Washington, D.C., police arrested approximately 300 people during a protest Monday for campaign finance reform near the capitol building.
Democracy Spring spearheaded the protest in coordination with several prominent labor, progressive and environmental groups. The coalition hopes to get money out of the political system. In total 1,240 people have been arrested near the capitol during a series of Democracy Spring protests over the last seven days alone, reports The Hill.
“Now is the time to take mass nonviolent action on a historic scale to save our democracy,” Democracy Spring blared on its website. “Thousands gathered this week in our nation’s Capital to demand Congress take immediate action to end the corruption of big money in our politics and ensure free and fair elections in which every American has an equal voice.”
Some protestors have used capitol tours to get past security in order to protest within the capitol building. They have organized sit-ins and some have even tied themselves to scaffolding in the Rotunda. Top officials at the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, the AFL-CIO and NAACP were among those arrested Monday. Recently actress Rosario Dawson, Progressive Change Campaign Committee staffers and Harvard Professor Lawrence Lessig were also arrested.
“This is our moment,” Dawson wrote on her Facebook page. “People are waking up and establishment politicians don’t want that to happen. The millionaires and billionaires don’t want to see that. Enough is enough.”
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders has spoken out in support of the protesters. The Vermont Democratic-socialist has often spoken in favor of campaign finance reform and getting big money out of politics. He wrote on his Twitter page that he commends the protesters for what they are trying to do.
Democracy Spring did not respond to a request for comment by The Daily Caller News Foundation.
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