Tag Archives: Washington

Fortress Washington girds for days of anti-Trump protests

The U.S. Capitol is seen during a rehearsal for the inauguration ceremony of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump in Washington, U.S.,

By Ian Simpson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Washington will turn into a virtual fortress ahead of Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration on Friday as the U.S. capital braces for more than a quarter-million protesters expected during the Republican’s swearing-in.

Police have forecast that some 900,000 people, both supporters and opponents, will flood Washington for the inauguration ceremony, which includes the swearing-in on the steps of the U.S. Capitol and a parade to the White House along streets thronged with spectators.

Many of those attending will be protesters irate about the New York real estate developer’s demeaning comments about women, immigrants and Muslims, a vow to repeal the sweeping healthcare reform law known as Obamacare and plans to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

His supporters admire Trump’s experience in business, including as a real estate developer and reality television star, and view him as an outsider and problem-solver.

Outgoing U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said police aim to separate groups to diffuse tensions, similar to last-year’s political conventions.

“The concern is some of these groups are pro-Trump, some of them are con-Trump, and they may not play well together in the same space,” Johnson said on MSNBC on Thursday.

About 28,000 security personnel, miles (kilometers) of fencing, roadblocks, street barricades and dump trucks laden with sand will be part of the security cordon around 3 square miles (almost 8 square km) of central Washington.

About 30 groups that organizers claim will draw about 270,000 protesters or Trump backers have received permits for rallies or marches before, during and after the swearing-in. More protests are expected without permits.

A protest group known as Disrupt J20 has vowed to stage demonstrations at each of 12 security checkpoints and block access to the festivities on the grassy National Mall.

PROTESTS AROUND THE WORLD

By far the biggest protest will be the Women’s March on Washington on Saturday, which organizers expect to draw 250,000 people. Hundreds of Women’s March-related protests are scheduled across the United States and around the world as well.

There will be an anti-Trump protest in New York on Thursday evening when Mayor Bill de Blasio, filmmaker Michael Moore and actors Mark Ruffalo and Alec Baldwin, who portrays Trump on “Saturday Night Live,” take part in a rally outside the Trump International Hotel and Tower.

One Washington protest will come amid a haze of pot smoke as pro-marijuana activists show their opposition to Trump’s choice for attorney general, Alabama Republican Senator Jeff Sessions, a critic of pot legalization.

The group plans to distribute 4,200 joints at the inauguration and urge attendees to light up. Possession of small amounts of marijuana is legal in Washington but public consumption is not.

Interim Police Chief Peter Newsham said officers were prepared for mass arrests, although authorities hoped that would be unnecessary.

“If we do have a mass arrest, we’ll be able to get people processed very quickly,” he told Washington’s NBC 4 television station.

Police and security officials have pledged to guarantee protesters’ constitutional rights to free speech and peaceable assembly.

Friday’s crowds are expected to be less than the 2 million who attended Obama’s first inauguration in 2009, and in line with the million who were at his second, four years ago.

The inaugural parade down Pennsylvania Avenue will pass the Trump International Hotel, a rallying point for protesters since the election now encircled by security fences.

In a sign of the Trump-related angst gripping Washington, the dean of the Washington National Cathedral said this week its choir would sing “God Bless America” at the inauguration despite misgivings by some members.

“Let me be clear: We are not singing for the President. We are singing for God because that is what church choirs do,” the Reverend Randolph Marshall Hollerith said in a letter.

Trump will attend an interfaith prayer service at the cathedral on Saturday, closing out the inaugural ceremonies.

(Additional reporting by Susan Heavey; Editing by Scott Malone and Bill Trott)

Protesters take to streets for a second day to decry Trump election

Protesters of Trump as President

By Gina Cherelus and Ian Simpson

NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Police put up security fences around U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s new Washington hotel on Thursday and a line of concrete blocks shielded New York’s Trump Tower as students around the country staged a second day of protests over his election.

A day after thousands of people took to the streets in at least 10 U.S. cities from Boston to Berkeley, California, chanting “not my president” and “no Trump,” fresh protests were held in Texas to San Francisco.

A Trump campaign representative did not respond to requests for comment on the protests but Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor and a high-profile Trump supporter, called the demonstrators “a bunch of spoiled cry-babies.”

“If you’re looking at the real left-wing loonies on the campus, it’s the professors not the students,” Giuliani said on Fox News on Thursday. “Calm down, things are not as bad as you think.”

