POLITICS
March on Washington highlights generational
divide on police reform
Speakers throughout the day emphasized a moderate
message at odds with the demands for a more sweeping criminal justice overhaul
voiced by many in the crowd.
By MAYA
KING
08/28/2020
08:31 PM EDT
Updated:
08/28/2020 08:46 PM EDT
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/28/march-on-washington-protest-police-reform-404629
The
thousands gathered for the 57th March on Washington on the National Mall on
Friday heard civil rights leaders call for policy reform and civic engagement.
Though for some, the message from the day’s speakers did not match the urgency
of the moment. The disconnect reveals a growing tension between veteran
organizers and younger grassroots protesters, one that the civil rights
movement has navigated for decades.
The event
focused on ways to end police violence against African-Americans — a steep
challenge that, Rev. Al Sharpton argued, could become a reality in 2020 as a
result of this summer’s multi-racial protests against police violence and
institutional racism. Those attending the march, which was organized by
Sharpton’s National Action Network and Martin Luther King III, expressed a
palpable concern about police violence that has not been as visible at previous
marches. Many said that incremental reforms would not fix things. Rather,
completely rethinking the approach to policing and public safety was necessary
— immediately.
“We’re
tired of hearing about reform. We’re tired of hearing that something will
change and it doesn’t,” said Zayhna Woodson, a college-aged attendee who
traveled with nearly a dozen members of her family to the march from Lansing,
Mich. To her, voting mattered more on the state and local levels because they
were changes she felt she had real control over.
“I feel
like the system, no matter what we do, how we vote, at the top — it doesn’t
matter. It needs to be abolished and made into something new. Because what we
have right now is not working. They say, ‘left-wing’, ‘right-wing’, it’s all
the same bird.”
“To a
certain extent, you’ve always got that energy,” explained Cliff Albright,
co-founder of Black Voters Matter. Albright argued that the march’s timing
didn’t match the needs of the moment, saying that hosting a national gathering
like Sharpton’s could alienate younger grassroots activists who’ve spent months
organizing protests and other direct action.
“A lot of
times what winds up happening is that there's just kind of simmering tensions
and these feelings of a lack of respect and feelings that your methods aren't
really being supported,” Albright said.
Friday’s
speakers called for the passage of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act and
John Lewis Voting Rights Act before the 2020 election. Both bills have passed
the House but remain in limbo in the Senate.
Sharpton
and others affiliated with the march maintained that galvanizing the thousands
of attendees to push for immediate action on the legislation is a major feat.
It is also why the gathering’s full title is the “Get Your Knee Off Our Necks
Commitment March,” to underline the grassroots’ role in pushing through
sweeping legislative changes.
Speakers
harkened back to the Civil Rights Act of 1965, which was made possible, in
part, by the original March on Washington in 1963. Rep. John Lewis, who died in
July, was the last living speaker at that march, which was organized by A.
Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin and featured Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have
a Dream” speech. Sharpton, who was molded in the same activist tradition,
emphasized that organizers hoped to achieve the same kind of policy outcome as
the event’s original planners.
“This is
the time for legislative change,” Sharpton affirmed in his address to the
crowd, flanked by Reps. Al Green and Sheila Jackson Lee, two sponsors of the
George Floyd Act. “This is the time for us to vote like we’ve never voted
before. We want to get rid of anybody that’s in our way. Our parents died for
us to vote.”
Even as
different generations of organizers debate tactics, there remains a sense of
community and understanding about the common goals of the movement — and the
life-and-death consequences of what it is pushing for.
“I think
that people are ready to see change now,” said Rep. Green (D-Texas). “They've
been waiting for a long time for this moment. And I think they're seizing upon
the moment that there's an urgency of now that cannot be escaped.”
Perhaps
what united the attendees most were the figures who were central to the march:
victims of police violence and their families.
Kenethia
Alston, the mother of Marqueese Alston, who was killed by D.C. police in 2018,
said she felt the frequent, high-profile nature of police killings like Floyd’s
and Blake’s will be the ultimate driver of policy success.
“The
message is not just for continuous symbols of marches but for true change for
police brutality cases,” Alston said in an interview? Or in her speech?. “I
believe that there’s been a new, energized revolution towards police brutality
and I’m trusting and affirming that that will be true change as it relates to
not only George Floyd’s case but Marqueese and others as well.”
Marchers
flooded the mall with “8:46” t-shirts and masks in recognition of the time
Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin spent kneeling on George Floyd’s
kneck, killing him. Many carried “say her name” signs in recognition of Breonna
Taylor, who was shot and killed by police officers in her own apartment, along
with enlarged photos of Elijah McClain, Tamir Rice, Trayvon Martin and others
killed at the hands of police or white vigilantes.
It begged a
single, profound question among many in the crowd: will I or my loved ones be
next?
“I want to
see change for my grandsons,” said Lisa Cabrel, the grandmother of six boys.
She and one of her grandsons traveled to the march from Bridgeport, Ct.
