Reuters
By Makini Brice
June 28, 2018
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-protests/women-march-through-washington-against-trumps-immigration-policy-idUSKBN1JO173
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -
Some 600 protestors were arrested during a clangorous occupation of a U.S.
Senate office building in Washington on Thursday, where they decried U.S.
President Donald Trump’s “zero- tolerance” stance on illegal immigration.
The protesters, mostly women dressed in white, sat on the Hart
Senate Office Building’s marbled floors and wrapped themselves in metallic
silver blankets similar to those given to migrant children separated from their
families by U.S. immigration officials.
Their chant “Say it loud, say it clear, immigrants are welcome
here” echoed through the building, drawing scores of Senate staff to upper
mezzanine floors from where they watched the commotion.
Capitol Police warned protestors that if they did not leave the
building they would be arrested. Soon after, protesters were lined against a
wall in small groups and police confiscated their blankets and signs.
It took police about 90 minutes to arrest them and end the
demonstration. Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, a Democrat, sat with the
protestors and was also arrested.
Capitol Police said in a statement that about 575 people were
charged with unlawfully demonstrating and they would be processed at the scene
and released. They said people who were charged and fined could pay 24 hours
after their arrests, but it was not clear who had been fined and how much.
Democratic senators Mazie Hirono, Tammy Duckworth, Kirsten
Gillibrand and Jeff Merkley, who have been critical of Trump’s immigration
policies, spoke with some of the protesters. Gillibrand held a sign that read:
“End Detentions Now.”
Women’s March, a movement that began in the United States when
Trump was inaugurated in 2017 and spread around the world, had called on women
to risk arrest at Thursday’s protest.
Organizers said in a statement that 630 women were arrested
during the protest.
“We are rising up to demand an end to the criminalization of
immigrants,” Linda Sarsour, one of the leaders of the Women’s March, said in
the statement.
Before arriving at Capitol Hill, the protesters marched down
Pennsylvania Avenue, pausing to chant “Shame! Shame! Shame!” at the Trump
International Hotel.
The Women’s March demonstration is part of a wave of actions
against Trump, whose administration began seeking in May to prosecute all
adults who cross the border without authorization.
More than 2,000 children who arrived illegally in the United
States with adult relatives were separated from them and placed in detention
facilities or with foster families around the United States.
The policy led to intense criticism in the United States and
abroad, and Trump signed an executive order that would let children stay with
their parents as they moved through the legal system, drawing renewed
criticism.
Loretta Fudoli took a bus to Washington from Conway, Arkansas,
to join Thursday’s protest. She said she had been arrested at demonstrations
three or four times since she became politically active after Trump’s election.
“Their parents shouldn’t even be locked up,” Fudoli said. “This
is not a bad enough crime to lock them up and take their children away.”
Most of the children separated from their families before the
order was signed have not yet been reunited with them.
The White House has said that the order was not a long-term
solution and has called for Congress to pass immigration reform.
Larger protests are being planned for Saturday in Washington,
D.C., and cities around the country under the banner of
#FamiliesBelongTogether.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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