The protesters blasted Trump for campaign rhetoric critical of immigrants, Muslims and allegations of sexual abuse of women. More than 20 people were arrested for blocking or attempting to block highways in Los Angeles and Richmond, Virginia, early Thursday morning.

White House spokesman Joshua Earnest said Obama supported the demonstrators’ right to express themselves peacefully.

“We’ve got a carefully, constitutionally protected right to free speech,” Earnest told reporters. “The president believes that that is a right that should be protected. It is a right that should be exercised without violence.”

In San Francisco, more than 1,000 students walked out of classes on Thursday morning and marched through the city’s financial district carrying rainbow flags representing the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities, Mexican flags and signs decrying the president-elect.

Several hundred students at Texas State University in San Marcos took to the campus to protest Trump’s election, with many students saying they fear he will infringe the civil rights of minorities and the LGBT community.

“NOT MY PRESIDENT”

In New York’s Washington Square park, several hundred people gathered to protest Trump’s election. Three miles (5 km) to the north at the gilt Trump Tower, where Trump lives, 29-year-old Alex Conway stood holding a sign that read “not my president.”

“This sign is not to say he isn’t the president of the United States, but for two days I can use my emotion to be against this outcome and to express that he’s not mine,” said Conway, who works in the film industry. “The only thing I can hope for is that in four years I’m proved wrong.”

In Washington, a jogger shouted an expletive about Trump as he passed the Trump International Hotel on Thursday, just blocks from the White House, where the former reality TV star had his first meeting with President Barack Obama to discuss transition plans.

More anti-Trump demonstrations are planned heading into the weekend, according to organizers’ online posts. One urged protesters to rally in Washington, D.C., on Inauguration Day, Jan. 20.

Supporters of Trump, who surprised many in the political and media establishment with Tuesday’s win, urged calm and recommended that Americans wait to see how he performed as president.

The United States has seen waves of large-scale, sometimes violent protests in the past few years. Cities from Ferguson, Missouri, to Berkeley have been rocked by demonstrations following high-profile police killings of unarmed black men and teens. Those followed a wave of large-scale protest encampments, starting with the Occupy Wall Street movement in New York in 2011.

Trump said in his victory speech, which was delivered in a far calmer manner than he displayed in many campaign appearances, that he would be president for all Americans. Some of his most controversial campaign proposals, including the call to ban Muslims from entering the United States, had been removed from his campaign website by Thursday.

A spate of isolated attacks on women and members of minority groups by people wearing Trump hats or saying his name were reported by police and U.S. media.

A hijab-wearing female student at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette was assaulted on Wednesday morning by a man wearing a white “Trump” hat, who knocked her to the ground and took her head scarf and wallet, university police said in a statement.

Reports also showed other cases in which Trump opponents lashed out violently against people carrying signs indicating they supported him.

(Reporting by Gina Cherelus in New York, Ian Simpson in Washington, Jon Herskovitz in Austin, Texas, and Curtis Skinner in San Francisco; Writing by Scott Malone; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Bill Trott)

Europe gets Trump ‘wake-up call’, but can it step up?

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump greets his running mate Mike Pence during his election night rally in Manhattan, New York

By Alastair Macdonald and Gabriela Baczynska

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – For Europe, already reeling from Britain’s decision to leave its 28-member club, Donald Trump’s election introduces a host of new uncertainties it is ill-equipped to tackle.

Preoccupied by a growing anti-establishment mood across the continent, the European Union’s leaders gave little thought to the idea a man dubbed “the pioneer of a new authoritarian and chauvinist international movement” by Germany’s deputy chancellor could take power in the United States.

The day before, one of the EU’s leaders had confided a contingency plan of “crossing ourselves and praying”. The day after, as they pledged to work with Trump, a senior EU diplomat summed up their dilemma.

“Since we have refused to really think through this scenario, we have a list of questions that need to be answered, but almost everything is a big unknown,” the envoy told Reuters.

For some, Europe must now step up and take more responsibility, both for its own security and the wider world, if the entrepreneur makes good on campaign talk of limiting U.S. defense commitments and other engagements abroad.

Trade relations, climate change, Russia and tackling Islamic State are all areas where Europe may have to forge its own path if a Trump-led Washington pulls back from the global stage.

“This is another wake-up call,” said Manfred Weber, a German ally of Chancellor Angela Merkel who leads conservatives in the European Parliament. “It is now up to Europe. We must be more self-confident and assume more responsibility.

“We do not know what to expect from the USA.”

