JACKSON, Miss. (AP) – The national co-chairman of the Poor People’s Campaign said Monday that the group will conduct an online mass assembly June 21 to focus attention on low wages and other issues.
The Rev. William Barber said organizers are planning to have an in-person assembly in 2022 in the nation’s capital.
Barber made the announcements at an event in Jackson, Mississippi. He said the Poor People’s Campaign is challenging systemic racism, systemic poverty and ecological devastation. He said the group is also advocating broader access to health care, a reduction in military spending and an end to what he called “religious nationalism.”
Barber said “it’s a lie” that the U.S. has a scarcity of money to support policies that would lift people out of poverty.
“We don’t have a scarcity of money,” Barber said. “We don’t even have a scarcity of ideas. … What this nation has is a scarcity of will and a scarcity of conscience, and we are the ones that must change that.”