On a gray, humid Saturday morning in central Florida, a little under a dozen people gathered outside the Spring Hill Branch Library to protest the construction of a hyperscale data center in their community. There was no immediate threat — the Hernando County commission had unanimously approved a one-year moratorium on such developments in June — but the organizers weren’t satisfied. A temporary pause wouldn’t be enough. They wanted a ban.

“We are going to fight, fight, fight,” said a 71-year-old woman named Carol, who was manning a table with flyers and a petition the group, No Data Centers Hernando County, planned on presenting to the local government. Carol, a retired country music radio host, is a staunch conservative and a proud Floridian. The American flag on her red T-shirt was made up of little sea turtles. A white visor, bedazzled with red and blue rhinestones, shielded her face from the late-morning sun. “How would you like to have one by you? If you live within 15 minutes of a data center, night and day you’re going to hear: EEEEENNNNNNHHHHHHHHHHHH.”

Beyond the noise pollution and environmental destruction — the frequencies emitted by data centers, she told me, hurt bees and other pollinators — Carol was concerned about the social cost of mass AI adoption. She told me about a woman she knows who cut off all her friends because “ChatGPT told her to.”

“She consults with ChatGPT what time she should wake up in the morning, what time she should go to bed, who should be her friends,” she said. 

The small rally in this Tampa exurb was one of nearly 150 protests affiliated with Humans First, which describes itself as a “conservative social movement that is dedicated to ensuring that the future of AI is in the hands of everyday people.”

Carol recited a litany of harms caused by data centers, some of them more dubious than others. Cows raised on ranches near data centers, she claimed, were giving birth to stillborn calves. Hyperscale facilities source their parts from China, an American adversary, threatening national security. “We’re setting ourselves up,” Carol told me. “Do you know what’s in those chips?” I told her I do not. “We’re blindly trusting the Chinese?” she continued, incredulous. “To give us chips?” (Conservative proponents of data centers, meanwhile, claim China is funding anti-AI campaigns in the United States.)

Communities across the country are pushing back on data center construction. A recent Gallup poll found that seven in 10 Americans oppose construction of data centers in their area. Nearly two-thirds of Republicans and 75 percent of Democrats surveyed said they objected to local data center construction. Americans may be more polarized than ever, but the backlash to data centers is bipartisan — and it may cement new, surprising political alliances. The concerns animating the conservative backlash are similar to those motivating liberals: the environmental costs of data center construction and maintenance; the ethical problems of AI, ranging from its use for mass government surveillance to its effects on users’ mental health; and fears that having a data center nearby will hurt their quality of life. But there are also some partisan anxieties behind the right-wing data center backlash, namely the threat of Chinese infiltration of US technology.

Humans First, a once-bipartisan offshoot of the Center for AI Safety, is helmed by Amy Kremer, a longtime conservative organizer who is arguably one of the people most responsible for the Republican Party’s populist turn. Kremer was an early leader of the Tea Party and a cofounder of both Women for Trump and Women for America First, the latter of which hosted the Stop the Steal rally in Washington, DC, that devolved into the January 6th riots. (Kremer was not among those who stormed the Capitol.) 

Despite Humans First’s partisan bent and Kremer’s political bona fides, the concerns at the Humans First-affiliated rally in Hernando County were decidedly local. A firefighter running for agricultural commissioner dropped off signs; a Republican candidate for county commissioner stopped by. The gathering ended with a lecture from a land use expert who explained how to change zoning codes to prevent the construction of hyperscale data centers — those that occupy at least 10,000 square feet and have a minimum energy draw of 100 megawatts. Before the lecture, No Data Center Hernando County member Kim Belanger, who works in IT, pulled up an article on data centers from the progressive website More Perfect Union. Even though the room skewed conservative, the article, she said, was “very informative.”

Patti Zirhut, the organizer, told me that she found out about Humans First on Facebook. Participating in the national day of action was a no-brainer, since Zirhut and her friends had already started No Data Center Hernando County to thwart data center construction in their community. 

“I am very conservative and I don’t believe in all the stuff that Democrats believe in at all,” Zirhut told me. But she also feels betrayed by Florida’s Republican leadership. She was a big fan of Gov. Ron DeSantis — at first. But in his second term, she said, “he’s been nothing but pro-development, just inviting everybody here, tearing up our state.”

