Latest news with #Protest
Al Jazeera
a day ago
- Lifestyle
- Al Jazeera
New Zeland Maori MPs suspended for parliamentary haka protest
NewsFeed New Zeland Maori MPs suspended for parliamentary haka protest Three Maori Party MPs were suspended from New Zealand's Parliament for performing a haka in protest of a bill backed by a far-right coalition partner that they say was an attack on Indigenous people. The bill was defeated, but tensions remain high.
The Independent
4 days ago
- Health
- The Independent
Video shows pastors arrested in Capitol Rotunda prayer-against-Trump encore
Several religious activists were arrested in the Capitol Rotunda Monday for demonstrating against planned GOP cuts to Medicaid for the second time in as many months. The Rev. William Barber led a group of clergy in several minutes of prayer in front of a statue of suffragettes inside the Rotunda building just after noon before the group was advised by a senior officer with the US Capitol Police that they were in violation of the building's prohibition against demonstrations. Barber and several others can be seen continuing to pray as they are led away in zip-ties, in video taken by The Independent at the protest. As Barber and his group received their first warning, a large group of at least two dozen Capitol Police officers formed a line separating the group from the visiting tour groups proceeding around the room. Other officers quickly began directing those tours out of the room. Within minutes, the group received their second warning, and officers in the police line began ordering reporters in the room to exit as well, or risk arrest. 'We're going to pray. if they arrest us, that's on them,' Barber had told The Independent ahead of his arrest. His words touched repeatedly on the Republican budget reconciliation bill passed by the House of Representatives last month, which is now in the Senate where upper-chamber lawmakers will begin debating changes to Donald Trump's 'one big, beautiful bill' — including splitting it up into multiple packages. At the core of the legislation is an effort to fund an extension of the 2017 tax cuts passed during Trump's first administration, and Republican lawmakers are doing so by adding work requirements that experts, including the Congressional Budget Office, estimate will endanger the eligibility of millions of Americans. This was the second time Barber and his organization, Repairers of the Breach, were involved in a prayer demonstration against the GOP budget bill, and it was evident in the mannerisms of Capitol Police officers who participated in the arrests. Barber's first arrest occurred in late April. One source familiar with the operations of the building told The Independent that Capitol Police were expecting the group's demonstration on Monday. Barber and his group walked from the Supreme Court, where a rally was held ahead of the demonstration. Several officers were holding zip-tie handcuffs before the arrests began, and in pairs the group were led out of the room with their wrists bound, with reporters now watching from afar. The reverend, who was walking gingerly with the aid of two canes, was the last — along with a woman in a wheelchair — to be restrained and led from the room. The Independent witnessed Barber being led into a side corridor, away from view. A total of eight people were arrested, per a representative for Repairers of the Breach. In an interview Monday morning, Barber said that the GOP budget bill's planned changes to Medicaid and food stamps, including work requirements and changes to SNAP for families with children, constituted a moral issue that should transcend typical Washington party divisions. 'Interestingly enough, we were arrested for just praying,' Barber said of his demonstration in May. 'They are passing a bill that's preying — p-r-e-y-ing — on the poorest of us, and we were arrested for praying. 'Clergy have said this is a moral issue. It's not a Republican or Democrat. It's a moral issue,' he continued. He had stinging words for House Speaker Mike Johnson and other Republicans who have claimed that analyses of the budget bill indicating that millions are at risk of losing Medicaid eligibility should it pass are false. Barber said that the disproportionate benefits of the 2017 GOP tax cuts for wealthier Americans amounted to the 2025 reconciliation bill being the largest robbery of wealth from lower-income Americans in history, with the exception of slavery. 'These folk get up every morning and decide the way to use power is to hurt people,' he said. 'There's no reason for them to even be touching Medicaid. That's the whole point. The only reason they're doing this is because they're trying to get the money for the tax is for those tax cuts to the wealthy and the greedy.' The reverend is a longtime activist for low-income Americans and raising the federal minimum wage through his organization and a larger group he is part of, the Poor People's Campaign. His Moral Monday rallies, held in DC, his home state of North Carolina and elsewhere, have rallied left-leaning faith leaders on issues that affect low-income communities across the country for more than a decade. Barber also rallied voters to support former Vice President Kamala Harris during the 2024 election. More recently, the 61-year-old was accused of directly moving funds from Repairers of the Breach into a personal shared bank account, which he then used for an alimony payment. His attorney told a local newspaper, the Raleigh News and Observer, that her claims 'are not true.'
