National Park Service withdraw plan to consider charging protesters for demonstrations

After a flood of comments, the National Park Service has scrapped a plan to consider charging fees for demonstrations around the National Mall and the White House.

The park service said Monday it was withdrawing proposed changes to its “First Amendment and Special Permit Use” regulations after receiving more than 140,000 comments on the plan.

The park service said it has decided to stick with existing regulations.

When the park service first unveiled its proposed rewrite of the rules in August 2018, the agency said charging fees to hold demonstrations on national park land in D.C. could help recover some of the costs of demonstrations in the nation’s capital, including trash pickup, barricades and repairing damaged turf.

The changes were necessary in part because the “volume and complexity of permit requests has increased dramatically over the years,” the park service said.

During the Trump presidency, D.C. has hosted massive political rallies and marches, such as the January 2017 Women’s March and the March 2018 “March for Our Lives.”

However, the park service’s plans quickly drew fire from activists and advocacy groups from across the political spectrum.

The American Civil Liberties Union argued the proposed rules amounted to an attempt by the Trump administration to limit protests in D.C.

In response to previous complaints from groups protesting the rules change, the park service said it never had a firm plan to charge for protests but that it was only studying the idea of whether “cost recovery” should be considered.

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