Social Justice march on Grand Junction City Council, June 3, 2020

Description

400 demonstrators marched into a meeting of Grand Junction’s city council and demanded that council people let them speak. According to activist Shannon Robinson, with the organization Right and Wrong that organized the march in the wake of George Floyd’s death, Right & Wrong had contacted a city councilmember and let it be known that they would be marching on the meeting. Yet several council members were surprised at the large crowd of people of color. City council person Philip Pe’a later made a controversial comment about the demonstration, saying that he wondered at the time if he should have brought his gun. Robinson helped diffuse a potential disturbance outside of the meeting, channeling the energy of protesters away from the chambers’ doors and into chanting and displaying signs along the street. Inside of the meeting, several protesters and some counterprotesters spoke. Bishop delivered the demands of the local African-American community, asking for changes in education, the creation of a community oversight community, partnering with police to end harassment, and the removal of Walter Walker’s name from the Colorado Mesa University soccer field. At the following meeting, some community members came armed to the meeting in counter-protest.