As an alternative of his annual March on Washington commemoration rally in D.C., Rev. Al Sharpton and the Nationwide Motion Community (NAN) led a “March on Wall Road” in decrease Manhattan on Thursday to carry companies accountable for bending the knee to the Trump administration’s anti-diversity, fairness, and inclusion (DEI) agenda.
On the 62nd anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington, Sharpton and NAN, together with a number of different civil rights and labor leaders, led a whole lot of members from Foley Sq. close to the African Burial Floor to the top level of Whitehall Road between Bridge and Pearl Streets. Afterward, they held a rally during which a number of civil rights activists, elected officers, ministers, and labor leaders spoke.
“Why can we come to Wall Road? Since you will have benefited from Trump, we’ve come to let you know your profit days are numbered. We aren’t going again,” Sharpton mentioned in the course of the rally.
“They stood us up proper on this space and offered us like a bar of cleaning soap,” Sharpton mentioned concerning the historical past of Wall Road being the second-largest port for slave buying and selling within the 1700s. “However we come again — the youngsters of our ancestors. We come again able to vote, able to spend our greenbacks. We aren’t slaves anymore. We aren’t going again on the slave market. Donald Trump, prepare for the battle [of] your life.”
The march started not removed from 26 Federal Plaza, the sector workplace for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Company (ICE), as audio system known as out Trump’s civil and human rights violations.
Among the many supporters marching had been common NAN members, ministers, and neighborhood organizers from throughout the nation, waving indicators and flags, and chanting “No justice, No peace!”
Democratic NYC mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani additionally participated within the march and was the one candidate to attend. Sharpton introduced he had invited each Mayor Eric Adams and former Governor Andrew Cuomo.
“I don’t endorse, however I do take attendance,” Sharpton mentioned earlier than welcoming Mamdani to the stage.
“I let you know that every single day, I’ll get up with Dr. King’s dream on the forefront of my thoughts, a dream the place we make this metropolis — the most costly in the USA of America — inexpensive for each particular person throughout this metropolis,” Mamdani mentioned in his remarks.
“To Donald Trump, we are saying this to you: We’ll proceed to battle for that which our forefathers have fought for, as a result of what we battle for is a minimum of what we deserve, and we won’t allow you to take that dignity from us,” he continued.
Different audio system included Martin Luther King III and his spouse, Andrea Waters King; Michael Eric Dyson, Benjamin Crump, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, Melanie Campbell, and Maya Wiley.
Baraka, who was arrested in Might whereas protesting towards ICE for allegedly trespassing at a detention heart in Newark, known as on all mayors to battle again towards Trump.
“We’re right here as a result of our ancestors demand that we be right here, as a result of the occasions demand that we be right here, as a result of each mayor in each metropolis in America ought to be rising up proper now as Donald Trump tries to ship the Nationwide Guard into our communities — we’re right here as they create the largest transference of wealth this nation has ever seen,” Baraka mentioned.
The march comes after Goal Corp. reported extreme declines in gross sales since a boycott was introduced earlier this 12 months by a number of organizers, together with Sharpton and Rev. Jamal Bryant, in a response to its dropping DEI initiatives. Just lately, the company’s CEO Brian Cornell resigned because of this. NAN has additionally been concerned in protesting in entrance of hedge fund supervisor and anti-DEI determine Invoice Ackman’s workplaces in Midtown for consecutive 86 weeks.
Buses traveled from 11 states to convey NAN chapters to the occasion.
Sheryl Huff, 59, president of the Center Tennessee chapter of NAN, introduced as much as 72 supporters together with her on a bus, together with the Memphis chapter.
“We will’t hold supporting and bringing our greenbacks to you, and also you slamming the doorways and telling us that we’re not price it,” Huff mentioned about anti-DEI actions from firms. A number of the initiatives they’re engaged on embody educating neighborhood members concerning the points, engaged on enhancing their credit score, getting their information expunged, and registering them to vote.
James Viafara, 20, president of the Medgar Evers Faculty NAACP Chapter, got here as a part of the New York State Convention Youth & Faculty division.
“I really feel, as a teenager at the moment, the urgency and the disaster that we witness offers us a distinct motive. It offers us a distinct function, and it affirms our mission,” Viafara mentioned.
Labor was represented with leaders from the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Workers; Nationwide Training Affiliation; American Federation of Lecturers; and others.
“Financial justice is civil rights” was the mantra repeated by Crump a number of occasions.
The march adopted a busy weekend for Sharpton — he spoke on the memorial service for Harlem large Lloyd Williams on Saturday after which delivered a speech in the course of the chapel ceremony at Howard College responding to the escalation of the Nationwide Guard in DC, particularly, towards Black residents after the Guard’s deployment by Trump.
“In the event you don’t need variety and financial inclusion in our coverage, then you definately don’t want variety in our client {dollars}. We’ll store with who does enterprise with us. We’ll stroll with who walks with us,” Sharpton mentioned.
He aimed additional feedback at Trump: “We’re gonna meet you at each flip. We’re gonna meet you at each poll field. We’re all coming collectively as a result of we aren’t going to allow you to finish this democracy and go to an autocracy.”
