protesters

The U.S. Justice Department failed to secure felony convictions against most of the 102 protesters arrested in Los Angeles and three other major cities last year on charges of assaulting federal authorities — a record far below the norm in federal assault prosecutions.

All of the dozen cases that made it to trial, mostly in L.A., ended in acquittal, mistrial or dismissal. Experts say that’s surprising for a department known for its ability to win at trial. The last three felony assault cases, in L.A. and Portland, Ore., will go to trial this fall.

The dismal record has raised questions about rushed investigations and aggressive charging tactics by prosecutors under pressure to show the Trump administration is cracking down on people who assault law enforcement. It comes as the Justice Department is facing broader setbacks in politically charged investigations, with grand juries repeatedly refusing to return indictments and trial juries granting acquittals.

“Prosecutors tend to win because they control what cases they pursue and they have a lot of resources and discretion,” said Mary Fan, a former federal prosecutor and law professor at the University of Washington.

The fact that the government failed to win any felony assault convictions at trial calls into question “whether or not these charges should have ever been brought in the first place,” she said.

Tracking the outcome of 167 arrests

The Associated Press’ analysis focused on arrests made during protests last summer and fall in L.A., Chicago, Portland and Washington, D.C. — cities with significant protests where President Trump deployed the National Guard or tried to.

Then-Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi said those who interfered with federal law enforcement would face “severe consequences.”

Most of the arrests — 102 — were for felony assault on a federal officer, which can carry a sentence of up to 20 years in prison. Of those cases, 41% were dismissed and 34% were pleaded down to misdemeanors. Ten people pleaded guilty to felony assault. Nine people got prison time.

Of those arrested on other charges, seven were sentenced to prison for offenses including arson and obstructing law enforcement. A few defendants have diversion agreements, meaning their cases will be dismissed if they demonstrate good behavior.

The AP’s analysis shows that the Justice Department’s record failed to meaningfully improve since December, when an initial assessment showed early struggles to prosecute people on the charges for which they were arrested.

The Justice Department said in a statement that federal prosecutors are right to prioritize cases against people accused of assaulting federal officers and that “each case is based on the facts.”

“If there are mitigating factors identified in a case, then prosecutors must also act appropriately to inform the court, and in some cases downgrade or drop charges,” the department said.

Prosecutors failed to persuade

It’s rare for federal prosecutors to lose at trial. In 2024, 82% of defendants charged with felony or misdemeanor assault were convicted at trial or with a plea deal, according to data from the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. AP’s analysis found that less than half of the protesters charged for either felony or misdemeanor assault were convicted.

In Portland, a jury couldn’t reach agreement on felony assault charges for Oriana Korol, who was playing clarinet in a marching band demonstrating outside the city’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement building last October when a scuffle involving officers broke out. Officers pepper-sprayed her and pushed her to the ground, where she struck one with her foot, according to court documents.

After a mistrial, prosecutors filed a reduced misdemeanor assault charge. She pleaded guilty and was sentenced Sept. 1 to time served and one year of supervised release.

Her attorneys wrote in a court filing that she “has accepted responsibility for the bad choices she made over a few seconds that caused no injury.”

Jonathan Caravello, a lecturer at California State Channel Islands, was acquitted of assault on a federal officer after a three-day trial. He was accused of throwing a tear gas canister deployed by immigration agents back at them while protesting a raid at a Camarillo cannabis farm.

Caravello said he was trying to get the canister away from the crowd. Videos showed he had tossed it high above officers’ heads and it landed far behind them. The jury acquitted Caravello after a quick deliberation.

“They’re trying to get a chilling effect out of these charges,” said Caravello, who turned down a misdemeanor plea deal.

Michael Rabbitt was among six co-defendants accused of felony conspiracy to impede a government vehicle from accessing an ICE facility near Chicago last September.

The vehicle slowly advanced despite being surrounded by protesters, leading some to put their hands on it, Rabbitt said.

After the government dismissed charges against two of the defendants, defense attorneys requested transcripts of the grand jury proceedings that led to the conspiracy indictment. The government eventually dropped the conspiracy charge and proceeded on misdemeanor counts of impeding a federal officer.

The judge later reviewed the unredacted transcripts and admonished prosecutors for improper behavior before the grand jury. The charges were dismissed days before trial.

Rabbitt said he was proud they fought the charges.

