Democracy Now! Audio - Democracy Now! 2026-01-23 Friday

Episode Date: January 23, 2026

Headlines for January 23, 2026; “Emperor” Trump’s So-Called Board of Peace Erases Palestinians from Gaza Governance; Nekima Levy Armstrong Jailed After Protesting ICE Official Who Also Serves as Pastor in St. Paul; ICE Out of Minnesota: Unions & Churches Lead Economic Blackout in “Day of Truth and Freedom”; “Kings and Pawns”: Howard Bryant on What Jackie Robinson & Paul Robeson Reveal About America

From New York, this is Democracy Now. I'm a real estate person at heart, and it's all about location. And I said, look at this location on the sea. Look at this beautiful piece of property. What it could be for so many people, it'll be so great. People that are living so poorly are going to be living so well. As President Trump lays out his vision for a post-war Gaza, what some might call Trump Gaza. We'll speak with Trapside News reporter Sharif Abdo Kuduze about his new investigation, leaked documents.

Planned community in Rafa would force Palestinians into Israeli panopticon. Then to Minneapolis, we'll talk to the lawyer for Nikima Levy Armstrong, who is still in jail. After she was arrested, after peacefully protesting in a St. Paul church, where a top-ice official serves as a pastor. David Easterwood is a pastor here. He is also the director of the field office for ICE in St. Paul. So someone who claims to worship God, teaching people in this church about God,

is out there overseeing ICE agents. We'll also speak with a union member who's part of one of the many unions joining today's Day of Truth and Freedom and Economic Blackout to protest the surge of ICE agents into Minnesota. And today marks the 50th anniversary of the death of Paul Robson, the great actor, singer, athlete, scholar, blacklisted and hounded by the government for his political beliefs. We'll look at a new book, Kings and Ponds,

on how Jackie Robinson, the Brooklyn Dodgers star, who integrated the all-white major baseball leagues, was pressured to testify against Robeson before Huac, the House and American Activities Committee. I've been asked to express my views on Paul Robeson's statement in Paris. One man is now a legend. The other was erased from history. We'll speak with acclaim sports journalist Howard Bryant, author of Kings and Ponds, Jackie Robinson and Paul Robson in America. All that and more coming up.

Welcome to Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the Warren Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman. In Minnesota, hundreds of businesses are expected to close today as part of a one-day economic blackout to protest the ongoing ICE immigration crackdown. Organizers of today's strike include faith leaders and unions. They're calling for people to not work, go to school or shop. Businesses closing include the famed Walker Arts Center. On Thursday, the prominent Twin Cities civil rights activist and attorney, Nekima Levy Armstrong, and two others were arrested on federal charges for their role in peacefully protesting inside a St. Paul church where a top ICE official serves as a pastor.

The three-faced charges under the Face Act, that's the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, a law written to protect abortion clinics. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Levy Armstrong. arrest, then the White House posted an AI-generated image to make it appear Levy Armstrong was crying after her arrest. Her skin was made to look darker. The Justice Department also attempted to bring charges against the journalist and former CNN anchor Don Lemon who covered the church protest, but a federal magistrate judge rejected the request. We'll speak to Nekima Levy Armstrong's lawyer and get an update.

on today's economic blackout after headlines. Outrage is growing in Columbia Heights, Minnesota, after ICE agents detained a five-year-old boy named Liam Ramos and his father, who's an asylum seeker. Photos from the scene show a masked agent standing next to Liam, who's wearing his backpack in a blue winter hat with bunny ears. He just returned from preschool. The father and son were then quickly sent to a detention jail in Texas.

On Thursday, Vice President J.D. Vance visited Minneapolis and defended ICE for targeting the boy's father and detaining the preschooler. So the story is that ICE detained a five-year-old. Well, what are they supposed to do? Are they supposed to let a five-year-old child freeze to death? Local officials in Columbia Heights condemned the detention of five-year-old Liam Ramos. Rachel James serves on the Columbia Heights City Council. She described efforts by neighbors to protect the little boy. I heard one neighbor say, I live in this house. I'm part of this family. I can take him, let him come to me. I heard another neighbor on the other side say, I have the forms. His mom signed the forms. Let me have him. I know him. I know him. I kept saying, stop, wait. He can go with us. He can go with the teachers. And then they took him over to the car and he was just standing there. And then they quickly put him in the back seat and drove away. On Thursday, the lawyer for the Ramos family, Mark Prokash, said Liam and his dad had, had. come to the U.S. in 2024 from Ecuador seeking asylum. Liam and his dad did enter the United States at a port of entry to seek asylum through the

CBP1 app at the Brownsville border crossing. So they did everything right when they came in. They used the app. They made an appointment. They came to the border and presented themselves to Customs and Border Patrol. They've shared all. all of their information with the government, and they were following the process. They were just trying to secure safety and persecution for their family from their home country. But ICE didn't care about the fact that they had those pending claims and then just arrested them. On Capitol Hill, seven Democratic lawmakers joined Republicans to pass a $1.2 trillion government funding package that includes $64 billion more for the Department. of Homeland Security and $10 billion more for ICE.

