Protecting the Right to Protest at the DNC and Beyond
Movement Law Lab’s Director of Movement Partnerships Joey Mogul and Associate Director Ruby-Beth Buitekant joined with scores of lawyers and legal workers to provide legal support to thousands of protestors who demonstrated at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago this past August. Movement Law Lab supported the formation of a legal coalition that coordinated efforts to protect people’s First Amendment rights, given the history of the government eviscerating these rights political parties’ conventions, especially the Chicago Police Department’s repression at the Democratic National Convention of 1968, the anti-Iraq war protest on March 20, 2003, the 2012 NATO summit, and throughout the 2020 summer of demonstrations in support Black lives.
Preparation for the protests at the DNC
Months prior to the DNC, Movement Law Lab worked closely with several legal organizations, including the Chicago Chapter of the National Lawyer’s Guild (NLG), First Defense Legal Aid, Law For Black Lives, Northwestern University Pritzker Law School’s Civil Rights and Community Justice Clinic and Palestine Legal, among others, to recruit lawyers to address the civil rights of all protestors, including young people and those who had unique needs related to their immigration status. This work supported the NLG, who recruited and trained scores of lawyers, legal observers, and other volunteers who were prepared to observe demonstrations, respond to hotline calls, and provide lawyers for jailed protestors or those charged with criminal or municipal violations.
In advance of the DNC, Movement Law Lab played a leading role in issuing an open letter to Chicago Police Superintendent Snelling and Mayor Johnson signed by 65 legal organizations, lawyers and legal workers. The legal coalition expressed grave concerns about recent actions of the Chicago Police Department (CPD) and the City of Chicago aimed to chill protesters from demonstrating during the DNC. The coalition also condemned CPD Superintendent Snelling’s comments to the press that threatened protestors with arrest for engaging in peaceful protests, and his “gross mischaracterization” and offensive remarks describing the 2020 summer protests in support of Black Lives as “rioting.” The coalition demanded the CPD and City of Chicago respect and protect demonstrators’ First Amendment rights during the DNC. The open letter was covered in the Chicago Sun Times and Chicago’s Southside Weekly. Mike Ludwig of TruthOut also wrote about the long history of law enforcement officials targeting protestors in the City of Chicago.
How we supported Equity And Transformation’s “Keep It 1000” Demonstration for Reparations
Movement Law Lab was proud to support Chicago’s Equity and Transformation (EAT) with their demonstration as part of their “Keep it 1000 Campaign.” EAT’s campaign demands reparations owed to Black people for the violence and repression stemming from chattel slavery, Jim Crow laws, lynching, and other anti-Black racist state violence in the U.S.. The demonstration drew hundreds of Black people, who marched and rallied on the westside of Chicago, outside the DNC Convention Center, with support of Movement for Black Lives, UJIMAA medics, the Rising Majority, among others. Movement Law Lab joined lawyers from Northwestern University Pritzker Law School’s Civil Rights and Community Justice Clinic and First Defense Legal Aid to provide security for the marchers, serve as liaisons with the police, and be on hand in case the police took retributive action. Fortunately, the march proceeded smoothly and no one was arrested.
The focal point of EAT’s action was to demand that President Biden sign an executive order that would accomplish what Congressman John Conyers, and, later, Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, have been proposing in HR 40 since 1989: create a commission to study and develop reparations proposals for Black people. For more on the history of the reparations movement, check out Movement of Black Lives’ Reparations Now toolkit.
EAT organized the action to show the collective power and solidarity of Black voters in Chicago and Illinois who refuse to give their vote away to the Democratic party without the party acknowledging the detrimental impact that slavery and its on-going impact on Black communities as well as other systemic racist policies. EAT also called on the political party to stop taking Black voters — who have consistently supported that party and have been the key factor in winning elections — for granted, and called on elected officials to earn Black people’s vote. EAT’s tremendous organizing efforts were covered by Corly Jay in the Tribe’s article, “Inside EAT’s preparation process for their DNC march for reparations.”
Thousands protest. . . and then the police showed up
Throughout the DNC, thousands of people protested at marches and demonstrations in support of an arms embargo to Israel and a just ceasefire in Gaza. There were also demonstrations in support of reproductive rights, gender-identity determination, and LGBTQ rights.
Even with coordinated oversight by lawyers and movement groups, there was a massive police presence, with arrests and even police brutality at the demonstrations. Despite several meetings with the CPD and the City in advance of the DNC, the CPD also denied people’s constitutional right to counsel after their arrests at the police station. We were grateful to work with thoughtful and effective community partners coordinated by Chicago National Lawyers Guild Mass Defense Committee, who were ready and responsive to the needs of all who came into contact with the criminal legal system, and the NLG who organized scores of legal observers to attend each of the demonstrations. This coordinated legal support was essential to supporting the movements on the ground who organized these consequential mass mobilizations.
The ongoing work to secure the right to dissent
Across the U.S. in 2024, massive numbers of people took to the streets and to their school quads to participate in historic marches, encampments, rallies, strikes, walk-outs, and acts of civil disobedience in support of Palestinian people. The numbers and coordination of organizations and individuals on the Left has been both historic and epic with respect to the Palestinian liberation movement. Yet, nationwide, people’s constitutional rights to protest and dissent were trampled on by law enforcement officers and school officials. Moreover, new laws, like anti-mask statutes, have been passed and new draconian school regulations have been enacted to restrict people’s ability to demonstrate. Private actors are also filing civil suits against protesters and Palestinian groups seeking to chill further dissent. Fortunately, movement lawyers have stepped up to the challenge to represent people facing criminal charges, school disciplinary hearings and to lodge legal challenges against governmental actors and private universities.
These most recent anti-protest initiatives are not confined solely to demonstrations related to Palestine. Rather, they are part of a larger authoritarian agenda seeking to stifle dissent and undermine democracy. This agenda will be further fueled by the incoming administration and the President-elect’s promises to use the U.S. military and national guard on the “enemy within.” We need to be prepared for accelerated and heightened attacks on protestors who oppose authoritarian policies seeking to deport millions of immigrants; destroy the climate and Palestinian movements; and legislative executive orders proposed by the right-wing Heritage Foundation in Project 2025.
In this new era, we need more movement lawyers to get in the game, by stepping up to work collectively with movement partners and organizers, as people did at the DNC, to defend the right to protest, a fundamental building block of a functioning democracy. At Movement Law Lab we will continue to work with our movement partners and we invite more lawyers to join us in the fight to protect and vindicate people’s rights to speech, assembly and dissent — the fundamental building blocks of democracy.
