Across the country, in three major cases, an extremely dangerous precedent is being set for the harsh criminalization of political speech and protest. Even the basic right to privacy is under attack. The gravity of these repressive moves needs to be confronted and all those under attack need to be vigorously defended by people coming together from diverse political perspectives. 

** On June 24, anti-ICE protesters, convicted in March, 2026 of terrorism charges, were sentenced to a combined 450 years in prison for taking part in a July 4, 2025 protest, outside Prairieland Detention Center near Fort Worth, Texas. 

** On June 16, Homeland Security officials raided homes and arrested 12 of the 15 protesters that Federal prosecutors are charging with “conspiring to interfere with law enforcement” for protesting the ICE invasion in Minnesota earlier this year.

** On May 29, the “Spokane 3” protesters were convicted in Washington State on federal conspiracy charges for blocking immigrant prisoners from being transferred for deportation by ICE.¹

These cases are part of the larger fascist assault to crush all and any political protest. The Trump fascist regime has explicitly laid out a blueprint for this in Trump's executive order signed last September: “Designating Antifa As A Domestic Terrorist Organization.” Three days later Trump signed the “National Security Presidential Memorandum/NSPM-7: Countering Terrorism and Organized Political Violence,” which aimed at pulling the whole government into the repressive campaign. 

The NSPM-7 made clear that this “counter-terrorism” effort included going after ideas that the regime says fuel "terrorism," including “anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and anti-Christianity; support for the overthrow of the United States Government; extremism on migration, race, and gender; and hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.”

This was taken even further in a recent document from the White House spelling out their "Counterterrorism Strategy." This paints a picture of the U.S. under attack from "enemies, foreign and domestic" where they create whole new threat categories, including: "Narcoterrorists and Transnational Gangs; Legacy Islamist Terrorists; Violent Left-Wing Extremists, including Anarchists and Anti-Fascists." In the introduction to this document, Trump wrote: "if you hurt Americans, or are planning to hurt Americans, 'We Will Find You and We Will Kill You.'"

To enable this, the regime is gutting due process and violating the rights that are supposed to be protected by the Constitution. And to charge these cases, the regime is specifically going after political speech, thought and constitutionally protected protest!

All these fascist orders singled out “Antifa” as the supposed source of "terrorism" that needs to be uprooted and destroyed. The Department of (In)Justice claims that Antifa is a “militant enterprise made up of networks of individuals and small groups primarily ascribing to an ideology that explicitly calls for the overthrow of the United States Government, law enforcement authorities, and the system of law."

This is a dangerous lie. “Antifa” is not an organization or even an organized network! It has no “members,” no offices, no leaders, no unified ideology, program, strategy or tactics. Antifa is short for "anti-fascist" and reflects an orientation towards taking on fascists, racists, and various forms of injustice.

These cases pull together friends and comrades, or sometimes complete strangers into single "conspiracies." The prosecutions portray ordinary protest activities—working together to plan a protest, distributing political literature, attempting to communicate in private ways, and wearing black to protests as proof of these conspiracies to engage in "domestic terrorism" or "political violence." Even the term "domestic terrorism" is itself a made-up category created for the sole purpose of targeting political protest!

These extreme prosecutions, sentences and convictions are illegitimate outrages! Everyone needs to stand with the Prairieland Defendants, the Minneapolis 15, the Spokane 3 and all those under vicious assault. Protesting fascism is not a crime! At the same time, everyone needs to recognize that these cases put anyone and everyone who hates the fascist moves of the Trump MAGA regime in the crosshairs.

Prairieland Defendants Get 30-100 Year Sentences for Political Protest 

The convicted protesters were given the heaviest sentences possible ranging from 30-100 years for engaging in an anti-ICE protest outside the Prairieland ICE Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas on July 4, 2025. The case itself has been a testing ground for the regime’s attempts to criminalize "antifa"—going after political speech, anarchist zines, and even the right to privacy—painting protesters as if they are engaged in a criminal conspiracy because they don't want their communications tracked by the state.

The July 4 protest began as a noise demonstration using fireworks. One of the protesters did fire a weapon (claiming self-defense), and a cop was shot in the shoulder, causing a serious but not fatal injury. The prosecution claimed that the shooting was a prepared “ambush,” but they provided no real evidence for this. At the trial, the cop who'd been wounded admitted under cross-examination that he drew his weapon without seeing an obvious threat, and that he may have been pointing his firearm at a fleeing person’s back just before he was shot. This is consistent with the statement by the accused, Benjamin Song, who called the idea that he intended an “ambush” the night of July 4 “impossible.” Rather, when he saw the cop exit his car and point his gun at another protester, the defendant fired his weapon in the direction of the cop, saying he saw his “worst nightmare” and feared an instance of police brutality and murder. 

