This is a re-publication of a newsletter email from Stop The Money Pipeline about the Summer of Heat campaign. Learn more about the campaign by visiting its website here.

It’s been another wild couple of weeks during the Summer of Heat here in New York.

Yesterday, 300+ demonstrators, led by moms and kids, built a Children’s Climate Memorial outside the luxury apartment complex of Citi CEO, Jane Fraser. As a bagpiper played, hundreds of people solemnly stepped forward to contribute their offering to the memorial, which was built to honor the estimated 20,000 children that are displaced every day by climate-driven extreme weather events.

Later, 59 people were arrested for refusing to leave the sidewalk outside of her apartment; it didn’t stop them from singing though.

The day before, led by Ugandan climate warriors like Hillary Taylor Seguya, 150+ people marched to the headquarters of AIG to urge the company to refuse to provide insurance for the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP), which, if built, would be the world’s largest crude oil pipeline. 7 people were arrested for blocking the doors to AIG’s headquarters.

In all, over the last 48 days, more than 440 people have been arrested for engaging in nonviolent civil disobedience, demanding big banks like Citi stop financing fossil fuels.

But Citi has started cracking down, arresting campaign leaders, and hitting us with trumped-up, fabricated charges.

At yesterday’s action, Citi security had Jonathan Westin, the executive director of the Climate Organizing Hub, arrested for a third time in two weeks without cause.

Jonathan was a marshal at the rally. His job was to keep people safe. It is commonplace for rallies and marches to have marshalls in New York. Even though Jonathan was wearing a marshal vest, he was targeted by the NYPD and arrested for no cause. Of the 15+ marshals at the protest, he was the only one arrested.

On July 18th, myself and John Mark Rozendaal―a lifelong pacifist, professional cello player, and retired Princeton professor―were falsely accused of assault by a senior member of Citi’s Security and Intelligence Services. Why? It gave them an excuse to hit us with a restraining order, which means we can’t go back to Citi HQ, or else we risk up to seven years in jail.

On July 22nd, Teddy Ogborn, a founder of Planet Over Profit, and a regular videographer of actions, was arrested and held for nearly ten hours, accused of moving metal barricades that he never touched.

Citi’s crackdown on activists makes it clear that we’re having an impact. Citi would not be targeting campaign leaders and attempting to intimidate us if that were not the case. And their scare tactics are not going to work. They are only deepening our resolve.

Not only are we going to keep the protests going all summer long, but we’re calling for them to spread nationally. You can join the Summer of Heat wave of action call this Tuesday at 630 ET / 530 CT / 430 MT / 330 ET to learn what you can do to plug in.

It’s already been a long, hot summer here in New York, but as the temperature around the world keeps rising, we’re committed to keeping the pressure up on Citi and all of Wall Street until we win.

In Solidarity
– Alec Connon, Stop the Money Pipeline coalition director

PS: If you’re in a position to do so, please consider making a donation to support this work. With Citi escalating the charges and multiple people facing fabricated charges, our legal costs are mounting and we appreciate your support at this time.

This is a re-publication of a newsletter email from Stop The Money Pipeline about the Summer of Heat campaign. Learn more about the campaign by visiting its website here.

Yet another heat wave is pummeling New York this week. Temperatures will hit 105°F in parts of the city. Across the country, 30 million Americans will swelter in 100°F heat. The Summer of Heat, it’s turning out, is an apt name for our campaign.

This past week, the metaphorical heat has been rising on Citi, too.

Over the past 8 days, there have been 5 major protests at Citi’s HQ. Last Monday, elders held a mock funeral and die-in; 46 were arrested. On Tuesday, the Costco Hot Dog Rebellion blocked 1000+ employees from getting into work for over an hour. On Wednesday, kids, parents, and grandparents gathered for a storytime and sing-along about the climate crisis in the HQ plaza. On Thursday, employees had to navigate dozens of lamenters and activists wearing sandwich board signs.

