It Could Happen Here - DHS Surveillance and Infiltration of ICE Protests in Minnesota 

Episode Date: August 27, 2026

Garrison outlines what we know about how DHS investigated anti-ICE protests in Minneapolis and new discovery documents revealing Homeland Security Investigations reports on financial probes of activist groups and labor unions. Sources: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73489661/united-states-v-sant/  https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.0_6.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.3_3.pdfhttps://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.5_5.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.7_4.pdfhttps://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.10_4.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.8_4.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.9_5.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.12_4.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.11_5.pdfhttps://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.21_4.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.22_4.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.23_4.pdfhttps://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416/gov.uscourts.mnd.234416.212.24_4.pdf https://www.justice.gov/opa/media/1446251/dl?inline=&utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdeliveryhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2X3DhFnngDYSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Last year, President Trump issued National Security Presidential Memorandum 7, which directed the Department of Justice to prioritize politically motivated violence. To accomplish that mission, the Deputy Attorney General stood up Joint Task Force Vanguard, to enforce a national security strategy, to investigate, prosecute, and disrupt those who engage in political violence and intimidation. Today, a federal indictment was unsealed, charging 15 defendants, with conspiracy to impede or injure federal officers and other charges related to efforts of two Minneapolis-based Antifa groups that violently opposed the enforcement of federal law in our state.

As U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen said, all 15, quote-unquote, Antifa defendants were charged with conspiracy to impede or injure an officer. According to the DOJ, the conspiracy to impede amounted to plans to temporarily block roadways around the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building, where ice operations in the Twin Cities were and still are based out of. The start of the 95-page indictment reads, quote, The defendants were members and associates of Twin Cities' Direct Action, which later changed its name to Direct Action Minnesota or Dam, an organization dedicated and committed to direct action against federal law and immigration enforcement. Direct action refers to disruptive and obstructive tactics used by participants to forcibly

challenge, block, or stop immigration raids, detentions, and deportations. Dam describes itself as a decentralized coalition and working class people engaged in various forms of community defense against the current federal occupation happening within the wider metro area and against state and far right violence more broadly, unquote. Here's attorney Daniel Rosen again at that press conference. The organization trains its members in the aggressive use of shields against law enforcement, surveillance, operational planning, and rapid mobilization against law enforcement actions. The first piece of evidence presented by Rosen in this press conference is a Facebook post by one of the defendants

reading, it's going to get so much worse and nonviolent ideology and our politicians aren't going to save us. We need to become ungovernable. We need to actively resist any way we can to material. stop the Nazi occupation forces. I do think it's worth noting that when President Trump spoke at the Libertarian Convention in 2024, the wall behind him featured giant text reading, become ungovernable. Now, most of this 95-page indictment is spent detailing random conversations on signal and various group chats discussing First Amendment activity. planning protests, discussing how to go about fundraising, making flyers, participating in

ICE rapid response, writing articles on crime think, and an anarchist speaking tour, all of which the indictment lists as, quote, overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy. And that's how conspiracy charges work. Not all the overt acts themselves have to be illegal. In fact, they usually are not, they just have to be actions taken involving multiple people to advance some other criminal goal in this case, quote unquote, impeding law enforcement. And what makes this case particularly weak is that the impeding in this case amounts to extremely ordinary First Amendment protest. So not only are the majority, if not all of the overt acts listed, completely legal actions,

they were actions taken in furtherance of legally protected First Amendment activity. Now, the indictment does list a few other charges against specific individuals. One person is charged with allegedly making threats based on statements made in Facebook and Instagram videos. Two people are charged with interstate stalking based on following vehicles leaving the Whipple building

across state lines into Wisconsin. One person is charged with allegedly assaulting a federal officer by knocking notes out of their hand and destruction of government property for kicking a vehicle. And lastly, another defendant is charged with assaulting a federal officer for allegedly break checking and side-swiping the officer's vehicle causing a collision. No evidence for these alleged assaults has been presented thus. far. But the conspiracy charge, tying the 15 defendants together, is the most, oh, so it's illegal to make plans with friends now, case I've ever seen. If it wasn't clear from the moment

this indictment dropped, it only gets more and more clear over time that this case is not based on the strength of the evidence or threat to public safety, but rather political targeting based on the beliefs held by the defendants, and the DOJ's ability to paint the defendants as antifa lunatics separate from the majority of peaceful, liberal, anti-ice protesters, all while building a precedent to criminalize ordinary First Amendment protest activity,

