The Left is learning from campus activism. The hook administrations have been using for a couple of years now to shut down the right to assembly and speech on campus is “public safety.” That is the most common argument I have seen so far for statues and monuments. Now they add “national security.” This turns the legitimate role of government on its head.
Rights don’t come from government; government exists to secure them. Rather than ensure the rights to assembly and speech with adequate law enforcement, the governments (mostly state and local so far) are withholding law enforcement and claiming the only way to keep people safe is to deny rights.