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On Monday, more than 200 people were arrested by U.S. Capitol Police while protesting for voting rights and a higher minimum wage, among other demands.
A USCP spokesperson said the demonstration Monday blocked the 100 block of Constitution Avenue, Northeast. In all, 204 people were arrested after the federal police officers around 1:30 p.m. Those arrested have been charged with crowding, obstructing, or incommoding (D.C. Code §22-1307), according to U.S. Capitol Police.
USCP said its officers issued three warnings on a speaker asking the people to leave the street.
The demonstration was organized by the Poor People’s Campaign. According to a press release sent prior to the protest, organizers are calling for:
- Restoration of the full Voting Rights Act passed in 1965
- Passage of the For The People’s Act
- Increasing the federal minimum wage to $15/hour
- Fair and respectful treatment of the nation’s 11 million immigrants
- An end to the filibuster
“We are living in a moment when 49 states have filed over 400 voter suppression bills; 17 states have passed voter restrictions since 2020,” said Rev. William Barber and Rev. Liz Theoharis, co-chairs of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival. “And we see the connection between this attack on voting rights and all of the other issues that impact the 140 million poor and low-income people in this country.”
U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock was one of the demonstrators at the protest.
Video posted to Twitter showed an officer leading Sen. Warnock away, but the video was later deleted. Warnock’s office says the senator was not arrested.
Warnock, who is also a reverend in Georgia, was one of many pastors and reverends in attendance at the demonstration.
Monday’s action on the Hill constituted one of the largest mass-arrest nonviolent protests at the Capitol in recent memory and attracted an array of prominent voices, including civil rights icon the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Luci Baines Johnson, the daughter of late President Lyndon B. Johnson.