including ICE rapid response. To make it so that any protest against ICE qualifies as interfering or impeding ice from carrying out its immigration enforcement duties. And to create this precedent, the feds located a small group of Antifa, some outside agitators, that they believe a jury might be more likely to convict

than the dozens and dozens of cases that have failed to move forward. In absence of any evidence of illegal violent acts, the DOJ must rely on radical sounding statements made by the defendants discussing their politics to turn a jury against them. And that's most of what the indictment contains. It's not detailing alleged acts of violence, it's detailing conversations about protesting. This indictment contains a lot of signal chat logs, as well as conversations from in-person meetings, which leads one to wonder how exactly did DHS obtain that information?

Well, a few weeks ago, about 30 documents were released as a part of a discovery motion filed by one of the defendants. And these documents provide maybe the closest look at how federal law enforcement under Trump and specifically how DHS and Homeland Security investigations are investigating and surveilling, not just quote unquote, Antifa, but anti-ice protesters more broadly, community activist groups, left-wing organizations and nonprofits, and even labor unions. The lawyer for the defendant in this case called this a, quote, unprecedented campaign by DHS to spy on Minnesotans.

Before I get into some of these specific details, I want to read the opening overview by the defense lawyer, Kevin Riyak, discussing what discovery has so far revealed. quote, undercover agents posing as protesters surveilled community meetings at churches, parks, libraries, schools, and union halls. These agents serptuously recorded dozens of conversations with ordinary people who were simply exercising their First Amendment right to protest, ICE's lawless rampage in our state. The agents gathered information about Minnesotans from law enforcement databases and internet searches and created dossiers that are apparently now available agency-wide.

Homeland Security Investigations' abuses did not stop there. HSI secretly obtained financial records for several national labor unions and social justice non-profits, all with zero criminal predicate to do so. The government's presentation to the grand jury reflected this broad and irrational investigation. With no evidence, the government alleged to the grand jury that the conspiracy in this case extends far beyond the defendants to include the AFL-CIO, the Minneapolis Federation of Educators, the Minnesota Association of Professional Employees, Monarcha, Veterans for Peace, and the Greece Pit bicycle repair shop, among others.

These wild conspiracy allegations are born from the fantasies of political retribution that animate the Trump administration. President Trump and senior administration officials routinely speak of the political left in dehumanizing. terms as deformed, scarred, and filled with ugliness, for example. The administration has crystallized those sentiments into policies that encourage and authorize political prosecutions like this one, most notably National Security Presidential Memorandum 7, unquote. I'm not exaggerating that this motion filed by the defense is maybe the greatest motion

I've ever read, the understanding by the lawyer in this case of how the Trump administration is carrying out state repression against protesters is incredibly politically fluent. That last bit at the end discussing administration officials referring to the political left as deformed, scarred, filled with ugliness. It relates to Stephen Miller's comments at Mark Rubio's left-wing terrorism summit last month that we discussed on executive disorder. And what he said, during that conference was legitimately crazy. I didn't get to much of what he said in our previous episode because we were running short on time,

but there's one quote I highlighted back then when I was doing research that I want to read now, quote, The Leftist looks at what is beautiful and what is good and what is natural and is filled with envy and hatred. The leftist looks at the perfect family with the perfect life and the perfect job and perfect kids that goes to church every Sunday,

and it's filled with a feeling of inadequacy and jealousy, and they covet. And they turn those emotions ultimately into a desire to subjugate to oppress and to inflict pain and suffering. It's not a coincidence that when you look at any of these violent Antifa demonstrations, and you see any photograph of those who were assembled, to be blunt, not one of the people that is demonstrating looks like a normal person.

They're all deformed in some way. in their appearance, in their dress, in their mannerisms. Why is that? Every one of them, through the course of their life and their decisions, has scarred their body and their appearance in many different ways, to the point in which their outer appearance becomes a manifestation of their inner hatred. Unquote. Super fascist stuff.

