Protesters disrupt state lawmakers in Jefferson City

The 2015 legislative session began Wednesday at Missouri’s capitol, and while state representatives filled the building, so did protestors. What started as a quiet gathering in the middle of the capitol, turned into a loud group of protestors demanding two different things.

“I came here because of dignity and Medicaid expansion, the system has failed us and peoples lives have been taken because of it,” says Lashonda Paulette, a protestor who held up multiple signs.

“We came for two purposes, one was to get our legislatures to expand Medicaid across the state of Missouri. We’re one of the very few that do not have the expansion, therefore many people are dying or don’t have doctors to go to, hospitals are closing, and the other is to update, upgrade the criminal justice system, the criminal justice system is targeted against African Americans, and it needs to be reformed; that’s why I’m here, and that’s why I have a sign that says that”, says Ginny Schrappen who is a member of the Metropolitan Congregations United in St. Louis.

The protestors participated in a “die in”, where they all laid down in the capitol, to show members of the House and Senate that these two issues are important to them and that it’s something people in Missouri are dying from. The group then went upstairs to the two chambers, continuing their chants.

“People from Kansas City, Columbia, St. Louis, some of the rural areas, black, white, people of all different identities are here to stand together to call upon our legislatures to set that moral agenda for their session”, says Rev. Molly Housh Gordon, Minister at the Unitarian Universalist Church in Columbia.

“That they do the right thing, that they do what we put them in office to do and that’s to serve us”, says Paulette.

After the protestors left, members of the House and Senate were able to go back to being sworn in peacefully.

ABC 17 News has not heard of any injuries or arrests.