This week, we have picked up exactly where we left off ― with a civil disobedience blockade of Citi’s headquarters. 11 people were arrested this morning, as they highlighted both Citi’s financing of fossil fuels and the ongoing atrocities in Palestine where the death toll has now been estimated to possibly be as high as 186,000.

Actions are starting to pick up across the country, too. Last week, activists in San Francisco shut down a major Citi branch and painted a “Summer of Heat on Wall Street West” street mural. Third Act groups across the country also organized actions.

Even the media is beginning to pick up that something big is happening. The New York Times reported that Citibank “is pouring the most money into new oil and gas projects worldwide” in a story that was mentioned on the front page; in the financial press, Bloomberg covered our recent meeting with Citi, pointing out that the companies Citi finances are driving the climate crisis; meanwhile, the more salacious, right-wing rag, the New York Post revealed that a Citi worker who violently pushed a young student is a senior general counsel at the bank.

Looking ahead, we’re going to keep this pressure up all summer long. Next week, we’re having two mass actions. One targeting insurance companies that are backing the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) which, if built, would be the largest fossil fuel pipeline in the world. The following day, on July 27th, we’re having a mass march and mass action targeting Citi, once again.

There’s a lot happening here. It could so easily be exhausting―especially given everything else happening in the world right now. But two things keep me going. One is the knowledge that no matter what else is happening in the world, ending fossil fuels is a moral necessity. The second is the people powering this campaign.

The students and elders, the scientists, teachers and caretakers, the musicians and artists, who are the beating heart of this campaign.

I truly believe that this is the only way we can win, the only way that we can build the power required to topple the fossil fuel industry: by building a social movement that is powered by people who are driven by their desire for justice―people who are willing to put it all on the line, take risks, and make sacrifices to win a more just, fair and beautiful world for us all.

This summer, I feel so lucky to be surrounded by people like that.

In Solidarity,
– Alec Connon, Stop the Money Pipeline coalition director

PS: Looking for a way to support the campaign? Join us at the actions in New York, make a donation to the campaign, or organize a protest at a Citi branch in your community!

This is a re-publication of a newsletter email from Stop The Money Pipeline about the Summer of Heat campaign. Learn more about the campaign by visiting its website here.

Since June 10th, 296 people have been arrested at Citi’s global headquarters for demanding an end to fossil fuel expansion. This morning, 46 elders, including faith leaders, scientists, and movement luminary Bill McKibben, were arrested.

This action comes hot on the heels of the largest Summer of Heat action so far: when on June 28th, nearly 1,000 people marched on Citi’s HQ and 64 people were arrested for blockading the doors.

Just a few days after the June 28th action, we met with Citi management. We met with the bank’s Chief Sustainability Officer, Corporate Banking Head of Corporate Transition, and the Head of Environmental, Social, Risk Management, as well as other members of the sustainability team.

The fact that Citi felt the need to send a large and relatively senior team to the meeting is a sign that our campaign is working.

On our side of the table, we had Roishetta Ozane, the CEO of the Vessel Project of Louisiana; Jeffrey Jacoby, the deputy director of Texas Campaign for the Environment; Kazi Fouzia and Mohiba Ahmed from Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM), a large NYC-based South Asian diaspora group; and Climate Defenders organizing director, Marlena Fontes.

Kazi and Mohiba spoke powerfully about the climate impacts already causing devastation in their home countries of Bangladesh and Pakistan. Roishetta spoke about the massive health impacts that LNG and fossil fuel projects are having on her community and other communities in the Gulf South.

After these powerful testimonies, we asked Citi 3 simple questions. Here are the questions we asked and Citi’s answers:

• Question 1: Will you commit to stop funding new LNG projects or any company engaging in developing new LNG? Citi refused to answer.
• Question 2: Will you commit to stop funding any company engaged in developing new coal, oil, or gas projects? Citi refused to answer.
• Question 3: Will Jane Fraser, the CEO, meet with us to hear our concerns? Citi refused to answer.

