Popular Resistance - The National Park Service has proposed major changes in rules for protests in Washington, DC that would severely undermine constitutionally-protected First Amendment rights. The National Park Service’s proposed rule changes put forward by the Trump administration and Secretary of Interior Ryan Zinke abride our Freedom of Speech, right to assemble and petition the government for redress of grievances.
The proposed rules would require organizers to pay high fees and costs to hold a protest in Washington, DC. The proposals would ban protests on the White House sidewalk and greatly restrict protests in Lafayette Park across from the White House. Costs could include the expense of erecting barricades, paying the wages and overtime of Park Service officers and the cost of repairing grass. The proposals would also restrict spontaneous First Amendment activities and give the police power to cancel permits for any “infractions”. Long-term encampments like Occupy would be banned, as would long term vigils like the anti-nuclear vigil in Lafayette Park.
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