DeSantis has positioned himself as an AI skeptic and signed a law in May requiring hyperscale data centers to cover their own utility costs and letting local governments set water use regulations for data center projects. But his administration has given data center developers millions in tax breaks, according to the Tampa Bay Times. The governor reportedly pushed to alter the state’s tax exemption for data centers so it would only apply to hyperscale facilities.

As they tabled outside the library, Zirhut and her friends discussed DeSantis’ prospective successors. “This is probably the most important governor’s race of your lifetime,” Belanger told me. She’s also concerned about a DeSantis-backed ballot amendment that would eliminate property taxes for most homeowners, since it would deprive county governments of much-needed revenue — potentially making developments like data centers more enticing.

Zirhut and the others were disappointed by Rep. Byron Donalds, the Republican front-runner in the gubernatorial primary and a vocal supporter of data center construction in Florida. “I just don’t understand why Trump would back him,” one of them said.

“I’m not anti-data center. I’m pro having a plan,” Donalds said in February. “Data centers are going to be a function of American life going forward.” Donalds has said he wants to bring more outside investment to Florida — a comment that has since come back to haunt him. “My vision is to make Florida the financial capital of the world,” he said at an event hosted by The Hill. 

“That is not what we want here in Florida at all,” Zirhut told me.

Donalds’ support for data centers is now costing him supporters from his own party. Recent attack ads have focused on the support he’s received from the tech industry, including more than $5 million in donations from Leading the Future, a $100 million pro-AI super PAC whose funders include Andreessen Horowitz and Joe Lonsdale of Palantir, according to the Tallahassee Democrat, as well as $500,000 from American Mission, which is itself funded by Leading the Future. Donalds appears to be staking out a middle ground between the industry that supports him and the voters whose support he needs to win the primary. On Monday, he announced legislation that would prevent data centers from driving up utility costs.

Opposition to data centers is widespread throughout the state. More than 20 counties and municipalities throughout the state have discussed or passed moratoria on data center construction, Politico reports. In some communities, the backlash has been strong enough to deter developers. In June, the sponsor behind a controversial data center proposal in Citrus County withdrew its plan to build an 800-acre data center in the community after the county commission approved a one-year moratorium on rezoning applications for data centers. 

“Unfortunately, local moratoriums on data centers would send a signal that the area is closed for business, both for data centers and for other significant economic development projects,” Dan Diorio, executive vice president of state policy and government affairs at the Data Center Coalition, an industry lobbying group, told The Verge. But that’s exactly what Zirhut and other organizers want.

Zirhut explained that she’s not anti-growth, but she doesn’t want the government to give handouts to major developers who have no ties to the community. “If we could keep it local, with local builders, that would be fine because they know what to do with Florida,” she said. “Even our agriculture commissioner” — Wilton Simpson, a Republican — “is having people come in and use herbicides and pesticides, spraying our lakes and killing all our vegetation.” She’s concerned about how AI can fuel mass surveillance, an issue that became especially salient after the Hernando County Sheriff’s Office started installing them on local roads.

“We don’t want people to lose jobs, and our country to be run by AI, and live like people in China, where our money is controlled and everything we do is looked at,” she said.

Though Zirhut is a lifelong Republican, the data center issue — and the bigger question of development — has led to some unexpected political compromises for her.

“If Byron Donalds wins the primary, I’m voting Democrat. I will not vote for him,” she told me, adding that she’d also be willing to vote for an independent candidate who opposed data centers. “I think a lot of people are like that. It’s not about the party. It’s not. It’s about human life.”

Bryan, a food broker from Michigan, wasn’t sure if he’d be able to make it to urgent care in time. He started feeling off on Thursday, and by Saturday, he was having to use the bathroom every 15 to 30 minutes.

“It’s no joke about the explosive diarrhea,” Bryan, who asked that his last name be withheld for obvious reasons, told me. I met him via Reddit, where I recently spent hours lurking in threads about cyclosporiasis, the explosive diarrhea illness infecting people across the country, and Cyclospora cayetanensis, the microscopic parasite that causes it, which spreads through human fecal contamination. Symptoms — including nausea, loss of appetite, cramping and bloating, and the much-discussed watery, explosive diarrhea — can begin anywhere from two days to two weeks after exposure, and experts say they can wax and wane. The explosive diarrhea may stop for a day or two, only to come back in full force. In extreme cases, patients can end up hospitalized after experiencing severe dehydration. So far, the government reports 141 hospitalizations and no deaths.

