Police remove anti-war protestor from Bush speech

Cindy Sheehan, the mother of a fallen soldier in Iraq who has reinvigorated the anti-war movement, was arrested and removed from the House gallery just before President Bush's State of the Union address. Sheehan, who had been invited to attend the speech by Democratic Rep. Lynn Woolsey, from Sheehan's home state of California, was charged with the misdemeanor of demonstrating in the Capitol building, said Capitol Police Sgt. Kimberly Schneider. Sheehan was taken in handcuffs to police headquarters a few blocks away and released soon afterwards. The charges were later dropped. Schneider said Sheehan had worn a T-shirt with an anti-war slogan to the speech and covered it until she took her seat. Police warned her that such displays were not allowed, but she did not respond, the spokeswoman said. Police handcuffed Sheehan and removed her from the gallery before Bush arrived. Sheehan was arrested in September with about 300 other anti-war activists in front of the White House after a weekend of protests against the war in Iraq. In August, she spent 26 days camped near Bush's ranch in Crawford, TX, where he was spending a working vacation.