A United Demand to End the Occupation
Donald Trump is using fear and lies to try to take over our cities, and it’s blatantly wrong. No one should be turning our own government against its own people. It endangers our families, our freedoms, and our futures.
On September 30, leaders from Los Angeles, Washington, DC, Chicago, Memphis, and Portland held a joint virtual news conference to call for an end to the dangerous, unnecessary, and illegal military occupation in their cities.
United in their demand, these leaders—Keya Chatterjee, Executive Director, Free DC; Stacy Davis Gates, Chicago Teacher’s Union; Sandy Chung, Executive Director, ACLU Oregon; Rachael Spriggs, Director of Power Building, Equity Alliance, TN; Maria Oceja, Community Organizer, TN; and Lydia Avila, We Are California, Los Angele—came together to:
Emphasize the danger of normalizing armed military presence in civilian communities.
Underscore the costs to states and families, since Guard members are needed at home for disasters and crises.
Share personal, state-specific impacts, making the issue real for local media and residents.
Highlight the wasteful and unlawful nature of these deployments.