The Democrats voting for the measure were Henry Quayar and Vicente Gonzalez, both of Texas, Jared Golden of Maine, Marie-Gluzen-Camp Perez of Washington, Don Davis of North Carolina, and Laura Gillen and Tom Swazi, both of New York. In news from Gaza, Israeli tank shelling killed four Palestinians Thursday. The killings came as President Trump was launching his so-called Board of Peace, in Davos, Switzerland. At the ceremony, Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, outlined his vision for turning Gaza into a glitzy seaside resort filled with futuristic high-rise buildings. In the Middle East, they build cities like this in, you know, two, three million people. They build

this in three years. And so stuff like this is very doable if we make it happen. Kushner said the first phase of the project would be rebuilding the southern Gaza city of Rafa, which was leveled by Israel. The Rafa border crossing with Egypt is expected to reopen next week. Many Palestinians fear Israel and the U.S. will move to forcibly displace them from Gaza. On Thursday, Israeli President Isaac Herzog met in Davos with the leader of Somalia's breakaway Somaliland region. Israel recently became the first nation in the world to recognize Somaliland as an independent nation. They've been reports. Israel wants to expel Palestinians en masse from Gaza to Somaliland. This all comes as Palestinians in Gaza struggled

to survive with little food or shelter. This is Mohamed al-Qudra in Kanunas, speaking about Trump's plan for Gaza. No matter how much he says, it's all in vain. Why? Because we as citizens aren't seeing any real change on the ground. The suffering remains the same. Rain, there are no tents, no shelters, as you can see, the destruction.

Wood, we don't have that. President Trump announced that the second phase had begun, but we haven't seen anything. People in Al-Mawasi are living in tents, displaced. People in the East can't reach their homes. You can hear the shooting, the shelling, day and night, martyrs. Russian, Ukrainian, and U.S. negotiators have begun meeting in Abu Dhabi for the first trilateral talks since Russia invaded Ukraine almost four years ago.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said he hopes the talks are a step towards ending the war. On Thursday, Zelensky met with President Trump and Davos, with Russian President Vladimir Putin, met with Trump's envoy Steve Whitkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner in Moscow. The Wall Street Journal's reporting that Trump administration's been plotting ways to topple the Cuban government in the wake of the U.S. abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. The journal reports the U.S. is, quote, searching for Cuban government insiders who can help cut a deal, unquote, to push out the current leadership. On Thursday, the Guardian reported the U.S. used a similar

model in Venezuela. Four sources told the paper that Maduro's vice president, Delci Rodriguez, and her powerful brother Jorge, had pledged to operate with the Trump administration if Maduro was removed from power. Rodriguez is now serving as Venezuela's interim leader. The United States officially left the World Health Organization Thursday. Public health experts fear the U.S. decision will hinder global public health initiatives. Dr. Thomas Friede the former head at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention called the withdrawal a grave error. He said, quote, health threats do not respect borders and weakening global cooperation makes Americans less safe, unquote. The Trump administration's ordered a review of almost all federal funding going to more than a dozen Democratic-led states.

The move comes just days after President Trump threatened to suspend federal funding for sanctuary cities and states at the end of the month. States that could be impacted include California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington, as well as Washington, D.C. Former Special Counsel Jack Smith testified before Congress Thursday and defended his decision to indict Donald Trump for seeking to overturn the 2020 election and removing classified documents. from the White House. Stand by my decisions as special counsel, including the decision to bring charges against President Trump. Our investigation developed proof

beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in criminal activity. If asked whether to prosecute a former president based on the same facts today, I would do so regardless of whether that president was a Democrat or a Republican. No one. no one should be above the law in this country, and the law required that he be held to account.

So that is what I did. During the hearing, Washington Congress member Pramilla Jaipo questioned Jack Smith about the importance of accountability. How would you describe the toll on our democracy if we do not hold a president accountable for attempting to steal an election? My belief is that if we do not hold the most powerful people in our society to the same standards of the rule of law, it can be catastrophic. A major Trump billionaire ally is now the partial owner of the social media platform TikTok, a group of investors, including Larry Ellison's company Oracle, agreed to a $14 billion deal to give them control of the U.S. version of the platform being spying. off from ByteDance, a Chinese own company. In 2024, Congress banned TikTok claiming national security concerns over its ties to China. But Trump had allowed the platform to keep operating as a deal was worked out. Ellison is also the largest shareholder of Paramount, the parent company of CBS.

And in the Philippines, a radio journalist has been sentenced to between 12 and 18 years in prison, in a case widely condemned by press freedom groups. Frenche Mae Kumpio has been jailed since February 2020 when she and four others were arrested for allegedly having ties to the Communist Party of the Philippines. She was convicted of terror financing. UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and Opinion Irene Khan has criticized Kumpio's prosecution, saying the charges were filed, quote, in retaliation for her work as a journalist, unquote. And those are some of the headlines. This is Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman in New York, joined by Democracy Now as Juan Gonzalez in Chicago.

