cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/45292256

The arrest of a US army veteran who protested against the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown has raised alarms among legal experts and fellow veterans familiar with his service in Afghanistan.

Bajun Mavalwalla II – a former army sergeant who survived a roadside bomb blast on a special operations mission in Afghanistan – was charged in July with “conspiracy to impede or injure officers” after joining a demonstration against federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) in Spokane, Washington.

Legal experts say the case marks an escalation in the administration’s attacks on first amendment rights. Afghanistan war veterans who know him say the case against Mavalwalla appears unjust.

"Here’s a guy who held a top secret clearance and was privy to some of the most sensitive information we have, who served in a combat zone,” said Kenneth Koop, a retired colonel who trained the Afghan military and police during Mavalwalla’s deployment. “To see him treated like this really sticks in my craw.”

no comments (yet)

sorted by: hot top controversial new old
there doesn't seem to be anything here
48 comments in c/politics@lemmy.world view that post
[–] 140 points 1 year ago (15 children)

That's going to get thrown right the fuck out of court, not even the fascist judges will bother with that shit.

But he'll be stuck in the jail system until that point, which is the real intent.

  • source
  • hideshow 15 child comments
  • [–] 81 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    You can beat the case, you can't beat the ride

    Doesn't even matter if charges are filed, a couple days in jail fucking sucks. And it doesn't just discourage the person in jail. It's a message to every other potential protestor: "this could be you".

    But they can't lockup everyone, their strategy only works if it gets protestors reduced to the amount they could imprison.

    If they get the opposite reaction and more protestors, it backfires on them.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 4 child comments
  • [–] 19 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    It doesn't backfire if their goal is to find an excuse to kill a bunch of protesters.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago

    US population outnumbers the military 342 to 1 (maybe 200 to 1 if not counting elderly and children), and the current administration keeps proving time and time again the military means fuck all to them. This is where Trump and his fucksticks are failing spectacularly. Previous dictators have bribed the shit out of their militaries to generate favor and compliance. Trump insults them, places them in dumbass situations, finds ways to screw them from pay, etc. The ICE funding was a way to create a private army of devotees. But a large portion of them are gravy seals, chucklefucks who think top score on COD will help them in actual battles. They got ran out of towns by bag toting grannies for fucks sake. At least, I tell myself this at night to sleep without living in constant fear of full out slavery and dogmatic oppression. And yes, I do realize that the civilian population has a large amount of support for him, but many of them will hipefully change their minds if it finally affects them.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago*

    EVEN JUST A FEW HOURS SUCKS. I know from experience.

    Fuck the police. ACAB.

    The whole time I was just worried about if I was gonna be deported, then I remembered my mother is a citizen so I also have derivative citizenship. But still, it triggered me so much, I was constantly ruminating/thinking about the alternate timelines where I got deported. Still think about it from time to time, heck, with the current ICE nazification, it can still happen right now. Police sirens scared the shit out of me, I could be just chilling playing a horror game, and then the siren blares through the neighborhood and I my heartrate goes even above being faced with monsters in a game (because the monsters in real life (aka: cops) are much scarier), I essentially go into fight or flight mode.

    Like I had so many traumatic events throught my life, this unlawful arrest was the final nail in the coffin, I feel like I have permanent brian damage.

    Parents have betrayed me, my brother has betrayed me, my country of birth betrayed me, now I'm in a different country and still dealing with authoritarian bullshit, like these corrupt pigs. Never felt like I have a safe place anywhere in this world, this world is hostile.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 44 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Yeah but did you read the person's name?

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 31 points 1 year ago

    And all his biometric and other data will be part of Palantir for use down the road when they start to claim “biomarkers that signal traitorous citizens” or some shit to round people up

  • source
  • parent
  • [+] 16 points 1 year ago (5 children)
  • [–] 21 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    A reminder that Grand Juries indict 99.99999% of the time. To the point where the multiple grand Juries that refused to indict the guy that threw the sandwich at ICE officers was actually newsworthy.

    They aren't there to determine whether it is likely someone did something, just whether the charges are even minimally plausible.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 4 child comments
  • [–] 57 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    You know, it sure is weird how much planning for the J6 terrorism was done right out in the open and those in authority at that time did SWEET FUCKALL to stop the J6 terrorists from doing what they did.

  • source
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [–] 31 points 1 year ago

    Every time I think about the history of federal involvement in left wing organizing vs right wing organizing in this country, my blood pressure rises about 20%.