For this, Benjamin Song, a former U.S. Marine Corps reservist, was convicted of three counts of attempted murder in March of 2026, and has just been given a 100-year prison term by the judge. 

Using this as the centerpiece of its case, prosecutors charged the other protesters as participants in the same conspiracy. But the evidence for this alleged conspiracy is almost entirely based on political speech and first amendment protected communications.

Overt Political Prosecutions

The trial was based on criminalizing "antifa" as a terrorist group. The prosecution called an "expert witness" affiliated with the fascist think tank Center for Security Policy to explain "antifa" ideology and organization to the jury, reinforcing the lie that the defendants were members of a "coordinated extremist movement" rather than simply individuals who shared political views acting together against injustice. The DOJ even persisted in calling the defendants a "North Texas Antifa cell." What they were was a group of friends who held meetings, organized mutual aid, talked with each other on Signal, and shared a righteous outrage against the Trump fascist regime. 

One defendant, Daniel Sanchez-Estrada, wasn't even at the protest when the shooting occurred! But he was still convicted of "conspiracy to conceal documents" and related obstruction charges. He received 30 years. His crime? Moving boxes of political zines.

In order to paint this group as a "terrorist conspiracy," the prosecutors entered into evidence things like anarchist books, political zines, protest legal guides and anti-ICE artwork. The state even used things like the use of the encrypted messaging app, Signal, and Faraday bags² as a justification for this prosecution. This relies on the notion that if you insist on the right to privacy, you must be doing something suspect. Bullshit! People have a right to live their lives, talk and travel freely without a viciously repressive state spying on them at every turn. 

The whole trial and sentencing was based on political, not a criminal prosecution. Even at the sentencing, according to the Prairieland Defendants Support Committee, the judge said he was ordering the maximum prison terms allowed in each case because “the state wants to send a message to anyone who shares a similar ideology.”

Let that sink in. This judge, and the fascist regime, is saying that if you share the same ideas as these anarchist, anti-fascist organizers, you too should face a criminal prosecution and be imprisoned for decades!

The FBI raids in Minneapolis

On June 16, federal prosecutors filed criminal charges against 15 people, mostly from Minnesota, accused of “conspiring to interfere with law enforcement” during the ICE invasion and occupation of Minnesota earlier this year. The U.S. attorney for the District of Minnesota, began his press conference by claiming that “political violence is a national scourge in our times.” He wasn't referring to the ICE murders of Alex Pretti and Renee Good; or the fact that 50 people have died in ICE hellholes since the start of Trump fascism 2.0. No, to these fascists, the “national scourge of our times” is the anti-ICE protests that erupted after Trump ordered a massive ICE invasion in Minnesota last winter—Operation Metro Surge—that led to the killings of Pretti and Good.

The U.S. attorney claimed that federal law enforcement is “combating” the “violence” of protesters, and that the 15 defendants took part in a “conspiracy to impede or injure federal officers.” This, even though they weren't even all part of the same demonstrations!!

The prosecutor also claimed, and repeated over and over, that the defendants were members or associates of two Minneapolis-based “Antifa” groups that “violently opposed the enforcement of federal law” in Minnesota. He called them “anti-ICE rioters” even though the political protests were overwhelmingly peaceful—except for the vicious ICE thugs brutalizing, beating, pepper spraying and violently arresting people.

The indictment³ spanning 94 pages, is chilling evidence of the way the political police are presenting political activist groups and ordinary protest organizing as violent extremism associated with so-called "antifa" groups. As with Texas, this includes the claiming that using Signal⁴—the encrypted messaging apps for correspondence—is "evidence" that protesters were "conspiring" with each other to commit crimes against ICE. 

And again, by basing their case on conspiracy charges, the prosecutors do not have to prove whether any of the alleged conspirators committed any alleged crime themselves. All they need to prove is that the defendants “undertook an overt act” which contributed to an overall "unlawful objective." The unlawful objective was defending their neighbors against illegitimate ICE thuggery.

The bulk of the indictment details texts and chats among those indicted, or discussion groups they were in, where they are discussing and coordinating logistics for a protest blockading ICE facilities. The prosecutors paint this as an "overt act" to have the 15 defendants convicted of conspiring to commit violence against authorities.

