[Bishop William Barber, a campaign co-chair, said the United
States current poverty level "is actually morally indefensible,
constitutionally inconsistent, politically insensitive, and
economically insane."]
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‘WE WON’T BE SILENT OR UNSEEN ANYMORE’: POOR PEOPLE’S
CAMPAIGN TO LEAD DC ASSEMBLY  
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Jessica Corbett
June 17, 2022
Common Dreams
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_ Bishop William Barber, a campaign co-chair, said the United States'
current poverty level "is actually morally indefensible,
constitutionally inconsistent, politically insensitive, and
economically insane." _

Activists with the Poor People's Campaign rally in Washington, D.C.
on December 13, 2021. , Poor People's Campaign/Twitter

 

THE POOR PEOPLE'S CAMPAIGN plans to hold a "generationally
transformative and disruptive gathering of poor and low-wealth people,
state leaders, faith communities, moral allies, unions, and partnering
organizations" in the U.S. capital on Saturday, June 18.

The Mass Poor People's and Low-Wage Workers' Assembly and Moral March
on Washington is scheduled to begin at 9:30 am local time. The
campaign has put together an online FAQ page
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Contrasting the planned event with a right-wing mob's attack on the
U.S. Capitol last year, Bishop William Barber, the campaign's
co-chair, said
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on _Democracy Now!_ Friday that poor people and allies from across the
country "are coming nonviolently to Washington, D.C."

Their key messages for those in power, Barber said, include: "We won't
be silent or unseen anymore."

"The time has come for us to have a Third Reconstruction
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Barber continued. "We had one in the 1800s, one in the 1960s. We need
one now, that's about policy, reconstructing a moral framework,
political framework in this country, because to have this level of
poverty, that's un-talked-about too often and unseen and unheard, is
actually morally indefensible, constitutionally inconsistent,
politically insensitive, and economically insane."

"So people are coming," he said, "but poor people are coming to say
not only do we need a moral reset—and low-wage workers are saying
it—we represent 32% of the electorate now, poor people do, and 45%
of the electorate in battleground states. And it's time for that power
to be organized, mobilized, and felt in every election throughout this
country."

Discussing the June 18 gathering and related events
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preceding it, Barber emphasized
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earlier this year that the D.C. assembly "is not just a day of
action," but a "declaration of an ongoing, committed, nonviolent,
truth-telling, multiracial, interfaith moral movement."

"We are not in this for a moment, but for a movement," he said. "June
18, and everything that leads up to it and after it, will be for the
fundamental shifting of the narrative and changing this sickness that
we're seeing in our nation."

Poor People's Campaign co-chair Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis, who also
appeared on _Democracy Now! _Friday, highlighted how the fight "to
implement a single-payer universal healthcare system" and the "demand
for living-wage jobs, for adequate housing, for immigration reform,
for protecting this democracy, they're all connected."

An organizing manual
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for Saturday's event also notes the connections and declares that "we
must do more to make America live up to her possibilities."
Specifically, the document calls for doing more:

* to fully address the interlocking injustices of systemic racism,
poverty, ecological devastation and the denial of healthcare,
militarism and the false narrative of Christian nationalism;
* to change the narrative and build the power of those most impacted
by these injustices; and
* to realize a Third Reconstruction agenda that can build this
country from the bottom up and realize the nation we have yet to be.

Those were also the focal topics at a Wednesday briefing with members
of Congress, which featured remarks from Barber and Theoharis as well
as several low-income Americans who called on Congress to actually
prioritize people like them in policy decisions.

"Every dollar that we spend destroying communities overseas is a
dollar not spent on universal healthcare, affordable housing, or
meaningful social services and public education," said Kyle Bibby, a
military veteran from New Jersey. "Every youth sent overseas for war
is a life at risk for a sacrifice that we cannot justify. Every
veteran returning who is saddled with trauma is a high toll to pay for
wars that never had a clear goal—and many are returning to
underfunded and forgotten communities.”

Morgan Leavy, a barista at Texas' first unionized Starbucks, said that
"if a bunch of mostly young adults with little-to-no organizing
experience can put enough pressure on a multibillion-dollar company to
raise the minimum wage in less than a year, we absolutely expect our
government to be able to do so too."

As _Common Dreams_ reported
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earlier this month, Leavy is the kind of person the campaign co-chairs
urged President Joe Biden to meet with in D.C.

Lamenting that "corporations are treated like people and people are
treated like things," Barber asked, "Why don't poor people get
meetings in the Oval Office instead of corporations?"

"It is time for the president to act on his pre-election promise to
address poverty," he said, noting that "labor unions are joining our
call to the president to use his power to lift the voices of impacted
people and to act now."

Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel
free to republish and share widely.
 

* The Mass Poor People's and Low-Wage Workers' Assembly and Moral
March on Washington;
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