ABC News
29-05-2025
- Business
- ABC News
Aussies caught in Trump versus Harvard battle
Sabra Lane: Australian students are caught up in the Trump administration's escalating fight with Harvard University. US presidents warning the institution to behave as billions of dollars in funding has been slashed to the university. The State Department stopped scheduling interviews for prospective international students as it ramps up social media screening of applicants. North America correspondent Lauren Day reports. Protestor 1: Harvard's voice is loud and clear. Protest group: Harvard's voice is loud and clear. Protestor 1: Every student's welcome here. Protest group: Every student's welcome here. Lauren Day: While their classmates gather in graduation gowns and caps, Harvard students fight for the future of America's oldest university. Protestor 1: Free ideas and free speech get in the way of authoritarians. And so like authoritarians before him in places like Russia, like Turkey and like Hungary, Donald Trump is attacking universities. Lauren Day: The Ivy League university has been in the president's crosshairs, along with a number of other institutions he accuses of promoting left-wing ideals and failing to address anti-Semitism on campus. Donald Trump: Harvard is treating our country with great disrespect. And all they're doing is getting in deeper and deeper and deeper. They've got to behave themselves. You know, I'm looking out for the country and for Harvard. I want Harvard to do well. I want Harvard to be great again. Lauren Day: The Trump administration has cut billions of dollars of federal funding for the university and moved to bar it from enrolling international students. It's now also stopped scheduling interviews for prospective students from abroad as it prepares to expand screening of their social media accounts. The moves have worried Australian students like Sarah Davis, the co-president of the Australia New Zealand Club at Harvard University. Sarah Davis: The vast majority of students who are graduating or who have already graduated, most of us are staying in the United States and are completely reliant on Harvard University's continued sponsorship of our working rights. Lauren Day: PhD student James Bailey is graduating this week. He had hoped to stay on to continue postdoctorate research on a project using AI to track poverty in Africa. Instead, he has to leave the US after massive funding cuts to scientific research. James Bailey: It seems to me deliberately destructive and therefore kind of wasteful. Wasteful is maybe too light of a word in terms of how much disruption it's had on some people's lives. Lauren Day: But he sees himself as one of the lucky ones. James Bailey: I know many others that have been cut short or stopped mid-study, which is terrible for science, but also ethically difficult when you're studying people and you have to cut that study in the middle. Lauren Day: The university's president, Alan Garber, told NPR the Trump administration's actions are part of a broader assault on higher education in America. Alan Garber: It is a warning. They see this as a message that if you don't comply with what we're demanding, these will be the consequences. Lauren Day: President Trump shows no sign of backing down, today describing Harvard as a disaster and totally anti-Semitic. Donald Trump: Harvard has to understand the last thing I want to do is hurt them. They're hurting themselves, they're fighting, but Harvard wants to fight. They want to show how smart they are and they're getting their ass kicked. Lauren Day: This is Lauren Day in Washington reporting for AM.
Irish Times
26-05-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
Why are Kneecap facing consequences when Israel is not?