Belgian Foreign Minister Didier Reynders told Reuters a Trump White House “may help some people in Europe understand that we need to reinforce defense cooperation among Europeans”.

But EU leaders know that euroskeptic radicals, inspired by Trump and Britain’s vote to leave the bloc in June, could exploit any attempt to tighten cooperation to condemn them to the same ignominious electoral fate as Hillary Clinton.

East Europeans fret President Vladimir Putin may use Trump’s vow to improve ties with sanctions-hit Moscow to extend Russian influence, as in Ukraine. The Norwegian head of NATO felt obliged to spell out that Trump could not renege on security guarantees.

“PUTTING ON A BRAVE FACE”

“Europe cannot blink after Brexit, after the election of Donald Trump,” French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said of the political earthquake in Washington, which, 27 years to the day since the fall of the Berlin Wall, continues to provide the lion’s share of military muscle to defending the continent.

“Europe must stand together more, be more active and go more on the offensive,” Ayrault said. “Even just to protect itself.”

Privately, senior officials question its ability to do that.

“Europe will need to do more to take care of its own – but are we capable?” a senior European diplomat asked. The EU has been riven with tensions over economic policy, the Syrian refugee crisis and Britain’s exit, and remains very divided.

Another senior EU diplomat told Reuters: “This changes the business model of the EU. But we have no idea how.”

He dismissed suggestions a U.S. withdrawal from some engagements could offer benefits by obliging Europeans to invest more in their cooperation and spend more on their own defense: “That’s not a silver lining. That’s putting on a brave face.”

EU foreign ministers called a special meeting over dinner on Sunday to discuss what Trump’s America will mean for Europe.

Giles Merritt of pro-EU Brussels think-tank Friends of Europe said leaders had no time to lose to “head off trouble” and could revive their own Union by helping defend global stability. They “must … fashion a common European response … before President Trump sets foot in the Oval Office”, he said.

CHANGE THE WHOLE SYSTEM?

It was a result few in Europe had wanted, barring Hungary’s authoritarian prime minister Viktor Orban. European leaders — and Obama Administration envoys — were reduced to highlighting the lowest common denominators of shared history and ideals in giving assurances of continued cooperation.

After a U.S. campaign marked by accusations of racism and sexism, Merkel, preparing for her own election battle next year, said she would work with Trump on the basis of shared values that included “respecting … people’s dignity regardless of their origin, the color of their skin, religion (or) gender”.

Donald Tusk, the former Polish premier who chairs EU summits, responded to what he called “new challenges” and “uncertainty over the future of our Transatlantic relations” by stressing centuries of blood ties across the ocean.

French President Francois Hollande stressed a need for even stronger Transatlantic cooperation to tackle climate change, Islamist security threats and the global economy.

Washington’s ambassador to NATO could offer no detail on the incoming administration’s policy but reassured European peers in Brussels that NATO had always been a “bipartisan venture”.

Anthony Gardner, outgoing President Barack Obama’s envoy to the EU, said change was possible in areas including sanctions on Russia, support for Ukraine, nuclear proliferation, trade, NATO and the Middle East, but added: “Let’s wait to see who appoints as his key advisers.”

He did not see Washington abandoning a key partner for the past 50 years, but his reassurance did not quell a sense of near panic among some senior officials in Brussels.

One said grimly: “This is bad. Brexit was a stupid and damaging mistake but the people running it are not complete lunatics. Now we have a populist in power who can change the whole system as we know it.”

(Editing by Philippa Fletcher)

Gun control measures expected to win in four states

Mark Heitz, of Tactical Firearms in Kingston, New Hampshire, looks over a civilian version of the Colt M4 carbine during the annual SHOT (Shooting, Hunting, Outdoor Trade) Show in Las Vegas

By Joseph Ax

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Gun control-related ballot measures in four states are expected to pass on Tuesday, opinion polls show, after gun safety advocates poured a massive amount of money into backing the initiatives.

In Maine and Nevada, residents will vote on whether to mandate universal background checks for firearm sales, including private handgun transactions.

If those two measures pass, half of all Americans would live in states that have such expanded checks. Eighteen states and Washington, D.C., have already approved similar laws.

Voters in Washington state, meanwhile, will consider allowing judges to bar people from possessing guns if they pose a danger to themselves or to others, such as accused domestic abusers. In California, a referendum would ban large-capacity ammunition magazines and require certain people to pass a background check to buy ammunition.