Hi, Juan. Hi, Amy, and welcome to all of our listeners and viewers across the country and around the world. We begin today's show looking at the Trump administration's contested plans for post-war Gaza. As President Trump formally inaugurated his so-called Board of Peace at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Thursday. His son-in-law, Jared Kushner, presented his vision of turning Gaza into an upscale, futuristic seaside resort with gleaming skyscrapers and entirely new cities, an ambitious proposal that would require an investment of at least $25 billion. Kushner outlined the so-called Gaza master plan as he presented slides, one of which showed a map of the besieged territory

divided into different zones. Kushner said the first phase of the project would be to rebuild the southern Gaza city of Rafah, which was leveled by Israeli attacks. The Rafa border crossing with Egypt is expected to reopen next week. Families in Gaza fear Israel and the U.S. will move to forcibly displace them to another country. This is Jared Kushner laying out his plan. We've developed ways to redevelop Gaza. Gaza, as President Trump's been saying, has amazing potential, and this is for the people of Gaza, we've developed into zones. In the beginning, we were toying with the idea of saying, let's build a free zone. And then we have a Hamas zone. And then we said, you know what, let's just plan for catastrophic success.

President Trump presented his concluding remarks on the plan Thursday, saying, quote, we're going to be very successful in Gaza. I'll say person at heart. And it's all about location. And I said, look at this location on the sea. Look at this beautiful piece of property. What it could be for so many people. It'll be so great. People that are living so poorly are going to be living so well. This all comes as Palestinians in Gaza struggle to survive with little food or shelter due to Israel's relentless blockade of humanitarian aid. This is Mohamed al-Kodra and Kahn Yunus responding to Trump's plan for Gaza. No matter how much he says, it's all in vain. Why? Because we as citizens aren't seeing any real change on the ground.

The suffering remains the same. Rain, there are no tents, no shelters, as you can see, the destruction. Wood, we don't have that. President Trump announced that the second phase had begun, but we haven't seen anything. People in Al-Mawasi are living in tents, displaced. People in the East can't reach their homes. You can hear the shooting, the shelling, day and night, martyrs. For more, we're joined by Sharif of Dukadous, the award-winning journalist and Middle East North Africa editor at DropSight News.

His new piece is headlined, leaked documents planned community and ruffa would force Palestinians into Israeli panopticon. He's joining us from Los Angeles. Sharif, thanks so much for being with us on Democracy Now. Start off by responding to what happened yesterday in Davos, Switzerland. President Trump, surrounded by many autocrats of the world, signing on to a charter agreement for the so-called Board of Peace, which Trump will lead even beyond his presidency, lead indefinitely. He personally has veto power and is in charge. of the money, apparently a billion dollars a seat for those who will be part of this Board of Peace. If you can respond to that and then lay out what you've learned from leaked documents. Right. Well, it's a billion dollars to have a permanent seat. People who signed up get three years.

But, you know, if we look at the charter of the Board of Peace, there's no mention of Palestine. There's no mention of Palestinians. There's no mention of Gaza. There's no mention of the right of return. There's no mention of the right to self-determination. What it does say is that, you know, Trump is chairman for life and it gives him these, you know, king-like powers where he can only be replaced if he resigns

or if he is deemed incapacitated under, but it needs to be a unanimous vote that is, you know, it's kind of unattainable. He can appoint new member states. He can veto any decision. And so you have this Board of Peace. You have what's called the founding executive board underneath that that has people like Jared Kushner, Marco Rubio, and others on it.

And then you have something under that called the Gaza Executive Board, which is made up of Palestinian technocrats that are supposed to implement these policies. So this is almost a farcical manifestation of colonialism in the 21st century. It's kind of like a parody of a colonial body. If you had proposed this a few years ago, you would have been laughed out of the room, except that now it's actually real. And at the event yesterday, you played a clip of it. Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, delivered this presentation of what he called the master plan

for Gaza's redevelopment and reconstruction. And yeah, you saw these kind of, you know, these renderings of high coastal towers and mixed zones and so forth. It looked like an AI fantasy. And let me just say, one of the, one of the slides in the presentation included Arabic script incorrectly written in reverse, so from left to right, Arabic script is written from right to left, and with the letters disconnected. So, I mean, you know, it's hard to take these people seriously. I mean, they're buffoonish. But the problem is, is that they control the largest military and economy in the world. So, but what we actually

Actually, you know, when he talks about residential zones and the future of Gaza, we actually now have a glimpse of what is actually being planned. And it is extremely frightening. It's very Orwellian. So first, what we have to understand is that Gaza has effectively been cut in half. So after October 10th, the Israeli military withdrew to what's called now the yellow line. And they occupy and control over 50% of the Gaza Strip. And analysis of satellite imagery by forensic architecture that we published at DropSight News shows how Israel is physically altering the geography of the land in that part of Gaza, east of the yellow line that it does control. So what they're doing is they're constructing a lot of military infrastructure.

There's been 13 military outposts built just since the ceasefire. So now there's something like 48 or 50 military outposts in this area. They've also built roads that are being connected to bases and settlements outside of Gaza in Israel. And what they're doing is essentially is establishing facts on the ground. This is what Israel always does. Facts on the ground that will eventually become permanent. And actually just yesterday, we found out that Israel is digging a trench that is many meters deep along the yellow line in Gaza, basically to prevent Palestinians from crossing from one side to the other to the side that Israel controls.

