Apr 19, 2025 –On April 17 2025, AIDS activist pallbearers delivered a mountain of coffins to Marco Rubio’s door at the State Department demanding a full reinstatement of PEPFAR, the federal program which had been keeping 20 million people with HIV around the world alive and healthy. The demo was widely covered by NYT, NPR, Rachel Maddow Show, Politico, and many other outlets.
Thanks to Blake Drummond and his DC collaborators for making this gorgeous 2-minute video.
Huge thanks to Michael Lee Scott who figured out how to create & build 200 coffins that would magically fit into a cargo van instead of an 18-wheeler, and to his assistants Barrett Davis & Ryan Lammer who worked for hours and hours and hours building them all.
And our drummers! Jeremy L. León, David Merrill and Peter Banks played the same dirge created for John F. Kennedy's funeral procession through DC in 1963. JFK created USAID!
Big shout-out to Jason Rosenberg for being my wingman for loading and traveling in the van to DC.
The demo was pulled off by seamless coalition work, with heavy lifting by Charles King, Matthew Rose and Asia Russell and other amazing staffers at their respective orgs.
And finally, thanks to all our NYC-based pallbearers who took a 5am bus to make it all happen.