The U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment protects the right to bear arms, and gun rights advocates fiercely contest any attempt to restrict that freedom.

The votes in Republican-leaning Maine and Nevada represent a key test of the gun control movement’s decision to turn to a state-by-state strategy after efforts to pass nationwide legislation failed in Congress.

Opponents in Maine and Nevada say the laws are confusingly written and would burden legal gun owners while doing nothing to stop criminals.

“We know today that the place where criminals are getting guns, the black market, they aren’t subjecting themselves to background checks,” said Ryan Hamilton, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association-backed opposition in Nevada. “It doesn’t target criminal behavior, it targets law-abiding behavior.”

But proponents say background checks are widely backed by the public and would save lives.

Jennifer Crowe, a spokeswoman for the pro-initiative campaign in Nevada, said research had shown nearly one in 11 people who purchased guns online would have been barred from doing so by a background check.

“We have this huge online marketplace that we know criminals are using to get guns,” she said.

Everytown for Gun Safety, the gun control group founded by billionaire former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, has spent tens of millions of dollars in Washington state, Nevada and Maine, while the National Rifle Association has focused much of its spending on supporting Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

In Nevada, the most expensive contest, the background check campaign collected more than $14 million, much of it from Bloomberg. The NRA devoted $4.8 million to fighting the measure.

(Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Scott Malone and Jonathan Oatis)

Duterte tells U.S. to forget about defense deal ‘If I stay longer’

President Rodrigo Duterte speaks before his departure for Japan, at the Ninoy Aquino International airport in Paranaque, Metro Manila in the Philippines,

MANILA (Reuters) – Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte hit out at the United States on Tuesday, saying he did not start a fight with Washington and it could forget about a military agreement between both countries if he were to be in power longer.

Duterte said he was against the presence of any foreign troops in his country and the United States could “forget” an Enhanced Defence Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) with the Philippines, if he stayed longer, without elaborating.

The United States, he said, should not treat the Philippines “like a dog with a leash”, adding to confusion about the future the longtime allies’ ties.

“I look forward to the time when I no longer see any military troops or soldier in my country except the Filipino soldiers,” Duterte said prior to his departure to Japan.

(Reporting by Neil Jerome Morales and Martin Petty; Editing by Michael Perry)

Washington state ‘grossly’ unprepared for major quake: report

Skyline of Seattle Washington

(Reuters) – Washington state is grossly unprepared for a large earthquake and tsunami that may strike in the coming decades, putting it at risk for a humanitarian disaster, the Seattle Times reported on Sunday, citing a draft government report.

Anticipating a poor response to such a disaster, the state’s emergency managers will begin asking residents to stock enough food and other supplies to survive on their own for two weeks, the newspaper said.

The Pacific Northwest region was once thought to be a low risk for a massive earthquake, compared with its coastal neighbor California.

Researchers, however, have come to believe that an 8.0 to 9.0 magnitude temblor has shaken Oregon and Washington every 230 years or so. The last struck about 315 years ago, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, so one is overdue.

To prepare for that possibility, Washington officials organized a four-day exercise called “Cascadia Rising” in June, and the results were laid out in a draft report, the Seattle Times reported.

“The state’s current mindset and approach to disaster response is not suitable to a catastrophic scale incident,” the assessment says, according to a copy the newspaper published online.

The draft report recommends expanding the emergency authority of Washington’s governor and putting in place plans for mass sheltering and feeding, among other steps.

The state Emergency Management Division wants to spend $750,000 a year urging people to have emergency kits that would last up to two weeks, the Seattle Times said.

On the Olympic Peninsula, which is vulnerable to being cut off if roads and bridges are damaged, people may be on their own for twice that long, an official told the newspaper.

“What you have on hand when this occurs is how you’re going to survive,” said Clallam County emergency coordinator Penny Linterman.

(Reporting by David Ingram; Editing by Sandra Maler)

Russia’s Putin suspends plutonium cleanup accord with U.S. because of ‘unfriendly’ acts

Putin at award ceremony

By Dmitry Solovyov

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday suspended an agreement with the United States for disposal of weapons-grade plutonium because of “unfriendly” acts by Washington, the Kremlin said.

A Kremlin spokesman said Putin had signed a decree suspending the 2010 agreement under which each side committed to destroy tonnes of weapons-grade material because Washington had not been implementing it and because of current tensions in relations.

The two former Cold War adversaries are at loggerheads over a raft of issues including Ukraine, where Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 and supports pro-Moscow separatists, and the conflict in Syria.

