August 12, 2018

Check Out These Emotional Photos and Videos of Anti-Racism Protesters Showing Up Against White Nationalists

More people are out in the streets to protest white supremacy than to defend it.

Demonstrators against racism march Sunday along city streets as they mark the anniversary of last year's Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville. Steve Helber/AP

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It’s been one year since tiki-torch-carrying neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members descended upon Charlottesville, Virginia, and an alleged white nationalist barreled his car into a 32-year-old anti-racist protester named Heather Heyer, taking her life and injuring 19 others. To mark the anniversary, white nationalists are preparing to gather today in Washington, DC, for their second annual Unite the Right rally. But in the capital and in Charlottesville, they are expected to be significantly outnumbered by counterdemonstrators protesting racial hatred.

Anti-racism protesters march Sunday in Charlottesville. 

Steve Helber/AP

On Sunday morning in Charlottesville, hundreds of people came out to honor the life of Heyer, gathering at the intersection where she was killed a year ago. One powerful video shows an African American woman leading a procession down the street, singing a variation of a freedom song that was used during the civil rights movement.

https://twitter.com/AndyBCampbell/status/1028676501925978113

Heyer’s mother, Susan Bro, joined the gathering holding flowers for her daughter’s memorial. She broke into tears as she addressed the group of supporters. “This was not all about Heather,” Bro said, recalling those who were injured in the car attack and others who are killed around the country during acts of racial violence that are not documented in headlines. “The world went crazy when Heather lost her life, and that’s not fair because so many mothers lose their children every day, and we have to fix that. We have to fix that. I don’t want other mothers to be in my spot.”

A couple embrace Sunday as they participate in prayers at the intersection where Heather Heyer was killed.

Steve Helber/AP

The protests began Saturday when students demonstrated at the University of Virginia, where the white nationalists first marched last year. 

A protester at the University of Virginia campus in Charlottesville

Cory Clark/NurPhoto/Sipa USA

The white nationalist rally last year was organized in response to theCharlottesville city council’s decision to remove a Confederate monument from a park. President Donald Trump addressed the Charlottesville clash at the time by saying there were “very fine people on both sides” of the protest, and he condemned the “egregious display of hatred, bigotry, and violence on many sides.” This year, white nationalists are holding another Unite the Right event, which they have billed as a white civil rights rally, in front of the White House at Lafayette Park in Washington, DC. There was a heavy police presence assembled to escort organizer Jason Kessler to the event.

Kessler said he expects 100 to 400 people to attend the rally, a showing that will likely be dwarfed by the thousands of counterdemonstrators who have filled Washington’s streets in the hours leading up to it. Many counterdemonstrators gathered in the city’s Freedom Plaza bearing signs condemning white supremacy.

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We have a considerable $390,000 gap in our online fundraising budget that we have to close by June 30. There is no wiggle room, we've already cut everything we can, and we urgently need more readers to pitch in—especially from this specific blurb you're reading right now.

We'll also be quite transparent and level-headed with you about this.

In "News Never Pays," our fearless CEO, Monika Bauerlein, connects the dots on several concerning media trends that, taken together, expose the fallacy behind the tragic state of journalism right now: That the marketplace will take care of providing the free and independent press citizens in a democracy need, and the Next New Thing to invest millions in will fix the problem. Bottom line: Journalism that serves the people needs the support of the people. That's the Next New Thing.

And it's what MoJo and our community of readers have been doing for 47 years now.

But staying afloat is harder than ever.

In "This Is Not a Crisis. It's The New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, why this moment is particularly urgent, and how we can best communicate that without screaming OMG PLEASE HELP over and over. We also touch on our history and how our nonprofit model makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there: Letting us go deep, focus on underreported beats, and bring unique perspectives to the day's news.

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