On Sept. 6, 2025, thousands of Washington, D.C. residents—from young activists to longtime residents—filled the streets under banners proclaiming “Free D.C.” and “End the occupation. They marched more than two miles toward the White House in what organizers called the “We Are All D.C.” protest, opposing the Trump administration’s deployment of federal troops and National Guard units to patrolling the city. Signs read “Stop the ICE invasion” and “Free D.C. – No masked thugs," linking the issue to broader civil-rights fights over immigration enforcement and authoritarian policing. As one artist on the scene put it, “This is my home… I never thought I’d live through what I’ve only seen in history documentaries. We need to resist."
At its core, the D.C. struggle is political democracy and civil rights. The U.S. Constitution grants Congress exclusive authority over the federal district, but allows Congress to admit new states. D.C. residents – nearly 700,000 people – pay federal taxes, serve in the military, and labor in our government, yet have no voting representation in Congress and no control of their own police force. This second-class status goes back generations. Frederick Douglass warned that Washington was “the one spot where there is no government for the people, of the people, and by the people,” with citizens “taxation but no representation." In practice, Trump’s weekslong “occupation” of D.C. – using federal law enforcement in a city already led by a Democratic mayor – is the latest iteration of that disenfranchisement. As former diplomat Mark Fitzpatrick told reporters, armed agents patrolling our streets are “an affront to the democracy of our city.”
The People’s Rights Organization (PRO) calls this what it is: a civil-rights crisis. The District’s lack of Home Rule and its subservient legal status mean D.C. residents have historically had few protections against federal overreach or discrimination. We know the deeper roots: during Reconstruction, Congress stripped D.C. of self-government to suppress Black political power. Today, the vast majority of D.C. residents are people of color, and their disenfranchisement is a vestige of that racial injustice. PRO condemns the echo of that history every time a federal agency overrides local decisions – be it in policing, surveillance, or court rulings.
For Gen Z, this moment is a clarion call. Young people have led D.C. protests, holding up hand-drawn signs and chanting for their democratic rights. They see that the “we the people” promise of America still excludes millions right in the nation’s capital. PRO urges Gen Z to channel this energy: demand D.C. statehood and full voting rights (resolving the crisis by constitutional means, defend the city’s Home Rule, and call out authoritarian policing. Above all, PRO reminds youth that democracy flourishes only when young voices rise. As protesters in D.C. showed, the next generation will not go quietly. Our fight is not only for one city, but for all Americans’ rights. The lessons are clear: a democracy that silences 700,000 residents is no democracy at all. It’s on Gen Z to carry the torch now.
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