Capitol Police arrest 60 parade protesters, including vet using a walker

U.S. Capitol Police arrested 60 people for unlawful demonstration Friday evening, the agency said.

A group of military veterans and their families gathered in front of the Supreme Court, demanding that taxpayer dollars for Saturday’s military parade and for putting troops in Los Angeles should be used for housing, health care and food, instead.

Some of those demonstrators crossed the street to the U.S. Capitol, where they are accused of breaching a bicycle rack perimeter. Some of them also may face charges of assault on police officers and resisting arrest.

Among those arrested was a Vietnam vet who was using a walker.

The veterans of conflicts from Vietnam to Afghanistan represented various branches of the military. They are united in the conviction that spending millions of dollars on the parade celebrating 250 years of the U.S. Army is wasteful and inappropriate.

“It feels like this whole dog-and-pony show that the president is trying to make about the Army is actually about him,” said Brittany Ramos DeBarros of About Face: Veterans Against the War. “And it’s actually a distraction from the fact that his administration is doing everything that they can to cut lifesaving services that veterans and our communities rely on.”

Outside the Supreme Court, one after another spoke against what they called the unlawfulness of the Trump administration’s current deployment of U.S. troops in American cities.

“If you want to thank me for my service, don’t make it a hollow platitude or empty words,” one veteran said. “My service was to preserve and defend our Constitution, and now we’re seeing the president betray our service.”

“This administration has or will likely place you in a position where you must choose: Harm innocent people, support their kidnapping, suppress legal protests and expressions of the First Amendment, or follow your conscience,” another veteran said. “You not only have a right, but an obligation to refuse illegal orders.”