Poor People's Campaign protests at Capitol in DC

Washington, DC – On the morning of Saturday, June 18, thousands of people poured into the streets in front of the United States Capitol to participate in the Poor People’s Campaign (PPC) political action. They are demanding justice and redressal for millions of people in the United States facing poverty and deplorable living conditions under U.S. capitalism. 

“54 years ago my father launched the Poor People’s Campaign to revolutionize the economic landscape of our nation. Unfortunately, Dr. King did not live long enough to see it come to fruition. However, on June 19, 1968, my mother Coretta Scott King was here in the nation’s capital to deliver a very powerful message on poverty,” said Reverend Dr. Bernice A. King, “She made the appeal that poverty is not only a longstanding evil of this nation, but an actual act of violence against the dignity, livelihood and humanity of its citizens.” 

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, hundreds of thousands died from curable diseases each year, due to poor access to health care. The pandemic only exacerbated these conditions, especially for African-Americans, Native Americans, Chicanos, Mexicanos and Latinos and other oppressed nationalities. Over a million people have died. It is why so many people from different cross sections of society – those in health care, peace activists, socialist organizations, and labor organizers, joined in coalition with the PPC to denounce the conditions capitalism puts workers and their families in, especially during the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“Such is the time now for a mass moral meeting in the streets,” said Dr. Reverend Barber of the PPC. “We can’t be silent anymore.” He added, “This is a movement until children are protected, until sick folk are healed, until low-wage workers are paid, until immigrants are treated fairly, until affordable housing is provided, until the atmosphere, the land, and the water are protected.” 

The PPC has also announced another mass mobilization in Washington, DC scheduled for September 2022. The PPC plans to join 5000 poor and working class people and religious leaders with 100 economists in a “nonviolent moral direction action.” 

The rally took place commemorated the 50-plus years since Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. founded the PPC in 1967, shortly before his assassination in 1968.