“More than brick and mortar:” DC begins to remove “Black Lives Matter” Plaza near the White House

Washington (AP) – Starlette Thomas recalls that she has descended almost daily to the intersection of 16 and H streets, to protest against police and systemic racial injuries in the summer of 2020.

On Monday, Bowie, 45 years old, the Maryland resident, returned to those protests to mourn the end of Black Lives Matter Plaza.

“Today I had to be here. I can’t just let this go, “Thomas said, while Jackhammers began to tear in the huge yellow letters in the street. Thomas discreetly assured a piece of sidewalk and said he kept it in conflict.

“To leave with a piece of it, it means it didn’t disappear,” she said. “It is more than brick and mortar.”

The crews started working on Monday to remove the “Black Lives Matter” yellow painted on a block at a White House. The mayor of DC, Muriel Bowser, announced the change last week in response to the pressure of the Republicans in the Congress. The work is expected to last about six weeks, and the words will be replaced with an unspecified set of mural paintings sponsored by the city.

The painting of these words was an act of challenge sponsored by the government during the first term of President Donald Trump. The removal amounts to a public recognition of how vulnerable the Colombia district is now, when Trump is again at the White House and the Republicans control both houses of Congress.

Bowser, a Democrat, ordered painting and renamed the intersection of Black Lives Matter Plaza in June 2020. He came after days of chaotic protests in that location following the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer; Bowser faced Trump to handle protests.

But now Bowser has little power to eliminate attacks on the limited autonomy of DC. Bowser said last week about X that “Mural inspired millions of people and helped our city through a painful period, but now we cannot afford to be distracted by the interference of the meaningless Congress. The devastating impact of federal jobs must be our number one concern. “

Among those who gathered to attend the work on Monday was Megan Bavian, CEO of Equus Striping, the sidewalk marking company that initially painted the letters.

The coerval called the dismantling Black Lives Matter Plaza, “obscene historian” and said that his presence was: “more significant at this time than ever in this country.”

The right -wing right celebrated the online change, with the provocative Charlie Kirk visiting the site to hail, “the end of this meal stroke in our country.”

In Trump’s second term, Bowser worked to avoid conflicts and reduce any content points. She traveled to Mar-a-Lago in Florida to meet Trump after the elections and publicly emphasized her points.

Trump has recently revived a frequent discussion point of the desire for a federal “takeover” of the nation’s capital, describing Washington as full of crime, graffiti and homeless camps. Bowser refused to comment on the reports that the White House is preparing an executive order targeting Washington. She said publicly that the biggest threat to the so-called autonomy of the rules of origin was “some of the people of Congress.”

Congress Republicans have repeatedly threatened that they will intervene in the city’s business in large and small ways. A measure currently before Congress, called the Bowser law, is trying to completely return the law on the 1973 internal rules, which gives the limited autonomy of the capital.

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The journalists Associated Press, Nathan Ellgren, contributed to reporting.