The deal, signed in 2000 but which did not come into force until 2010, was being suspended due to “the emergence of a threat to strategic stability and as a result of unfriendly actions by the United States of America towards the Russian Federation”, the preamble to the decree said.

It also said that Washington had failed “to ensure the implementation of its obligations to utilize surplus weapons-grade plutonium”.

The 2010 agreement, signed by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and then-U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, called on each side to dispose of 34 tonnes of plutonium by burning in nuclear reactors.

Clinton said at the time that that was enough material to make almost 17,000 nuclear weapons. Both sides then viewed the deal as a sign of increased cooperation between the two former adversaries toward a joint goal of nuclear non-proliferation.

“For quite a long time, Russia had been implementing it (the agreement) unilaterally,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a conference call with journalists on Monday.

“Now, taking into account this tension (in relations) in general … the Russian side considers it impossible for the current state of things to last any longer.”

Ties between Moscow and Washington plunged to freezing point over Crimea and Russian support for separatists in eastern Ukraine after protests in Kiev toppled pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovich.

Washington led a campaign to impose Western economic sanctions on Russia for its role in the Ukraine crisis.

Relations soured further last year when Russia deployed its warplanes to an air base in Syria to provide support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s troops fighting rebels.

The rift has widened in recent weeks, with Moscow accusing Washington of not delivering on its promise to separate units of moderate Syrian opposition from “terrorists”.

Huge cost overruns have also long been another threat to the project originally estimated at a total of $5.7 billion.

(Reporting by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Richard Balmforth)

Motive sought in fatal shooting at Washington state mall after arrest

Authorities at the Cascade Mall

(Reuters) – Investigators were working to determine what led a gunman to open fire and kill five people in a department store at a Washington state mall, police said on Sunday after arresting a 20-year-old suspect in the deadly rampage.

Police took Turkish-born Arcan Cetin into custody on Saturday evening in Oak Harbor, about 30 miles (48 km) southwest of Burlington where the shooting occurred on Friday night.

Cetin’s demeanor when apprehended was “zombie like,” police said at a news conference. He was unarmed and did not run from officers, they said.

A motive for the rampage remains unclear and Cetin, who is due to appear in court on Monday, has not been charged.

The FBI said while they had no indication the attack was a “terrorism act,” it could not rule out that possibility.

Cetin, who police said is a legal, permanent resident of the United States, is accused of opening fire in the cosmetics section of a Macy’s department store at Cascade Mall, killing four women and a man.

Surveillance video showed the suspect entering the mall without a rifle but he was later spotted on video in the store brandishing a weapon, police said. The rifle was recovered at the mall.

The attack followed a series of violent outbursts at shopping centers across the United States, including the stabbing of nine people at a Minnesota center last weekend.

It comes at a time of heightened tensions in the United States after a succession of seemingly random attacks in public places, ranging from a gay night club in Orlando, Florida, to a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado.

Investigators planned to search Cetin’s Oak Harbor residence, vehicle and interview witnesses on Sunday to collect evidence and “build as good as a case as you can,” said Sergeant Mark Francis, a spokesman for the Washington State Police.

Police have reports that Cetin’s ex-girlfriend worked at the Macy’s, Francis said. The possible connection was under investigation.

Cetin has a criminal record that includes three domestic violence charges in which his stepfather was the victim, the Seattle Times reported, citing court records.

He also was arrested for drunken driving and barred by a judge in December from possessing a firearm, the newspaper reported without providing details. Reuters was unable to confirm the reports.

Police did not identify the victims but local media said they ranged in age from mid-teens to mid-90s, and included a mother and her daughter. The Skagit County Coroner’s Office said it planned to release information about shooting victims on Monday.

(Reporting by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco and Laila Kearney in New York; Editing by Louise Heavens and Bill Trott)

Police search for gunman who killed five at Washington state mall

(Note: paragraph six contains language that may be offensive to readers)

By Matt Mills McKnight

BURLINGTON, Wash. (Reuters) – A manhunt was underway on Saturday in northwest Washington state for a gunman who opened fire with a rifle in a shopping mall and killed five people before disappearing under the cover of darkness, authorities said.

The suspect entered the Cascade Mall in Burlington, around 65 miles (105 km) north of Seattle, and began shooting at about 7 p.m. local time on Friday in the cosmetics section of a Macy’s department store, police said.

