Chokehold Protester: 'We're Under Siege; It Must Stop'

Protesters across America took to the streets for a second night, demanding justice for Eric Garner.

People rallied together in opposition to a New York City grand jury's decision not to indict a white NYPD officer for placing Garner in a chokehold, leading to his death.

Judy Edwards, a Harlem resident and protester, spoke out in a rally Thursday night in lower Manhattan's Foley Square.

"We're under siege and it has to stop," Edwards told the Associated Press.

New York demonstrators targeted the city's major traffic arteries as well. They gathered near the Holland Tunnel, the Manhattan Bridge, and on the Westside Highway, temporarily shutting them down.

Protests rang out in other cities as well, including Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Minneapolis,Oakland, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. People carried signs and chanted.

Meanwhile, politicians spoke about the need for better police training, body cameras, and changes in the grand jury process to restore faith in the legal system.

In New York, police union leaders blasted Mayor Bill de Blasio for not supporting his officers when he outlined previously announced plans to teach them how to communicate better with people on the street.

President Barack Obama also weighed in, saying one of the chief issues at stake is "making sure that people have confidence that police and law enforcement and prosecutors are serving everybody equally."

The New York City grand jury decision comes just days after a 12-year-old boy was shot and killed by Cleveland police, and about a week after a grand jury in Ferguson, Missouri, chose not to indict an officer in the shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown.

A federal civil rights investigation is underway in the Garner case.