Thousands march in Washington, DC, and across the US in voting rights push [Video]

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

• Thousands came to Washington and other US cities to push for passage of voting-rights legislation.
• House Democrats have passed voting legislation, only to see it stymied by the Senate filibuster.
• Advocates are pushing to counter restrictive voting bills that are being enacted in many states.

Thousands of people on Saturday marched in the nation’s capital to commemorate the 58th anniversary of the March on Washington in 1963 — seeking to push Congress to pass federal voting-rights legislation to counter the raft of restrictive voting bills being implemented in states across the country.

Organizers for the ‘March On for Voting Rights’, which in addition to Washington, DC, is taking place in Atlanta, Houston, Miami, and Phoenix, are using the event to call out voter suppression and push for fair elections.

On the way to the National Mall, marchers advocated for lawmakers to pass voting-rights measures that have stalled in Congress — the For the People Act (H.R. 1) and the John Lewis Voting Advancement Act (H.R. 4).

The House has passed the sweeping bill, but it has stalled in the Senate — Democrats need 60 votes to advance the legislation and Republicans have refused to sign on to H.R. 1, even filibustering the bill in June  — fueled by opposition from former President Donald Trump, who has long propagated unsubstantiated claims of voting fraud.

The John Lewis Voting Advancement Act, which passed the House in a 219-212 party-line vote on Tuesday, faces an uncertain future in the Senate. 

The Rev. Al Sharpton, one of the organizers of the march, gave a rousing speech in support of voting rights — arguing that the filibuster could not stand in the way of progress.

“We will not sit by and allow you to filibuster our right to vote,” he said. “We paid too high a price. People died to give us the right to vote. People spent nights in jail to give us the right to vote. People lost their lives to give us to give us the right to vote.”

He added: “There is no filibuster that can stand in the way of a people determined to get their rights. That’s why in the blistering heat, we came to Washington to say, ‘You’re not going to filibuster away our voting protections.’”

Despite the legislative setbacks, civil rights and labor leaders have called voting rights an extension of the ideals espoused by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.

On Saturday, King’s son, Martin Luther King III, spoke out forcefully for federal voting-rights legislation.

“This is a battlefield of morals and you are armed with the truth and the truth is a flame, you cannot extinguish. People have done it before, and we’ll do it again. We will demand federal voting rights until we have them. So don’t give up. Don’t give in. Don’t give out. You are the dream, and this is our moment to make it true.”

Source: ABC News