46 Arrested at Protest Against Congressional Vote For War: San Francisco Federal Building

For Immediate Release:
Contact: Jason Mark, 415-558-9490
Friday, October 11, 2002
or jason [at] globalexchange.org

46 Arrested at Protest Against Congressional Vote For War: San Francisco Federal Building Shut Down

Hundreds of indignant demonstrators descended upon the U.S. Federal Building in San Francisco at 7 a.m. October 11, to “shut it down” as a protest
against the Congressional vote to support President Bush’s war resolution the previous day. Among the protesters were students and retirees, an
impromptu brass band, Buddhist monks, Catholic Priests and even children.
The building remained closed as a result of the protest for three hours.
Forty-six of those attempting to blockade the Federal Building were arrested
after hundreds of federal workers were prevented from entering the building.
All those arrested were cited out by 5 pm, the afternoon of Oct. 11.
Many of those arrested had spent the night at the federal building as part
of a two hundred strong peace camp. “Some people were frantic about getting
into work and hostile,” said June Brashares, one of those arrested, “but
others just stood back drank their coffee and said I think you guys are
doing the right thing.”
Immediately after the blockade, some 80 protesters made their way to Senator
Diane Feinstein’s office and conducted another action to decry the
California Senator’s vote to support of the President’s resolution.
“This is just the beginning,” declared Medea Benjamin, co founder of Global
Exchange an international human rights group that helped organize the
protest. “It is amazing that we were able to pull off such a large spirited
show of outrage the day after this ignominious vote. We are building an
antiwar movement the likes of which this country has not seen since the
peace movement that ended the war in Vietnam.”
Today was the second day of action against the Congressional vote. Barely
hours after the Congressional vote was complete, a spontaneous expression of
outrage erupted in downtown San Francisco as some 300 demonstrators marched
to the Federal Building from Montgomery St., where they rallied in the early
evening, and then set up an all night vigil and peace camp attended by 200
participants who spent all night organizing affinity groups and discussing
tactics for the morning blockade.
The evening peace vigil and morning protest represented a broad coalition of
Bay Area-based citizens organizations who were reacting in horror to the
president’s war resolution. Now that the resolution has passed peace and
human rights groups say they will focus their energy on building a broad
based antiwar movement, which could put the brakes on the planned Iraq
invasion. What is unique about this particular peace movement is that no
bombs have yet fallen, but peace activists and social justice activists have
already gotten to a point that it took anti-Vietnam wars activists years to
achieve.
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