Like, incredibly fascist. And the point by Kevin Riyok, the lawyer for one of the defendants, that the Trump administration has turned these, fascistic sentiments into enforcement policy like MSPM 7 is a really crucial point. Because these are not just personal sentiments held by Stephen Miller, these sentiments have been distilled into mandates to investigate and prosecute the political enemies of the Trump administration. Just four days after Border Patrol murdered Alex Prettie, Homeland Security Investigations opened a new investigation into anti-ice protests in the Twin Cities

called Operation Puppet Master, as in looking for the alleged puppet master orchestrating the spontaneous and community-led protests, or I guess as in HSI is the puppet master, infiltrating the protests with undercover agents puppeteered by DHS. Either way, DHS produced a report detailing the opening of Operation... puppet master, and that report states, quote,

this case is opened to document the integration of HSI undercover agents into groups, organizations, or other gatherings identified by intelligence information and other sources as potentially threatening to law enforcement personnel in the performance of their duties. The report by HSI Special Agent Jacob Marquise continues, quote, since November 28, 2026, I assume he means 2025. Great work, guys. Ongoing protests and incidents of civil unrest have occurred in public areas throughout Minneapolis, Minnesota. During these events, violent opportunists, or VOs, have exploited the protests as cover to attempt breaches of federal properties and perpetuated multiple assaults against federal officers tasked with protecting these facilities.

Homeland Security Investigations of St. Paul has identified an organized, network of conspirators operating through online and in-person who are providing material support to violent opportunists and agitators involved in impeding federal law enforcement, rioting, destruction of federal property, and assaults on federal agents and officers. Unquote. This sentiment was also shared by U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen in that press conference. During Operation Metro Surge, direct action Minnesota infiltrated an exploited lawful protests to more efficiently carry out its unlawful direct actions. Despite the claims made by Rosen and in this HSI report of violent opportunists

exploiting protests to perpetuate multiple assaults, in the defense's overview of these reports and documents, the defense lawyer notes that HSI does not actually identify any specific violent opportunists in this report, nor does it flag any specific any specific violent opportunists in this report, nor does it flag any specific. specific incidents of rioting, destruction of property, or assaults on federal agents or officers. To quote the lawyer for the defense, the undercover surveillance initiated by Operation Puppetmaster did not actually investigate or on earth any such instances, but instead encompassed all manner of privacy and constitutional violations against organizations and

individuals who opposed ICE's activities in Minnesota, unquote. And in his press conference, announcing the conspiracy charges, U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen was asked multiple times whether any officers actually got hurt and Rosen could not identify any instance of officer injury. You talked about coordinated attacks. What kind of injuries did officers sustain as part of these campaigns if any of, can you elaborate on that?

I can't elaborate on that today, and I don't believe I use the word attacks, but if I did, I stand by it. That really sums up this whole case for me. No, I can't provide any evidence to support the wild claims I'm making, and I don't think I used that word, but if I did, I stand by it. Incredible stuff. We will look into more of the Homeland Security Investigation case files after this had a break.

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I knew if he woke up, without a doubt, he was going to hurt me. I started feeling that there was someone at the end of my bed, and I just started screaming. They are abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced. But these aren't stories about what's taken from them. There's stories about what it takes to make it out alive. Listen to the Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back. The HSI report detailing the opening of Operation Puppet Master concludes by stating, quote,

HSI St. Paul is actively conducting a thorough financial investigation to uncover the funding sources used by these groups and to detect any illicit transactions enabling further criminal acts. HSI, St. Paul, will use the results of this financial investigation to identify those responsible, disrupt ongoing, and future unlawful activities, and pursue prosecution of the individuals involved, unquote. And two weeks after the launching of Operation Puppet Master, HSI opened another investigation called Project Whipple Shield, specifically focusing on the identification of potential funding sources, the organizational structure, and the, quote, predicate actions behind these campaigns.

To quote that HSI report, quote, this investigation is focused on identifying and disrupting sophisticated, organized campaigns, supporting, and engaging in this behavior, and to prevent such unlawful activities. Regarding this investigation, lawyer for the defense, Kevin Riyok, wrote, As with Operation Puppetmaster, HSI's investigation in Project Whipple Shield extended far beyond any potential threat to law enforcement safety.

