrily without an expressed purpose or any sort of organization. Usually a protest requires something being protested, but for MSNBC’s purposes, that can just be ignored for the sake of their story.
There were people present at these protests who were non-violent, who truly were just there to express their opinion on ICE deportations. However, that did not remain the case for long, and it would be a blatant lie to act like the protests did not escalate to violence. But that’s exactly what Noriega did:
You have the police really deploying fairly aggressive crowd control tactics. And the crowd, the protesters themselves are also quite fired up, quite agitated. I've seen, you know, a handful of people throwing water bottles and things like that at the police lines. That's pretty much the extent of the, I don't know, what you might describe as something other than peaceful action that I've seen, but you're definitely seeing people angry at not just the federal government, not just at Trump, not just at the National Guard, but also at the LAPD and at the local law enforcement as well.
In Noriega’s version of the story, it was the police who aggressed; the worst any protesters did was throw some water bottles. That doesn’t seem to explain the 29 rioters arrested for vandalism and various violent crimes the night before. Still, MSNBC clung to the notion that these were just citizens expressing their anger over law enforcement in the United States.
Noriega claimed “this is not a protest that I would describe as a riot.” How he did describe it, however, didn’t help his case:
It's also not a sort of peaceful, slowly walking down the street with a permit, you know, chanting organized slogans, kind of march. It's more confrontational than that. It's more disorganized than that. It is not seeking approval, you know, from the authorities of the city, either formally or in spirit. I would describe it as a very confrontational, very high tension, but nevertheless peaceful protest.
Once again, Noriega was describing a riot with everything but the word. Confrontational and disorganized, not even seeking recognition for its cause, what happened in L.A. was nothing more than people taking to the streets for the sake of violence, for the sake of rioting.
Noriega held to his narrative of a peaceful protest even as host Ayman Mohyeldin told him to make sure he and the crew stayed safe as the segment came to a close.
The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read.
MSNBC’s The Weekend: Primetime
June 8, 2025
6:05 p.m. EST
(...)
AYMAN MOHYELDIN: Over the course of those hours and the course of the last couple of days, have you gotten a sense of whether the protesters had any specific demands? Why were they concentrated around that specific building? Were they just expressing anger, or was there another objective from those that were there on the front line?
DAVID NORIEGA: Look, I think this ranges from everything from a sort of spontaneous, angry reaction to these large scale immigration enforcement operations in L.A. in a not necessarily fully or clearly articulated way to much clearer demands being made by some of the more organized elements in these protests.
[ON SCREEN HEADLINE: Newsom Urges Calm: “Don’t Give Trump What He Wants”]
Look, the core message here that you see in signs, that you hear people chant, that you hear all the time is “ICE out of L.A.” There are – this is a profoundly immigrant community. The number in the percentage of undocumented people and their loved ones in the city is enormous. And this is something that, honestly, has been in the works for a long time. People in the city have been organizing for and preparing for a large-scale immigration enforcement action by the Trump administration. There are rapid response networks that have been organizing from the ground up in this city for months, preparing for this moment. So when it happened, when it came, it's no surprise that there was a strong and organized response to it, just in terms of people filling the streets.
[ON SCREEN HEADLINE: Trump Deploys National Guard in L.A. Against Wishes of State’s Leaders]
In terms of concrete demands, you know, the Metropolitan Detention Center that I'm standing in front of, this federal facility where ICE detainees are housed before they're transferred to bigger facilities, I'm told that both members of Congress, sitting members of Congress, who have the legal authority to enter this building for oversight purposes, as well as lawyers, pro bono legal service providers who have – who are trying to give the detainees, allow the detainees to avail themselves of the right to counsel that they have, according to U.S. law, have been denied access to that building.
[ON SCREEN HEADLINE: L.A. Mayor: Peaceful Protest Will Always Be Protected]
So we have members of Congress, civil society in Los Angeles demanding access to the building that they say they are lawfully allowed access to.
[ON SCREEN HEADLINE: All Democratic Governors Sign Letter Accusing Trump of “Alarming Abuse of Power”]
So far, we have not actually seen them be able to get access. Instead, really, what you have is a showdown between protesters. It feels very tense, you know, like I said, I'm in between these two lines, police lines pushing protesters that way and that way. It feels at this moment like a powder keg. You have the police really deploying fairly aggressive crowd control tactics. And the crowd, the protesters themselves are also quite fired up, quite agitated.
I've seen, you know, a handful of people throwing water bottles and things like that at the police lines. That's pretty much the extent of the, I don't know, what you might describe as something other than peaceful action that I've seen, but you're definitely seeing people angry at not just the federal government, not just at Trump, not just at the National Guard, but also at the LAPD and at the local law enforcement as well.
[ON SCREEN HEADLINE: Trump Deploys Natl. Guard to L.A. On Third Day of Immigration Protests]
CATHERINE RAMPELL David, so last night, the LAPD released a statement referring to these as peaceful protests. Donald Trump has since referred to them as riots. Could you give us your view from on the ground about what it's actually like there? How – is there a lot of chaos? Is riot really a word we would use to describe the conditions on the ground where you are?
NORIEGA: No, I wouldn't describe this as a riot.
[ON SCREEN HEADLINE: Newsom Urges Calm: “Don’t Give Trump What He Wants”]
And I've covered protests, many protests, large protests over the years, and not just the United States, in other countries. I've been to protests that I would describe as riots. This is not a protest that I would describe as a riot.
[ON SCREEN HEADLINE: L.A. Mayor: Peaceful Protest Will Always Be Protected]
It's also not a sort of peaceful, slowly walking down the street with a permit, you know, chanting organized slogans, kind of march. It's more confrontational than that. It's more disorganized than that. It is not seeking approval, you know, from the authorities of the city, either formally or in spirit. I would describe it as a very confrontational, very high tension, but nevertheless peaceful protest.
MOHYELDIN: All right, David Noriega, live for us there in Los Angeles. David, thank you so much. We’re going to check in with you over the course of the evening. Please stay safe, take any measures that you need to protect yourself and the crew.
(...)
