Juneteenth celebrated across the country with parades, festivals, yoga

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The end of slavery was commemorated across the country Saturday with a series of parades, the unveiling of a statue of George Floyd in Brooklyn, and even open-air yoga as Juneteenth was inaugurated as the country’s newest federal holiday.

In New York, Gov. Cuomo announced that landmarks across the state, including Grand Central Terminal and Niagara Falls, would be lit red, black and green in honor of Juneteenth, which he also proclaimed a state holiday.

“While Juneteenth may be our newest federal holiday, the ethos we observe today — that independence, equality, and liberty for all are only guaranteed when we march as one towards those ideals; that the arc of the moral universe only bends towards justice when we work together to bend it — has always been the foundation of our national identity,” Cuomo said in a statement.

Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, the frontrunner in the mayoral race, celebrated the holiday alongside Sen. Chuck Schumer with a rally outside the Brooklyn Library, followed by a march.

A 6-foot wooden statue of Floyd, who died in police custody in Minneapolis last year, was unveiled in Flatbush. The unveiling was presided over by Floyd’s brother Terrence, who endorsed Adams for mayor earlier in the week, calling him “the racial justice leader we need right now.”

Created by New York-based sculptor Chris Carnabuci, the statue will remain at Flatbush Junction for a few weeks before being moved to Union Square in Manhattan. Floyd’s death unleashed outrage and nationwide protests demanding more police accountability and an end to police brutality.

Mayor de Blasio and his wife Chirlane McCray kicked off Juneteenth festivities in the city Friday with a block party at St. Nicholas Park in Harlem, organized by the Mayor’s Task Force on Racial Inclusion and Equality.

Across the country, in Tulsa, Okla., the city organized a Juneteenth Festival, which featured an open-air community yoga class.

President Biden signed the law proclaiming Saturday the first Juneteenth National Independence Day on Thursday, declaring that he would not “rest until the promise of equality is fulfilled for every one of us in every corner of this nation.”

The holiday commemorates the end of slavery on June 19, 1865, when a final group of slaves in Galveston, Texas, learned that they were free under President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation of 1863.

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz tweeted, “Today is Juneteenth, a special celebration of the fact that our country strives each and every day to make good on its promise to protect the inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all men and all women who are created equal.”

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