As a connoisseur of elaborate salads, I was dismayed by the news that a poop-causing parasite may have found its way into America’s summer produce. I wanted answers — and, it appeared, so did thousands of other people on Reddit, who have taken to crowdsourcing information (and misinformation) in the absence of concrete guidance from the federal government. Health agencies are being cautious about doling out immediate advice, but the gap in information has left suffering, toilet-bound Americans — and those who fear joining their ranks — to their own devices, and even made people a little conspiratorial. Online, people are speculating whether the government is trying to protect farmers or food distributors. The reality is more mundane but no more satisfying: Federal agencies won’t make hasty recommendations until they have more data, and Cyclospora infections are notoriously difficult to pin down.

Though Bryan wasn’t able to get a test to confirm it, he believes he has cyclosporiasis, making him one of more than 5,000 people across the country infected by the parasite. That figure is almost certainly an undercount, since many cases aren’t reported — and cuts to a federal program that tracks foodborne illness may be hindering investigation efforts. The “explosive diarrhea parasite” is a bigger problem than anyone has been able to grasp, though it’s not clear just how big. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed 1,645 cases since May 1st and is aware of at least 5,100 additional cases that require further analysis.

At urgent care, Bryan received “a full battery of tests” except for one — the one that would detect Cyclospora, which isn’t detectable by standard diarrhea tests. “The nurse practitioner said, ‘We can do one of two things: We can wait until Monday, or I can prescribe you Bactrim immediately,’” he explained. “She told me the labs were so backed up in Michigan that they can’t even keep up with the amount of people.”

Michigan has more confirmed cyclosporiasis cases than any other state: 2,640 as of Monday, according to state health officials, who said lettuce and other salad greens are a “potential source for this outbreak, although other food items cannot be completely ruled out.” State health officials haven’t traced the outbreak to a specific type of produce, or to any growers or suppliers. But The Washington Post reports that federal and state officials are investigating Taco Bell after the fast food chain voluntarily recalled lettuce, cilantro, onion, pico de gallo, and guacamole at some of its locations.

Janet Hamilton, executive director of the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists, explained that a lack of information doesn’t mean a lack of government action. 

“Anytime we have large outbreaks like this, it’s important to remember that they take time to solve, and it’s not uncommon that it can take multiple days, especially if there’s more than one product that’s involved,” Hamilton said. “There are a lot of folks who are working on this investigation, and it’s a good demonstration around why we do need epidemiologists and disease detectives to have some support and protect our food supply in the US.”

Even under the best of circumstances, the parasite is a tricky one to track. 

“Cyclospora outbreaks are among the most challenging foodborne outbreaks to investigate,” Rodney E. Rohde, program chair of the Medical Laboratory Science Program at Texas State University, told The Verge. The parasite’s long incubation period — usually about a week — and the short shelf life of most fresh produce make it hard to determine what foods made someone sick. Even when a culprit is identified, testing foods for Cyclospora is difficult. 

“Another challenge is that pathogens are often present in very low numbers and may be unevenly distributed throughout a food lot,” Rohde said, so a lab may analyze a 25-gram sample of thousands of pounds of product without getting a conclusive result. And even when a tainted batch is confirmed, Rohde explained, “tracing remains difficult because fresh produce often passes through multiple growers, packers, distributors, and retailers before reaching consumers, and contaminated lots may no longer be available once illnesses are recognized.”

But there are some additional hurdles to that. ProPublica’s Annie Waldman pointed out that the Food and Drug Administration lost more than 240 consumer safety specialists last year amid President Donald Trump’s cuts to federal health agencies. And last July, the CDC scaled back a program that tracked foodborne illnesses in partnership with the FDA, the Department of Agriculture, and state health departments. Before July 2025, the CDC’s Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network (FoodNet) worked with 10 state governments to track Campylobacter, Cyclospora, Listeria, Shigella, Vibrio, Yersinia, Salmonella, and Shiga toxin-producing E. coli. FoodNet stopped requiring state health departments to track most of those pathogens, including Cyclospora.