“I’m scared
for him,” she said, referencing her grandson. “I’m scared when he goes to
school, I’m scared when he’s outside playing. I’m afraid that the police don’t
understand Black childrens’ behavior and their mannerisms so they take
everything for a threat and they kill our children. I want to see change for
that.”
CLARIFICATION:
The 1963 march was principally organized by A. Philip Randolph and Bayard
Rustin.
Tens of thousands join Get Your Knee Off Our
Necks march in Washington DC
Rally highlighted police brutality and voting rights
Event organised by NAN, NAACP and National Urban
League
Joan E
Greve in Washington and Adam Gabbatt in New York
Fri 28 Aug
2020 19.43 BSTFirst published on Fri 28 Aug 2020 16.16 BST
Tens of
thousands of people gathered in Washington DC on Friday, demanding criminal
justice reform and voting rights following a summer of protests against
systemic racism and against police treatment of Black people.
The Get
Your Knee Off Our Necks march, announced in early June following the killing of
George Floyd by police in Minneapolis, Minnesota, also marks the 57th
anniversary of the March on Washington, where Martin Luther King Jr gave his “I
have a dream” speechurging racial equality.
Thousands
gathered in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, many wearing Black
Lives Matter T-shirts, as speakers demanded racial equality and an end to
police brutality in the US.
“We get
less healthcare, like we don’t matter,” said the civil rights leader the Rev Al
Sharpton, whose National Action Network organization was one of the event
organizers.
“We go to
jail longer for the same crime like we don’t matter. We get poverty,
unemployment, double the others, like we don’t matter.
“We’re
treated with disrespect by policemen that we pay their salaries like we don’t
matter. So we figured we’d let you know, whether we tall or short, fat or
skinny, light skinned or dark skinned, black lives matter.
“And we
won’t stop until it matters to everybody.”
King’s son,
Martin Luther King III, was among those to speak, telling the crowd they must
“defend the freedoms that earlier generations worked so hard to win”.
Friday’s
event comes ahead of a November election expected to see a record number of
mail-in ballots, and with a Republican party seemingly opposed to making it
easier to vote.
Donald
Trump has admitted he is blocking money sought by Democrats for the postal service
so he could stop people voting by mail.
“Our voting
rights are under attack,” King said.
“We must
vigorously defend our right to vote because those rights were paid for with the
blood of those lynched for seeking to exercise their constitutional rights.”
The
Democrat-controlled house of representatives has passed legislation making
voting more accessible in 2019, and recently renamed the bill the John R Lewis
voting rights act. The Republican controlled Senate has refused to act on the
legislation.
Organized
by the civil rights campaigner Al Sharpton’s National Action Network and groups
including the NAACP and the National Urban League, the speakers at Friday’s
rally also highlighted police brutality and the need for reform.
The
Washington march comes days after Jacob Blake became the latest in a series of
Black people to suffer brutal treatment at the hands of police.
Blake was
shot in the back by police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Sunday, and remains in
hospital. His family said on Tuesday that Blake had been paralyzed from the
waist down.
Speaking on
Friday, Blake’s father, Jacob Blake Sr, said: “There are two systems of justice
in the United States. There is a Black system and a white system and the Black
system isn’t doing so well. I’m tired of looking at cameras and seeing these
young black and brown people suffer.”
Blake’s
sister, Letetra Widman, said Black people were done “catering to your delusions”.
“America,
your reality is not real,” Widman said. “We will not pretend. We will not be
your docile slave. We will not be a footstool to oppression.”
Widman also
called on protesters to continue to march peacefully. “You must fight, but not
with violence and chaos – with self-love,” Widman said. She called out loudly:
“Black men, stand up. Stand up, Black men, and educate yourselves.”
The
families of George Floyd, Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, Ahmaud Arbery, and
Breonna Taylor, all Black people killed by police or by individuals on the
extremist fringes who regarded themselves as vigilantes.
The march
was organized amid protests over the killing of Floyd.
The
46-year-old died after a police officer knelt on Floyd’s neck for eight minutes
and 46 seconds, including the final two minutes when Floyd was unconscious.
“The reason
why George Floyd laying there with that knee on his neck resonated with so many
African-Americans is because we have all had a knee on our neck,” Sharpton told
USA Today.
The march
was set to be the largest political gathering in Washington since the
coronavirus outbreak began to escalate in March.
The
thousands of participants streaming in for the march on Friday morning stood in
lines that stretched for several blocks, the Associated Press reported, as
organizers insisted on taking temperatures as part of coronavirus protocols.
Organizers
reminded attendees to practice social distancing and wear masks throughout the
program.
The march
will be matched by demonstrations in states which have a high Covid risk, NAN
said, including in Montgomery, Alabama and Las Vegas, Nevada.
The NAACP
is hosting a “virtual march” throughout the day.
Speakers
will include the New Jersey senator Cory Booker, congresswoman Brenda Lawrence,
from Michigan, and Stacey Abrams.
A group of
protesters are due at the march who have walked all the way from Milwaukee to
the nation’s capital for the event.
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