By Kawan Lovelace | Civil Rights Attorney | Former NYPD Detective | Lovelace Law PLLC, Long Island City, NY | Admitted in New York State
On June 23, 2026, federal judges in Texas handed down federal terrorism charges convictions resulting in sentences of decades in federal prison for eight people. Not for violence. Not for murder. Not for bombing anything. For protesting. Two of them received 50-year sentences for wearing black clothing and expressing anti-government views under federal terrorism charges. If you’re reading this and not feeling a chill run down your spine, you should be.
This is not hyperbole. This is not a slippery slope argument about what could happen someday. This is happening now. And if you think it won’t touch you or your family, you’re not paying attention.
Watch our full breakdown of this case and what it means for your rights: [Link to IG Video]
What Happened: The Facts That Should Terrify You
On July 4, 2025, a group gathered outside the Prairieland ICE Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas. Some participants fired fireworks at the facility and vandalized property. A police officer responding to the scene was shot and wounded. Benjamin Song, the alleged organizer, was convicted of attempted murder and received a 100-year sentence.
The eight defendants were convicted in March on various riot, terrorism and explosives charges relating to the attack on the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado on July 4, 2025.
Fair enough. If you shoot at a cop, you should face serious consequences.
But then the government did what authoritarian governments do: they swept up everyone they could find and charged them with terrorism.
The Mechanism of Control
Savanna Batten: Convicted of providing material support to terrorists. Her crime? Wearing black clothing and being present at a demonstration where she committed no violence, vandalized no property, and fired no weapons.
Elizabeth Soto: Convicted of the same charge. Her crime? Wearing black clothing and operating a printing press that produced anarchist zines. She was not alleged to have participated in planning. She committed no act of violence. But she subscribed to an anti-government ideology, expressed it through a small printing press, and wore black while doing it. For this, she received a 50-year sentence.
In Prairieland, prosecutors relied on her black garb as a means to tie her to the conspiracy; in Soto’s case, prosecutors argued that her black clothing and her operation of a small printing press that produced anarchist “zines” tied her to the conspiracy. Both received sentences of 50 years on Tuesday.
Think about that. Think hard about it. This is not a case of punishing violent crime. This is a case of punishing thought. Punishing expression. Punishing ideology.
And that is the definition of authoritarianism.
How This Ties Into Excessive Force and Why This Is Worse
I fight cases involving false arrest and police misconduct. I know what it looks like when the government overreaches. I know how it feels when your constitutional rights are violated. I was part of the system too as a cop, detective and a prosecutor. It’s broken.
But this Prairieland case represents something even more dangerous than the police misconduct cases we typically handle. In those cases, at least there’s a clear allegation of criminal conduct: a false arrest, a beating, an unlawful search. The government has to prove you actually did something.
Not anymore.
Under the ANTIFA designation and the broad conspiracy statutes being deployed, the government no longer needs to prove you did anything. They just need to prove you were there. That you wore the right (or wrong) clothes. That you expressed the right (or wrong) political views. That you read the right (or wrong) literature. That you associated with people who might have been thinking about doing something.
That is the mechanism of totalitarianism: make the category so broad, so vague, so dependent on ideology rather than conduct, that anyone can be swept up at any moment. Anyone can be arrested. Anyone can be charged. Anyone can be imprisoned for decades.
The ANTIFA Criteria as a Tool of Mass Arrest
In September 2025, the Trump administration designated ANTIFA as a domestic terrorist organization. Let me be clear about what that means in practice:
Let’s be very clear: ANTIFA is not an organization. It has no membership, no structure, no leadership. It is a decentralized ideology opposing fascism. It is a set of political beliefs.
The government just criminalized a set of political beliefs.
And they did it in a way that allows federal prosecutors to charge practically anyone who expresses those beliefs, associates with people who express those beliefs, or wears clothing consistent with those beliefs, with terrorism.
The terrorism charges followed Trump’s order last fall to designate antifa as a domestic terrorist organization. Those charges did not require a tie to any organization, and there is no domestic equivalent to the State Department’s list of foreign terror organizations.
Think about the infinite flexibility that creates. Want to arrest an activist? Charge her with conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists. Want to imprison a protester? Claim he was part of an ANTIFA cell. Want to silence a journalist or a community organizer? Allege links to antifascist ideology.
The Prairieland case shows us exactly how prosecutors will use this tool: broadly, aggressively, and without regard for whether the defendant actually committed any act of violence. The sentencing shows us what judges will do with it: impose maximum sentences that are normally reserved for murderers and rapists.
This is not the gradual erosion of civil liberties. This is the wholesale abandonment of the Constitution.
What This Means for America: The Reach Is Limitless
You need to understand something: this is not going to stay in Texas. This is not going to be a one-off case that we move past and forget about.
Federal prosecutors across the country are already using this playbook. In Alabama, they’re charging people who set a shopping cart on fire during a protest with material support for terrorism. In Minneapolis, they’re indicting ICE protesters under broad conspiracy statutes. The Justice Department announced that eight North Texas Antifa Cell operatives were sentenced for their roles in rioting, using weapons and explosives, providing material support to terrorists, obstruction, and the attempted murder of an Alvarado police officer at the Prairieland Detention Center on July 4, 2025. This is the first sentencing of defendants affiliated with Antifa following President Donald J. Trump’s executive order designating the group as a Domestic Terrorist Organization in September 2025. They are going to replicate the Prairieland model everywhere.