“Essentially, CDC is backing off on one of their best surveillance systems,” Dr. J. Glenn Morris, director of the Emerging Pathogens Institute at the University of Florida, told NBC News at the time. In a list of talking points provided to the Connecticut Department of Public Health, the CDC said financial constraints had led to the drop in surveillance: “Funding has not kept pace with the resources required to maintain the continuation of FoodNet surveillance for all eight pathogens.”

On a Tuesday press call, CDC officials distinguished between FoodNet and its more robust national surveillance program. “The data that we have for cyclosporiasis for this outbreak is the same as we’ve had for all the other seasons,” said Gwen Biggerstaff, deputy director of CDC’s Division of Foodborne, Waterborne, and Environmental Diseases. “We use the same systems and the same process, so that is unchanged.”

FoodNet was “designed as a sentinel system,” said Hamilton of the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists. “It was not designed to be the primary system for detecting outbreaks. The primary way that we detect outbreaks when it comes to Cyclospora or cyclosporiasis is really associated with making it be reportable within states, and it’s that reporting process, and then sharing of data with the CDC, that really allows us to detect Cyclospora infections.”

The CDC has identified an epidemiologic link between four states: Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia, and Kentucky. Cases have been reported in 34 states, though it’s not clear how many of those are linked. The department has not identified the source of the outbreak, and tracing efforts are ongoing. Where does that leave Americans who want to take an abundance of caution? The CDC and FDA aren’t currently recommending that people avoid eating certain foods, and both Hamilton and Rohde stressed the importance of practicing proper food hygiene, including thoroughly washing and drying all fresh produce.

And in light of recent reports suggesting lettuce may be a potential vector for infections, Rohde suggested avoiding it and other products connected with outbreaks in the past, especially if you’re immunocompromised or live in a state with high caseloads.

“Vegetables and fruits are obviously important to a nutritious diet,” he told me via email, “BUT one should be cautious and pay attention to ongoing local, state, and federal health reports for your geographic locale.” And if that means avoiding herbs at the peak of summer, then so be it.

Previous cyclosporiasis outbreaks have been traced to lettuces and other leafy greens. After more than 640 people across 11 states fell ill with cyclosporiasis in 2020, the Food and Drug Administration recalled bagged salads sold at Aldi, Walmart, and other retailers under the names Fresh Express, Giant Eagle, Walmart Marketside, and others. The FDA and the CDC reportedly traced the infections to Fresh Express’ Illinois plant. Other outbreaks have been traced to snow and snap peas, raspberries, and herbs like parsley, basil, and cilantro.

“Ultimately, prevention depends most on reducing contamination during production rather than in the home,” Rohde said. 

Desperate for a leafy green, I asked whether farmers market produce is a safe alternative. Rohde’s answer was disappointing but illuminating. He explained that preventing future outbreaks means reducing contamination at the source — that is, in farms and distribution networks. “Farmer’s markets may be non-connected to any type of common agricultural water supply that could be a potential source of contamination. So, in that sense, they may be safer. But, if one is in a ‘hot geographic area,’ I would still be cautious.”

Though expert opinion on the matter is mixed, and will likely remain so until more information about the outbreak emerges, I’m going to avoid raw greens for now, lest I succumb to Bryan’s fate. 

Nearly a week in, he’s starting to feel much better, he said — but the road to recovery was a long, bumpy one, punctuated by Preparation H wipes and many, many trips to the bathroom. “I wish this on no one,” he said. 

It’s a big year for America. It’s the semiquincentennial, otherwise known as America250, and the United States is cohosting the World Cup. But spectators at these events — and the millions of people who live in the cities hosting them — may not realize that they, too, are being watched.

From Kansas City to New York, the US cities hosting the World Cup have been ramping up their surveillance capabilities in the months leading up to the tournament. Security measures are at an all-time high in Washington, DC, which isn’t hosting the World Cup, but is home to a series of spectacles this summer. The Fourth of July festivities in the nation’s capital will have an unprecedented level of surveillance. Law enforcement agencies say they can’t take any risks during these once-in-a-lifetime events — but privacy advocates warn that some of this surveillance won’t be limited to this summer’s celebrations.

