2013 POOR PEOPLES CAMPAIGN MARCH TO ADDRESS SEQUESTRATION CUTS AND ATTACKS ON VOTING RIGHTS

2013 POOR PEOPLES CAMPAIGN MARCH TO ADDRESS SEQUESTRATION CUTS AND ATTACKS ON VOTING RIGHTS

2013 Poor Peoples MarchOn May 11, 2013 community, civil rights, union and student activists will reclaim Rev. Dr. King Jr.’s legacy by staging a three day march from Baltimore City to Washington D.C. entitled, “2013 Poor Peoples Campaign March.” Groups will plan a national strategy to fight new austerity measures along with major social issues including police terror and mass incarceration.

Rev. CD Witherspoon, President of the Baltimore chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and representative of the Baltimore Peoples Power Assembly, stated, “The sequestration cuts will only increase the misery of poor people in major cities and in small towns across this country. This region, Baltimore, Maryland and Washington D.C., will be hit very hard causing layoffs and harming both workers and those needing their services. These developments, along with the recent attacks by Supreme Court justices on voting rights, give our national march in May a renewed sense of urgency.”

Witherspoon continued, “Our 41 mile march to the nation’s Capitol will unite families fighting police terror from Baltimore to Oakland with low wage workers fighting for justice and against sweat shop conditions like Wal-Mart and MacDonald’s. They will march alongside the growing jobless who will be the victims of cuts in unemployment benefits, students who will be losing their ability to go to school because of sequestration cuts, trade unionists whose rights are under attack from Michigan to South Carolina, and all those fighting for justice whether it’s for immigrant rights, LGTBQ and women’s rights, or voting rights.”

“When we arrive in Washington D.C. we will deliberate on a national strategy to overturn these new austerity measures. These recent events underscore the need to ignite a new movement for justice that can genuinely represent the people.  We have already begun the call for peoples and workers power assemblies in neighborhoods and communities everywhere. Dr. King had a vision of a people’s movement that would overturn injustice and win the human right of a job for everyone, a decent income, housing and health care. It’s important to note that the original Poor Peoples Campaign and Tent City was one of the first occupations,” Witherspoon concluded.

Activists contend that this is a historic year for the civil rights movement. This year marks the 50 year anniversary of the August 28, 1963, Jobs and Freedom March along with many other important milestones in civil rights history, including the 45th anniversary of the May 12, 1968 Poor Peoples Campaign.

The May 11th march is initiated by the Baltimore Chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the Baltimore Peoples Power Assembly.