What happens next in Gaza – and members of the Israeli government are laying out their plans in full view, clearly encouraged by the lack of consequences for war crimes to date – will continue to define the trajectory of our world. It already has. The longer Israel's destruction of Gaza and the Palestinian people continues, and the longer those with the power to stop it do nothing effective, the more heightened actions of protest will become and the more trust in those obliged to stop this destruction will collapse. This trajectory seems inevitable. It is the hypocrisy that drives people stone mad. Identifying the hypocrisies and gaslighting inherent in the response to Israel's actions in Gaza is not necessarily whataboutery, but it is a signal of the kind of double standards that warp truth and clarity. READ MORE Some of these examples may feel like small beans when held up against the mass slaughter in Gaza. If Russia was booted out of the Eurovision Song Contest , then why wasn't Israel? As it happens, the European Broadcasting Union is now reviewing the event's voting system due to the curiously high level of public voting for Israel's song in the competition. In the United States , for another example, the same voices who were cheerleaders for 'free speech' on university campuses when it came to right-wing provocateurs now advocate for the suppression of protest when it comes to Palestinian solidarity. What this demonstrates is that 'free speech' was clearly never a value, but an empty phrase that is an example of the ultimate hypocrisy as it is leveraged for the opposite of its meaning. Some hypocrisies are about who is reprimanded by the law and who isn't. If a member of the Belfast hip hop group Kneecap can be charged with committing a terrorist offence for allegedly displaying a flag the group says was thrown on stage during a concert, then will something also happen about allegations of much more serious crimes also happening in Israel's war on Palestine ? Last month, British human rights lawyers filed a 240-page war crimes complaint with the Metropolitan Police's war crimes unit. It concerned 10 British citizens serving in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). The Guardian reported that the dossier included allegations about 10 suspects targeting and killing citizens by sniper fire, indiscriminately attacking civilian areas and hospitals, attacking historic and religious sites, and the forced transfer and displacement of civilians. 'Scores of legal and human rights experts have signed a letter of support urging the war crimes team to investigate the complaints,' the Guardian report stated. Why Kneecap with a flag, and not others with a gun? Of course, it's not a binary choice. The application of the law is not one of finite gestures. No one is demanding the jettisoning of policing of less serious allegations of crimes in the pursuit of larger ones. Investigating those alleged to have committed 'core international crimes' is complex and would take time. But why Kneecap, and why now? Is it anything to do with the manufactured uproar around their Coachella performance? And what happens when larger crimes – war crimes – are not met with any consequences at all? The arm of the law delivers a message, both in its action and stasis. The public subsumes that message. As people identify hypocrisies, and perceive distorted priorities, their cynicism grows and their trust in institutions erodes. Kneecap said in a statement: 'The IDF units they [the British state] arm and fly spy plane missions for are the real terrorists, the whole world can see it.' Whatever you think about Kneecap – what they did or didn't do or say – they are raising legitimate questions of proportionality here. Part of the power of artists is their capacity to offer perspective in real time. The political sphere operates on a lag – this is why culture moves politics, and not the other way around. The lack of a concerted international effort to stop what Israel is doing in Gaza has frustrated those protesting and advocating for peace and freedom who are quietly screaming: catch up, do something. These metaphorical screams can become real actions that sometimes cross lines. The murder of two people working for the Israeli embassy in Washington DC last week was a horrific event that could not have been predicted. Yet it is not a surprise to see violence erupt. It is never justified, and it is wrong. But there is a degree to which there is a terrible inevitability about it. When protest is policed, but the legitimate reasons for the protests are not; when outspoken artists are charged and soldiers participating in what has been characterised by so many as genocide are not; when governments and global institutions speak of international law and values, but do not uphold them, then anger, frustration, despair, pessimism take hold. So, too, do feelings of helplessness, of a lack of agency, fear of reprisals for protest and ultimately a lack of trust in governments, media and global institutions. Poet June Jordan was right when she described what people were prepared to do for the Palestinian people as a litmus test for morality.
