Nine AIDS activists were arrested on
Wednesday protesting New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's AIDS
services cuts.
The arrests took place on World AIDS
Day outside the mayor's annual World AIDS Day Bagel Breakfast at the
Brooklyn Public Library.
Wearing giant bagel costumes, the
activists, members of the non-profit group Housing
Works AIDS, chained themselves together and blocked traffic at
Grand Army Plaza.
The activists chanted, “People with
AIDS are under attack, what do we do? Act up, fight back!” as
police hauled away their limp bodies.
Activists also disrupted Bloomberg's
World AIDS Day speech and distributed Bagel Boycott fliers to those
in attendance.
“AIDS activists are fed up with
Bloomberg, who each December holds his World AIDS Day Bagel
Breakfast, and then each January proposes devastating cuts for AIDS
services, such as housing and nutrition, for low-income people with
HIV,” the group said in a statement.
“Mayor Bloomberg's attitude to poor
people with AIDS is 'Let them eat bagels!'” Charles King, president
of Housing Works AIDS, said.
The group said it was protesting
Bloomberg's combined 2008-2009 $12 million AIDS services cuts.
This year, Bloomberg proposed cutting
the budget of the HIV/AIDS Services Administration, the agency that
oversees housing, nutrition and other benefits for 45,000 poor New
Yorkers with AIDS and their families.