It concluded, with no evidence but obvious political animus, that numerous Twin Cities unions and nonprofit organizations were involved in a widespread conspiracy to violate 18 U.S.C. 111, assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers or employees. And it surveilled and surreptuously gathered financial records generated by these organizations, despite the lack of any clear connection between those organizations and criminal conduct, unquote. At that press conference announcing the indictment, U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen said that direct action Minnesota is actually, quote, comprised of members of

subgroups like the Black Cat Workers Collective, unquote. But the alleged, quote-unquote, subgroups extend far beyond just black cat workers collective, as evidenced by a little diagram that was presented to grand jurors for this indictment. This diagram is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. In the middle is the logo for Direct Action Minnesota, the organization that the DOJ alleges is connected to the 15 defendants. But surrounding the dam logo is logos for 15 other organizations, all with arrows pointing towards direct action Minnesota and text reading council member, as if all of these organizations are sending council members to direct action Minnesota to plan or orchestrate the direct actions in response to Operation Metro

Surge. This diagram that was presented as a slide to grand jurors is titled, The Conspiracy, And the conspiring organizations are listed as Monarcha Rapid Response Line, which is one of the rapid response networks in the Twin Cities. The other organizations in this diagram going clockwise include Minnesota 5150, the organizers of the No Kings protests, Minnesota Ice Watch, Minnesota Association of Professional Employees, a labor union, Minneapolis Federation of Educators, Local 59, left jab, a left jab, a self-defense group. The Grease Pit, a bike shop.

Democratic Socialists of America, Black Cat Workers' Collective, AFL-CIO, Workers' Solidarity Circle, Whipple Watch, Veterans for Peace, Socialist Alternative, showing up for racial justice, SCIU 26, Red Pine Revolutionary Collective,

and Ray Rainbolt Memorial Gun Club. HSI agent Desmond Garcia testified to the grand jury regarding this slide, Quote, this is kind of a breakdown, like I mentioned earlier, with members of Dam being associated with other organizations. Through the course of the investigation, this is just a snapshot of some of the other organizations that members are affiliated with that kind of comprise and make up direct action Minnesota, unquote. This is one of the funniest things I've ever seen and

provides really, really useful insight into how HSI is imagining the organizational structure of these protests, that all these organizations are sending, quote-unquote, council members to this more secretive group, Direct Action, Minnesota, that orchestrates the most radical parts of the anti-ice protests. Regarding this diagram slide, the lawyer for the defense, wrote, If any individual was connected to both Dam and any of these entities,

the government considers the entities to be conspiring. fueled by visions of this vast and irrational conspiracy, HSI surptutiously obtained financial records of labor unions and nonprofit organizations as a part of a quote-unquote financial investigation into, quote, domestic terrorist financing, unquote. And let's go over the financial probe aspect of this investigation. One of the reports uncovered through discovery revealed that HSI secretly subpoenaed three years worth of financial records from SCIU, one of the biggest labor unions in the country, largely focused on organizing the health care, public service, and service work sector.

Last March, HSI agents served an administrative summons or a administrative subpoena to FedWire to obtain wire transfers involving SCIU. The wire transfers that the Federal Reserve Bank in New York gave over to DHS range from January 1st, 23 to March 19th, 2026. To quote the HSI report, quote, beginning in December, HSI St. Paul began a multifaceted approach to identify and investigate individuals engaged in acts of violence, destruction of federal property, intimidation of federal officers and employees, and attempts to impede federal operations. Through this investigation, HSI of St. Paul has identified a network of individuals operating online and in person who are engaged in this behavior by either directly

participating or by providing support through fundraising, planning, and organization. The following report of investigation provides preliminary cursory details related to wire transfers from various financial institutions to and from Service Employees International Union, Maine Financial Institution, the U.S. Bank of Minneapolis, Minnesota, unquote. And what did this investigation find? Well, a quote-unquote preliminary analysis of the wire transfers, quote, revealed that the SCIU National Union has numerous wire transactions to and from SCIU local unions for various types of debits and credits to include annuity payments, strike payments, strike supplies, investments, union member dues, retiree dues, medical expenses,

and pension fund expenses, unquote. So they found nothing. They just looked through three years of financial records from SCIU and only found regular transactions that a union would have. They found absolutely nothing. And this report ends with this incredible sentence,

quote, this financial investigation involving protest domestic terrorist financing continues. Sure, dude, yeah, I'm sure it's going to continue. I'm sure it's going to continue to find nothing.

