Key facts
- The Sunrise Movement said 54 people were arrested at the sit-in in Schumer's office.
- The group said a few hundred people joined the protest from across the country, including New York.
- Sunrise is fundraising $24,000 on Instagram for bail and potential legal fees, it said.
- Protesters held signs reading "The filibuster kills" and "Schumer: Step up or step aside."
- Sunrise campaigns director Kidus Girma said the action is one of several planned over two weeks.
- Capitol police were not immediately available for comment, the report said.
Fifty-four protesters with the Sunrise Movement, a youth climate organization, were arrested after staging a sit-in inside Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer's Washington DC office on November 12, according to the group. The Sunrise Movement said a few hundred people joined the protest from across the country, including some from New York, which Schumer represents.
The group said on its Instagram that it is fundraising $24,000 to cover bail fees and any potential legal fees for those arrested. Capitol police were not immediately available for comment, the report said.
In a clip posted on the Sunrise Movement's Instagram, young people sitting on the office floor chanted: "Hey hey, ho ho, Schumer has got to go!" Protesters, including children, held signs reading "The filibuster kills," "Stop the climate crisis," and "Schumer: Step up or step aside."
The protesters delivered a letter to Schumer arguing, per the group's press release, that "after a collective decade of Schumer leadership it was time for change," and demanding Democrats prioritize ending the filibuster when Congress returns in January. They also dropped the letters at the offices of every Senate Democrat, according to the report.
Sunrise campaigns director Kidus Girma said the action is one of several planned over the next two weeks targeting Senate Democrats and "demanding they actually take action." Girma said: "Young people went to Senator Chuck Schumer's office to demand a Senate majority leader that would fight for the young people who elected a historic blue wave last week. They're demanding change, not the same old, same old."
The protest comes as Senate Democrats prepare to vote on a majority leader for the upcoming Congress. Several Democratic senators have said they will not support Schumer for the position, including Bernie Sanders, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats, as well as several members of the freshman class, like Michigan's Abdul El-Sayed and South Carolina's Annie Andrews. Some have backed Maryland's Chris Van Hollen as a challenger, including Peggy Flanagan, Minnesota's senator-elect, and 50501, one of the groups behind the No Kings protests.
The report said it was not the first sit-in at Schumer's office organized by young people that week. On November 10, three protesters were arrested during a protest by the youth advocacy group Get Free, according to executive director Nicole Carty.