A group of anti-racist activists have come together to paint a giant “Black Lives Matter” message along the road leading to the White House in Washington D.C. The message is done in bright yellow paint and stretches the width of 16th Street, with each letter coming in at a massive 35 feet long. Better yet, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser is behind the move 100%.
This is a road leading to the White House #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/rvFNISmIAU
— 🎥 Ayo Bakare 📺 (@AJBakare) June 5, 2020
- The D.C. Department of Public Works even closed down the road so the sign could be made. City workers helped paint the “Black Lives Matter” message along with volunteer activists in a project that began early on June 5. It can be seen from a height and is a strong and vivid statement that many have praised.
- Not everyone is a fan of the sign. While the message is a vitally important one that needs to be shared and internalized, the D.C. chapter of Black Lives Matter believes that instead of serving the movement of fighting racism, it’s only distracting from it. “This is performative and a distraction from her active counter organizing to our demands to decrease the police budget and invest in the community. Black Lives Matter means Defund the police,” the group tweeted.
- Mayor Bowser has been at war with Trump. It all started when Trump erected a barrier around the White House, which Bowser believed was unnecessary, along with Trump’s deployment of National Guardsmen and federal police in locations around the city. “We are all very concerned about how the federal assets pushed out from the federal complex and we worked with them to push back,” Bowser said in a statement. “We are subject to the whims of the federal government. Sometimes they are benevolent and sometimes they are not. And so we have to fix it.”
- Bowser went even further with the Black Lives Matter message. In a move that’s sure to anger Trump, she’s gone ahead and renamed the D.C. intersection just outside the White House to Black Lives Matter Plaza. It sits at 16th and H Streets NW. “We want to call attention today to making sure our nation is more fair and more just and that black lives and black humanity matter in our nation,” Bowswer said, according to dcist.
This is performative and a distraction from her active counter organizing to our demands to decrease the police budget and invest in the community. Black Lives Matter means Defund the police. @FenitN @wusa9 @ABC7News @IGD_News @news https://t.co/8VUnHOBtsg
— BlackLivesMatter DC (@DMVBlackLives) June 5, 2020
