Judge Declares Mistrial In Case Against Texas Anti-ICE Protesters Trump Administration Said Were Antifa

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The Trump administration is still desperate to prove that Antifa is an actual organization that exists, and since the administration has also made a habit of wasting the courts’ time with cases borne from MAGA fiction, it is prosecuting a case in Texas in which Justice Department officials are accusing a group of protesters of being terrorists, saying they are part of a “North-Texas Antifa cell.” Well, on Tuesday, a federal judge declared a mistrial in that case because a defense lawyer wore a shirt in court that included images from the Civil Rights movement, which one could argue is an indication that the Trump-appointed judge believes the movement that sought equality for Black people was one of left-wing extremism.

From the Guardian:

US district judge Mark Pittman, an appointee of Donald Trump, declared a mistrial only hours after jury selection began at the federal courthouse in downtown Fort Worth. He abruptly halted the proceedings after MarQuetta Clayton, an attorney for one of the defendants, had been questioning potential jurors for about 20 minutes, taking issue with a shirt she was wearing underneath a black blazer. The shirt contained images of civil rights movement leaders, including Martin Luther King Jr and Shirley Chisholm, as well as images of protests from that time.

Clayton was present in the courtroom all day with her shirt visible to Pittman, but the judge did not stop the proceedings until Clayton began questioning the approximately 75 potential jurors who had assembled.

Pittman claimed the shirt sent a political message that could bias jurors and equate the actions of the defendants in the case with that of the civil rights movement, adding that the decision to wear the shirt may have been intentional. Pittman also argued that the defense lawyers would be outraged if prosecutors were to wear shirts that showed pro-ICE or pro-Trump imagery in front of a jury.

Well, now, that’s interesting.

So, according to this judge, the Civil Rights Movement is a nod to the left, while the movement to rid the nation of Black and brown immigrants at the behest of a loud and proud xenophobic bigot is a nod to the right. At this point, it’s just abundantly clear that MAGA America doesn’t even know what it means to be on the right side of history.

As for the case itself, the trial, which began Tuesday, revolves around nine defendants who were part of a group of protesters who were criminally charged after a demonstration at an ICE detention facility near Fort Worth on July 4, during which protesters set off fireworks, and some were accused of spraying ICE vehicles with graffiti.

As for what evidence the administration has that these protesters were part of a “North-Texas Antifa cell,” well, that’s just the MAGA-fied DOJ making shit up, as President Donald Trump and his minions continue to make a big political show out of going after a boogey man group that it has never been able to show evidence of the existence of.

Last September, Trump vowed to label Antifa a “major terrorist organization,” continuing to ignore all the federal authorities, including former Trump-appointed FBI Director Christopher Wray, who stated in 2020, while testifying to Congress, that Antifa is “not a group or an organization,” but “a movement or an ideology.”

This year, the Trump administration even went as far as to claim to have in custody the girlfriend of the founder of Antifa. Of course, neither the unnamed founder nor his unnamed girlfriend has been identified publicly, let alone prosecuted, probably because, much like the Antifa organization, these people don’t exist.

In fact, according to the Guardian, the case against the Texas protesters represents the first time the government has filed terrorism charges against Antifa, which is more of an indication of how far the administration is willing to take its propaganda than anything else.

Imagine if a Trump supporter were accused of a crime, and a Democrat-controlled Justice Department just decided to unilaterally declare them to be a member of the KKK — not that Antifa would be comparable to the Klan even if it were a real organization, which, again, it is not.

Even if the defendants of this case are guilty of vandalizing ICE vehicles, this administration still can’t seem to prosecute a case without feeling the need to lie, misdirect, and try its best to make its opponents seem more dangerous than they are.

We didn’t need a defense attorney wearing a shirt that is arguably inappropriate shirt to illustrate what role MAGA would have played in the actual Civil Rights era.

We see who these people are every day.

SEE ALSO:

What Is Antifa And Are They Really A ‘Terrorist Organization?’

Antifa And Terrorism 101 With Intelligence Expert Malcolm Nance