Because in the 95-page indictment against these 15 defendants, one of the frequently recurring topics in the overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy is discussing how they don't have any money, how they're constantly trying to fundraise to help continue the anti-ice protests. The indictment outlines them consistently struggling to pull together $5,000. But yeah, sure, let me make a few calls to the SCIU real quick. I'm sure they'll just wire transfer over the money. And the other thing is that this three-year time span of the financial probe, stretches way longer than Operation Metro Surge and the protests surrounding

ICE activists in the Twin Cities, because what's actually going on here, and to the Fed's own admission, is that they're just enacting NSPM 7, using whatever pretext they can concoct to dig through the finances of entities and organizations that they view as political enemies. And it wasn't just SCIU. HSI also obtained three years' worth of bank records for the communication workers of America, including donations and PAC spending. The CWA union represents thousands of journalists and print and broadcast news workers in the U.S. and Canada. And as a part of this financial probe, HSI obtained records for one of the Canadian branches of this union,

the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, with the administrative summons requesting information from the Bank of Montreal. all. This very same summons also demanded three years' worth of financial records from the environmental activist organization Sunrise Movement and the Sunrise Movement Educational Fund. And as we will discuss, HSI was also actively surveilling sunrise meetings in Minnesota. Now, HSI also subpoenaed financial records from at least one other entity that we know of, a local Minneapolis activist organization called Voices for Racial Justice. But rather than bank records and wire transfers, HSI went

after PayPal and Venmo transactions. Voices for racial justice was founded in 1993 and describes itself as the longest-running racial justice organizing training organization in the state of Minnesota. The DHS investigative report regarding the subpoena into the organization says that the website for Voices of Racial Justice, quote, boasts several articles on ICE Out and or Truth, Freedom, and ICE out of Minnesota. Their website also provides links to defend the 612, Minneapolis-St. Paul Whistles, and Monarcho Rapid Response for upcoming trainings.

Unquote. That's basically the entire justification DHS gives for probing into the donations and Venmo and PayPal records for this racial justice organization, that their website hosts links to other anti-ice organizations. Defense attorney Kevin Riyak wrote,

This broad coalition of financial records of labor and social justice advocacy organizations done in secret and with no articulable criminal predicate violates both the First Amendment and these organizations right to financial privacy. It also reflects a sinister turn in our democracy when the party in power feels no compunction about peering into the private finances

of its political opponents, collecting that information, and story. it away for further use. The lawyer also notes, quote, among other problems, the use of the administrative summons seems to violate the Right to Financial Privacy Act, which requires law enforcement to provide notice to the account holder if they are trying to obtain bank records via administrative subpoena. Here, not only did DHS hide these inquiries from the account holders, it told responding financial institutions, quote, you are requested not to disclose the existence of the summons for an indefinite period of time. Any such

disclosure will impede the investigation and thereby interfere with the enforcement of federal law, unquote. Though the federal government would likely argue that HSI's use of the administrative subpoenas without notice would fall under some of the exceptions within the Right to Financial Privacy Act. Most reporting I've seen on this batch of discovery has focused on the financial probing of unions and activist organizations. And yeah, that is a big deal. That is very serious and deserves a lot of focus. But most of the investigative reports released as a part of discovery pertain to HSI undercover operations, surveillance and infiltration of anti-ice organizing in the Twin Cities. And there's a lot of interesting information in there that explains why the 90-something page

indictment is like that, why it has transcriptions of so many regular in-person conversations and text logs from Signal. To quote, defense lawyer Kevin Riyak, undercover HSI agents posing as protesters or activists surveilled community meetings at churches, parks, libraries, union halls, schools, and restaurants. Undercover agents secretly made audio and video recordings of those meetings, unquote.

And now I want to quote from one of the HSI reports regarding their use of undercovers. Quote, prior to the initiation of Operation Puppetmaster, HSI deployed an undercover agent to participate in both virtual and in-person meetings within the Twin Cities area. The objective of these activities was to gather intelligence regarding any organized networks of conspirators operating online and in person who may be providing material support to violent opportunists

and individuals engaged in impeding federal law enforcement, rioting destruction of federal property, and assaults on federal. agents and officers, unquote. So before Operation Puppetmaster even started in January, the month prior HSI already had an undercover digging in to the anti-ice protests. In reports, this undercover is identified as 9843, and he started out by attending a virtual ice watch training on December 3rd, put on by a group called States at the Core and a Chicago-based org called, Protect Rogers Park. A few days later, the agent, quote-unquote, acting in an undercover capacity,

attended a publicly advertised in-person legal observer training in Richfield, Minnesota. During the training, the agent joined a rapid response network sponsored by a Minneapolis-based community defense group called Monarcha via a QR code. On December 13th, the undercover attended a sunrise movement action training called How to Stop Ice and Build the Revolution at a Universalist Church in Minneapolis. After this meeting, the undercover was added to the group's announcement chat and started messaging one of the organizers about how people are verifying which hotels ice agents were staying at. A few days later, the undercover reviewed a website with info, toolkits, and signal links