“This case was bigger than us,” he said. “I’m proud that we won this case, not just for us, but for protesters across the country.”

Many pleaded down

Though many federal criminal cases end in plea deals, some legal experts say it’s rare for felony assault to be pleaded down and may signal overcharging — filing a more severe initial charge so defendants will be more willing to plead guilty to one with a lighter sentence.

“I think when prosecutors bring charges ethically, they should be prepared to prove them beyond a reasonable doubt,” said Laurie Levenson, a former federal prosecutor who is a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles.

The U.S. Attorney’s office overseeing Los Angeles said it brought the prosecutions in response to a “wave of violence against law enforcement officers who were doing their jobs.” It voluntarily dismissed charges against some defendants after further investigation, it said.

L.A. prosecutors have arrested three additional people for felony assault at immigration-related protests this year. One pleaded guilty to a felony and two to misdemeanors.

In Chicago, all but one of 19 felony assault cases were dismissed. The U.S. Attorney’s offices in the Northern District of Illinois, District of Columbia and Oregon did not respond to requests for comment.

Some DOJ convictions

A man accused of throwing a Molotov cocktail at a hotel outside Los Angeles where federal authorities were staying was sentenced to five years in prison. Two others were sentenced to more than three years after pouring lighter fluid on a burning California Highway Patrol vehicle.

Federal judges sentenced eight people to decades in prison for their participation in a demonstration outside a detention center in Texas in July 2025 where a police officer was shot in the neck.

Three people were convicted at trial of conspiracy to impede or injure an officer for protesting outside a detention facility in Spokane, Wash., in June 2025. The Spokane and Texas cases were not included in AP’s analysis because they did not occur in one of the four cities where Trump deployed troops or attempted to.

Ding and Rush write for the Associated Press. Rush reported from Portland. AP writers Eric Tucker and Alanna Durkin Richer in Washington contributed to this report.

Rome, Italy – “Anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism”, read the black-and-yellow signs distributed by Amnesty International outside the Italian parliament on Wednesday afternoon.

Hundreds gathered in front of Montecitorio Square in Rome to oppose Italy’s so-called anti-Semitism bill.

The demonstration was organised to coincide with a meeting of the Chamber of Deputies’ Constitutional Affairs Committee, which is examining legislation approved by the Senate on March 4 by a large majority. Under Italy’s constitutional system, a bill must be approved by both chambers in the same text before it can become law.

“We are tired of seeing anti-Semitism instrumentalised to promote censorship of any kind of criticism of the State of Israel and its criminal policies,” said Daniel Calo, of Tikkun, a group of Italian Jewish antiracism activists.

“In the face of this shameful bill, we reiterate once again, forcefully, that opposing Zionism is not anti-Semitism.”

At the centre of the controversy is the possible adoption into national law of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism, which critics argue conflates anti-Semitism with criticism of Israel.

According to the IHRA, “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, eg, by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor”, is anti-Semitic, as is “drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis”.

Anneliese Baldaccini of Amnesty International Italy said the bill, if adopted, would apply across schools, universities, social platforms and cultural associations.

The proposed law is “based on a definition that censors political criticism”, she said.

Activists argue that existing legislation already provides the tools to combat hate crimes.

They are instead calling for the adoption of the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism, a non-binding set of guidelines that seeks to combat anti-Semitism while protecting freedom of expression that was developed in response to the IHRA definition.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, Francesca Albanese, the Italian legal scholar and UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, said legislation equating criticism of a state with anti-Semitism risked restricting freedom of expression.

“Any piece of legislation that directly or indirectly equates criticism of a state with anti-Semitism is problematic and risks creating more problems than it seeks to solve,” Albanese said.

She argued that the bill could limit the ability to analyse, document and criticise the “apartheid state of Israel”, and accused Italy of prioritising the protection of Israel over accountability.

“The need to protect the State of Israel from criticism is stronger than the need to do justice,” she said. “It is extremely dangerous because every Jewish person in the world risks being seen as a kind of emissary of Israel.”

She described Italy, under the current government, as one of Europe’s strongest defenders of Israel.

Tony La Piccirella, a Palestine solidarity activist who was part of the Global Sumud Flotilla, said he worried that the bill “provides a legal instrument to attack newsrooms, online information platforms and social media, in order to silence anyone who denounces the genocide and the entire economic system that sustains it”.

