Video – “Dylan Roof Got More Due Process”: #Conyers Supporters Hold Rally in Detroit

A rally was held in Detroit today in support of Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) in the wake of calls for his resignation after sexual harassment allegations.  Video below:

On Monday, December 4, 2017, roughly 200 clergy, community activists and constituents packed the sanctuary of Hartford Memorial Baptist Church on James Couzens Freeway in Detroit. The rally was organized in less than 48 hours after calls for Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) to resign reached members of the House Democratic leadership in Washington.

Rev. Wendell Anthony, president of the Detroit NAACP and senior pastor of Fellowship Chapel, delivered the line that dominated the local coverage. “Dylann Roof got more due process than John Conyers is getting right now,” Anthony told the crowd, pointing to the 2015 Charleston church shooter whose case ran through a federal trial with counsel, discovery and a jury. The comparison drew a long ovation.

Rev. Horace Sheffield III of the Detroit Association of Black Organizations told the crowd the Conyers case was being tried in the court of cable news rather than in the House Ethics Committee. Sheffield argued that Conyers, 88 and hospitalized that weekend with a stress-related illness, had not been given a chance to respond to the specific allegations or to confront his accusers.

The rally was not a denial of the accusers. Multiple speakers stressed that point, and several said they believed the women who had come forward. Former settlement recipient Marion Brown, former staffer Melanie Sloan and the initial anonymous complainant had each described conduct that, if proven, would warrant serious consequences. But the Detroit ministers argued the timeline ran past the Ethics Committee rather than through it.

The politics of race ran through the service. Speakers pointed out that Conyers stepped away from his ranking position on House Judiciary within days of the first BuzzFeed story, while Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) kept his seat through three rounds of accusations. Rep. Brenda Lawrence (D-MI), who represents the neighboring 14th District, sat in the front row but did not speak at length.

Conyers watched part of the rally by phone from his hospital bed, according to his attorney Arnold Reed. The next day, December 5, he called in to Mildred Gaddis’ show on 102.7 Praise and announced he was retiring effective that afternoon. The crowd at Hartford Memorial, in other words, was not able to change the outcome. The video above captured what they said anyway.