Press Release
April 5, 2006
Contact: Karen Dolan, Cities for Peace
kdolan@igc.org or cell: 240.603.8023
Contact: Steve Burns, Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice,
(608) 250-9240 outreach@wnpj.org
ONE HUNDRED CITIES AND TOWNS ACROSS THE NATION SAY "BRING THE TROOPS HOME NOW!"
Prior to the invasion of Iraq in March 2003, 170 US municipalities said No to the Iraq war. On April 4th, in an effort spearheaded by the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice, 24 towns and cities in Wisconsin joined 76 other towns and cities for peace nation-wide. This brings the number of post-war Cities for Peace up to 100.
"These 32 communities were a representative sample of the state, with 22 of the 32 located in counties that George Bush won in the 2004 election. This is yet more evidence of a new antiwar majority in Wisconsin" said Steve Burns, Program Coordinator of the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice. Burns also noted that 12 of the 32 communities had voted for Bush in 2004, including the Kewaunee County town of Luxemburg, which voted 63% for Bush but passed the "Troops Home" initiative by a 51-49 margin. Six other towns where Bush won in '04 voted "yes" on the initiative.
A USA Today/CNN/Gallup Poll last month found that a strong majority of Americans, 54%, want troops to be withdrawn from Iraq now or within a year. With the cost of the war so far over $250 billion, more than 2300 US military deaths and tens upon tens of thousand innocent civilian Iraqi deaths, even more Americans say it wasn't worth it to go to war in Iraq.
"It seems however, that the word is not getting to policy-makers on Capitol Hill. So average citizens are taking democracy in their own hands, organizing with their friends and neighbors and taking their arguments to City Hall," says Karen Dolan, a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington D.C. and the Director of Cities for Peace.
Federal policy-makers would do well to listen. Cities for peace are 100 strong and growing!
For more information, visit www.citiesforprogress.org , www.wnpj.org
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