Why didn't Gainesville become Charlottesville when Richard Spencer came to visit?

GAINESVILLE – On the day after white supremacist Richard B. Spencer delivered a speech that brought 2,500 people – mostly protesters – to the University of Florida, President Kent Fuchs said what happened in Charlottesville, Virginia was a wakeup call.

“If Charlottesville had not occurred I don’t think we would have taken it as seriously,” Fuchs said on Friday. Seeing those images, the assault weapons and that death, just woke me up.

“That was my wakeup call."

Gainesville also benefited from timing. A Confederate memorial statue that stood for years in its downtown was no longer there. The statue, known as “Old Joe,” was moved in August, two days after white supremacist and anti-fascist groups engaged in a series of clashes in Charlottesville that turned deadly.  

“They didn’t have anything to rally around like they did in Charlottesville,” Fuchs said. “But they also revealed their tactics, like tiki torches, that we were able to ban.”

Fuchs and 1,000 law enforcement professionals from around the country braced for the worst as Spencer planned to speak Thursday at the Phillips Center for the Performing Arts. By sunset, only two people had been arrested amid the protests near the venue. Several skirmishes were promptly quelled.

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A shooting occurred about a mile south of campus as protesters left the event, and three of Spencer’s supporters were arrested in connection with the incident later that night. No one was injured, and the men from Texas are facing attempted homicide charges.

“That’s a huge component of luck, that no one was hit by that bullet,” Fuchs said. “Or if it happened on campus or god forbid if someone was hurt, we would be having a very different conversation.”

A Gainesville police officer actually heard the gunshot and arrived at the scene in seconds. Alachua County Sheriff Sadie Darnell said the abundance of officers at the event sent a message to anyone with plans to cause trouble.

“We also had the luxury that I don’t think Charlottesville did of at least six weeks of planning,” Darnell said. “The planning and capability of marshaling all of those resources helped.”

Darnell called on the Florida Sheriff’s Association and Gov. Rick Scott to summon resources from across the state. Specialized teams were clustered around the center on rooftops, placed undercover within the crowds and monitored video cameras.

The officers who responded were told to have a standard for arrests. If someone threw a punch, they went to jail, she said.

“If someone threw a wad of paper at you, we’d tell them to knock it off,” she said. “But throwing a punch at somebody reaches the level of an arrest.

“Those were the rules of engagement, which were clear and worked out beautifully,” she said.

Fuchs said the community's response to the event was excellent. But now he has to find a way to cover its $600,000 cost. There’s no money in his budget or any research institution to cover such an expense.

“That’s 1,000 student tuitions right there,” Fuchs said. “It’s not sustainable.”

Fuchs said he hoped the university's efforts to guard against potential violence would spur discussions to find a more sustainable solution to contend with such divisive events.

The resources expended, he said, helped subsidize hate speech.

“I’m not looking for money," Fuchs said, "I want a solution for this nation.”