Miami Herald
25-05-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Seattle Protest Breaks Out in Violence: What We Know
Violence broke out after counterprotesters gathered in a Seattle park to demonstrate against a "far-right" Christian rally being held there on Saturday. The Seattle Police Department said it made 23 arrests-22 adults and a juvenile-in Cal Anderson Park. One officer was injured. Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell, a Democrat, said that a "far-right" rally was being held in the park to "provoke a reaction by promoting beliefs that are inherently opposed to our city's values, in the heart of Seattle's most prominent LGBTQ+ neighborhood." He said that "anarchists" had infiltrated a group of counter-protestors opposing the rally and "inspired violence," prompting arrests and causing the event to be shut down early. Newsweek has contacted the mayor's office and the Seattle Police Department for comment via email. Mayday USA, a conservative Christian group, brought its #DontMessWithOurKids rally to Seattle, the fourth of five stops on a national tour, on Saturday. Organizers say the #DontMessWithOurKids movement "refuses to stand idly by while the children of our nation are indoctrinated by liberal, political, and sexual agenda that seeks to destroy their God-given identities." A counterprotest-urging people to "Protest Fascist 'Family Values'"-was arranged in response, endorsed by the Freedom Socialist Party, Organized Workers for Labor Solidarity, Puget Sound Mobilization for Reproductive Justice and Radical Women. Organizers called on people to "send a message with a loud picket line, signs and banners: Bigotry is not welcome here!" About 500 people attended the MaydayUSA event, and a similar number of people turned out to protest it, said The Seattle Times. Seattle police said officers were working to keep the two groups apart when they witnessed multiple people inside one group throw items at the other at around 1:30 p.m. "Officers immediately moved to arrest the people responsible, and while taking the individuals into custody, were assaulted by more protesters, resulting in even more arrests," Sergeant Patrick Michaud wrote in a news release. "In total, officers arrested 11 during the initial scuffle." Michaud wrote that 12 additional arrests were made throughout Saturday afternoon. He said: "In total, police arrested 22 individuals for charges of assault and obstruction and booked them into King County Jail. Officers also arrested one juvenile for obstruction, who was released from the precinct." One officer was treated in hospital and released after receiving an injury during the protests. Videos on social media showed people scuffling with officers in riot gear, and officers pinning multiple people to the ground. Mayor BruceHarrell said in his statement: "When the humanity of trans people and those who have been historically marginalized is questioned, we triumph by demonstrating our values through our words and peaceful protest-we lose our voice when this is disrupted by violence, chaos, and confusion." He added: "I am grateful for those who make their voices heard in support of our neighbors without resorting to violence. In the face of an extreme right-wing national effort to attack our trans and LGBTQ+ communities, Seattle will continue to stand unwavering in our embrace of diversity, love for our neighbors, and commitment to justice and fairness." Ross Johnston, a preacher and an organizers of the Mayday USA event, wrote on X: "The audacity of the @MayorofSeattle to claim that we as Christians were 'attacking' is bigoted and the rhetoric of a God hating politician whose 'power' came up against a superior force. "PS: all arrests were from the protester camp - it takes a bit of a brain to understand what that means maybe you have one? (Highly doubt it)." Organizers of the counterprotest said: "Anti-queer, anti-trans "Mayday USA" is bringing their reactionary preaching to Seattle with help from right-wing pastor Matt Shea and his Christian Fundamentalist "On Fire Ministries." Provocatively, they are rallying under the hashtag "#DONTMESSWITHOURKIDS" at Cal Anderson Park on Capitol Hill in the heart of Seattle' Queer community. Let's send a message with a loud picket line, signs and banners: Bigotry is not welcome here!" Harrell said he was directing Seattle Parks and Recreation Department to review "all of the circumstances" of the application for the Mayday USA event "to understand whether there were legal location alternatives or other adjustments that could have been pursued." He said the police department "will complete an after-action report of this event, including understanding preparation, crowd management tactics, and review of arrests and citations." Related Articles Green Card Holder Who Came to US as Young Child Detained Returning to USHow to Watch Storm vs Wings: Live Stream WNBA, TV ChannelScientists Warn That These Popular American Cities Are Sinking Under Residents' Feet'We Currently Have No Container Ships,' Seattle Port Says 2025 NEWSWEEK DIGITAL LLC.
