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John Lewis Keynotes Atlanta Immigration Rally
Anti-ICE demonstrators shouted slogans in support of their cause, a MARTA train sped by on the tracks overlooking the gathering in the gulch below. The conductor of the train tooted its horn in solidarity with the protesters.The two sounds presented the ears with an interesting dichotic listening experience. Hearing the toots of the train’s horn, the crowd roared its approval and then began the short trek to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Federal Building.
Congressman John Lewis (D-GA) delivered the keynote address in Atlanta during a national day of demonstrations against the Trump immigration policy of separating children from their parents when they cross the Mexican border.
Lewis spoke to a crowd conservatively estimated in the neighborhood of 20,000 men, women and children. They gathered out front of the Atlanta Detention Center at the corner of Peachtree Street, as it intersects with Brotherton Transportation Mall, where transients flock into the city on Greyhound buses, much like immigrants gather on our nation’s southernmost border . The transients tend to mill around Brotherton Transportation Mall hours and sometimes days after their arrival in Atlanta.
The Atlanta Detention Center housed immigrants arrested by ICE in Atlanta until two weeks ago when Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms issued an executive order…