So Gaza is literally being cut in half with a moat. So this is the new reality. And what they're doing, in addition to this construction of military outposts and roads, is also systematic destruction of Palestinian property, of buildings, and of infrastructure. And what we found, what forensic architecture found through the satellite analysis, is that there's one square kilometer between two military corridors in southern Gaza, in Rafah, where Israel is engaged in a pattern that's not visible anywhere else.

What they're doing is they are raising the land, they're compacting the ground, and they're clearing the rubble. And they're doing this in a way that suggests this is the site of the first so-called residential zone or planned community where it's going to be built. And we know that they're starting in Rafah. And so what will this so-called planned community look like? Last week, the Civil Military Coordination Center, the CMCC, which is a U.S.-led body, held a presentation for this so-called planned community.

Now, the CMCC was established by CENTCOM a week after the ceasefire went into effect. It's led by a U.S. Army lieutenant general. and it's supposed to oversee and monitor the implementation of the ceasefire. And it's located in this big warehouse in southern

Israel. And last week they held this big presentation for this plan community that's supposed to house up to 25,000 Palestinians in Rafah. And we obtained leaked documents of this presentation.

And they kind of very meticulously outline what this area is going to look like. It goes through, you know, the municipality, the economy, health, education, law and order. And after actually reviewing a transcript of these materials, which we sent to Jonathan Wittall, who is a former senior UN official, you know, in Palestine from 2002 to 2005, I'm sorry, 2020 to 25, he said that these new communities built on the rubble of people's homes are not only governance labs to test ultimate control and subjugation, but they're also the reincarnation of refugee camps. So we can go through some of what these documents show.

So let me just briefly say. So first, it provides a set of criteria for deciding which Palestinians will be, quote, invited to live there. And this includes undergoing security checks to, prevent the entry of what they called Hamas elements. It doesn't specify who's going to be doing these security checks, but historically in Gaza, the movement of Palestinians, for example, in and out of Gaza, has always been controlled by Kogat, which is the branch of the Israeli military that oversees

the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. So to enter the so-called housing zone or planned community, Palestinians will have to pass through a security checkpoint, and everyone entering, will be registered with biometric documentation to enable them to move around, to enable them to access services, and that registry will be based on Palestinian ID numbers in coordination with Kogat.

So, you know, the Israeli military already has an incredible amount of monitoring and surveillance of Palestinians in Gaza, but this gives them yet another layer of monitoring through biometric documentation. For the economy, for example, it brings all economic transactions under increased surveillance. So Gaza historically has a cash-based economy.

Now, Palestinians living in this zone will be used something called electronic shekel wallets to do transactions. It also says that residents should be able to import products into Gaza, but those products will be subject to security checks at the crossings. It makes no mention of the fact that Israel controls, the crossings. And as we know, for the last 20 years, they've enforced a siege on Gaza where they prevented many goods from coming in. But Sharif, Shereef, go ahead, John.

Yeah, Sharif, if I can just interrupt you. I'm just trying to get a sense of the issue of the so-called Palestinian technocrats that are supposedly, that will be supposedly implementing this. Could you talk about that aspect of it and their relationship of it? the so-called technocrats to the resistance forces within Gaza? Well, I mean, these are different people, among them, Ali Shah, who is the head of it, who's a former member of the Palestinian Authority. You know, he's the one who announced at the event through video link yesterday at Davos that the Rafah border crossing will be open in both ways next week.

They're selected to, you know, implement these policies on the ground. Originally, the idea was that different Palestinian factions would appoint this kind of committee through a democratic process, but that didn't happen. They were just selected by the U.S., by Israel, and so forth. The reaction of Palestinian factions to their appointment has been actually interesting. They haven't tried to condemn them for joining this. Hamas put out a statement that seemed semi-supportive of them. And I think, you know, they've been put in a position where any Palestinian kind of input to try and get some aid into Gaza, to try and ease the suffering of Palestinians, to try and, you know, help engineer what the future of Gaza will be, was kind of welcome.

But the problem is, is that they're, you know, multi-layers down in this hierarchical structure, this colonial mandate structure that is overseeing. Gaza. You have the Board of Peace. You have Trump as emperor of it. You have this founding executive committee. And then, you know, they're under that. They have absolutely no sovereignty, no control and no real say over the decisions of the lives of Palestinians in Gaza. And you've written that this proposed, this first proposed residential zone is sometimes referred to as the Emirati compound. Could you talk about the role of the UAE and all of this? Yeah, it's referred to in the presentation as the Emirati compound. It's unclear, you know, why that name was chosen. There is the Emirati Field Hospital in Rafah that is not far from this site where this first

zone is being built. Now, you know, under the education part of this presentation for, and this is perhaps the kind of like the most Orwellian part of it, it says that they should create schooling and a curriculum that, quote, will not be Hamas-based, but will follow culture of peace principles, for example, modeled after the UAE, end quote. Now, that phrase, a culture of peace, is mentioned in the normalization agreement between the United Arab Emirates and Israel that was signed in 2020 as part of the Abraham Accords. Now, since then, the UAE has normalized relations with Israel more than any other Arab country. They have, very robust trade, tourism, defense deals, surveillance like tech deals.

