The Mass Poor People’s Assembly & Moral March on Washington set to take place on Saturday is going online due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The virtual gathering will give an opportunity for poor and low-income people from all over the United States to testify about their experiences with poverty and racism, among other issues. An estimated 140 million people in the country are living in poverty, according to the Poor People’s Campaign.
The Poor People’s Campaign, a national group working to unite poor communities, is hosting this weekend’s assembly.
The event falls on the same day as President Donald Trump’s campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The Poor People’s Campaign said it chose the date because it did not want “another election cycle to pass without poverty and its interlocking injustices at the center of the political discourse.”
“Despite public health advice against in-person mass gatherings, the President is holding a rally in Tulsa to stoke fear and rally his base,” the Rev. William J. Barber II, president of Repairers of the Breach, told CNN. Repairers of the Breach is a sponsor of the event.
“Together with a broad coalition of national and grassroots justice organizations, the Poor People’s Campaign is holding a digital assembly and virtual Moral March on Washington to unite people who want to bring the country together to reconstruct democracy. While Trump is trafficking in death in Oklahoma, we will be livestreaming a call to life.”
Here’s what you need to know about the event:
When is the assembly?
The two-hour assembly will take place on Saturday, June 20, at 10 a.m. ET. The same event will be rebroadcast at 6 p.m. ET and on Sunday, June 21 at 6 p.m. ET.
Where will it take place?
While the event was originally going to be an in-person assembly in Washington, DC, it will now take place online due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Who are the organizers?
The virtual assembly is being organized by The Poor People’s campaign and local grassroots organizations from all 50 states. Repairers of the Breach, a non-profit ecumenical organization, and the Kairos Center for Religions, Rights, and Social Justice are sponsoring the assembly.
Rev. Barber of Repairers of the Breach and the Rev. Liz Theoharis, director of the Kairos Center, will chair the event.
Who will speak at the event?
Speakers will include service workers from the Midwest who have worked through the pandemic without personal protective equipment, mothers who have lost children due to lack of health care, and an Apache elder who is petitioning the federal government to stop a corporation from destroying a sacred site in Arizona.
“The speakers are the people who are experiencing or have endured police misconduct and violence, poverty, environmental injustice and the like: farmers whose neighbors are committing suicide, the mother who lost her daughter to police violence or lack of health care, the people from cancer alley who became the place of the highest per capita Covid death rate,” the Poor People’s Campaign said in a news release.
Public figures, including former Vice President Al Gore, Rob Reiner, Erika Alexander, Danny Glover, Bernice King and Wanda Sykes will attend the event.
Why is it important?
Organizers say the US is in dire need of unity, especially as Americans reel from a pandemic that has killed more than 113,700 people and protests against police brutality and racial injustice.
The virtual assembly will provide an opportunity for anyone “join together in a united call for justice from wherever they are.”
A “moral budget” and policy agenda will be presented during the event. Speakers and organizers will demand that the major political parties to find solutions to the injustices of systemic racism, poverty, environmental challenges and police brutality.
How can I watch?
The Digital Justice Gathering is an open online event for anyone to attend. You can watch by going to June2020.org. Numerous TV and radio networks will stream the assembly.
The program will be interpreted into Spanish and American Sign Language and will be open captioned in English.