Sally Field Arrested in DC for Protesting Climate Change

Sally Field is the latest celebrity to be arrested in Washington, D.C. while protesting inaction surrounding climate change with actress Jane Fonda‘s activist group. Field was among the protesters arrested Friday afternoon while demonstrating with the activist group outside the U.S. Capitol.

The Oscar-winning actress was shown on video shared to social media being cuffed (zip-tied) and led away from the steps of the government building by police.

Fonda’s organization, Fire Drill Fridays, tweeted video footage of the incident and thanked Field, 73, for her part in the demonstration. Field and the others taken into custody will likely be charged with crowding, obstructing or incommoding, which is a misdemeanor.

Fonda began the Fire Drill Friday protests in early October and was arrested four times before she had to keep her distance from the demonstrations because she was facing a longer stay behind bars as the charges against her kept increasing. Fonda, 81, spent one night in jail.

However, officials in D.C. said she will not be charged for those previous arrests.

Before her arrest in D.C., where Field was as a recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors, she told a rally crowd, “We cannot sit back in our comfort zones and on our couches and wonder, ‘What can we do?’ We can get out. We can do something, in the rain, whatever it takes.”

She spoke of starring in Norma Rae, the 1979 movie based on a true story of North Carolina woman Crystal Lee Sutton, who spearheads a union organizing effort at a textile factory. Field noted that many companies in the textile industry — forced to pay slightly higher living wages to unionized workers — end up leaving the U.S. for other countries.

“They decimated Norma Rae’s, Crystal Lee Sutton’s, communities. They were decimated. And that is because they had no transition,” she said, adding that with a move to a sustainable economy, workers can transition to “a better job, a greener job, and a workplace that will support them and their families.”

The theme of Friday’s protest was on the transition for workers and communities who would be most affected by the transition to a green energy economy.

Other stars who have made headlines for being arrested at Fire Drill Fridays include Ted Danson, Diane Lane, Piper Perabo and Sam Waterston.

The latest arrest came just hours after the House Judiciary Committee approved impeachment articles against President Donald Trump. When asked about Friday morning’s vote, Fonda said, “I’m thinking about Madrid, actually,” referencing the ongoing United Nations Climate Change Conference taking place in Spain’s capital.

Photo credit: Tommaso Boddi / Stringer / Getty