Activist recounts surveillance, arrest, and church protest dispute (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: We have put you in handcuffs.

[00:00:01] Speaker 2: Why?

[00:00:02] Speaker 1: That's the part, that's the policy. Of course it is.

[00:00:03] Speaker 2: Why are you recording this? Why are you? Wait, hold on. You're under arrest. I understand, but I'm asking, why is he recording this? I would ask that you not record. It doesn't have to be. I don't want to be a trouble for MAGA. So I'm asking you not to record. Is it departmental policy to record? If it's not, can you stop recording? Yes. Thank you.

[00:00:32] Speaker 1: Nikima Levy-Armstrong is now out front. Nikima, I want to ask you about that video and just this whole issue of who's recording and why and what the policy is, because it's really crucial. But, you know, you're here. You just got out of custody a few hours ago. And I know, you know, we spoke just hours before you were arrested yesterday morning. So then all of a sudden, you were arrested and it's been 36 hours that you were in custody. What happened in that time?

[00:01:01] Speaker 2: So what happened was, yesterday morning, FBI agents essentially, I guess they, so let me backtrack a little bit. So they had me, as well as some of the other organizers and protesters, under surveillance. So they treated us as if we were dangerous criminals. We were not. They treated us as if we were dangerous criminals, watching our movements. They even went to my co-defendant Chantal Allen's home and watched her and her wife get into their vehicle and drive away the other night. And apparently they were tracking me in my vehicle, which I did not know. And so we were, we stayed in a hotel in downtown Minneapolis because we had heard that they might be arresting people. And we had our lawyer contact the U.S. marshal's office to see if there was an arrest warrant, not yesterday, but the day before. And they said there was no arrest warrant, you know, on file. And then he also called the U.S. attorney's office, as well. And they did not give him any information. So we wanted to be close to downtown. We also didn't want the FBI to kick in our doors, you know, with our families there. So we stayed at a hotel so that we would be able to turn ourselves in, in the event that we found out that there was an arrest warrant. However, in the meantime, dozens of FBI agents, again, were surveilling us. They found out the hotel that we were staying in. They surrounded the building, monitored the building. And at one point in the middle of the night, we were in my room and I opened the, or one of my friends opened the hotel door to go take her bag next door. And an FBI agent stormed out of the room across the hall from me and chased her and slammed her to the ground. And he thought that later we realized he thought that she was me. So he got physical with her and attacked her. And when I saw this man run out of the room, I just closed the door and locked it. And then I tried to reach my attorney. Like, I think that they're in the room next door surveilling us. It was just so shocking to see the lens that they went to as if we were dangerous criminals. And we're literally talking about a nonviolent peaceful protest. And so once we were able to get ahold of our attorneys early in the morning, we talked to them about me being able to turn myself in. And they, and initially David Rosen, who is the head prosecutor on this case had told my attorney, Jordan Kushner, that I could just self-surrender with him by my side. And then he got a call from a higher up in Washington who said, no, the FBI was going to have to arrest me. And I knew that they just wanted to put on a show because JD Vance was coming into town because MAGA got worked up over the church protest. And that is why I believe that the FBI agent was trying to record me.

[00:04:04] Speaker 1: So that's why the recording, but what you described is a whole lot of people and manpower and hotel room bills and all of these things that they're doing when you were willing to just walk in and turn yourself in.

[00:04:17] Speaker 2: Absolutely. We followed the steps to see if there was an arrest warrant for me and there was nothing in their system. And so we were only eight minutes away from the federal courthouse in downtown Minneapolis, which is where I would, where my attorney thought that I would have to turn myself in. So we followed all of the steps, but they treated this as if I was a fugitive on the run that I had committed murder. And they're doing all this, putting all these resources into tracking down one black woman when they will put zero resources into holding Jonathan Ross accountable, the ICE agent who killed Renee Good. Let's not forget that fact. He's still roaming around free. There are federal agents protecting his home as we speak, but instead they tried to make me a target simply for speaking the truth and calling out the authoritarian behavior of the Trump administration and the brutality of ice in the twin cities of Minnesota.

