Protest fights government overreach
Over 100 upset rights to assemble, petition are being infringed on
Well over 100 protesters stood outside the state Capitol to decry the closure of businesses in the state Friday as Gov. Andrew Cuomo told reporters inside the building that schools would not reopen during the current academic year in order to slow the spread of coronavirus.
The crowd gathered a little over a week after a similar group filled the same spot to demand the state reopen for business. Friday’s rally started on State Street and moved to the area around the sculpture of Civil War General Philip Sheridan before it migrated from the Capitol to the governor’s mansion on Eagle Street.
One man, who refused to give his name, said he was a construction worker and was worried about how he would feed his two daughters. He hadn’t worked since the state shutdown began, he said.
“I’ve got payments piling up that I can’t make,” he said. “I want to come back to work.”
A short time before the protest started at noon Friday, police lined the streets nearby to pay respect to Sgt. Randall French, the Troy police officer whose body was being escorted to a Rensselaer County funeral home the day after he died of COVID-19.
Other protesters circled the area around the Capitol in their cars, waving flags and honking their horns.
Albany police shutdown part of Washington Avenue and Eagle Street, making it difficult for some protesters to find parking.
Carrying signs and bullhorns, the protesters alternated between insulting Cuomo and urging him to reopen the state. Standing on the base of the Sheridan statute, organizers warned of government overreach and the possibility of permanent damage to upstate small businesses, as well as warnings about potential injury from any coronavirus vaccines and a takeover by the New World Order.
Most protesters wore masks but some did not.
One of the protest organizers, Cara Castronuova, a former boxer and physical trainer featured on NBC’S television show “Biggest Loser,” said the shutdown was government overreach that infringed on New Yorker’s rights. Standing shoulder-to-shoulder with fellow speakers, Castronuova told the crowd their right to assemble and petition their government was being denied.
“I don’t care if there’s a virus, it sets a terrible precedent for the future,” she said in an interview afterward. “The state should be educating, they should not be controlling and mandating.”
Another protester, who said he was from Renssealer County, held a sign telling Cuomo to allow churches to hold in-person services again.
Watching a church service on a cellphone screen wasn’t the same as gathering together to worship, he said.
The second protest in as many weeks came as Albany County reached over 1,150 confirmed coronavirus cases.
Forty-four people have died of the disease in the county, part the roughly 63,000 people to die from COVID-19 complications since the disease was first detected in the United States. New York state, particularly New York City and its surrounding suburbs have been the virus’ biggest hotspot in the U.S. with more than a third of all deaths happening in the state.