    I mean, fuck. We inspired and then "rehabilitated" the Nazis. We took a shitton of higher ups and just pardoned them and gave them jobs in gov. Shockingly, the gov has been rather opposed to left wing ideas since.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    That same opposition that we went to all of that trouble to get in power in 2020 despite them sucking and predictably failing is still in control of the party as arrogant as ever, shouting down anyone arguing for popular electable candidates. Sabotaging any popular electable candidates that might get in there as with Mandami in New York City.

    Without getting real opposition and otherwise real leadership there is no way we will unseat these guys ever. And unseating them for an establishment candidate just prevents things from getting bad at an accelerated rate. Nothing is fixed, things still get worse. Which is why they lose.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 51 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    "Alarm"

    .. fuck off the place is on fire

  • source
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 11 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    the place is on fire

    Which is typically when you heed an alarm...

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Alarms exist to alert you when the dangers are not immediately obvious, or are somewhere else. The US is on fire both figuratively and literally and people are waiting for the alarms to go off before the even decide to start thinking about maybe doing something.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [+] 79 points 1 year ago (2 children)
  • [–] 13 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    -People who Say School Shooters ARE Protected by the Constitution!

    (may not apply if shooter is thought to be trans)

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago

    Or Antifa, or the Leeeeeeffffvt. (Seriously, saying your against Anti Fascism = ? Anyone? Beuler? Anyone? Right, you're pro Fascism. Don't deny it while proving it's what you are by opposition.)

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 26 points 1 year ago

    Release the Epstein files!

  • source
  • [–] 25 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    Yeah, that is a direct attack on the first amendment and a show of force to the rest of the population not to get in their way.

    Republicans are responsible for this horrible economy, the constitution being burned and ignored, and our country losing all democracy.

    I will be sure to remind them at every opportunity what they did to us.

  • source
  • hideshow 5 child comments
  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    Don't forget every single person who voted republican in 24!

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 4 child comments
  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (3 children)
  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    Seriously, those that chose not to vote outnumbered the red voters immensely. I feel more anger towards those that chose apathy and lethargy over those that have been conditioned to fear and stupidity.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 24 points 1 year ago (9 children)

    Looking forward to the day every single one of these jack-booted thugs from the Nazi leaders at the top all the way down to the ICE Gestapo pigs face Justice at our version of the Nuremberg trials.

  • source
  • hideshow 9 child comments
  • [–] 15 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    And who is going to do that? The rest of the world is going to sit idly by as the US marches brown and lgbt+ people into the extermination camps. Hell half of them will use it as justification to build their own camps and invade the other half. All while the world slowly cooks itself.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    A depressing thought, if Nazi Germany had only done the Holocaust without the invasions, the powers of the time would have completely ignored it. At most they would have shook their heads disapprovingly.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    Do not hold your breath. By all indications these guys are going to consolidate power and make a one-party stay with rigged elections. We have no opposition popular or muscular or ambitious enough to unseat them. After 2028 it is doubtful any opposition could unseat them.

  • source
  • parent
  • [–] 15 points 1 year ago

    Dissenters will not be tolerated.

  • source
  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago

    Looks like fascism

  • source
  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    So much for the military being able to stand up for the country as opposed to be an individuals lapdogs.

  • source
  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    Gotta expect that shit from a draft dodging psychopath

  • source
  • 6 comments in c/news@lemmy.world view that post
    [–] 58 points 1 year ago

    Only loyalty matters in authoritarian regimes.

  • source
  • [–] 35 points 1 year ago

    I smell another failed indictment coming.

  • source
  • [–] 25 points 1 year ago

    Only in a police state is impeding an officer the same severity as injuring one.

  • source
  • [–] 16 points 1 year ago

    "Here’s a guy who held a top secret clearance and was privy to some of the most sensitive information we have, who served in a combat zone,” said Kenneth Koop, a retired colonel who trained the Afghan military and police during Mavalwalla’s deployment. “To see him treated like this really sticks in my craw.”

    Yeah, well first they came for the hippies and you didn't speak out and now here we are dumbass. It should stick in your craw to see anybody treated like this.

  • source
  • [–] 10 points 1 year ago

    “Really sticks in my craw,” he says before shrugging and accepting it.

    If you live in the states and you’re allowing this, you’re complicit.

  • source
  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago

    The silver lining to Trump 2.0 is that mainstream liberal news is finally covering what anarchists have been trying to tell the rest of society about for decades.

  • source