[00:05:14] Speaker 1: Nakima in that video that they were filming of you, right? Because they, they, they obviously have said this is something they're now doing and we've seen them do it. Jonathan Ross himself was filming during, during when he shot Renee Nicole. Good. You say in your video, I don't want to be a trophy for MAGA. We heard that in what we just played that you provided for us. But that video that we're looking at, it confirms what your attorney said. And by the way, what the DHS secretary posted, which is you looking very calm and stoic. Okay. During your arrest, she posted an image of you. You looked very serious and calm. But then the white house posted a digitally altered image and it's looking bereft and crying and very broken up. And, um, so that's the one on the right. I don't know if you can see it, but for viewers, the doctored AI generated fake image posted by the white house is on the right on the left is the real image, which was posted by the DHS secretary. So Nakima, when did you find out that this and what did you think when you first saw what the white house posted? Because you knew it to be a lie.

[00:06:17] Speaker 2: Absolutely. So my husband was there and he was also recording. So that is the recording that you have, which was taken by my husband. And, um, at the time when I questioned the FBI agent about why he's why he was recording, he had a smirk on his face, right? He knew that this was a sham prosecution to begin with. I could tell, honestly, by the look in his eyes. And I said, you can't, you know, later I said, you can't even look at me with a straight face, you know, about this whole thing. And so when I asked him about recording, he said, I was not going to go on Twitter or anything. I was just asked to record this video. And so I didn't find out until we were in federal custody. When my husband told me that it was like, uh, last night when they jailed us, because actually the judge, the magistrate that we appeared before, um, after, um, you know, being arrested, he actually ordered us to be released yesterday. But the U S attorney who is prosecuting this case asked for a stay in the judge's decision so that he could contest it. And it was a bunch of BS as to why they should be able to detain us. And so that one hour stay while becoming a whole other day in federal custody, because there were over 150 protesters who showed up at the federal courthouse peacefully, but they shut the federal courthouse down hours early and then quickly transported us in shackles to the Sherbourne County jail, which is where we were held until, you know, a few hours ago, when we were released, they didn't have to do all that. We had ankle chains around us, belly chains. We had, uh, handcuffs with a board in between. I mean, honestly, like, like they were transporting slaves during slavery and it was very and a board chain for that. And a belly chains, ankle chains, belly chain and handcuffs with a board in between where you couldn't even move your wrists. And they put us in the back of a van. These are the U S marshals and they did not even put us in seatbelts. So we did not feel safe even being transported from the federal courthouse to the jail, but none of it was necessary. Our lawyers tried to get back into the federal courthouse. They wouldn't even let them in. They closed hours early. So all of this was intentional to further punish us for speaking truth to power and standing up for vulnerable people being abused by ICE.

[00:08:42] Speaker 1: Nakima, they did just release a court affidavit. Um, and this, this came a DHS agent, um, testifying in here. So I wanted to read for you what they've just put out. We've just gotten this. It says that your church protests quote disrupted the religious service and intimidated, harassed, oppressed, and terrorized the parishioners, including young children, and caused the service to be cut short. It goes on to describe a conversation that they said you had before the protests where they said that you specifically said Nakima to others. Remember if you have anything that is activist identifying, do not wear it in. Uh, if you're just going in to sit down and be a part of the situation, I wanted to give you a chance to respond to this affidavit.

[00:09:28] Speaker 2: I said what I said, we went into the church service. Anyone who saw the video saw that we were very peaceful and the description that they gave with regard to churchgoers. That to me sounds like what ICE is actually doing in our community, terrorizing adults and children, making them fearful, you know, disrupting their lives. That's what ICE is doing. That's not what we did as we were in there trying to do this. As we were in there trying to have a dialogue, at least I did with the pastor initially, once I said the name, David Easterwood and asked, how could he be both the pastor and the director of ICE in Minnesota? The pastor is the one who said, shame, shame, because he didn't want to have that discussion in front of the congregation. He, I believe he didn't want them to know that they have an ICE pastor as a part of the church, because of course there's leadership, the knows, and there are some of the congregants who did not know. Now, as we were, you know, leading chants, there were protesters talking directly to parishioners and vice versa. There were also people who were worshiping during the service. There were people who were singing. There were people who were sitting in the pews praying. So that is in stark contrast to the affidavit that you just read in terms of what actually took place in that church.