03/10/18 – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – ACTION HAPPENING NOW
For More Information:
Mike Oxford: (785) 224-3865
Cal Montgomery: (312) 813-6816 (text only)
Priya Penner: (585) 944-3086
Marilee Adamski-Smith: (715) 204-4152
WHO: National ADAPT
WHAT: ADAPT Demands the FDA to Stop Shocking Disabled People into Submission
WHERE: In front of FDA Director Scott Gottlieb’s house, Intersection of Pennsylvania Ave NW & L St NW, Washington, DC 20037
WHEN: Saturday, March 10, 2018, happening now
Day 2: ADAPT Continues Protests Against FDA Director Demanding an End to the Torture of Disabled People at JRC
For the second straight day, activists from the disability rights organization ADAPT are outside the Washington D.C. Home of Dr. Scott Gottlieb, the Trump Administration’s Director of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Chanting “Gottlieb, Gottlieb, do your job! Gottlieb, Gottlieb stop the shock!”, ADAPT is keeping vigil outside Gottlieb’s condominium. Their aim is to pressure him to release the regulations that would ban the use of the electro shock devices employed by the Judge Rotenberg Center in Canton, Massachusetts.
The activists who come from across the country insist they are through waiting patiently for Gottlieb and the FDA to act. “The stakes are too high,” said Cal Montgomery, an ADAPTer from Chicago. “Every day the FDA waits to protect people from this device, people are harmed. We have waited for almost two years! We are not going away!”
The group of about 50 ADAPTers are holding vigil in the park across the street from Gottlieb’s home at the intersection of Pennsylvania Ave NW & L St NW in D.C. say they have no plans to leave. They have received warnings from DC metro police not to trespass on the property where the FDA Director lives and not to violate noise ordinances or they will be arrested.
“We are peaceful protesters, who are just trying to make it clear to Dr. Gottlieb that he needs to act now and stop the torture. It is appalling that he has allowed this to go on for so long!” said Priya Penner of Rochester New York. In addition to chanting and singing outside Gottlieb’s home, the activists also are distributing information to Gottlieb’s neighbors about the horrors of the Rotenberg Center and the ease with which Gottlieb could make them end.
For decades ADAPT has worked to secure for disabled Americans the same rights and liberties enjoyed by their nondisabled neighbors. Learn more about ADAPT’s history and activities at www.adapt.org, on social media with the NationalADAPT Facebook page and on the @NationalADAPT Twitter, and under the hashtag #ADAPTandRESIST. You can also follow the fight against the JRC shock device at www.adapt.org/jrc and #StopTheShock.
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