During the meeting, members of Citi’s team suggested that we are targeting them because they are already a climate leader, citing a Bloomberg opinion piece. We responded that we are targeting them for the following reasons:

• Since 2021, Citi has provided $60 billion to the companies most aggressively engaging in upstream oil and gas development
• Last year, Citi provided $4.3 billion to companies developing new LNG projects
• Last year, Citi’s clean energy to fossil energy ratio was 0.58:1 – lower than even JPMorgan Chase and a million miles from where it needs to be

We also told them that while it is disingenuous and dangerous to claim that Citi is currently a climate leader, we believe that Citi can be a leader.

If Citi were to commit to not financing LNG and fossil fuel expansion and massively increase its clean energy financing over the coming years, it truly would be an important leader in the fight to rein in catastrophic climate change, save countless ecosystems and prevent untold human suffering.

Until then it is complicit in the climate crisis and the lives and ecosystems being lost.

Immediately after the meeting, we reached out to request two follow up meetings: Roishetta and Jeffrey have requested a meeting to talk more about Citi’s LNG financing; we have requested a follow up meeting between Citi and the Summer of Heat campaign.

As campaign organizers who are accountable to a movement of people―including hundreds who have been arrested for the cause―we will continue to report back on how these meetings go to all of you.

You can amplify our report back from our meeting with Citi on social media. It’s on TikTok. Instagram. Twitter/X.

In Solidarity,
– Alec Connon, Stop the Money Pipeline coalition director

This is a re-publication of a newsletter email from Stop The Money Pipeline about the Summer of Heat campaign. Learn more about the campaign by visiting its website here.

In the 13 days since the launch of the Summer of Heat, there have been 7 actions and 184 arrests at the headquarters of the world’s largest funder of fossil fuels, Citibank.

This past week was youth and Palestinian solidarity week (which meant that millennials like me got to take a step back and catch our breath). On Tuesday, youth organized a Climate Justice Means Free Palestine rally, which turned into a brief occupation of Citi’s headquarters as young people called out both Citi’s role in the atrocities in Gaza and fossil fuels.

But on Friday, the youth were back, blockading Citi’s HQ with 4 fifteen foot long pipelines that spelled out: Citibank Stop Funding Death.

I don’t know if it was because of the record-breaking heat, or because it was the seventh protest at the headquarters in 10 business days, but whatever the reason, Citi employees were much more irascible than at previous actions.

One middle-aged man in a suit violently pushed a young student. Another kicked a climate defender in the shin. When one climate defender pointed out that hundreds of people have died at the annual hajj pilgrimage due to extreme heat, she was told by a Citi worker to “take a xanax”.

Because, yeah, I suppose taking a numbing painkiller is one way to respond to the fact that corporations like Citibank are pushing our world toward climate breakdown.

It’s been a full two weeks already, but there’s not a lot of time for rest. Starting today is the Summer of Heat – Gulf South Solidarity Week.

As part of one of the largest build-outs of new fossil fuel projects happening anywhere in the world, dozens of new LNG, oil export, and petrochemical projects are slated to be built along the coastlines of Texas and Louisiana. And so, this week, we’re honored to welcome 170+ community organizers and frontline leaders from the Gulf South to New York.

All week, we’ll be organizing actions (there are at least five that I know of), before the week culminates on Friday in the largest Summer of Heat action so far: the Gulf South Rising, Fossil Banks Sinking March and Mass Civil Disobedience.

The goal on Friday is to have 1,000+ people march from Zuccotti Park, where Occupy Wall Street was launched in 2011, to the headquarters of Citibank, where more than 100 people will engage in nonviolent civil disobedience to demand an end to fossil fuels. If you’re in New York, I hope you’ll join us―because we need you.

