PHOENIX — Martin Luther King III, the eldest son of the late civil rights leader, is scheduled to visit Phoenix this weekend to pressure senators into eliminating the filibuster in order to pass voting rights legislation.
Deliver for Voting Rights, an organization that's lobbying for passage of the Freedom to Vote Act, announced Tuesday it was organizing a march and rally Saturday morning at Eastlake Park.
According to a press release, King will join civil rights leaders in a pre-march rally at Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church before marching to the Phoenix park for a post-march speaker program.
The purpose of Saturday's events is to "call on President Biden and the Senate to urgently pass federal voting rights legislation" and ensure a filibuster won't interfere in the legislative process, according to a release.
Arizona Senators Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly, both Democrats, have not committed to changing filibuster rules in order to allow the voting reforms to pass by a simple majority. The existing rules require a 60-vote majority for the legislation to pass through the Senate.
King is the second child of Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King. He was 10 at the time of his father's assassination in 1968.
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