This story was last updated at 11:59 p.m.

Hundreds gathered in the streets for the eighth consecutive night of D.C. protests over the police killing of George Floyd. The demonstrations persisted through pouring rain and thunderstorms, and the night ended without any violence between protesters and police.

Around 9 p.m., as the drenched crowds near the White House thinned, a few hundred people marched toward the U.S. Capitol. They linked arms, chanted and, at one point, stopped to sing “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” according to independent journalist Abdallah Fayyad. The song is often called the black national anthem.

Crowd stops to sing “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” known by some as the black national anthem. Poem/lyrics by African American poet James Weldon Johnson, the first black professor hired at NYU.

Teddy Roosevelt also appointed him as US Consul in Venezuela and Nicaragua: pic.twitter.com/4bsSYewhJg

— Abdallah Fayyad (@abdallah_fayyad) June 6, 2020

Throughout the night, crowds chanted “No justice, no peace,” and the name of Breonna Taylor — Taylor, who was killed by police in her Louisville home in March, would have turned 27 on Friday. At least twice, protesters sang her “happy birthday.”

One woman came to the protests with a sign that read “Breonna Taylor still needs justice,” and urged people to call local and state officials in Kentucky to demand the officers be charged in her case.

At the start of the evening, protesters gathered along the newly-christened Black Lives Matter Plaza, a stretch of road leading up to the White House that the city renamed on Friday. The District organized seven muralists to paint the words “Black Lives Matter” on the pavement in 35-foot-tall yellow letters spanning about two blocks.

The D.C. chapter of Black Lives Matter called the mural “performative” on Twitter Friday morning, saying it’s a distraction from the mayor’s failures to act on demands like decreasing the city’s police budget. “Black Lives Matter means Defund the police,” the organization wrote.

Protesters at Friday’s demonstration had varying opinions on the mural.

“Some people think it’s not doing nothing, but it’s better to show a sign of change,” said Daniel Jecty, 21, a demonstrator at the protest who stayed even in the pouring rain. “ Having the symbol out here for Black Lives Matter is better than nothing.”

Another protester, Kristen, said she liked the mural and that “it sends a really strong message,” but that “it’s important to remember that we can’t be distracted by it and we still have to keep focus on the actual reform happening with the police department,” she told DCist. “You know, the mural is great, but if we don’t actually make change where it matters, then it’s kind of an empty thing.”

By the end of the night, someone had scrawled the words “not good enough” on one of the mural’s large yellow letters.

The D.C. Council is expected to vote Tuesday on a police reform bill from Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen that would outlaw chokeholds, speed the release of officer body camera footage, and prevent anyone affiliated with law enforcement from serving on a board that investigates complaints filed against police. Ward 1 Coucilmember Brianne Nadeau also introduced a bill to prohibit D.C. police from using tear gas to disperse protesters.

A number of people brought their young children to the protests in downtown D.C. on Friday. Eight-year-old Zyah Brown, from D.C., came out with her mom wearing a mask that read “A black woman created this.” Looking around the crowd, Zyah said, “I feel powerful. I feel grateful for all these people representing black lives and George Floyd.”

Keisha Haddock also brought her young children to Friday’s protest.

“This is our history,” she said, “This is something that we will never ever forget, and I wanted for my children to be able to see our people come together with everybody else’s people to stand for one cause,” she said.

Haddock said she expected thunderstorms, “but Black Lives Matter. Therefore we are here, and we will [stay] here as well.”

Jecty, too, was undeterred by the downpour. “I’m here in the rain because what else are we going to do? You’ve got to do this every day. You can’t be a day off,” he said. “F**k the rain. I don’t care.”

This isn’t the first night that the protests have been affected by the weather—on Thursday night, rain storms dampened the crowd some, but a couple hundred people remained outside Lafayette Square even after the downpour.

The law enforcement presence in D.C. has also scaled down over the past couple of days. Friday appeared to have the most limited law enforcement presence since Monday, when the Trump administration deployed officers from more than a dozen federal agencies into the city. Still, around six bus loads of military personnel were spotted unloading near the White House, per Voice of America.

Attorney General William Barr said Thursday he may pull back some of the federal officers, as demonstrations have remained peaceful. Some 900 active-duty troops that were brought to the region — though never deployed downtown — have been sent back to their bases.

A video posted on Twitter showed protesters cheering as members of the Metropolitan Police Department took a knee on Friday. The move, which has been employed by police across the country this week, has sometimes been praised as a sign of solidarity with protesters, but also criticized as an empty symbol meant to appease crowds.

Around 7 p.m., during the downpour, a group of protesters gathered in front of the Metropolitan Police Department Headquarters. Organizers read a list of names of people killed by police officers in the region. The list includes D’Quan Young, Marqueese Alston, Jeffrey Price, Jamaal Byrd, Terrence Sterling, Amir Brooks, Raphael Briscoe, Alonzo Smith, Miriam Carey, Trey Joyner, Bijan Ghaisar, Gerald Javon Hall, Isabelle Duval, and Sherman Evans.

The massive federal law enforcement presence has led to a series of clashes between Mayor Muriel Bowser and President Donald Trump.

Trump tweeted about the mayor twice on Friday, calling her “grossly incompetent, and in no way qualified to be running an important city like Washington, D.C.” He also accused her budget of being “totally out of control,” and said she asks the federal government for “handouts.” The D.C. budget has been in surplus, though it’s now suffering from the economic impacts of COVID-19.

Bowser has sharply criticized Trump’s rhetoric around the protests and his administration’s deployment of federal authorities into the city, arguing that it has made even clearer why D.C. needs statehood (Bowser has limited control over what federal forces are called into the city because the District is not a state). The mayor tweeted a video Friday night showing a giant a projection of the words “Black Lives Matter” onto a building in the plaza near the White House, saying “we turned on the night light for him so he dreams about #BlackLivesMatter Plaza.”

Earlier in the evening, a crowd also gathered along 16th Street for a vigil organized by a number of houses of worship. At 5:45 p.m., the churches that line the street tolled their bells for eight minutes and 46 seconds, the length of time Minneapolis Police officer Derek Chauvin kept his knee on Floyd’s neck.

The mostly-white crowd was full of people of all ages, including children and babies. During the bell ringing, everyone took a knee in silence. The only sound came from the church bells and occasional honk of support from a passing car.

All is silent now, except for the church bells. They’ll toll for 8 mins 46 secs, the amount of time the police officer’s knee was on George Floyd’s neck. pic.twitter.com/aUlXzwlooR

— Mikaela Lefrak (@MikaelaLefrak) June 5, 2020

Throughout the week, demonstrations have formed in suburbs throughout the D.C. region. On Friday night, more than a hundred people gathered on Columbia Pike in Arlington and planned to march to the county’s courthouse in honor of Breonna Taylor’s birthday.

D.C. is preparing for protests on Saturday to draw the largest crowds since the demonstrations began last Friday.

This post has been updated throughout.