But the legislation has received strong backing from Italy’s Jewish institutional leadership.

Noemi Di Segni, president of the Union of Italian Jewish Communities (UCEI), was heard by the Senate’s Constitutional Affairs Committee in January and described legislative action against anti-Semitism as “urgent and unavoidable”.

Di Segni, who was born in Jerusalem and has served in the Israeli military, has repeatedly rejected describing Israel’s war in Gaza as genocide.

In January 2025, she called such accusations “unacceptable”, arguing that terms including “genocide”, “concentration camp”, “starve”, “Nazi” and “apartheid” should not be used to describe Israel’s conduct.

The bill has exposed divisions that cut across the government-opposition divide.

It was approved by the Senate by a large majority that included much of the opposition. Six Democratic Party senators voted in favour, while the party as a whole abstained, and those divisions have continued in the Chamber.

Among the bill’s most outspoken opponents is Stefania Ascari, of the Five Star Movement, who addressed protesters before entering parliament.

“The greatest danger to Jews and to the entire world is the terrorist state of Israel,” Ascari said. She accused the bill of targeting “freedom of expression, the autonomy of universities, [and] the work of associations and NGOs”.

The committee’s sitting ended without a vote or substantive examination.

Its work is expected to resume next week, although the timetable remains uncertain. The Chamber has scheduled a final plenary vote for October 2, leaving parliament a narrow window to complete the committee stage.

In the meantime, activists say they will continue to gather outside parliament and on the streets, to vent their concerns.

The number of migrants arriving on British shores in small boats so far this year has fallen by more than 40 percent compared to the same period last year, with the people smugglers being forced into a change of tactics due to the French and British police’s closures of many gaps. However, the last week has seen alarming incidents of “intimidating and thuggish behavior” — as described by a government spokesperson — by far-right activists.

On Sunday, roads in Portsmouth were blocked after a boat carrying 140 migrants was brought ashore there. This came the day after similar scenes of direct action had blocked roads and disrupted travel in and out of the Port of Dover. In both incidents, organized men in black, with some wearing balaclavas, blocked traffic and even smashed the windscreens of police cars.

Though largely peaceful, the protests reflect a change in tactics, raising questions about policing, intelligence gathering and the lack of robust measures taken against them. The threat posed by these groups should not be belittled. There is the potential not just for a climate of fear among immigrants but also a threat to law and order and the standing and reputation of the UK as a tolerant country.

The police, the government and officials from all parties condemned the protests. Many rightly questioned the scale of Kent police’s failure after it emerged a tipoff was received the day before the far-right agitators blocked Dover’s roads. Details were apparently passed to police after residents of a nearby village heard individuals boasting in a pub about going to Dover to “attack Muslims.” That information fell on deaf ears and Kent police even later described the protest as “spontaneous.”

Far-right groups are of the opinion that no action taken or policy adopted by the government is good enough

Mohamed Chebaro

Nick Lowles, the chief executive of Hope Not Hate, an organization that charts far-right activity, told the BBC: “To have 300, 400 people with balaclavas marching down the streets, stopping traffic. You know, it’s not just good enough. We need to call these people out for their politics and for the type of Britain that they want to see.” He added: “We’ve got different ways to register our protest. We do not go on the street. We do not burn people out of their houses. We do not cause trouble and threaten to fight the police.”

We should be careful about the repercussions of these images and videos being widely shared and the normalization of those scenes and the messages they convey. They are not viewed only by people in the UK but are also disseminated around the world.

Hope Not Hate was quicker than the police to inform the public that the Dover disturbances were organized by a far-right group called Patriot Platform. This new network was launched in June, uniting smaller, localized antimigrant groups. It claims to represent a Christian “army of patriots,” rallying around a vision of reclaiming the country’s borders and a message that Britain belongs to the British. It seems its adherents are ready to adopt vigilante methods to combat immigration in an effort to revive the country’s Christian values, as the group claims.

After winning power in July 2024, the Labour governments of first Keir Starmer and now Prime Minister Andy Burnham have fought to curb the arrival of small boats across the Channel, using a variety of laws and tactics to deter people from making the dangerous journey. But the past two years have also shown that far-right groups are of the opinion that no action taken or policy adopted by the government is good enough, as if antimigrant agitation could be a conduit to replacing Labour with Reform UK, the party led by colorful euroskeptic politician Nigel Farage.

