Last week the cops were ready and waiting for us. This week they were ready, waiting, and arrested people just for trying to enter a public building to deliver a letter to the Senate President. Maybe they were thinking about sitting in his office, but they hadn’t done anything illegal when they were arrested. First time I’ve known of people getting arrested just for putative mens rea.
This week’s theme was an end to militarism and gun violence. After a rousing group singalong “Ain’t Gonna Study War No More,” speakers addressed the need to reallocate funds from the military to education and health. Others spoke of their experiences as victims of gun violence. As we ended with the song “Somebody’s hurting my people, and I won’t be quiet any more,” some of the group tried to enter the building to deliver a letter to Senate President Sweeney, who is blocking Governor Murphy’s progressive budget because he doesn’t want to raise taxes on the rich. They were arrested before they could get through the door. The NJ Democrats didn’t want to be disturbed during their meetings with the lobbyists.
We’ll be back next week.
And we thought we had made progress and it comes to this. How very sad…and troubling.
For more videos and details about the demands for today’s Poor People’s Campaign in Trenton, see this post by Brian Lee. https://www.facebook.com/brian.awesome.lee/posts/10214339361812083