for ICE rapid response called Defend612.com. 612 is the Minneapolis area code. On December 22nd, the undercover participated in a sunrise Zoom meeting about a then-upcoming protest in front of the Hampton Inn housing ice agents. Per the investigative report detailing undercover operations prior to the creation of Operation Puppetmaster, during this sunrise Zoom meeting, the undercover agent, learned that there were, quote, multiple signal chats dedicated to the hotel scouting and license plate gathering. The gathering is a collaborative effort with, quote-unquote, Whipple Watch,

the known agitator group stationed outside the Whipple building. HSI undercover agent 9843 was added by the team leader for the quote-unquote action team to this signal chat group, unquote. So beyond joining public signal chats, it appears the, main way this undercover was able to worm his way into more private chats regarding Whipple Watch was through attending sunrise movement meetings. In the motion outlining this batch of discovery, the lawyer for the defense noted, quote, undercover agents actively participated in organizing and directing the groups they were surveilling, at times working to entice people into discussing or committing crimes, unquote. The main example of this in these documents,

is another Sunrise Movement meeting from late January, titled Resistance Skills Training, held at the Minneapolis Public Library. Two undercoveres attended this training, and the investigative report details about 25 people in quote-unquote breakout sessions focused on recruiting, action, and de-escalation. The report notes that Sunrise recommends using, quote, police liaisons and protest safety marshals. The quote-unquote action section discussed sit-ins and the protests outside hotels. With HSI noting in the report, quote,

it was made clear that the Sunrise Movement Organization focused on, quote-unquote, peaceful protests. Regardless of that, one of the undercovers at this meeting, quote-unquote, privately informed someone that he works in construction and could, quote, build items that might assist other groups with more, quote-unquote, direct action protests, unquote. And the undercover also told this person at the meeting that going to jail, quote-unquote, did not bother him. So two undercovers attended this sunrise movement meeting discussing peaceful protests and noted that in the report, but still tried to talk to attendees about, quote-unquote, building items to assist in direct action. protests and that they're okay with going to jail because of it.

We'll talk more about how undercover HSI agents began their infiltration after this ad break. I'm Ruby Carr, the host of the podcast, Encore. Check out our brand new episodes featuring music from the show that everyone is reheating as we speak. Heated rivalry. Join me as I go behind the songs that brought Shane and Elia together. I'll tell you the stories of Fice, My Moon, My Man, Wolf Forades, I'll Believe in Anything. and tattoos all the things she said and how they all became a part of this global phenomenon. Stream encore on IHeart Radio, crave, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, this is Hayes Davenport.

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or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back. The main undercover HSI agent who started to infiltrate the protests in December 2025, who's identified in reports as undercover 9843, also operated a signal account with the screen name peanut butter jelly. And according to the defense, this undercover, quote, routinely exchanged signal messages with people regarding purely First Amendment protected conduct, messaging participants in the Art Money Coms Club signal chat, and stating,

quote, also, V interested in the financial organizing piece. I like numbers and data. And marrying that together with propaganda, so would love to work on both sides of these groups, unquote. Yeah, I'm sure you're interested in the financial organizing piece. Yeah, I bet, I like numbers and data. Incredible. The interested in the financial organizing piece. Also, as a part of discovery, we've learned that the undercover discussed fundraising messaging strategies and offered to draft fundraising language for Twin Cities Direct Action and design a protest flyer. One message with the undercover using the screen name peanut butter jelly reads,

I'm sure you're swamped with the speaking tour, but do you have a suggestion for a donation platform. I believe open collective and the idea of asking our own banks was discussed? Unquote. According to the defense, these new discovery documents also detail how undercovers

quote, routinely surveilled individuals engaged solely in First Amendment protected activity, including the Whipple Watch Group that engaged in peaceful observation of ICE vehicle activity in and out of the Whipple building. Conduct that both Judge Mendez

and Chief Judge Schiltz have confirmed is not unlawful, unquote. One of the DHS investigative reports details how agents captured the license plan information of anti-ice protesters attending a Twin Cities direct action quote-unquote art club meeting at the Prince of Peace, the Lutheran Church. In the report, the undercover who infiltrated this meeting, quote, described the meeting as democratic in nature in the same. sense that everyone talked over each other, unquote. The undercover also noted how most of the meeting discussed fundraising and how to make

social media adjut prop. But while he was attending this meeting, other HSI agents documented the license plates of attendees. According to the defense, quote, agents then used this information to obtain the names of the attendees, searched social media for pictures of these individuals, and compiled an Intel workup that included names, photos, addresses, personal information, including family and employment information, and vehicle registration information for each meeting attendee. None of these individuals did anything other than engage in protected First Amendment speech in a church meeting room. Yet, now their personal information is memorialized in a DHS dossier, unquote. The best idea why,