With NSPM-7’s explicit directive to categorize protest as terrorism, civil disobedience is now being equated with violent rioting, and solidarity with conspiracy. All of those accused in this case were among those in Minnesota (and across the country) who were condemning and protesting the armed ICE Gestapos' two brutal, public murders of Good and Pretti. The U.S. Attorney for Minnesota indicated there could be more charges as they continue investigating the response to the assault on immigrants in Minnesota. He said, “If you are actively conspiring to impede law enforcement… you ought to go on the assumption that we’re watching, and we’ll get you."

Outside the courthouse where the defendants made their first appearance, dozens of people gathered to speak out against the charges. A former president of the National Lawyers Guild spoke to the crowd, saying: “What’s wrong with being ungovernable?” He called the charges “thought crimes,” and an “act of political retribution” aimed at suppressing dissent. Later, federal agents used teargas and pepper spray to force the crowd to leave.

As an attorney defending some of the accused put it, “This is a fascist prosecution. People are being prosecuted for peaceful political dissent.” 

Spokane 3: "Spontaneous Conspiracy" Charges Criminalize All Political Protest

On May 29, 2026 a jury in Spokane, Washington, found three protesters—the “Spokane 3”—guilty of federal conspiracy charges based on the prosecutors’ bogus theory that the three had joined together in a “conspiracy” at the protest itself “to impede federal officers in their duty.” This stemmed from a protest of hundreds of people in June 2025 outside an ICE office in Spokane. Demonstrators sought to prevent ICE from transporting two Venezuelan men who were legally present in the United States. Protesters peacefully surrounded the bus, linked arms, sat in the roadway, and delayed the transfer for several hours. ICE thugs pushed aggressively into the crowd, grabbing people by their arms, and necks and pushing them down on the ground. There was spraypainting, and someone let out the air in the tires of the ICE vehicles but there were no injuries. Thirty-one people were arrested, mainly for failure to disperse, charges which were in the main later dropped.

These were people heroically acting together to stop a grave, illegal and immoral injustice. 

In the weeks after, the Trump fascist DOJ sent a memo to federal prosecutors across the country insisting that they prosecute and publicize their prosecutions of anti-ICE protesters. One month after this demand, nine Spokane protesters were indicted for “conspiring to injure or impede federal officers.” The conviction carries a prison term of up to six years and a fine of up to $250,000! 

One defense attorney said afterwards he thought the whole verdict was surreal, and frankly, “If not a single police officer got hurt and none of [the three defendants] were involved in damaging property, I just don't even know how you charge this case.”

You charge it by using the same kind of blanket conspiracy charges we pointed to above. But in this case, as the defense argued, the prosecutors were arguing there was a “spontaneous conspiracy.” The prosecutors asserted that just by virtue of people all being at the same protest—even if they didn't know each other—they were engaged in a "conspiracy." So they need not prove the defendants personally damaged the ICE vehicles, but instead could just present photos and video evidence of defendants' various actions at the protest, insisting that the three defendants were working to facilitate, assist or shield property destruction carried out by others in the crowd. Even the judge instructed the jury that a conspiracy doesn't require a pre-planned meeting.

The defendants have filed what is called a Rule 29 motion, asking the judge to set aside their guilty verdicts because the prosecutors’ proof at trial was so weak that no rational juror should have found them guilty. If the judge does not grant that, then the three are expected to appeal.

This guilty verdicts should be immediately vacated, but even still, think through the dangerous logic: with this ridiculous charge of "spontaneous conspiracy" any gathering of people acting against the Trump fascist regime could be considered a "conspiracy."

Uniting All Who Can Be United to Defeat This Repression

As the revolutionary leader Bob Avakian said in his recent major talk, HUMANITY ON THE BRINK: A Forced March Into the Abyss, or Forging a Way Forward Out of the Madness?:

... it is necessary to be prepared, actively as well as ideologically in terms of orientation, to meet and defeat this repression, broadly mobilizing people in opposition to it, including people who have political disagreements with those targeted at any given time.

And through this fight, it is necessary to win more people, building up more organized forces, for the fight against Trump/MAGA fascism, in terms of the immediate situation, and for the fundamental goal of revolution—giving life to what we describe as the R/CR/More R phenomenon (that is, revolution and resistance against the system, met by the counter-revolution of the repression of the regime, and met in turn by calling forth more powerful resistance and building for revolution). This is going to be an extremely acute focus and front of the struggle against the Trump regime and for the possibility of something even more fundamental to change. So it is necessary, as I said, to be prepared both ideologically and practically, and to make this a mass question, and give life to the orientation of uniting all who can be united against this repression, regardless of even significant differences among those so united—but, at the same time, not allowing this, even as serious as it is likely to become, to cause people to panic and to backtrack on struggling against the regime and for more fundamental change.