WATCH: Independent journalists blast mainstream media for ignoring violent summer riots

The summer of 2020 brought with is the rise of independent journalists. The dearth of mainstream reporting on perpetual protests, the hundreds of riots, and the destruction they left behind was marked. Mainstream media barely covered the events, and when they did, they tried to spin it as, in one case, "fiery but mostly peaceful."

Mainstream media left a void that was filled by young journalists like Julio Rosas of Townhall and Shelby Talcott of the Daily Caller, both of whom shared their insight into civil unrest, Antifa, and their journalistic practice with CPAC audiences.

In the wake of George Floyd's death in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25, protests sprang up in thousands of cities across the country, with actions in hundreds of locations turning violent. In Portland, Ore., riots lasted for over 100 nights. In Seattle, Antifa militants and BLM activists set up an autonomous zone, cordoning off six blocks in downtown Seattle. This action was repeated in other cities, from New York to Washington, DC, to Portland.

One of the first things the militants did at the beginning of the summer was to create security forces that were localized to their "zones," that kept law enforcement out, and created their own rules. The local governments in these Pacific Northwest cities supported the encampments.

The mainstream media did as well, broadcasting either during the day when nothing was going on, or covering the story from afar, using only official accounts from politicians, which gave an inaccurate view of what was really happening on the ground.

To get the real story, journalists needed to be on site even after the sun went down, to cover the events as they unfolded in real time, not as the activists tried to spin it. Talcott and Rosas tracked the riots across the country, often going to the heart of the action to get the story despite personal risk. Talcott was arrested and held for 16 hours in Louisville, Kent.

The Post Millennial covered the Seattle occupation extensively, and was on the ground in June, exposing the conditions inside the zone. Businesses inside the zone were miserable, but afraid to speak out.

Talcott and Rosas covered these riots in depth across the country, delivering instantaneous footage to Twitter and social media feeds. CNN and MSBC told us that civil actions in the name of BLM and Antifa were "mostly peaceful" protests against pervasive police brutality, but indie journalists showed that this was only one, very skewed side of the story.