HSI decided to zero in on the group of individuals allegedly associated with direct action Minnesota, or formerly called Twin Cities direct action, relates to a meeting held in early January. If you recall, HSI undercover 9843 was added to the Whipple Watch signal chat after attending a few sunrise movement meetings. And according to investigative reports, on January 10th, an undercover agent received a flyer in the Whipple Watch chat for an upcoming emergency meeting on the 11th. Remember, this was three days after the killing of Renee Good. The undercover got permission to attend this emergency meeting

and was quote-unquote vouched by one of the defendants, Isaac Sand, identified in chats as Ike. This emergency meeting was to share plans of an upcoming protest on July 23rd. And the HSI report claims that this meeting is where Twin Cities Direct Action emerged from, as that was the name of the Signal Chat created at the end of this meeting, and the Twin Cities Direct Action logo was first used on a flyer for this upcoming protest. On January 19th, the undercover surveilled and attended a follow-up meeting at a local restaurant in North Minneapolis, hosted by SCIU 26,

and Socialist Alternative to plan this action on the 23rd, which was then identified as a general strike. The HSI report describes this meeting as a, quote, general discussion on the upcoming walkout on ice event being held on January 23rd. And as usual, this report doesn't actually allude to anything illegal being discussed in this meeting, and this strike in March action later took place on January 23rd.

and was attended by tens of thousands of people. Planning such an action is an ordinary protected First Amendment Act. Around this point, and especially following the killing of Alex Preti, DHS started really ramping up the surveillance and infiltration of anti-ice protests in the Twin Cities. They started using multiple undercover agents, not just 9843, and began surveilling and trying to infiltrate many more types of protests

beyond what was organized by Twin Cities' direct action. Two HSI reports detail surveillance of individuals and groups attending the No King's protests and an anti-war protest last March. The report on the Stop the War in Iran protest held on March 7th, specifically mentioned 5150, Veterans for Peace, Sunrise, and PSL. To quote the report, Undercover 5022 and Undercover 137, did not have extended interactions with any members of the crowd.

Many people were also not identifiable slash recognizable due to wearing face coverings. Undercover 5022 observed that during the event, several people appeared to be conducting event overwatch or quote-unquote marshalling. They were wearing reflective vests, were wearing red hats and carried radios. They were located at the edges of the crowd.

Investigative note, based on training and experience, Undercover 5022 is aware that organizations involved in the activities that are subject of this investigation utilize tactics including placing quote-unquote marshals to service lookouts and conduct internal communications and security at events, unquote. While testifying to the grand jury, Agent Garcia claimed that every single individual being investigated has criminal predicate. Quote, one of the things that is abundantly clear, not only in guidance, but it's just principles as sort of, far as this investigation is, no one is ever investigated or looked at or even researched on for First Amendment protected activities. Every single individual that we have investigated,

there is criminal predicate to why we are investigating them, either statements that they have made that are criminal to their actual participation in overt criminal acts, unquote. Now to quote the lawyer for the defense, of course, as the above examples demonstrate, HSI was obtaining wide swaths of financial data from labor unions and nonprofits with zero, quote-unquote, criminal predicate. Undercover agents captured dozens of First Amendment protected conversations on serptitious recordings, many of which did not involve any of the defendants or unindicted co-conspirators in this case. Agent Garcia's statement is simply not true, unquote. And yeah, I don't know how you can think after considering

