With political violence on the rise, Cleveland City Council leaders are urging members to take extra precautions after shots were fired near a councilman last week.
Councilmember Kevin Conwell is uninjured after the Friday morning shooting in University Circle, which police are currently investigating. It's unclear what the shooter's motive was or if the councilman was the target. Police say Conwell was in the "vicinity" of the shots.
"We know that there's been a lot of political violence and there's an extreme polarization in our community, so we've just been instructing all the council members to just be on high alert right now," Council President Blaine Griffin said.
At a Monday meeting, Griffin told members to be diligent as they walk the city's neighborhoods for council duties or in their reelection efforts. He recommended traveling with another person for safety, as Conwell did at the time of the shooting.
Griffin said he has also spoken with the city’s safety director to have a "heightened watch" over council members and their homes.
Reports of violent crime is on a decline in Cleveland. Homicides are down 30% in the first half of 2025 as compared to last year.
That's why council members at Monday's meeting also rebuked outside suggestions to bring in the National Guard, as pressure mounts from President Donald Trump and some Republican lawmakers.
Safety Committee Chair Mike Polensek said he spoke "at length" last week to Congressman Max Miller, a Bay Village Republican who penned an opinion piece earlier this month calling for the National Guard to come to the city. Trump has already mobilized troops in Washington, D.C. and other U.S. cities he says are in need of federal intervention due to crime.
Polensek said he expressed city leadership's "universal opposition" to the National Guard coming into Cleveland, but requested other aid, such as the Ohio Highway Patrol helping with intensified traffic enforcement and additional neighborhood patrols from the Cuyahoga County Sheriff's Department.
"I don't think that [bringing in the National Guard] handles some of the root causes of the problem," Griffin told Ideastream. "I think that is more of a show of force than it is trying to really address it...We don't have to try to bring in tanks and everything to try use blunt force. We have to use intelligence-led policing, which means that we're going to have to have resources for all of the law enforcement people on the ground."
Griffin said he plans to meet with Miller to express those concerns.
"This is not a war zone," Griffin said. "I know that Cleveland has its challenges, and nobody will say that we're the safest place in the world, but what I will tell you is that it is not the most dangerous place that people are trying to make it out to be."
Mayor Justin Bibb has also spoken in opposition of the National Guard coming to Cleveland.
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine recently said Bibb requested help from state troopers, similar to a multi agency push in 2023.
