Freedom To Vote! Rally & Press Conference. Voter Intimidation is a Crime!

FROM:  The Northside Coalition of Jacksonville, Inc.

WHAT: Freedom To Vote! Rally & Press Conference. Voter Intimidation is a Crime!

WHO: Northside Coalition of Jacksonville and cosponsors: All About the Ballots, Florida for All, Harriett Tubman Freedom Fighters, Indivisible Mandarin, Jacksonville Branch of the NAACP, Jacksonville Community Action Committee, Sisters Seat at the Table and The Florida State Conference of the NAACP.

WHERE: State Attorney’s Office, 4th Judicial Circuit 311 W Monroe St, Jacksonville, FL 32202

WHEN: Saturday, March 15th, 1:00pm

Contact Person: Kelly Frazier (904) 530-1596

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JACKSONVILLE-  A local activist group is speaking out and planning a rally to protest charges being dropped against a young man who threatened voters with a machete.

Last October, at Duval County’s second busiest Early Voting site, an 18-year-old was arrested for voter intimidation and assault with a machete. On January 28th, the State Attorney’s office dropped all charges. One victim has since quit her job, sold her home, and is relocating out of fear for her family’s safety.

The Northside Coalition of Jacksonville has joined with many other civil rights and racial justice organizations who signed a letter opposing the charges being dropped. These grassroots organizations started a petition & organized meetings, including with the Assistant State Attorney, whose justifications cited the perpetrator’s military aspirations. State Attorney Melissa Nelson officially declined to meet or to accept the hundreds of petitions that have been collected, triggering the need for this rally to ensure the community knows we will fight for all residents to have safe and accessible elections free from the threat of violence and intimidation.

NCOJ President Kelly Frazier said, “Everyone knows that if the young man brandishing a machete at a voting site had been Black, the matter would have been resolved very differently, and we might be reading his obituary. Instead, for reasons that make no sense to anyone, the young man was let off scot-free without any consequences.”

In response to this injustice, NCOJ and cosponsors invite the community to this rally event on Saturday, March 15th: “Freedom to Vote! Rally & Press Conference” to hold all accountable for not properly prosecuting the “GANG” who showed up at a Duval Early Voting site with a machete: State Attorney Melissa Nelson, Assistant State Attorney Octavius Holliday, Neptune Beach Police and others.

Planned speakers: Rosemary McCoy, Harriett Tubman Freedom Fighters; Kelly Frazier, Northside Coalition of Jacksonville; Monica Gold, Jacksonville Community Action Committee