Both the Fourth of July fireworks on the National Mall and the July 19th World Cup final in New Jersey have been designated National Special Security Events (NSSE) by the Department of Homeland Security, the most stringent security designation the agency gives. This isn’t unusual for major sporting events — the Super Bowl is always given an NSSE designation — but it’s a first for the Fourth of July. The UFC fight at the White House in June was also an NSSE, as was the official UFC watch party on the Ellipse.

Attendees at the Fourth of July fireworks show on the National Mall will have to pass through airport-style security checkpoints and won’t be allowed to bring folding chairs or coolers. Counter-drone measures will be in place, The Washington Post reports, as will bomb technicians, countersnipers, and medical personnel from several federal agencies. While attendees will notice these security measures, others could be close to invisible — including camera networks that track their biometrics.

The measures at the National Mall appear to be a response to criticisms of lax security at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, which was infiltrated by a gunman who allegedly shot at a Secret Service agent. 

There will be similar measures in place at the World Cup final, which Donald Trump is expected to attend — and where he will reportedly present the trophy to the winning team. 

“This is going to be security-o-rama regardless of whether the president goes,” Jules Boykoff, author of Red Card: The 2026 World Cup, Sportswashing, and the FIFA Greed Machine, told The Verge. “If the president goes, that’s just an extra lacquering of security.”

Boykoff, a professor of political science at Pacific University, said there may be an increased ICE presence at the World Cup final as well, and pointed out that ICE arrested rapper 21 Savage at the 2019 Super Bowl — another NSSE — claiming he overstayed his visa.

Anne Toomey McKenna, an attorney who specializes in privacy and biometric surveillance, said the NSSE declaration may also make it easier to justify collecting communications data under the looser standard of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, instead of the more stringer requirements of the Wiretap Act.

Andrew Giuliani, executive director of the White House task force for the World Cup — and son of Rudy Giuliani — has said there will be heightened security at all the World Cup matches, even the ones Trump doesn’t attend. “You’ll have multiple perimeter checks from security. You’ll have checks while you get onto public transportation to make sure you’re a valid ticket holder,” Giuliani told the Atlantic Council’s Frederick Kempe. “Soccer fans — or futból fans — they generally like to come to stadiums late, in the 15, 20 minutes or so before the game.” But Giuliani said ticket holders should know that gates open three hours before kickoff and plan to arrive early so they don’t miss kickoff.

The surveillance isn’t limited to one-off events and in fact involves building up a massive apparatus across the country. Through FEMA, the Department of Homeland Security gave $250 million in grants to states that are hosting World Cup matches, much of which was used to buy counter-drone equipment, according to The New York Times. The FBI has also been training local law enforcement agencies on drone mitigation. According to Giuliani, the Fan Fests in all 11 host cities will be covered by counter-drone technology. It’s unclear whether these cities are using the same tech that led to an airspace closure in El Paso earlier this year.

New York City — technically one of the host cities, even though the matches are taking place across the river in New Jersey — spent $6.5 million on counter-drone technology. In Kansas City, Missouri, authorities have confiscated at least 16 drones since the World Cup began.

“The general rule with the World Cup and Olympics is that local and national police forces use the sports mega event like their own private cash machine,” Boykoff said. “The World Cup creates a state of exception that allows for all manner of securitization processes.” And in many cases, once these tools are in place, they remain. Paris, for example, enabled AI video surveillance ahead of the 2024 Olympics — and is keeping it in place through the end of 2027 despite privacy concerns.

Similar camera systems have been installed throughout the US ahead of the World Cup, even in areas far beyond stadiums. Kansas City also planned on putting cameras equipped with facial recognition on some city buses, even though the state government refused to fund the project over privacy concerns. The city initially went through with the program anyway, saying it would help identify missing persons and could thwart human trafficking attempts during a major international sporting event. City officials said that the images captured are checked against active missing persons alerts and only retained if there’s a match.

“Privacy is always a tricky thing,” Tyler Means, chief mobility and strategy officer at Kansas City Area Transportation Authority, told The Washington Post. “We’ve always had cameras on our buses. It’s just new technology. I think in time it’ll smooth over and people will realize, ‘Well, it didn’t really feel any different.’”