And it seems that this idea of, you know, the education idea for this housing zone is aimed at promoting an Emirati-inspired re-education program that will promote normalization with Israel. And, you know, the last thing I'll say about this presentation is that it also, it also, says that, you know, the land on which it's being built, they need to examine the private rights of Palestinian property holders so they can see about mechanisms for compensation to these, you know, whoever's land it once was. You know, they have the nerve to mention private property rights of Palestinians in Gaza, or nearly the entire population, has been displaced,

mostly multiple times. Nearly every building has been damaged or destroyed outright. And, you know, there's a genocide where Israel has created the conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians.

And so they coldly talk about private property rights as if, and compensation, as if this genocidal war that we've all witnessed for over two years never happened. But essentially, you know, that's the vision of what's to come. We heard Jared Kushner say, you know, we're not going to do the free zone and the Hamas zone.

And he's referring to those two sides of the yellow line, which is kind of how it stands. You know, one side where most Palestinians are and the other side that's controlled by Israel. He said, you know, we want, what do you say, catastrophic success? And you saw the rendering showing all of Gaza. I don't think that's what's actually going to happen. We're seeing now, as I mentioned before, there's a trench literally being built that's splitting Gaza and half. Israel is consolidating control. And what you're going to have is these Orwellian housing zones where Israel and outside forces have complete economic, social, and security control over every aspect of the lives of a new generation of this possessed Palestinians who are corralled into these spaces.

And then in this kind of like other half of Gaza, you're going to be left with Palestinians living in a wasteland where no construction is allowed to be conducted. that's under constant assault by Israeli bombs where there's hardly any food, there's hardly any shelter, and they love to survive under conditions of genocide. And this is the future that they're trying to write for Gaza. Sharif, we just have a minute, but I had to ask you about the attacks that continue in Gaza, killing at least 11 Palestinians Wednesday,

including three journalists who are working with the Egyptian Committee for Gaza relief. Mohammed Keshda, Abdul-Aoufshath, and Anasgu Naim, were killed when an Israeli missile struck their vehicle. Shath was a contributor to CBS News, Ajean's France Press. He had just gotten married. Mohamed Mansour of the Egyptian Committee for Gaza Relief condemned Israel's attack on the journalist. This is what he said.

What happened is a very big crime committed by the Israeli army by targeting a crew belonging to the Egyptian committee. This crew was not firing rockets nor fighting the Israeli army. army. The Egyptian committee's crew was in a humanitarian mission. This crew is searching day and night for a shelter to house our people. Shereef, can you tell us about these three journalists? Again, according to the International Federation of journalists, at least something like 258 journalists and media workers have been killed in Gaza in the last two years. Yeah, as you mentioned, this is Mohamed Ishtha, Anas Runeem and Abdul Rauf Shaath, who is actually as a freelance cameraman, a long-time

cameraman for CBS News and Agenz France Press. And they were killed while they were in their car recording footage of a tent encampment for displaced people in central Gaza. They were killed about a mile away from that camp. The Egyptian committee that hired them that they were working for, so the car was clearly marked and yet the Israelis bombed it anyway. And this is part of a pattern that we've seen over the past two years where the Israeli military has killed an unprecedented number of journalists with complete impunity.

And it came as world leaders are gathering in Davos and talking about, you know, so-called a board of peace and so forth. And it's sad to say that these types of killings of journalists of Palestinian civilians every day hardly make waves anymore. It's become normalized in the world for Palestinians to die. And the world has allowed this to happen. And this is, you know, yet another blow to the journalistic community in Gaza that has suffered more than we've seen, you know, in any part of the world in generations.

And more than just a blow to the journalists of Gaza, but to the journalists of the world. Shurri Phbdo Kudu, we thank you so much for being with us, award-winning journalists, the Middle East North Africa editor at DropSight News. We'll link to your piece. Headlined leaked documents. Planned Community Arefah would force Palestinians into Israeli Panopticon. Next up, we go to Minneapolis. We'll speak with the lawyer for Nekima, Levy Armstrong, who's still in jail after being arrested

for peacefully protesting in a St. Paul Church where a top ICE official serves as pastor. Stay with us. and his father who's an asylum seeker. Photos from the scene show a masked agent standing next to Liam who is wearing a backpack in a blue winter hat with bunny ears. He just returned from preschool. The father and son were then quickly sent to a detention facility in Texas.

On Thursday, Vice President J.D. Vance went to Minneapolis and defended ICE for targeting the boy's father and detaining the preschooler. So the story is that ICE detained a five-year-old. Well, what are they supposed to do? Are they supposed to let a five-year-old child freeze to death? Local officials in Columbia Heights condemned the detention of five-year-old Liam. Rachel James serves on Columbia Heights City Council.

