When Elizabeth Meyer and Ashley Philipp heard honking horns, they rushed to a window in their office in Paducah’s Century Building, which houses Sen. Mitch McConnell’s local field office.
“We looked out and saw the Poor People’s Campaign signs, looked up what the People’s Campaign is and thought, yeah, we need to be down there,” Meyer said.
The Monday afternoon noisemakers and flag and sign wavers comprised a 30-vehicle caravan sponsored by the Kentucky Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival to protest McConnell’s “meanness, mayhem and misery.”
Other caravans converged on McConnell field offices in Bowling Green, Fort Wright, Lexington, London, and Louisville, plus the majority leader’s Washington office.
The protests coincided with the ongoing Moral Monday digital march hosted by the Rev. William Barber, Poor People’s Campaign co-chair, and included live reports from each location.
Participants wore masks in their cars and trucks. They were also masked and practiced social distancing when the caravans formed up.
The Rev. Amanda Groves, a PPC volunteer, helped organize the Paducah caravan. She denounced McConnell’s “inaction on Covid-19 relief and not passing the HEROES Act.”
She said some people questioned why anyone would protest at a McConnell field office knowing he wouldn’t be there. “This was to show everybody else that they can stand up – that they don’t have to sit there all gloomy and stew and suffer.
“We have a voice. We just need to use it.”
[click_to_tweet tweet=”This was to show everybody else that they can stand up – that they don’t have to sit there all gloomy and stew and suffer. We have a voice. We just need to use it. – Rev. Amanda Groves on protesting outside McConnell’s office in Paducah” quote=”This was to show everybody else that they can stand up – that they don’t have to sit there all gloomy and stew and suffer. We have a voice. We just need to use it. – Rev. Amanda Groves on protesting outside McConnell’s office in Paducah”]
Meyer and Philipp have a photocopier in their office. They used it to make a “Stop McConnell’s Meanness” sign with the PPC logo. They held up their handiwork curbside, drawing grins, honks, waves, and thumbs up from the protests.
Meyer and Philipp fell in next to Chuck Paisley and Sheila Bruce who unfurled a big yellow banner that showed McConnell as the grim reaper.
“I don’t appreciate what Mitch McConnell’s doing,” Paisley said. “That’s the bottom line of it.”
Printed and homemade signs were stuck on cars and trucks. Flags protruded from windows. Many featured the McConnell “meanness, mayhem, and misery” theme.
Other area pastors joined the caravan. The Rev. Greg Waldrop, also a PPC volunteer, said the protest overlapped with McConnell’s determination to speedily replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court. He remembered that before the 2016 election, McConnell refused to allow the Senate to vote on Merrick Garland, President Barack Obama’s nominee to the high court.
Hence, Waldrop called McConnell’s green lighting of President Donald Trump’s nominee, whoever that might be, “unfair, cynical, and disappointing.”
“We’ve got to get Mitch out of there,” said the Rev. Bruce Dobyns, who is also president of the Mayfield-Graves County NAACP chapter.
“Rev. Barber is doing what Dr. King did,” said J.W. Cleary, Paducah-McCracken County NAACP president. “Anytime there is a protest against injustice, I want to be part of it.”
Cleary is also a retired member of United Steelworkers Local 550. Several union members joined the caravan, including Jerry Sykes, a United Auto Workers retiree.
“Unions are all about social justice,” said Sykes, who wore his old blue “ORGANIZE BUILD POWER WITH JUSTICE” UAW tee-shirt. “Sen. McConnell — should I say ‘Moscow Mitch?’ — refuses to pass the Heroes Act. We need that bill passed.
“People are being evicted from their houses and apartments. They’re losing their jobs. When’s the government going to step in to help?”
Ann Reid, aboard a silver Chrysler convertible, agreed. “Mitch has got to go,” she said. “He’s for corporate billionaires—it’s time to ditch Mitch.”
–30–
[custom-related-posts title=”Related Posts” none_text=”None found” order_by=”title” order=”ASC”]