Three-Day Poor People’s Campaign Congress

Hundreds of Poor People’s Campaign leaders from over 30 states are coming together on Capitol Hill June 19-21, 2023 to shift the nation’s attention to the reality of poverty in the country, highlight poverty as an American death sentence, and demand action to end murder by public policy.

“Until our nation’s leaders invest the great riches of this nation in ensuring equal justice for all, beginning with the poor and low-wealth of this nation, we cannot be silent,” said Rev. Dr. William J. Barber on Monday, June 19.

The three-day Poor People’s Campaign Moral Poverty Action Congress sounds the alarm on the crisis of poverty, and brings together poor and low-wealth people and faith leaders from across the country to strategize and demand that addressing poverty be on the nation’s agenda heading into the 2024 elections. Participants will also demand the White House meet with poor and low-wealth workers, religious leaders, economists and lawyers with their moral movement to discuss how our nation’s leaders can address the crisis of death by poverty.

This action comes as hundreds of thousands of Americans are being kicked off of Medicaid, child poverty is on the rise after the expanded child tax credit was allowed to expire, and as we near the 14th year since the impossibly low federal minimum wage of $7.25/hour was increased. And it follows a manufactured debt ceiling crisis that was resolved on the backs of poor people.

The Congress began Monday with Bishop William J. Barber II leading a discussion with Yale School of Public Health Assistant Professor Greg Gonsalves and UC-Riverside Professor David Brady, the author of a recent report citing poverty as the fourth leading cause of death in America, among others.

LIVE: Poverty Kills: The Moral Mandate for Ending Poverty in America | Poor People’s Campaign Moral Poverty Action Congress https://t.co/PDmvW6rRI5

— Poor People’s Campaign (@UniteThePoor) June 19, 2023

On Tuesday, June 20, local Poor People’s Campaign leaders, including impacted people,faith leaders, and advocates, will visit members of the House and Senate – on both sides of the aisle from the 30+ states they represent – to demand they use their power to address poverty, which kills more people every year than homicide, but gets significantly less of the attention from politicians.

“Given the abundance that exists in this country and the fundamental dignity inherent to all humanity, every person in this nation has the right to demand dignified jobs and living wages, housing, education, health care and welfare,” said the Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis, co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign. But the truth is that millions of Americans are denied those fundamental rights, and thousands are dying as a result.”

Following the visits, impacted people and faith leaders will hold a funeral procession leading up to the Capitol, where participants will speak out about how poverty is an American death sentence, as it is the fourth leading cause of death in the country. Others will discuss how the interlocking injustices have directly impacted their lives and their families.

On Wednesday, June 21, Reps. Barbara Lee and Pramila Jayapal will reintroduce a resolution calling for a Third Reconstruction, a large-scale federal effort to end poverty and dismantle racist policies and structures. The resolution, entitled the Third Reconstruction: Fully Addressing Poverty and Low Wages from the Bottom Up, will outline concrete ways to address poverty and the interlocking systemic injustices in our country.

“Poverty first grabbed me when I gave birth to a 4 pound, 3 ounce baby and became a single mother at 18. Poverty has never let me go. I managed to graduate high school, but West Virginia’s low wages have kept me and my family’s income below the federal poverty level,” said Kimberly Burks, whose son Quantez Burks died in the West Virginia Beckley Southern Regional Jail shortly after his arrival. “My sons became teen fathers trapped in the same downward spiral of poverty. Now [my son] Quantez has been beaten to death while handcuffed in jail, the ultimate cost of poverty. After all that I’m standing and demanding a life of dignity and respect, liveable wages and an end to poverty and lives lost to poverty.”

As Frederick Douglass wrote during the years leading up to the First Reconstruction, “power concedes nothing without a demand.” From Appalachia to Alabama, the Carolinas to California, the Borderlands to the Bronx, from the hood to the holler, the Poor People’s Campaign is organizing the power of the nation’s 140 million to ensure that the abundance we live in is utilized for the needs and priorities of the poor.

Follow the Poor People’s Campaign at www.poorpeoplescampaign.org.