The unidentified suspect, who police described on Twitter as an Hispanic male, initially walked into the shopping center without the rifle but surveillance video later caught him brandishing the weapon, said Lt. Chris Cammock of the Mount Vernon Police Department at briefing on Saturday.

The rifle was later recovered at the mall, said Cammock, who is commander of the Skagit County Multi-Agency Response Team.

Four women were killed in the rampage, which police believe was carried out by a lone gunman. Later a man who was seriously wounded in the shooting died at a local hospital. None of the victims were identified.

Steve Sexton, the mayor of Burlington, described the shooting as a “senseless act.”

“It was the world knocking on our doorstep and it came to our little community here,” he said before acknowledging the response by law enforcement. “I know now our support goes with them to bring this son of a bitch to justice.”

Authorities offered no information about a possible motive for the attack, which followed a series of violent outbursts at shopping centers across the United States, including the stabbing of nine people at a Minnesota center last weekend.

“We have no indication that we have a terrorism act,” said Michael Knutson, assistant special agent in charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Seattle office. “I can’t discount that, but I can’t conclude it either.”

After the shooting, police and rescue workers worked their way through the mall, clearing stores and evacuating shoppers, some of whom locked themselves in dressing rooms. The mall remained closed on Saturday as investigators sifted for evidence and attempted to recreate the crime scene.

Cammock said police had no clues about the identity or whereabouts of the suspect, and asked the public for help in tracking him down.

Authorities released a grainy photo of the suspect taken by a surveillance camera. It shows a young male in his late teens or mid-20s with short dark hair, dressed in dark shorts and T-shirt and carrying a rifle.

Local authorities searched through the night for the gunman and warned residents to remain indoors, though later said the area was safe.

The suspect was last seen walking toward an interstate highway that runs past the mall, which is 45 miles south of the Canadian province of British Columbia.

When asked why police had described the suspect as Hispanic, Cammock told reporters he believed those who saw the photo made the statement based on his dark complexion.

The shooting comes less than a week after a man stabbed nine people at a mall in the central Minnesota city of St. Cloud before being shot dead by an off-duty police officer. The FBI is investigating that attack as a potential act of terrorism.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee and Jonathan Allen in New York; Writing by Frank McGurty; Editing by Meredith Mazzilli)

Dozens of wildfires rage across arid U.S. West

Flames whipped by strong winds burn though a hillside before destroying camper vans during the Blue Cut Fire in San Bernardino County, California

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Dozens of wildfires raged in the arid U.S. West on Tuesday, blackening hundreds of square miles of land and forcing residents from homes in California and Washington state.

At least six people have died in Western wildfires this summer.

Seven new large fires have flared up since Monday, bringing the total number of blazes burning in the region to 32, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. Combined, the wildfires have charred more than 500,000 acres (200,000 hectares), the agency said.

In California’s San Luis Obispo County, firefighters have been able to carve containment lines around about a third of the 37,100-acre (15,000-hectare) Chimney Fire by Tuesday morning.

That blaze, which started in the county’s rugged coastal hills on Aug. 13, has destroyed 36 homes and continued to threaten nearly 1,900 more, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire).

Evacuation orders were in effect for about 6,000 residents on Tuesday, according to Cal Fire spokesman Aladdin Morgan, up from just 2,500 on Monday.

The historic Hearst Castle, a major tourist attraction on California’s central coast, will be closed to the public through the week as a safety precaution due to the blaze.

The monumental estate, built in the early 20th century for publishing tycoon William Randolph Hearst, was no longer in immediate danger, but the Chimney Fire had crept within three miles (5 km) of the castle over the weekend before shifting direction, authorities said.

To the north, firefighters were battling a cluster of blazes that have blackened about 8,000 acres of dry brush, grass and timber in the Spokane, Washington, area.

Washington state Governor Jay Inslee declared a state of emergency for 20 Washington state counties on Tuesday as he toured the Spokane area, his office said.

Authorities said on Monday that, due to limited resources, they had to enlist the help of local farmers to help battle flames that had destroyed more than a dozen buildings in the area.

Those blazes all erupted on Sunday, stoked by extremely hot, dry weather and gusty winds. Lower temperatures, rising humidity and diminished winds were expected to help crews gain some ground on Monday, as firefighting reinforcements arrived.

As of Tuesday, the so-called Hart Fire had been 10 percent contained while officials were hopeful that a pair of fires, dubbed the Spokane Complex, could be contained within their existing footprints.

(Reporting by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco; Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Christian Schmollinger)