Jane Fonda and her red coat arrested again in climate protest

If it’s Friday, it means Jane Fonda and her red coat got arrested again

Nov. 1, 2019 11:18 AM PT

Jane Fonda, wearing the long red coat that’s quickly becoming iconic, was arrested Friday yet again after what has become a weekly routine in Washington, D.C.: coordinated civil disobedience to raise awareness of climate issues.

Unlike other celebrities, who sometimes change outfits multiple times in a day as they are photographed at different events, Fonda has been sticking to her bright-red uniform week after week at the protests. Red appears to be the movement’s accent color.

The only things distinguishing the arrests in photographs have been what’s on her head and which celebrity is headed to the slammer with her.

Joining Fonda for her trip to jail this time were actresses Rosanna Arquette and Catherine Keener. In previous weeks, Ted Danson and Sam Waterston invited the zip-tie handcuffs. Next week, the founders of Ben and Jerry’s are supposed to join in.

Headgear has ranged from a black-and-white checked cap to a black beret to Friday’s brown fedora, with an exceptional bare-headed display when Fonda and Danson were hauled in a week ago.

Fonda closed the event with her speech on Friday morning, after about an hour of spoken-word presentations and the like, as the Fire Drill Fridays group began to step away from the stage and prepare for their march.

The “Grace & Frankie” actress pushed for the Green New Deal, which she said would mean all fossil-fuel companies would have to “leave all new oil and gas in the ground” — a financially ruinous proposal for the industry.

“They’re not going to want to do that,” she said. “We’re going to have to make them. And no matter who we elect to office, no matter how good she is, we’re going to have to hold the president’s feet to the fire” as well as all other legislators along the way.

Fonda then invited the group to “walk over to the Hart building, enter the Senate rotunda and join us in civil disobedience.” After waiting to pass through security — yes, a mass protest took its time to go person by person through a metal detector and X-ray checkpoint — and into the Hart Senate Office Building, the protesters staged a sit-in in the atrium.

After warning the protesters that they would be arrested if they stayed, Capitol Police pulled out the zip-ties and got to work calmly clearing the atrium. The protesters applauded each arrest.

Fonda had to wait a while before it was her turn.

As she waited to be arrested, she didn’t address how the millions of Americans who rely on fossil fuels would be persuaded to change their lives but did tell reporters that “even the scientists” were saying a massive social change would be required to achieve her vision of climate-rehab goals.

“Suffice to say, it’s too late for moderation,” the actress said.

By the time Fonda was arrested, at 1:37 p.m. local time, there were only about a half-dozen protesters left sitting on the Senate building floor.

The protest, which was livestreamed on Facebook, at times sounded more like a feminist march than a climate event, with chants including “Power to the women,” “Rise for the Earth, rise for the women” and “Our bodies, our Earth, stop the violence now.” No surprise: The week’s theme was the intersection of women and climate, and the Women’s March and Code Pink joined in.

Forests, fresh water, mass migration/human rights and the matter of who’s supposed to pay for it all are topics of upcoming Fridays, Fonda said.