The cameras aren’t operational yet because of backlash and technical delays, but Kansas City plans on implementing the program later this year — even though the World Cup will be over by then.

The America250 celebrations will be monitored by thousands of law enforcement officers, including National Guard troops and FBI agents, many of whom will be wearing body cameras. Several cities have expanded or reactivated CCTV systems ahead of the World Cup. Seattle reportedly reactivated dormant cameras after FBI and Seattle Police Department officials briefed the mayor on “credible threats” during the games.

McKenna said the increase in surveillance at these events isn’t unwarranted given the increased level of risk, but said there’s an issue with how biometric data is gathered and retained. McKenna noted that British Columbia, which is also hosting the World Cup, has regulations around how long surveillance footage from matches and other events can be retained — rules the US lacks.

Though CCTV has been around for decades, advances in camera technology — and AI integrations — have made these systems incredibly sophisticated. Early footage “told us a lot about what was happening, but it really wasn’t that different from what a police officer standing on the street could see themselves,” McKenna said. “That’s how the law in the US reached the conclusion that CCTV systems are okay — because it happens in a public space, so there’s no real reasonable expectation of privacy risk under the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures.”

But cameras reach much farther than they used to — they can tilt, pan, or zoom, and can often see several miles away. They can be equipped with thermal imaging devices and facial recognition technology, all of which may be accessible to law enforcement. Some AI software can even analyze people’s facial expressions and claim to predict a person’s behavior, McKenna said. 

“We have increasingly advancing AI systems with analytical capabilities that can merge so much data and detect things from the footage that before we wouldn’t know,” McKenna said. “An officer on the street wouldn’t be able to identify every person walking by, but facial recognition technology software is very common, and it can be utilized together with the footage that is being taken and collected by CCTV systems.”

All of this information can be sent to federal fusion centers, where information is shared between local law enforcement and federal agencies like ICE and the FBI. McKenna explained that when there’s more information-sharing between local law enforcement and federal security agencies, “we lose control over how that information is used.”

“That’s part of the protection we’re supposed to have under our laws — that information that’s been collected for national security purposes not be used for domestic law enforcement purposes,” McKenna said. “We have increasingly seen a blurring of national security measures becoming part of domestic law enforcement.”

There are still a couple weeks left in the World Cup. But there’s no telling how long all the surveillance data gathered around the matches will be stored, or how it will be used.

Just days after a gunman killed conservative activist Charlie Kirk, it became clear that President Donald Trump would use the assassination to fuel a crackdown on free speech. To avenge Kirk’s death, the administration vowed to go after so-called “antifa” (otherwise known as antifascist) terrorists. Now that promise is bearing fruit. This week, eight Texas activists were sentenced to between 30 and 100 years in prison — one for attempted murder, but most for supposedly belonging to an insurrectionary “Antifa cell,” including one sentenced to 30 years in part for moving a box of zines.

These unusually harsh sentences are a major victory for the Trump administration, one that will likely serve as a blueprint for targeting activists across the US. The emboldened administration has quickly celebrated them. In a statement, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said that the sentences show that the law will come down hard on “Antifa terrorists who attack law enforcement and federal facilities.” But many of those sentenced did no such thing.

The Texas cases concern a July 4th, 2025, protest outside the Prairieland Detention Facility in Alvarado, Texas. Roughly a dozen protesters set off fireworks and shouted messages in Spanish through a bullhorn. Then it escalated: A few people slashed an ICE van’s tires, broke a security camera, and vandalized a guard shack. When guards came out of the building and told the group to leave, some complied, but others stayed. After a police officer arrived on the scene and drew his gun, one person shouted “Get to the rifles” and fired a rifle he’d brought with him, according to charging documents. The officer, who was shot in the neck, testified that he “knew” his life was in danger and spent three to four hours in the hospital after being shot.

Benjamin Song, the shooter, said he fired because he thought the officer was going to fire on a protester, and was convicted of attempted murder. But in addition to the shooting charge, prosecutors dubbed Song the “leader of the antifa cell.” Alongside rioting and discharging a firearm during a violent crime, a conviction for providing material support to terrorists was also included — and he was sentenced to 100 years in prison. 

