Protesters from poor people's group arrested near Republican convention

[Nambe]

NEW YORK (AP)

A day after massive street demonstrations, smaller groups of protesters turned Monday to health care, civil rights and economics - areas where they said President George W. Bush (news - web sites) and the Republicans convening in New York's Madison Square Garden have failed the country.

A group called the Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign massed a crowd of several thousand outside United Nations (news - web sites) headquarters and negotiated with police to march to the convention site, despite lacking a permit. Police proposed a route to a permitted protest area and demonstration leaders eventually accepted. ..

As the march neared the Garden, police began setting up barricades and clashed with protesters who tried to break through them. A few arrests were made as police in riot gear and on horses swept through to disperse the crowd.

A plainclothes officer was knocked off a scooter in the melee and was taken to hospital, police said. ..

[alittlelark]

1. Wht should they matter?

I'm suprised it's even in the news.

The poor are poor because they are not close enough to GOD. Only the rich are close to GOD - that's why he gave them $$$$$

<sarcasm off>

[Salluc]

2. Did they cross on 23rd Street?

At about 7:30 tonight, I saw a pretty large group of protesters on 23rd Street moving from 6th Avenue to 7th Avenue. The police (all millions of them) had given them 1/2 of the street. Do you know if this was the same group?

[NYC]

5. Yes, same group.

We marched from 47th Street, down Second Avenue, turned right on 23rd St., and walked to Eighth Avenue, then uptown on Eighth Avenue to 30th Street.

The march earlier in the day also ended at 30th Street and Eighth Avenue (from Union Square).

People did not break through the barricades when the trouble started. It's a long story.

[burrowowl]

6. Heard about

march on Democracy Now. Can you tell us about it?

[NYC]

7. Which march?

The earlier one from Union Square at 1:00 to MSG was the poverty march.

However, these things blend. The later march, 4 p.m. at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, started marching at 5:40 p.m., was "March for Our Lives" which was also heavily about poverty.

Groups intermingle. Many of the people from the first protest march were at the second.

First march had about 7,000 people, no arrests that I know of.

Second march had about 5,000 people, one person arrested along 23rd St., I believe more arrested later, and a scuffle with the police after they started closing people in barricades to segment us. Lots and lots of cops with helmets at the second march, and they did not keep any distance from us. Lines of them would move into the crowd, even before we left Dag Hammarskjold.

[burrowowl]

8. The one that started at Dag Hammarskjold plaza

I think it also included handicapped as well.
I hope everyone that got arrested gets out, were there any legal observers?

[NYC]

9. There was no special contingent

of handicapped people, but there were a few. (There usually are.)

Re getting out of jail, the National Lawyers Guild is doing their best, but there were reports of people being held way too long before being processed. Also, lawyers were having delays getting to their clients in custody.

You may have heard that as of Friday(?) the police had started arresting the legal observers as well. There was to be a press conference on the courthouse steps at 10 a.m. today. I didn't attend, and I didn't hear reports about it. The NLG is doing their best to keep up. When there is an arrest, they run to the location, and collect as much information as they can.

The march that started in Dag Hammarskjold was officially called "March for Our Lives: Stop the War at Home". Like all protests, several groups were represented.

If you are interested in the poverty aspect of it, I would say that there were more poverty groups and signs in the earlier march. (For instance "Community Voices Heard". Both marches had several health care signs and affordable housing signs.)

The Dag Hammarskjold march was a rally permit only. No permit to march. After much discussion, it was agreed that we would walk downtown on Second Avenue to 23rd St. (quite far below MSG), turn right to walk west to Eighth Avenue, then uptown to 30th St., the closest anyone is allowed to get to the Garden.

When we were on Eighth Avenue, many of us had entered the block between 29th and 30th St. For no reason we could discern, the police barricaded the rest of the people before the 29th St. intersection. The block I was on was more than half empty when they barricaded the others.

The only reason we could figure was that they wanted to photograph the people in the block closest to MSG, and show that it was a small turnout.

Much chanting of "let them through", then a "higher up" police officer (white shirt) came, and said, "Remove the barricades." When the barricades were removed, the protestors started through the intersection (no traffic anywhere around there -- all prevented), police on mopeds came and actually ran into protestors. Peter had his leg scraped, another man had his foot run over, and Peter said that a couple people had been injured. One of the moped cops fell off the moped after hitting someone, and the wheels were spinning, and the rubber was burning. That moped cop went to the hospital. I don't know about the injured protestors.

The protestors did NOT move forward into our block. Then, riot police entered our block. I don't know why. We were also penned into our block, and could not get out. They came way forward, then I don't know why, but retreated, many protestors following them. Then, one of the women who had been in the barricade moped scuffle, but had been on our side of it, (and had been asking a woman moped cop WHY?) suggested we all get out our scarves, etc. because the riot cops leaving our block had felt "rushed". Nothing came of that. (The moped cops were plain clothes, by the way.)

I protested for 8 hours today in the heat and humidity, so when it seemed that the people barricaded behind would never be allowed forward, I left. I think all the activity was over.

There was only one way out, to the far side of Ninth Avenue by way of 30th St.

Along 23rd St., someone had been arrested, probably between Lexington and Park, and I believe there were 2 more arrests farther west on 23rd St. when the paddy wagon came rushing up again, but I didn't see what happened. It is very likely some people got arrested in the moped barricade scuffle, but I couldn't see through all the people.

I would say that only about 500 to 700 of us had made it to the forward-most block. The others were barricaded behind.

All along the march, people were hanging out their windows waving to us or displaying their anti-Bush signs. At the Chelsea Hotel, on an upper floor, two side by side windows had bedsheets "bouncing" to the rhythm of the protest drums. Much support from the people we passed.

Edit: Approximately 5,000 people at Dag Hammarskjold.

[Sugarbleus]

3. This was one of the groups I was rooting for the most...

I wish there was video or film of them. I miss much of what's on the Tube, Live, by the time I turn it on...(West Coast here)

Poverty is the pits, folks. Whether it's caused by mistakes on the person's part (circumstances) or whether it's caused by virtually criminal economic policies fostered by a government. Poverty and economic injustice, at all levels, HAS TO BE ADDRESSED. The problem left unchecked leads to resentment, sickness, crime, and other untold problems in society. It brings us all down.

Poverty and/or losing nearly everything, CAN happen to almost anyone...except maybe the "fortunate" class way at the top.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

4. Are there no workhouses?

Are there no prisons?

Who do these poor people think they are, anyway?

[newdealer]

10. I've marched with this group

This is a conglomeration of smaller activist groups such as the Kensington Welfare Rights Union, based here in Philadelphia. I've been involved in several of their protests, and it usually ends up with a few arrests. They set up a "Bushville" in Brooklyn and received some media attention. As to the arrests, some decide to engage in civil disobedience and are prepared to be arrested. There wasn't any such plan for the march today. What usually happens is they will stop the march at some specific location. Almost always, the police will slowly advance on the group until someone is physically knocked down, or pushed by the police to make it seem as if there is some transgression. At which point the police take the opportunity start making arrests under the guise that the pros testers "provoked" the incident. Once, an elderly women was participating in a protests, and the police advanced faster than she could move, and she fell into the police line, which prompted the police to move in aggressively and start making arrests. That's probably what happened today.