On November 13, 2018, a group of nearly 200 activists gathered outside Representative Nancy Pelosi’s office, just south of the Capitol Building, and knocked on the door. Without waiting for an answer, they entered and began chanting and singing protest songs.

The crowd was made up of representatives of the roughly year-old Sunrise Movement, and the sit-in at the Minority Leader’s office served as a bit of a coming-out party. One by one, the activists, mostly high school and college students, gave Pelosi’s staff letters demanding a Green New Deal and massive investment of cash into clean energy and initiatives for environmental justice. They were joined by Congresswoman-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez; 50 members of the group were eventually arrested.

The event was one of just hundreds of demonstrations that took place during the most active period of climate protest in United States history.