She described efforts by neighbors to protect the boy. I heard one neighbor say, I live in this house. I'm part of this family. I can take him, let him come to me. I heard another neighbor on the other side say, I have the forms. His mom signed the forms. Let me have him.

I know him. I know him. I kept saying, stop, wait. He can go with us. He can go with the. teachers. And then they took him over to the car and he was just standing there and then they quickly put him in the back seat and drove away. On Thursday, the lawyer for the Ramos family, Mark Prokosh, said Liam and his father had come to the U.S. in 2024 from Ecuador to seek asylum.

Liam and his dad did enter the United States at a port of entry to seek asylum through the CBP1 app at the Brownsville border crossing. So they did, they did. They did, everything right when they came in. They used the app. They made an appointment. They came to the border and presented themselves to Customs and Border Patrol. They've shared all of their information with the government, and they were following the process. They were just trying to secure safety and persecution for their family from their home country. But ICE didn't care about the fact that they had those pending claims and then just arrested them. as hundreds of businesses are expected to close today as part of an economic blackout to protest the surge of ice agents in Minnesota.

We'll talk more about that in a minute. But first, we're getting an update on how the prominent Minneapolis civil rights attorney, activist, and ordained minister, Nakima Levy Armstrong, and two others were arrested on federal charges for their role in peacefully protesting inside a St. Paul church where one of the pastors, David Easterwood, also leads the local ice field office. in the Twin Cities area. David Easterwood is a pastor here. He is also the director of the field office for ICE and St. Paul. So someone who claims to worship God teaching people in this church about God is out there

overseeing ICE agents. The activists involved in the protests now face charges under the FACE Act. That's the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, a law, written to protect abortion clinics. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Levi Armstrong's arrest, then the White House posted an AI-generated image to make it appear Levy Armstrong was crying after arrest. The Justice Department also attempted to bring charges against the journalists and former CNN anchor Don Lemon, who covered the church protests, but a federal magistrate judge rejected the request. We go now to Minneapolis, where we're joined by Jordan Kushner, civil rights and criminal defense

attorney who is helping to represent Nekima. We thank you so much for being with us, Jordan. If you can start off, you were with her when she was arrested, is that right? Can you talk about the AI generated image? Can you talk about her wanting, saying that she would turn herself in, but they said no, because they said they were after her over the last few days and what she was doing in that church? That's correct. The arrest was a horrible ordeal. She was, and some other people in her group were staying in a hotel. The group of FBI and Homeland Security agents busted into the hotel the night before her arrest, rough people up.

They were thrown out by the management. Later on at 3 in the morning, someone left Nekima Levy Armstrong's room. The police tacked or the agents tackled her violently and took her to a detention facility before they realized that she wasn't Levy-Armstrong. So she was obviously terrified about turning herself in. A legal team, including myself, went to the hotel that morning. We contacted, reached out to agents to try and arrange for her to turn herself in voluntarily at the federal courthouse, which was only about six blocks away. They put the U.S. attorney for the District of Minnesota, a Trump appointee, Dan Rosen.

He called me himself. I made my request to him. he said it was very reasonable and he was just going to call me back in a few minutes with the specific logistics. Then he calls back and says, oh, we're not going to let her turn herself in. We need to arrest her at the hotel. So she needs to voluntarily leave the hotel room and turn herself in. So after he talked to his bosses in D.C., he had completely reneged on his commitment.

They then sent agents up there to the hotel room to arrest her. one of the agents was filming the arrest. As they put her in handcuffs, he was filming it on his cell phone. I've never seen anything like that. They can have their body cameras. This was completely unprofessional. He said he was just doing it because of instructions, and he promised it wasn't going to go on Twitter.

Nevertheless, it went on Twitter. It went on the Department of Justice's Twitter. So this was their trophy. And then, as you said, the White House subsequently altered the video to make it look like she was crying. I observed the whole arrest. She was dignified, rational, calm and reasonable the whole time. It just shows the complete political motivation of the government and making this a circus. This has nothing to do with enforcing the law. It has nothing to do with protecting on anyone's religious rights. It's all about, it's about, frankly,

just about fascism. I mean, in a fascist, and fascism means part of that, is that the government makes their own narrative. They invent reality, and they're literally doing that with an AI video. And so what this is about, yeah. And Jordan, I wanted to ask you, if you could talk about the charge that she's been arrested on and basically a statute that has its roots in the reconstruction era into prosecute members of the KKK for terrorizing black Americans? Yeah, she's charged.

with conspiracy to violate civil rights or excuse me, conspirator to violate constitutional rights of other people. Namely the claim is that by protesters going into a church to raise objections to how this

church conducted its business with Nikima Levy Armstrong being a reverend herself that that somehow deprived the people of their, in the church of their right to freedom of worship. It's a, you know, it is a farce. It was passed to really protect people's constitutional rights. That's what she's charged with.

The government also sought to charge you with another offense under the FACE Act, which involved, you know, obstruction of someone else's exercise of the religious practices. The magistrate refused to sign on to that charge. So we're left with the conspiracy to violate constitutional rights. This was an exercise of free speech. They were exercising their own constitutional rights. It's unheard of for someone's people to be charged with a criminal offense for a free speech protest like that.

