Evanston was one of more than 600 cities that held “Impeach & Remove” rallies across the country on Dec. 17. Organizer and co-leader of Indivisible Evanston Rosie Rees told the crowd that 800 people had signed up to attend the event, and it appeared the crowd exceeded that number. Police blocked off the downtown area because of the crowd.
Keynote speakers included former State Senator Daniel Biss, currently a board member of Reform for Illinois; State Senator Laura Fine; Jill Wine-Banks, MSNBC Legal Analyst and former Watergate prosecutor; Metropolitan Water Reclamation District Commissioner Cam Davis; and Rev. Dr. Michael Nabors, President of the Evanston/North Shore Branch of the NAACP.
What is going on right now is not political. It is Consitutional,” said Sen. Fine, who taught in the Political Science Depaartment at Northeastern Illinois University.
Mr. Biss, an Evanston resident and Illinois gubernatorial candidate in 2018, said the U.S. is experiencing “a critical existential moment of accountability.”
“We have to keep talking to one another…and most of all, eleven months from now, there is a four letter word that we are going to use: V-O-T-E!” said Commissioner Davis.
Ms. Wine-Banks, an Evanston resident, thanked everyone for coming out in the cold and windy weather. “There is nothing more important that you could be doing tonight,” she said, and encouraged all in attendance to go to Iowa, Wisconsin and Michigan to “go door-to-door, getting out the vote.”
Ms. Rees and Steve Sidell, both of Indivisible Evanston, led the crowd in a series of chants, such as: “When democracy is under attack, what do we do? Stand up fight back! When the Constitution is under attack, what do we do? Stand up fight back! When our rights are under attack, what do we do? Stand up fight back!”
Partners for the pro-impeachment rallies nationwide included MoveOn.org, Need to Impeach, CREDO, #MarchForTruth, Daily Kos, By the People, Public Citizen, Indivisible, Stand Up America, Action Group Network, Free Speech People, Women’s March, Mainers for Accountable Leadership, People for the American Way, Center for American Progress, Progressive Democrats of America, DemCast, Democracy for America, Indivisible Chicago, CRWW, Act.TV, Greenpeace, Democracy 21, National Action Network, Georgia Alliance for Social Justice and Common Cause.