More than 100 arrested after climate change protest on Wall Street in Lower Manhattan
NEW YORK CITY (WABC) -- One day after protesters took to the Upper East Side to march against fossil fuels, demonstrations continued Monday on Wall Street leading to over 100 arrests.
A total of 114 protesters were arrested and taken into custody during Monday's climate change protest in Lower Manhattan. Most are expected to be processed and released.
Protestors first gathered in Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan, and then marched to target sites in the Financial District. Some tried to get to the New York Stock Exchange but were stopped by police along the way.
Those arrested were charged with civil disobedience.
Despite the arrests, the group promises more activism this week during the U.N. General Assembly.
"This is our last resort," said Alicé Nascimento of New York Communities for Change. "We're bringing the crisis to their doorstep and this is what it looks like."
The aim of the protesters is to demand an end to fossil fuel financing from outside the largest financial institutions and the New York Stock Exchange.
"Despite scientific consensus that burning fossil fuels is the primary driver of global warming, the world's 60 biggest banks poured over $5.5 trillion into the fossil fuel industry since the signing of the Paris Agreement, driving climate chaos and causing deadly local community impacts," said New York Communities for Change in a press release.
Activists said they were willing to risk being arrested for their cause.
"This is non-violent civil disobedience," said Renata Pumarol of Climate Defenders. "In order to make big changes and send a big message to the powerful people."
On Sunday, yelling that the future and their lives depend on ending fossil fuels, tens of thousands of protesters on kicked off a week where leaders will try once again to curb climate change primarily caused by coal, oil and natural gas.
But protesters say it's not going to be enough. And they aimed their wrath directly at U.S. President Joe Biden, urging him to stop approving new oil and gas projects, phase out current ones and declare a climate emergency with larger executive powers.
"We hold the power of the people, the power you need to win this election," said 17-year-old Emma Buretta of Brooklyn of the youth protest group Fridays for Future. "If you want to win in 2024, if you do not want the blood of my generation to be on your hands, end fossil fuels."
The March to End Fossil Fuels featured such politicians as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and actors Susan Sarandon, Ethan Hawke, Edward Norton, Kyra Sedgewick and Kevin Bacon. But the real action on Broadway was where protesters crowded the street, pleading for a better but not-so-hot future. It was the opening salvo to New York's Climate Week, where world leaders in business, politics and the arts gather to try to save the planet, highlighted by a new special United Nations summit Wednesday.
Organizers estimated 75,000 people marched Sunday.
"We have people all across the world in the streets, showing up, demanding a cessation of what is killing us," Ocasio-Cortez told a cheering crowd. "We have to send a message that some of us are going to be living on, on this planet 30, 40, 50 years from now. And we will not take no for an answer."
Dana Fisher explains what the protesters hope to achieve on Eyewitness News Mornings @ 10:
This protest was far more focused on fossil fuels and the industry than previous marches. Sunday's rally attracted a large chunk, 15%, of first-time protesters and was overwhelmingly female, said American University sociologist Dana Fisher, who studies environmental movements and was surveying march participants.
Of the people Fisher talked to, 86% had experienced extreme heat recently, 21% floods and 18% severe drought, she said. They mostly reported feeling sad and angry. Earth has just gone through the hottest summer on record.
But oil and gas industry officials said their products are vital to the economy.
"We share the urgency of confronting climate change together without delay; yet doing so by eliminating America's energy options is the wrong approach and would leave American families and businesses beholden to unstable foreign regions for higher cost and far less reliable energy," said American Petroleum Institute Senior Vice President Megan Bloomgren.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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