Posted: 05/09/2012 9:18 am
Updated: 05/09/2012 9:51 am
Source: Huffington Post
Activists from Occupy Wall Street, the environmental movement and labor unions, along with victims of home foreclosures, have begun massive demonstrations at Bank of America’s shareholder meeting in Charlotte, N.C., on Wednesday morning.
Occupiers have characterized the event as a test run for activism ahead of September’s Democratic National Convention, and expect more than a thousand protesters for a full day of marches and direct-action demonstrations both inside and outside the shareholder meeting. For those gathered, Bank of America has become the quintessential culprit for the Great Recession — a bailed-out bank with a bad record on foreclosures and the environment.
Inside the Bank of America meeting, disgruntled shareholders — including Trillium Asset Management, the City of New York and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees — will force votes on proposals that would curb the bank’s political spending and force it to review its foreclosure practices. Foreclosure victims are hoping to give testimony during the meeting.
Outside the meeting, protesters promise a boisterous slate of events to draw attention to Bank of America’s relationship with the federal government, the coal industry and its long record of foreclosure abuse. Occupy Atlanta’s Tim Franzen said there are three marches planned, each with its own theme: the bank’s environmental record, the housing crisis and corporate accountability issues. The marches will converge into one big protest.
Click Here to follow the latest developments from Charlotte on the live blog.
Tim Franzen calls in with more information on Johnny Rosa, the man who was denied entry to the shareholder meeting. Rosa is currently being arrested. Franzen says Rosa had been a victim of Bank of America’s foreclosure practices.
Franzen made his way to Rosa and asked if he could comment to HuffPost and held the phone up to him.
“I just want to stop what they are doing,” Rosa shouted.
Franzen believes that all of those arrested so far have been foreclosure victims.
– Jason Cherkis
Wayne Borders, an Occupy Columbia activist, calls in to say that the arrests that have occurred might have been planned arrests. Nobody is worried too much about police presence just yet. “We’re keeping it under control,” says Barrett. “We’re just holding our ground and continuing along with the program we have going.”
– Jason Cherkis
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