Thousands Gather For March On Washington To Demand Police Reform and Racial Equality

Brakkton Booker

Thousands of demonstrators will descend on the nation's capital on Friday to demand an overhaul to the nation's criminal justice system and push for racial equality at the same site Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. called for those same reforms decades ago in his iconic "I Have A Dream Speech."

Like the 1963 March on Washington, organizers plan to open with a series of speeches at the Lincoln Memorial before attendees march through the streets of the city, this time ending at the Martin Luther King Jr. memorial.

This march – dubbed "Get Your Knee Off Our Necks" — comes at a particularly tense time as frustration over police brutality and use of force have sparked national outrage following the Memorial Day killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis.

The event is scheduled to start 11 a.m. ET. Watch here.

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The program's headliners will be civil rights activists Al Sharpton and Martin Luther King III.

It will also feature family members of Black Americans who have been killed by police or in other racially-charged incidents, including Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Rayshard Brooks and others whose names have become rallying cries during recent national protests demanding their killers be held accountable.

Civil Rights attorney Benjamin Crump, who represents many of the victims' families, said "the problem isn't de-escalation, the problem is racism."

"Certainly as with all these tragedies you want accountability because we can't get justice," Crump said Friday on NPR's Morning Edition.

"Justice would be George Floyd being able to take another breath today. Justice would be Breonna Taylor still being here. Justice would be Ahmaud Arbery still being here. So the only thing we can hope for right now is accountability."

Racial justice and police reform is a hot-button political issue as election day draws near.

On Thursday as Donald Trump accepted the Republican Party's nomination for president, he underscored his self-proclaimed moniker as the "law and order president," while accusing Democratic challenger Joe Biden as someone who repeatedly tears down America. Meanwhile, hundreds of demonstrators gathered just outside on the White House's South Lawn to decry racism and demand police accountability.

The march also comes on the heels of the shooting of Jacob Blake by police in Kenosha, Wis., on Sunday. Blake, a Black man, was shot seven times in the back at close range. He is now paralyzed from the waist down, according to his family's lawyers.

That shooting was captured on video and went viral on social media, sparking days of demonstrations that turned deadly this week.

A 17-year-old from Illinois allegedly opened fired on protesters in Kenosha, killing two and injuring a third. The shooter, a white male, reportedly has ties to a militia and is a staunch supporter of law enforcement.

He is facing six criminal charges, including first-degree intentional homicide, in connection to the shooting.

The ongoing coronavirus pandemic also looms over the event.

Due to a requirement imposed by Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser that visitors to the district from high-risk states self-quarantine for 14 days, turnout for the march is expected to be lighter than organizers had originally anticipated.

Event organizers had planned for 100,000 attendees, but a permit issued by the National Park Service indicates about half that are expected, according to The Washington Post.

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