But a threatened flag-burning later Wednesday had potential to fuel the tensions outside the Republican National Convention.
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Officers, some wearing riot helmets, yelled at the crowd to move back as the flag-burning group locked arms.
Hundreds of demonstrators who had gathered in Cleveland’s Public Square have scattered ahead of Donald Trump’s prime-time acceptance speech on the last night of the Republican convention.
“I’m extremely disappointed with turnout”, said Lee Garnett, a 39-year-old tech worker who came from San Francisco to protest Trump’s nomination.
One enduring success from the law enforcement experience here may be the city’s bicycle unit, which in collaboration with departments from Akron, Ohio, and elsewhere played a key role in maintaining order and responding to potentially volatile situations. Most crowds numbered in the hundreds, not the thousands.
The organizer, one of the city’s most prominent, says “people contacted me saying, ‘boy I would like to attend but I’ve been hearing about all this violence and people bringing guns… and the huge number of police.’ People just did not feeling comfortable coming”.
Trump’s campaign manager, Paul Manafort, said disruptions by protesters could work to the candidate’s political advantage.
Authorities say most are free on personal recognizance bonds with some accused of flag burning still not charged while prosecutors review charges.
In 2012, Cleveland police killed two unarmed black people in a 137-bullet barrage after a vehicle chase that began when officers mistook engine backfire for gunshots.
More than 2,000 officers from more than a dozen states are working in Cleveland this week, alongside local officers.
Cleveland police said the cause of the skin irritation was unknown.
Syringes were added to a list of items banned in the protest zone around the convention over concerns that officers could be targeted.
Otherwise, the opening day of the convention was relatively peaceful.
The day’s demonstrations started when a few dozen people holding banners printed with a red-brick design formed a human wall to mock Donald Trump’s plan to seal off the Mexican border.
Police arrested 18 people Wednesday after a skirmish broke out following a protest by the Revolutionary Communist Party in which a flag was burned. There were police on foot, on bikes, riding motorcycles at high speed while escorting buses filled with more police, inside vehicles, on rooftops, even on horseback.
Anti-government and anti-racism protesters are set to burn an American flag Wednesday at an undisclosed location. But police have been practicing friendly community policing, where they interact with the public, and the people have been supportive.
This story has been corrected to show protests were Wednesday, not Thursday, and to show police say that a fire extinguisher was used, not pepper spray. Sunsara Taylor told reporters those who were arrested were being illegally detained to prevent them from continuing to protest.
His arraignment was held up Thursday because of what was described as a paperwork delay.
ABC 17 News is also seeing report that another protest is impacting traffic in downtown Cleveland.
The four-day convention has been a challenge for police, who have arrested 22 people. Seventeen of the arrests came Wednesday, during a melee that erupted during a flag-burning outside an entrance to the convention arena.
A woman was arrested for an outstanding warrant, and a man was charged with petty theft for allegedly trying to steal a police officer’s gas mask Sunday night, officials said.
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Cleveland Police Chief Calvin Williams was one of several officers in the middle of the crowd trying to keep people controlled.