I’m not going to lie. This is tiring. Organizing action after action; working 12, 13, 14 hours a day; it takes a toll. I’ve been arrested three times in the past two weeks; twice at actions when I wasn’t anticipating it. On Friday, I was arrested, without warning, as I tried to calm down an irate security guard. As the heat rises in New York, the temperature at our protests is growing, too.

But, tiring as it may be, as the deadly heat currently scorching the world―from the US and Mexico to the Middle East; from Greece to Egypt― reminds us: the fight to end fossil fuels could not be more important.

And so even if we are tired, the stakes make it easy to keep going. So does the community and the courage and the beauty that is spilling out of this campaign, and the fact that we’re already starting to inspire other actions around the country and the world.

And so on this Sunday, I’m already looking forward to the week ahead.

In Solidarity
– Alec, Stop the Money Pipeline coalition co-director

PS: If you’re wondering what you can do, one of the key things we’re asking people to do right now (besides show up) is to make a donation. If you’re in a position to make a donation, it’s greatly appreciated.

This is a re-publication of a newsletter email from Stop The Money Pipeline about the Summer of Heat campaign. Learn more about the campaign by visiting its website here.

This week we launched the Summer of Heat campaign ― and this is the first of our Summer of Heat campaign newsletters that we’ll send out over the next few months.

It’s been quite the first week here in New York. We organized civil disobedience actions at Citibank’s global headquarters four days in a row: On Monday we blockaded every entrance with 150+ people. On Tuesday, we did it with a giant pod of orcas. On Wednesday, it was the turn of the scientists, including Dr. Sandra Steingraber and Dr. Peter Kalmus. And on Thursday we blockaded the headquarters with 200+ elders and 50+ rocking chairs.

On Friday, we held a block party in the plaza outside the HQ and in the midst of it all, we also found the time to disrupt a speech by Citibank’s Head of Wealth Management, Andy Seig. In total, 144 people were arrested this week, demanding an end to the financing of fossil fuels.

In some ways, it’s been a grueling week. I was in jail twice. My voice is hoarse; my throat strained from chanting at actions all week long. If my voice already sounds this gravely after just one week, I worry about what it will sound like at the end of the summer. As much as it has been a taxing week however, it has also been inspiring.

The stakes of the climate fight cannot be overestimated. Already, at less than 1.5°C of warming, half of the world’s coral reefs have collapsed and millions of children are being displaced by climate-driven extreme weather events every year. If we don’t stop burning fossil fuels in the coming years, it will get so much worse.

Given these stakes, it feels good to be a part of a campaign that at least feels close to being commensurate with the scale of the crisis.

I take heart, too, in knowing that history shows how effective sustained campaigns of civil disobedience can be. Indeed, many of most significant advances in social justice of the past 150 years ― from women’s suffrage to desegregation to the many gains won by organized labor ― owe less to subtle, “respectable” maneuvering than to the disruptive campaigns and groups that first made the issues impossible to ignore, and then forced decision-makers to act.

I believe that will be true of the fight to end fossil fuels, too―and that civil disobedience will play a key role in turning Wall Street against the fossil fuel industry.

As we take a breath and prepare for another week of civil disobedience actions, there are several ways that you can support the Summer of Heat campaign, wherever you are.

You can take a few minutes to call Citi’s CEO, email a dozen of their top executives, or call them out on social media. If you have the means to do so, you can also make a donation to the Summer of Heat campaign here. We’ll put every cent to good use.

And, of course, if you’re really eager to jump in, you can also look up where the closest Citi branch is to you and plan an action; or you could even start to plan your trip to New York. June 28th would be a very good day to be in town…

In Solidarity
– Alec Connon, Stop the Money Pipeline coalition co-director

PS: Interested in checking out the media from the first week of Summer of Heat? The pick of the bunch is here: Newsweek, the Hill, Salon, Democracy Now – Wednesday, Democracy Now – Thursday, Bloomberg, ABC7, AM NY, NPR, Common Dreams, and the NY Post