And the criteria for being arrested under this model is so broad it might as well not exist.
Do you oppose government immigration policy? That could link you to ANTIFA ideology. Do you participate in demonstrations where some people break windows or spray paint walls? Conspiracy charge. Do you read certain books or follow certain social media accounts? That could be evidence of terrorism support. Do you wear black clothing to a protest? That’s now evidence of affiliation with a terrorist organization.
This is how authoritarian regimes consolidate power. They take a broad, vague category, claim it’s a threat to the nation, and then use it to arrest anyone who might oppose them. They don’t need evidence of actual crimes. They don’t need to prove you hurt anyone. They just need to prove you belong to the category.
And once you’re arrested under a terrorism statute, the entire machinery of the federal government comes down on you. Maximum sentences. Consecutive charges. Decades in prison for attending a protest.
The Connection to Excessive Force and Why This Is Worse
We fight police misconduct cases at Lovelace Law. We know what excessive force looks like. We know what illegal stops and false arrests look like. We know the injury it causes to individuals and families.
But at least in those cases, there’s a clear line: you got beaten, you got arrested illegally, you got your constitutional rights violated. It’s wrong, and we fight it, and sometimes we win.
This is different. This is the government saying: we are going to create a category so broad that we can arrest anyone we want, charge them with terrorism for expressing political beliefs, sentence them to decades in prison, and call it national security.
And the worst part? There’s no requirement of actual violence. Elizabeth Soto didn’t shoot anyone. Savanna Batten didn’t throw anything. They wore black clothing and expressed anti-government views. And they’re going to spend the next 50 years in federal prison.
Remember January 6th protestors? They got violent. Where are those convictions?
If you get arrested at a protest tomorrow, and the government decides you belong to the ANTIFA category, you are facing decades in prison. Not for violence. Not for property damage (unless they can prove that, which is a lower bar than we want to admit). For your political beliefs.
That is authoritarianism. That is the end of free speech. That is the end of the right to protest.
We Are Living in an Authoritarian State Now
I don’t say this lightly. I’ve studied history. I know what authoritarianism looks like. And we are watching it happen in real time in America. My wife lived during the communist regime in Lithuania, and some of the stories she tells me are terrifying. People dissapearing for no reason, neighbors spying on each other, government issued loudspeakers all across public spaces spewing authritatian idealogy.
When the government criminalizes political ideology. When federal judges impose 50-year sentences for wearing the wrong color clothing and having the wrong beliefs. When prosecutors can sweep up anyone they want under a vague terrorism statute. When the designation of a terrorist organization doesn’t require actual membership or structure, just an alignment with decentralized political beliefs.
That is authoritarianism. That is not the American system our Constitution promised. That is the dismantling of it.
And the Prairieland case is the proof. Five of Song’s co-defendants—Cameron Arnold (also known as Autumn Hill), Savanna Batten, Zachary Evetts, Bradford Morris (also known as Meagan Morris), and Elizabeth Soto—were each sentenced to 50 years in federal prison. All five were convicted in March of rioting, providing material support to terrorists, and using explosives during the attack.
Critics of the Justice Department’s case have said the outcome could have wide-reaching effects on protests. “That opposition is something that the government wants to squash so a case like this helps the government kind of see how far they can go in criminalizing constitutionally protected protests and also helps them kind of intimidate, increase the fear, hoping that folks in other cities then will think twice over protesting.”
What We’re Doing About It
At Lovelace Law PLLC, we are not going to stand by and watch this happen.
If you have been arrested in connection with protest activity, if you have been charged with conspiracy or material support for terrorism, if the government has accused you of ANTIFA affiliation based on your clothing, your beliefs, or your associations, we need to talk.
We will fight these cases. We will challenge these statutes. We will argue in federal court that the Constitution still means something. That free speech still matters. That the right to protest is not negotiable.
We may lose. The courts are stacked with judges appointed by administrations hostile to civil rights. But we will fight anyway, because that is what it means to be a civil rights attorney in an authoritarian state.
This is not the future we want. But it is the present we have. And we are going to meet it with everything we have.
Resources & Further Reading
- Justice Department Press Release: Leader of Antifa Cell Members Sentenced
- CBS News: Ice Detention Attack Defendants Sentencing
- National Lawyers Guild: Civil Rights & Constitutional Protections
Contact Lovelace Law for Federal Charges & Civil Rights Defense
If you need us, call. (718) 662-8265
Free confidential consultation available.
Lovelace Law PLLC Civil Rights Attorneys Defending Constitutional Rights in an Age of Authoritarianism 28-07 Jackson Ave, Long Island City, NY 11101 Website | Directions
Lovelace Law PLLC is a civil rights law firm based in Queens, New York, dedicated to defending the constitutional rights of those harmed by excessive force, false arrest, police misconduct, and the government’s weaponization of the criminal justice system against political speech and protest in Brooklyn, Queens, Bronx, and Manhattan, NYC.