Surely those that marched in Dover and Portsmouth are not like the Blackshirts just yet. But the resemblance is there

Mohamed Chebaro

After two nights of vigilante, militant-style action against migrants, people have begun to question whether the UK is witnessing the rise of fascism. What we saw at the weekend was a reminder of Italy’s Blackshirts, the violent private army and paramilitary wing of Benito Mussolini’s National Fascist Party, which was founded in 1919. Not long after them came the Hitler Youth of the 1930s, which transitioned from a fringe, violent paramilitary wing into a powerful, mandatory state apparatus.

Surely those that marched in Dover and Portsmouth are not like the Blackshirts of Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists just yet. But the resemblance is there to be seen. This time, the “enemy” is not the Jews of the 1930s but migrants, who are seemingly considered to all be of the Muslim faith.

How the government can act against this clear and present danger is not obvious, as it could end up with more ugly scenes. Already, citizens have taken it upon themselves to “defend the realm” through encircling hotels and government facilities housing migrants or wearing black uniforms and balaclavas and blocking roads and ports. Surely the obvious thing to ask is who is behind them? Who is financing and organizing these acts, which we are told are only the beginning?

It is going to be very difficult for the British government to undo the damage caused by the men in black at Dover and Portsmouth. Launching an investigation to find any lapses of intelligence or policing should be the first step.

Governments across Europe seem to be increasingly at the mercy of far-right forces that are riding high in a changing world. This emerging threat rests on three aspects: the far-right nativist ideology; a warped digital realm that magnifies and spreads toxic, hate-filled content; and an unexplained financial lifeline.

The task ahead is daunting. The so-called patriotic drive of the far right is not aimed at migrants alone — its real enemies are democracy, liberties and the rule of law. Its methods are not peaceful protests but organized activism bordering on vigilantism and militancy.

• Mohamed Chebaro is a British-Lebanese journalist with more than 25 years of experience covering war, terrorism, defense, current affairs, and diplomacy.

Mohamed Chebaro is a British-Lebanese journalist with more than 25 years’ experience covering war, terrorism, defense, current affairs and diplomacy. He is also a media consultant and trainer.

More from Mohamed Chebaro

Police used water cannons and batons as a few thousand protesters broke through security barricades in Bihar’s capital.

Indian students and unemployed youth have clashed with police as they marched towards the residence of the chief minister of the eastern state of Bihar, ruled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party, demanding access to jobs and transparency in recruitment exams.

The government forces in Bihar used water cannons and lathis – the Indian version of batons – as a few thousand protesters broke through security barricades in the state capital Patna, videos seen by Al Jazeera showed on Tuesday.

The demonstrations came a month after massive Gen Z protests in New Delhi pushed for the ouster of India’s education minister over alleged irregularities in conducting key competitive examinations.

The July 25 resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan also marked a significant political defeat for PM Modi, who has tried to maintain a strongman image, while India has continued to slide in multiple democratic indices under his rule since 2014.

Police in Bihar, home to about 130 million people, detained at least 25 protesters in Patna and released them later, according to the Indian Express newspaper.

Local police accused some protesters of attacking security personnel.

“Police will identify those involved in stone pelting at police and will take action against them,” Patna Police Superintendent Kartikeya K Sharma told reporters on Tuesday.

The protests began last week with unemployed youth demanding jobs, but they later expanded to include calls for education reform.

Bihar Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary said his office was “listening to every student’s voice”.

A delegation of student representatives met Bihar’s top bureaucrat, Pratyaya Amrit, after the protests. Amrit then told reporters that the discussion “was positive, and we were assured of a favourable response within a couple of days”.

The tight employment market in India makes government jobs, which offer long-term stability, a major draw for millions.

Since the massive youth-led protests organised by the online Cockroach Janta Party in New Delhi, there have been similar demonstrations in other states challenging both the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and opposition parties.

In southern Karnataka, members of a BJP-linked student body staged a protest near the state chief minister’s residence on Tuesday over alleged irregularities in recruitment for government jobs.

Bihar’s regional Education Minister Mithilesh Tiwari said the government had addressed students’ demands, without giving more details, and added that the door for dialogue remained “wide open”.

In New Delhi, the Cockroach movement has also announced a march next month to protest against what it says is the Modi government’s failure to fulfil several promises of change, including the withdrawal of police cases against protesters.