all the examples I've just read that HSI had criminal predicate for every single organization or person that was under investigation or surveillance. That's just a lie. Because if they had criminal predicate, they would be charged. There would be charges against more people. There could be charges against some of those other 15 conspiring organizations in that diagram shown to the grand jury. Oh, and by the way, the DOJ lawyer who convened this grand jury, Deputy Attorney General Brian Lynch, was also a January 6th insurrectionist who entered a restricted zone alongside other rioters. And as this indictment was being put together, the government forced the court to vacate the convictions against oathkeepers involved in January 6th. This grand jury was literally put together by a January 6th insurrectionist to indict protesters for conspiracy to impede. At the exact same time, the federal government was vacating convictions of other January 6th insurrectionists. The last thing I want to note about this batch of discovery is how it also details instances of counter-surveillance. In one report, a self-described community member

walks up to a government vehicle containing HSI agents conducting surveillance, also staged to support an undercover infiltrating an event, and the community member asks the agents inside if they are ice, they say no and point to a safety vest and a helmet in the vehicle. The community member then responds by saying, okay, and then tells them that he'll have to run the vehicle's plates to check. DHS investigative reports also detail, people at meetings warning that ICE could be trying to infiltrate those very meetings

and telling all the attendees to not say anything that they wouldn't say directly to an ICE agent, which is really good advice when that meeting is being attended by an ICE agent. And one of the funnier investigative notes in dispatcher discovery relates to an undercover's infiltration of a self-defense workshop, quote, due to the physicality of the event, undercover 502's concealed body-worn audio recorder erroneously fell to the floor of the gymnasium near the end of the training.

The undercover briefly left the gymnasium, realized she no longer had the device, and returned to the gymnasium to retrieve the device from the floor. During these approximately three minutes, the undercover was not present in the gymnasium. So, while the dispatcher discovery has given us a closer look at the extent of the surveillance of anti-ice protests and HSI's method of investigation, the government did not hand over everything. It was supposed to as a part of discovery.

And the lawyers are requesting more documents. This batch of discovery is missing, among other things, quote, special reports of investigation that the government has admitted withholding, claiming that they're unrelated to this investigation, even though they were created and filed within it. The disclosures admit to any investigative report. that document HSI's domestic surveillance, but were placed in other case files. They admit documents and communications related to the initiation and supervision of HSI's undercover operations, and they admit downloads of the undercover phones and undercover laptops used by undercover agents in this case to communicate with the defendants and others, unquote.

And those documents are useful not just to us, so we know how these investigations are being carried out, but also for the defense. because reports of government surveillance of protesters and activists during Metro Surge are relevant to the defendant's motion for, quote, selective prosecution and outrageous government conduct as they constitute additional evidence of DHS targeting individuals based on their political beliefs and First Amendment protected conduct, unquote. So yeah, that is my not so brief overview of this batch of discovery. I'll have links to the court documents below.

if you want to take a look yourself. And hopefully, we'll get even more discovery in these next few months. See you on the other side. It Could Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from Cool Zone Media, visit our website, coolzonemedia.com, or check us out on the IHeart Radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can now find sources for It Could Happen here listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening. Didn't catch the latest Roland Martin unfiltered podcast. Here's what you missed. People wake up and go, oh damn, wait a hold up. They change all of that. Yes. It's real. This is a wholesale attack. It is targeting black people in every federal agency. It's raw. Why folks have never allowed that reckoning to last more than a decade.

Catch Roland Martin's daily commentary on the Black Information Network. And download Roland Martin unfiltered on the IHart radio app, Apple Podcasts. Or wherever you get your podcasts. I am talking to a felon right now with face tattoos, and I cannot decide if I like him or not. That was a caller from my podcast, Therapy Gecko, where I speak with anonymous callers about their problems, relationships, and anything else in the depths of their mind. It all happens on my show, Therapy Gecko. So if you're trying to get out of your own head and into someone else's, this is the podcast for you. Listen to Therapy Gecko on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or Wrenowned. wherever you get your podcasts.

Hello, my love. I'm Ryan Weiss, and for the past 15 years, I've been an emotional intelligence coach and a spiritual guide, and I'm sharing with you my new podcast, Waking Up with Ryan. Waking Up with Ryan is a daily audio video podcast, here to help you connect with yourself

before the noise of the day takes over. So let's start our days together with a moment of calm that's just for you. Listen to Waking Up with Ryan on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Dr. James Stout. You might know me as a host of the podcast

it could happen here. But I'm hosting a brand new show now called Natural Causes, where we explain how going outside is political and look at how we can live together with nature and take care of one another in a world that's on fire. You know, we feel uncomfortable saying something like culture in wildlife, but that's what it is. We're going to explain how a tick can make you sick

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