That's a legal, peaceful protest. Jordan, I was just watching right. Reverend Craig Lawyer, who's the 10th Bishop of the Episcopal Church in Minnesota. He talked about what's happening. The immigration crackdown is a campaign of reckless cruelty. He refused to condemn what Nakima had done, said that it's time. And we've seen this with the Catholic bishop. as well, saying it's time for us to, he said, put our bodies on the line.

I want to end just by saying, we wanted to have Nakima on this morning, but she's still not out of jail? We have 10 seconds. Yeah. The magistrate ordered her release. The government did a maneuver where they appealed. So it's being reviewed by a judge and waiting for a judge decision about whether she's going to be released.

So the government used more manipulative tactics to keep her in jail when there was no basis whatsoever. is detained on a case like this. I want to thank you very much for being with us. Others arrested, included Chantil Luisa Allen, a St. Paul School Board member and activist William Kelly. Jordan Krishna, thanks so much for being with us. Civil Rights and Criminal Defense Attorney representing Nikima Levy Armstrong, who's still in

jail after being arrested last Sunday, after being arrested yesterday for peacefully protesting a St. Paul Church Sunday, where top ICE official serves as a pastor. We're going to stay in Minneapolis for the next day. next two minutes where we're joined by a union leader. Many people are saying today they plan to do nothing. They're not going to go to work or school or shop or as part of an economic blackout to protest the surge of ICE agents in the state. It's being called a day of truth and freedom. Some call it a general strike. Organizers include faith leaders, scores of unions, including the AFL-CIO.

We go to Karen Knutson, president to the CWA, Local 7250, layout what you're calling for. Thanks a lot for having me, Amy. Today, after weeks of living under the heavy weight of this racist campaign of terror by ICE agents in the Twin Cities that have torn apart families, have brutalized people and murdered people, today, the working class of Minnesota, of the Twin Cities is standing up and refusing to go to work, refusing to go to school, refusing to shop. And for once, we're going to flex our muscle that we contribute to the society every day. Nothing runs without the working class in this country. And today, we're going to show our power. And what specifically are you calling for people to do? And how was the coalition

built around this issue? Well, in the Twin Cities, there's been active. and organizing of this generation, you know, going back to prior to the George Floyd uprising. Of course, the George Floyd uprising was a key moment in Minnesota's history, in this country's history, and many of the organizers have, you know, experience from that. And that created a network of organization and experience and confidence to be able to go forward with this kind of organizing. This has never been done before, though. This is unprecedented in our generation where we're asking people not to go to work,

and there's going to be hundreds of thousands of workers today that will not go to work because they support the demand for ICE out. ICE is deeply unpopular in the Twin Cities, even hated because of their brutality, because of their tactics, because of the murder of Renee Good. And today is a chance to actually use our power in a way that will catch the attention of those rich and powerful

who live off of our labor every day, and it's going to show the community what power we do have and what we can do to fight back against ICE. Karen Knutzen, we want to thank you so much for being with us, President of the Communications Workers of America Local 7250. Next up, well, today, 50 years ago, Paul Robson died, the acclaimed actor, singer, activist. We're going to speak with the

with the author Howard Bryant about his new book, Kings and Ponds, Jackie Robinson and Paul Robeson in America. Stay with us. When they crucified my lord, sung by Paul Robeson. He died 50 years ago today. This is Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org. I'm Amy Goodman with Juan Gonzalez. Yes, today marks the 50th anniversary. of the death of the great actor, singer-athlete scholar Paul Robeson.

At one point, he was world famous. You probably recognize his voice from this 1936 film Showboat. There's an old man called a Mississippi. That's the old man that I'd like to be. What does he care? What does he care? Paul Robeson singing Old Man River and performing in showboat. Yes, Paul Robson was the son of an escaped slave.

He was attacked, blacklisted, and hounded by the government for his political beliefs. For years, Paul Robson was tracked by the FBI as well as the CIA, the Department of State, numerous other government agencies. Together, they compiled tens of thousands of documents on him, which they used to bring him before McCarthy's Hewack. That's the House on American Activities Committee. In 1949, Robson was effectively blacklisted. In 1950, the government revoked his brief. passport. For eight years, he was barred from travel, a prisoner in his own country. Now, Jackie Robinson, the Brooklyn Dodgers star who'd integrated the all-white major

baseball leagues, was hailed as a national hero in 1949 for testifying against Robeson before Hughack. I've been asked to express my views on Paul Robeson's statement in Paris. One man is now a legend. The other was erased from history. Today we look at the fascinating new book out this week, Kings and Ponds, Jackie Robinson and Paul Robson in America. We're joined now by the book's author, Howard Bryant, currently the sports correspondent for Weekend Edition at National Public Radio. Also the author of over 15 other books.

