Millions of people around the world will pause Wednesday, at least for a moment, to mark Earth Day. It's an annual event founded by people who hoped to stir activism to clean up and preserve a planet that is now home to some 8 billion humans and assorted trillions of other organisms.
Here are answers to some common questions about Earth Day and how it came to be:
Earth Day has its roots in growing concern over pollution in the 1960s, when author Rachel Carson's 1962 book “Silent Spring,” about the pesticide DDT and its damaging effects on the food chain, hit bestseller lists and raised awareness about nature's delicate balance.
But it was a U.S. senator from Wisconsin, Democrat Gaylord Nelson, who had the idea that would become Earth Day. Nelson had long been concerned about the environment when a massive offshore oil spill sent millions of gallons onto the Southern California coast in 1969. Nelson, after touring the spill site, had the idea of doing a national “teach-in” on the environment, similar to teach-ins that were being held on some college campuses to oppose the war in Vietnam.
Nelson and others, including activist Denis Hayes, worked to expand the idea beyond college campuses, with events across the U.S., and came up with the Earth Day name.
A history of the movement by EarthDay.org, where Hayes remains board chair emeritus, says the date of the first Earth Day — April 22, 1970 — was chosen because it fell on a weekday between spring break and final exams and the aim was to attract as many students as possible.
It's not a federal holiday. But many groups use the day to put together volunteer events with the environment in mind, such as cleanups of natural areas. You can see a list of events worldwide, or register your own event, at EarthDay.org.
It has. The overwhelming public response to the first Earth Day is credited with adding pressure for the U.S. Congress to do more to address pollution, and it did, passing landmark legislation including the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act.
More broadly, it's seen as the birth of the modern environmental movement. In later years, Earth Day expanded to become a truly global event. It now claims to have motivated action in more than 192 countries.
In 2000, Earth Day began taking aim at climate change, a problem that has grown more urgent in recent years.
This year's Earth Day centers around the slogan “Our Power, Our Planet” and encourages collective action against environmental impacts.
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FILE - Activists display prints replicating solar panels during a rally to mark Earth Day at Lafayette Square, Washington, April 23, 2022. (AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe, File)
FILE - Climate activists hold a rally to protest the use of fossil fuels on Earth Day at Freedom Plaza, April 22, 2023, in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A Minnesota prosecutor on Monday announced charges against an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer in the nonfatal shooting of a Venezuelan man during the Trump administration’s crackdown in Minnesota.
The officer, Christian Castro, is charged with four counts of second-degree assault and one count of falsely reporting a crime in the Jan. 14 shooting of Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said at a news conference. A warrant was issued for his arrest.
“There’s no modern precedent for what happened to the people here in Minnesota,” Moriarty said of what transpired during the Minnesota immigration crackdown. “So it requires a lot of us to dig in and look at ways to hold people accountable that we probably never thought we would be looking at in our careers.”
A federal officer shot Sosa-Celis in the thigh after he and another officer chased a different man to the apartment duplex where the man and Sosa-Celis lived. Moriarty said both Sosa-Celis and the other man were legally in the U.S.
Federal authorities initially accused Sosa-Celis and Alfredo Alejandro Aljorna of beating an officer with a broom handle and a snow shovel during the incident, but a federal judge later dismissed the charges and federal officials opened an investigation into whether two immigration officers lied under oath about what happened.
Department of Homeland Security and Justice Department officials didn’t immediately respond to emails seeking comment. DHS previously said that lying under oath is a “serious federal offense” and that making false statements could result in an officer being fired or prosecuted.
The city of Minneapolis last month released video of the incident captured from a distance by a city-owned security camera.
The administration sent thousands of officers to the Minneapolis and St. Paul area as part of President Donald Trump’s national deportation campaign. DHS, which oversees ICE, called Operation Metro Surge its largest immigration enforcement operation ever and deemed it a success.
But tensions mounted during the weekslong campaign and the shooting deaths of U.S. citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal officers provoked mass unrest and questions about officers’ conduct.
Hennepin County, which includes Minneapolis, has been conducting investigations into multiple incidents and filed charges last month against an ICE agent for alleged actions while on duty.
Minnesota leaders and the Trump administration have since clashed over which has the authority to investigate and prosecute officers for conduct while on duty. The Trump administration has suggested that Minnesota officials don’t have jurisdiction.
State officials have said they don’t trust the federal government to investigate itself or hold officers accountable.
Hennepin County continues to investigate Good's and Pretti’s killings and sued the administration in March over access to evidence in the two cases, as well as in the case involving Sosa-Celis. Although Moriarty hasn't charged anyone in either killing, she has said she's confident her office's investigations will bring transparency, even if not criminal prosecution.
Fingerhut reported from Des Moines, Iowa.
FILE - Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty explains her progressive approach to prosecutions, June 19, 2024, at her office in Minneapolis, Minn. (AP Photo/Mark Vancleave, File)
