Dozens of Youth Activists Arrested After Green New Deal Protest in Mitch McConnell's Office

[G_j]

https://earther.gizmodo.com/dozens-of-youth-activists-arrested-after-green-new-deal-1832872331

On Monday, youth activists occupied Mitch McConnell’s office bearing banners calling on him to look them in the eyes and explain why he doesn’t support a Green New Deal. They were eventually expelled, and 42 were arrested by Capitol Police for unlawfully demonstrating, the law enforcement agency told Earther.

The move marks the latest escalation in the fight over the Green New Deal as it inches toward a vote in the Republican-controlled Senate. On Friday, video footage depicting a confrontation between youth activists pushing for the Green New Deal and Senator Dianne Feinstein went viral, fueling a heated news cycle that lasted all the weekend. It was part of a full court press on Senators on both sides of the aisle.

“All we’re asking for is to have a goddamn chance at a livable future,” Varshini Prakash, the co-founder of youth and millennial activist organization Sunrise Movement, which has been leading the protests, said from inside McConnell’s office shortly before arrests began.

Sunrise Movement activists visited McConnell’s office in Kentucky late last week while the Senate was on recess, camping out and asking for a meeting to no avail. Monday’s protest marked an escalation as activists with the Sunrise Movement descended on his Washington, D.C. office.

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