Howard, welcome to Democracy Now. What an amazing book. the story that you tell. Tell us the story of Paul Robeson and Jackie Robinson, how you decided to focus on both and what they tell us about America. Yeah, well, thank you for having me on the show. It really does feel like what is past as prologue. So much of working on this book of Paul Robeson, who, of course, was a victim in the center of a lot of the McCarthyist tactics that we see today facing off against Jackie Robinson really did feel compelled by his employer, by Branch Ricky, the president of the Brooklyn Dodgers, to testify against Robeson to show that African Americans were loyal to the United States after Paul Robeson had given a speech in Paris in 1949. These two giants who had never met one another were really placed in opposition to one, you know, to each other in front of the most notorious government body that this country's ever produced. This book is really the story of these two giants on opposite sides of the political spectrum in 1949,

but actually had much, much, much more in common than we would have thought. And could you talk about why Branch Ricky tried to or to insist that Robinson testify, especially given the fact that the, for instance, the Communist Party had played a major role in attempting seem to integrate baseball in the 1940s. That's right. Well, I think that's exactly why. I think once when the amazing thing, one of the things I really enjoyed about working on this book was how Branch Ricky's version of the integration story has essentially been treated as the only version. And so much of his motivation for signing Jackie Robinson, at least the public version,

had been that Ricky had this amazing moral compass, when actually the biggest reason that he felt compelled. He did have a moral compass here. He did really go up against his fellow owners who saw signing Robinson as a huge betrayal of them. They wanted to keep the game all white. But one of the biggest reasons was the fact that Branch Ricky in Brooklyn, huge labor area,

really progressive, very strong left-wing progressive politics. they were pressuring the Dodgers more than any other team in baseball to be the ones to integrate. And Ricky really had no, I wouldn't say he had no choice, but he absolutely was under pressure. It wasn't simply just his moral compass. It was the fact that the pressure from political groups from the progressive side really, really pushed to make this happen. That's how movements change. And in terms of what Robinson actually said in Congress, and did he have second thoughts later in life about his role?

Yeah, I think one of the hardest things for Jackie Robinson was the fact that he never wanted to testify in the first place. He felt obligated to Branch Rickey. And later on, after he had testified against Paul Robeson and after the violence that had come, after his testimony. Two very bloody riots in Peakskill, New York, followed Jackie's testimony. And his legacy never really survived this. It was something he didn't really want to do, but he felt a loyalty to Branch Rickey. He felt a loyalty to say something on behalf of Black Americans. And his widow, Rachel Robinson, who, by the way, is still alive at 103 today, believed that there was nothing that Jackie would have wanted to take back more between that

and his support of Richard Nixon in 1960, that these were the two pieces of advice that Rachel Robinson felt that did not help Jackie and haven't helped his legacy. Howard, we have students come in to watch the show every week, and a group of eighth graders came in, and I said, how many of you have heard, I said you were going to be on the show, have heard of Jackie Robinson. Almost everyone raised their hand. I said, how many of you have heard of Paul Robeson? And almost no one raised their hand.

So I think it's really important for you to give us the history of Paul Robson. He was perhaps the most famous black American in the world at a certain point. And talk about what it meant for him to have been so gone after by the CIA, the FBI, and having his passport revoked because he was a world's world. famous actor and singer. Yeah, I think it's a great example of what is, once again, what is past this prolog and what you feel is impossible, is very possible. I think one of the things that I wanted to do with this book was to really make it clear how similar the times were between the 1940s and the Paul Robeson McCarthy era. And what is happening today in terms of the assault

on education and higher education, the assault on civil liberties, the forcing of loyalty, all of this playbook, the closing of the borders. So much of what is taking place that took place then is taking place now. And when you look at somebody like Paul Robeson, who is a giant, who is one of the most accomplished Americans this country's ever produced, he is not just the talk about Jackie Robinson integrating the major leagues in 1947. Well, Paul Robeson integrated Broadway in 1943. Paul Robeson was a lawyer. It's Columbia educated lawyer. He played in the National Football League. He was one of the greatest college football players of all time as an All-American in 1917 and 1918. This is a giant of a man. And so to see how powerful those political forces

are that silenced him and really did everything it could to erase him so these young kids today don't know who he is, tells you about the importance of maintaining stories. And as the great Pulitzer Prize winner, David Marinus, has always said, history writes people out of the story, and it's our job to write them back in. And 50 years after Paul Robeson's death, it's time for a reappraisal of one of the great Americans. And in 1949, Life magazine ran a spread of people they considered dangerous and un-American. The list included figures like Langston Hughes. and Albert Einstein. Can you talk about the parallels you see with the media in 2026 and the complacency and even cooperation with the Trump administration?

Well, complacency, cooperation, and that was one of the things that was so compelling about working on this, because the history is not some old relic. It's not really dusty. Every time I was working on a chapter, I said, this feels like today, and this sounds like today, and this sounds like today. And when you You look at the complacency that we have today. So many people look back at that time and said, how did we allow that to happen? But the same thing is happening right now. You see the, especially in media, and especially with the public, I think people become numb to it. And if it's not happening to them specifically.

We're going to have to leave it there. But I thank you so much. People have to pick up your book and read the rest. It is fantastic. It's called Kings and Ponds. Jackie Robinson and Paul Robeson in America. That does it for our show. Happy early birthday to Trina Nodora.

I'm Amy Goodman with Juan Gonzalez.