Other defendants were convicted of lesser crimes ranging from rioting to providing material support to terrorists, catchall charges the government has applied to acts as disparate as distributing anarchist literature and “dressing in black bloc.” But their sentences, too, spanned decades.

Two people — Savanna Batten and Elizabeth Soto — weren’t involved in planning the protest, arrived separately from the others, and left when guards told them to, before the shooting. They were each sentenced to 50 years in prison. Among other accusations, the government declared they “were part of a group that created and distributed insurrectionary materials called ‘zines.’” Daniel Sanchez-Estrada, who didn’t attend the protest at all, was sentenced to 30 years in prison for moving a box of zines — an act prosecutors claimed was “corruptly concealing a document or record.” Ines Soto, Elizabeth Soto’s husband, was granted a continuance and will be sentenced on July 1st, according to the Department of Justice. (So will seven others who pleaded guilty to one count of providing material support to terrorists, some of whom testified as witnesses in the trial.) The other sentences handed down suggest that his will be similarly harsh.

The Department of Justice reportedly conceded that the zines weren’t even illegal — they were made for a book club named after anarchist organizer Emma Goldman, which read about topics including feminism and “the eradication of artificial intelligence from the face of the earth.” But it claimed that the Sotos had, by tabling at a zine fair, provided “material support to terrorists.”

“The defendants’ violence and terrorism is an assault on Democracy,” said Reed O’Connor, a Republican-friendly judge who among others handed down the sentences. O’Connor argued that the government needs to “deter this type of conduct.” In a statement to The Guardian, Song called it “collective punishment.”

In a statement, FBI Director Kash Patel said the agency “remains committed to identifying, locating, and dismantling Antifa and its funding networks across the country,” and more cases are coming. Last week, prosecutors indicted 15 people in Minnesota on a raft of charges including conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer, solicitation to commit a crime of violence, assault on a federal officer, and the destruction of federal property. Like the Prairieland defendants, the DOJ claims the 15 people charged in Minnesota are connected to “antifa.”

The indictment notes that the defendants are involved with the Black Cat Workers Collective and claims they “infiltrated and exploited lawful protests” in the Twin Cities, where thousands of people resisted Operation Metro Surge, a monthslong DHS operation that resulted in the arrests of thousands of immigrants and the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, which the federal government has suppressed efforts to investigate and prosecute.  It accuses some — but not all — of the defendants of using homemade shields, using debris to obstruct traffic, and obstructing DHS vehicles with wood, leaf blowers, and other items as they left the Whipple Federal Building to make arrests.

The indictment cites communications on Signal, which was used widely to coordinate mutual aid distributions and patrols of neighborhoods for ICE vehicles in Minnesota. Patel said during the protests that the FBI had opened an investigation into activists’ group chats. Here, the indictment says defendants coordinated “anti-law enforcement action,” practiced operational security — or OPSEC — techniques, and engaged in “counter-surveillance tactics.” One defendant is accused of kicking a government vehicle and “causing dents.” Two are accused of traveling across state lines “with the intent to kill, injure, harass, intimidate, or place under surveillance another person.” In plain English, the DOJ is trying to punish people for trailing ICE officers — and if it succeeds, other activists could be next.

Though the indictment distinguishes between legal and allegedly illegal actions, its language is slippery. Erik Davis, a religious studies professor at Macalester College in St. Paul and one of the arrested activists, expressed disbelief at the charges at a court hearing last week. “I seem to be indicted for holding meetings,” Davis reportedly told the judge. Indeed, the 94-page indictment claims that Davis moderated an “Emergency Meeting on Resistance to ICE Operation” in January and sent messages about other meetings in Signal group chats. The indictment notes that another defendant, Isaac Auman Sant, wrote an article for an “anarchist blog.” In his article, Sant allegedly mentioned watching someone break into an ICE vehicle. Notably, the indictment does not say that Sant vandalized the car, just that he was in the presence of someone who did.

The strategy here is guilt by association. Just as White House officials justified Alex Pretti’s death by smearing him as a domestic terrorist and “would-be assassin,” any of the thousands of regular people who resisted ICE’s siege of the Twin Cities could be called an antifa terrorist — and be condemned to a lifetime in prison as a result.