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I won't stop: Jailed activist blasts US crackdown on anti-Trump protesters
Source: The Guardian
‘I won't stop’: Jailed activist blasts US crackdown on anti-Trump protesters
Exclusive: Yvette Felarca, who faces riot charges after participating in an anti-fascist demonstration, joins lawyers in warning over prosecutions nationwide
Sam Levin in San Francisco
Tuesday 25 July 2017 10.00 BST
When Yvette Felarca exited her flight in Los Angeles, there were a dozen police officers waiting for her.
The 47-year-old teacher was handcuffed, jailed, and later, to her shock, charged with assault, inciting a riot and participating in a riot over her involvement in an anti-fascist demonstration at the California capitol more than a year ago.
“The charges are obviously politically motivated. It is clearly a witch-hunt,” Felarca told the Guardian in her first interview since she was released Thursday, on $25,000 bail after two nights in jail. “This is in response to the fact that the movement against Donald Trump is strong and the resistance is strong.”
Felarca is one of hundreds of anti-Trump activists across the US facing prosecution for protesting against the White House and white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups that have increasingly organized in public. The criminal cases – including many in which protesters could face decades in prison – has drawn accusations that the government is trampling on the first amendment and broadly targeting critics in an aggressive effort to silence them.
-snip-
Exclusive: Yvette Felarca, who faces riot charges after participating in an anti-fascist demonstration, joins lawyers in warning over prosecutions nationwide
Sam Levin in San Francisco
Tuesday 25 July 2017 10.00 BST
When Yvette Felarca exited her flight in Los Angeles, there were a dozen police officers waiting for her.
The 47-year-old teacher was handcuffed, jailed, and later, to her shock, charged with assault, inciting a riot and participating in a riot over her involvement in an anti-fascist demonstration at the California capitol more than a year ago.
“The charges are obviously politically motivated. It is clearly a witch-hunt,” Felarca told the Guardian in her first interview since she was released Thursday, on $25,000 bail after two nights in jail. “This is in response to the fact that the movement against Donald Trump is strong and the resistance is strong.”
Felarca is one of hundreds of anti-Trump activists across the US facing prosecution for protesting against the White House and white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups that have increasingly organized in public. The criminal cases – including many in which protesters could face decades in prison – has drawn accusations that the government is trampling on the first amendment and broadly targeting critics in an aggressive effort to silence them.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/25/yvette-felarca-trump-protest-charges-activism
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