Washington, DC – Global Zero activists from all over the United States gathered in Washington, DC to protest at the Nuclear Security Summit. What happened next was nothing short of the Best. Day. Ever.
Convened by President Obama, this summit of world leaders aims to secure nuclear materials all over the globe — which is a great idea in principle, until you find out that nuclear weapons aren’t even on the agenda. And as long as there are 15,000 nuclear weapons in existence, nuclear security is impossible.
Participants from Global Zero’s 2016 Action Lab organizer training joined us in downtown DC to call on Summit participants to address the threat posed by nukes and to see our lifesize inflatable nuclear missile. Over a hundred activists turned out to send a clear message: 15,000 does not equal security.
After the rally, Action Lab participants headed to Capitol Hill to lobby their members of Congress to oppose plans for a $1 trillion overhaul of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. You can check out tweets from the protest and Capitol Hill lobbying in this Storify:
And that’s not all. World leaders heard us. Summit delegates from Brazil, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Sweden, and Turkey, as well as U.N. Secretary General Ban-Ki Moon, urged their peers at the Summit to prioritize the elimination of nuclear weapons in pursuit of true and lasting nuclear security.
This movement is growing and being heard — and it’s an awesome sight to behold. The whole Global Zero team is so grateful to the activists and organizations that turned out for zero, and to the Action Lab participants who are helping to build the movement in their communities across the U.S.
For the rest of the weekend, Action Lab participants will be learning the ropes of grassroots organizing and activism. They’ll hear from nuclear weapons experts, Global Zero’s field team, and luminaries of the movement for zero. We can’t wait to keep working with every one of them!
Stay tuned!