’We Are Still Here And You Can’t Get Rid Of Us’: After Chauvin Verdict, Local Activists Say Their Work Isn’t Done

By Jenny Gathright and Dominique Maria Bonessi

Kanika Savoy attended her first protest on Friday. The 22-year-old Trinity Washington University student said she came out to join a group of dozens that had gathered in Freedom Plaza that evening because she “saw everything that was happening and I just couldn’t stand by.”

Savoy, who is from Prince George’s County, said she cried in her living room when she heard the news about that former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was found guilty for the murder of George Floyd. She said it was “unbelievable”— but not a marker that the work of fighting for Black people’s safety is done.

“We’re not finished,” Savoy told WAMU/DCist on Friday night at Freedom Plaza. “I don’t believe in this lifetime that we will ever be finished.”

Nearly a year after Chauvin murdered Floyd in Minneapolis, and less than a week after he was convicted for the crime, D.C. organizers held two consecutive days of protests over the weekend.

They drew crowds of several dozen each, significantly less massive than the marches against police violence that brought thousands into D.C.’s streets last spring and summer. Organizers say the lower turnout was a sign of complacency or, in some cases, exhaustion. But the marches still drew new protesters, who said they were spurred to action by a series of shootings by police that drew national attention the same week that Chauvin was found guilty of murder.

On Saturday afternoon, a group of about 50 people gathered in Black Lives Matter Plaza for a protest led by the group Freedom Fighters DC, which formed last summer in the wake of the killings of Floyd and Breonna Taylor. As the group began to coalesce, the rest of the plaza was relatively quiet. Some young women played double dutch, vendors sold Black Lives Matter and Biden/Harris sweatshirts and T-shirts across the street. At P.J. Clarke’s on the corner, a couple sat outside for lunch.

Lauren Foster, a 19-year-old sophomore at American University, said she had attended protests the previous weekend and was motivated to come out again on Saturday because she wanted to be among like-minded people amid an onslaught of news about police violence.

“Growing up as a Black woman in a very complicated world, it’s difficult to constantly see Black people that look just like me being murdered,” said Foster. She mentioned Ma’Khia Bryant, the 16-year-old Black girl shot and killed by police in Columbus, Ohio, last week. “That story broke my heart. I think it’s important for us to come out to these protests to show that we are here and we do matter … and regardless of what you do, we are still here and you can’t get rid of us.”

Saturday’s event began with a series of speeches from organizers to raise people’s consciousness about recent police killings and explain their argument for the abolition of the police. It ended with a march through several blocks downtown. Police followed the protests closely on bikes and blocked off intersections with their cars when protesters were standing in the center of them.

Perc, an organizer with Freedom Fighters DC who uses a pseudonym in her activism to protect her privacy, said she still sees a value in holding marches like this and maintaining a consistent presence in D.C.’s streets. Activists have been protesting consistently since last summer’s massive demonstrations. As recently as April 17, four people were arrested after a clash with police during a protest of violence against Black and Brown people.

“The moment we let up and stop showing up is the moment they think we forgot or that we’re okay and we’re accepting the hate crimes that they commit towards Black and Brown people,” she said. “The moment that we are silent is the moment we say, ‘We will allow this.’”

Throughout the year, Freedom Fighters DC and other groups that formed last summer during large-scale protests against police violence have also expanded their work beyond just street protests. Perc emphasized that her group has other goals: Freedom Fighters DC hosts weekly mutual aid pop-ups where they offer hot meals, and some of her goals this summer include doing more to support unhoused residents. She’s also envisioning trips outside the city for young Black people and sharing empowering books and reading lists.

Perc said the consistency of protests is also important to her — “because that’s how we get results.” But she thinks attendance has been smaller recently because some locals have simply moved on from the issue.

“I personally think that the numbers dwindled down because people are becoming complacent,” said Perc. “When [President Joe] Biden won, there were hundreds of people on Black Lives Matter Plaza. And none of those people are here—barely any of those people are here … they’re focusing on other things.”

Others who came out to protests this weekend were doing so as a way of renewing their commitment to the movement against police violence.

Kae Leonard, a 21-year-old Virginia resident who is living in D.C. for the summer, said she came out to protests on Friday because she felt like it was her duty as a writer to document what she could about the movement. She said she felt no relief after the Chauvin verdict this week.

“My friend called me and I sat on the phone with her and I said, ‘I still feel like we can’t breathe,’” said Leonard, who is Black.

When asked whether her demands of those in power had changed since the verdict, Leonard said they hadn’t.

“We’re still asking them to stop killing us,” she said.

The march on Saturday ended with what organizers called a healing space — a chance to re-center on the goals of organizing and activism before the group dispersed.

“Close your eyes,” said Freedom Fighters DC organizer Zeus X, who led the exercise. “Breathe in love and breathe out the hate that they have placed upon us,” she said. “Breathe in all of our willingness to fight for Black liberation and for our ideals … breathe out fear.”

Perc said these kinds of exercises are important because they teach people how to maintain emotional balance—and they help to emphasize that protesting doesn’t always have to come with total exhaustion.

“That is a way that we’re going to get people to come back out,” said Perc. “It’s hard to keep fighting and yelling every single day. It takes a mental toll on you. And we understand that. We’ve been doing it every single day since George Floyd. So if there’s anyone who understands that, it is us.”

This was originally posted on the DCist.