It’s been another wild couple of weeks during the Summer of Heat here in New York.
Yesterday, 300+ demonstrators, led by moms and kids, built a Children’s Climate Memorial outside the luxury apartment complex of Citi CEO, Jane Fraser. As a bagpiper played, hundreds of people solemnly stepped forward to contribute their offering to the memorial, which was built to honor the estimated 20,000 children that are displaced every day by climate-driven extreme weather events.
Later, 59 people were arrested for refusing to leave the sidewalk outside of her apartment; it didn’t stop them from singing though.
The day before, led by Ugandan climate warriors like Hillary Taylor Seguya, 150+ people marched to the headquarters of AIG to urge the company to refuse to provide insurance for the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP), which, if built, would be the world’s largest crude oil pipeline. 7 people were arrested for blocking the doors to AIG’s headquarters.
In all, over the last 48 days, more than 440 people have been arrested for engaging in nonviolent civil disobedience, demanding big banks like Citi stop financing fossil fuels.
But Citi has started cracking down, arresting campaign leaders, and hitting us with trumped-up, fabricated charges.
At yesterday’s action, Citi security had Jonathan Westin, the executive director of the Climate Organizing Hub, arrested for a third time in two weeks without cause.
Jonathan was a marshal at the rally. His job was to keep people safe. It is commonplace for rallies and marches to have marshalls in New York. Even though Jonathan was wearing a marshal vest, he was targeted by the NYPD and arrested for no cause. Of the 15+ marshals at the protest, he was the only one arrested.
On July 18th, myself and John Mark Rozendaal―a lifelong pacifist, professional cello player, and retired Princeton professor―were falsely accused of assault by a senior member of Citi’s Security and Intelligence Services. Why? It gave them an excuse to hit us with a restraining order, which means we can’t go back to Citi HQ, or else we risk up to seven years in jail.
On July 22nd, Teddy Ogborn, a founder of Planet Over Profit, and a regular videographer of actions, was arrested and held for nearly ten hours, accused of moving metal barricades that he never touched.
Citi’s crackdown on activists makes it clear that we’re having an impact. Citi would not be targeting campaign leaders and attempting to intimidate us if that were not the case. And their scare tactics are not going to work. They are only deepening our resolve.
Not only are we going to keep the protests going all summer long, but we’re calling for them to spread nationally. You can join the Summer of Heat wave of action call this Tuesday at 630 ET / 530 CT / 430 MT / 330 ET to learn what you can do to plug in.
It’s already been a long, hot summer here in New York, but as the temperature around the world keeps rising, we’re committed to keeping the pressure up on Citi until we win.
PS: If you’re in a position to do so, please consider making a donation to support this work. With Citi escalating the charges and multiple people facing fabricated charges, our legal costs are mounting and we appreciate your support at this time.
