Juneteenth protests bring calls for justice
Demonstrators in S.F., Oakland join millions nationwide
Thousands of people gathered for rallies and marches around the Bay Area on Friday to demonstrate against racism and police brutality and participate in a nationwide “day of action” marking the end of slavery in the United States.
The biggest of the day’s events was in Oakland, where a peaceful protest along the waterfront closed the Port of Oakland for the day. A smaller but still spirited group in San Francisco urged city officials to defund the Police Department and redistribute the resources into community programs.
As afternoon turned to evening, Oakland youth gathered in DeFremery Park for a festive march timed to Juneteenth, which commemorates the day in 1865 that Texas became the last state to officially declare a halt to the slavery of African Americans by whites in the South.
“We’re here to bring life, to celebrate each other,” said Lauryn Campbell, 18, one of the organizers of the march. “It’s to celebrate what blackness is.”
The march featured protesters marching up Adeline Street in West Oakland behind a flatbed truck as they chanted slogans including “Ain’t no power like the power of the youth, ’cause the power of the youth don’t stop.” Beyond celebration, Campbell said the group hoped to bring awareness to police brutality, housing discrimination and other issues that face Black citizens.
After the march, protesters stayed to sit on the grass in the park and listen to speakers. Among them was Tricia Hutcherson, 48, of Alameda, who said her daughter had brought her out.
“You’ve got to give people a chance
to express their dream,” Hutcherson said. “Maybe it doesn’t change everything. But if one person hears something that pricks their heart, it’s not in vain.”
This followed a morning rally where ship workers led by the African American Longshore Coalition stopped processing cargo and all economic activity came to a halt at the Port of Oakland. It was one of 29 demonstrations organized by the International Longshore and Warehouse Union at seaports along the West Coast.
“You represent the potential and the power of the labor movement,” said Angela Davis, a professor, author and activist famous for her membership in the Black Panther Party. She told the large crowd that she hopes other labor unions will join in the effort of “abolishing the police as we know them” and “reimagining public safety.”
Other speakers included Michael Brown Sr., father of Michael Brown Jr., the 18yearold Black man who was killed in 2014 by a police officer in Ferguson, Mo.
The demonstrators went from the waterfront for a second rally, this one organized by the Committee to Stop Police Terror and End Systemic Racism. There were more speakers — including rapper and film director Boots Riley.
“We don’t want to just ask for things to get better,” Riley told the crowd in front of City Hall. “We’re going to say, ‘It’s going to get better or else.’ ”
In San Francisco, the largest event was a march coordinated by Coleman Advocates to celebrate the Black Lives Matter movement. It began on the steps of City Hall and spilled into Civic Center Plaza.
As it began, three local youth artists performed for the cheering, dancing crowd, rapping, “Tell me why they want to beat us black and blue and bloody red.”
Speakers included the mother of Mario Woods, a 26yearold who was shot by five officers in the Bayview in 2015 after he refused to drop a knife. She stood before the crowd wearing a shirt with her son’s face and the words “No justice, no peace.”
Gwen Woods told some 500 spectators that the police are “executing” people of color, just as they did in the days of slavery.
“They would’ve expected a better world than this,” she told the crowd, referring to her son and all the other African American victims of racism and brutality. “Don’t let it be a moment, let it be a movement.”
The group later marched to the San Francisco Unified School District offices and demanded officials there break their contract with police to provide security at the schools.
There, dozens of people sat or knelt as two dancers jumped and twirled to the beat of a drum during a blessing ceremony. After that, schoolchildren placed at the front door cardboard signs resembling dollar bills that read “Defund police” and “Fund black youth,” as the crowd chanted words of encouragement and support.
“When you see how much money is poured into the police, why can’t we invest that money into schools?” said Vina Naik, 32, a Sunnyvale attorney for a nonprofit, who took off work for Juneteenth. “If we fix everything from a very early age, I think we’d be in a very different country.”
Mass protests and marches have been held across the country since May 25 when a white Minnesota police officer knelt for nearly nine minutes on the neck of George Floyd, an African American man who told the officers, “I can’t breathe,” before he died.
If anything, the intensity of such events has picked up in recent days — spurred by Juneteenth as well as growing efforts nationwide by protesters to topple or remove statues that were erected to honor Confederate soldiers and leaders. Similar efforts are now being aimed at wider historic figures associated with the conquest and colonization of North America.
One such incident occurred in San Francisco on Friday evening, when a number of people gathered and used rope to pull down a 30foottall statue of Junipero Serra that had been installed in 1907.
Other protests Friday including a gathering of three dozen nurses in front of Kaiser hospital on Geary Boulevard in San Francisco. More than 70 demonstrated at Kaiser’s Oakland Medical Center on Broadway.
The nurses were “fighting racial disparities in health care,” Oakland nurse Jewell Jordan said about the protests, organized by the California Nurses Association.