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LOADINGERROR LOADING When Kat Abughazaleh, a former extremism reporter-turned-Democratic congressional candidate, learned that the U.S. government had brought an indictment against her last week, it felt “wild” and “weird.” But given that President Donald Trump is in office, it was not particularly surprising. “It was surreal to see my name on there, but this was the type of stuff that we, disinformation reporters, had been warning people about for years, had been warning Democrats about for years,” Abughazaleh, who is running for Congress in Illinois’ 9th Congressional District, currently held by retiring Democratic Rep. Jan Schakowsky, told HuffPost by phone Monday. “It was part of the reason I wanted to run for Congress — to fight against these types of political stunts and attacks on our First Amendment rights.” Advertisement A grand jury indicted Abughazaleh and five others, including two other political candidates, on felony charges last month, accusing them of conspiring to impede a vehicle driven by a federal immigration agent and allegedly attempting to stop it from entering Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Broadview facility in Chicago on Sept. 26. Prosecutors claim the federal agent was forced to drive extremely slowly to avoid injuring protesters, and that Abughazaleh and her alleged co-conspirators banged on the windows of the government vehicle, crowded in front of it, and pushed it. They further allege that someone eventually scratched the word “PIG” onto the car before breaking the vehicle’s side mirror and rear windshield wiper. Abughazaleh denies any wrongdoing. Court records indicate that an arraignment is now scheduled for Nov. 12. Demonstrators have been showing up weekly at the Broadview ICE facility since September, protesting the Trump administration’s aggressive and often legally dubious immigration enforcement methods in Illinois. Multiple people have been arrested, and protesters frequently report that they have been hit by batons or tear gas, or have been manhandled by masked agents without provocation. Advertisement In a video from Sept. 19, just a week before the protest that led to her indictment, Abughazaleh can be seen being thrown to the ground by ICE agents. She told HuffPost at the time that she and others had seen a protester being “kidnapped,” so “everyone that was there joined arm-in-arm to block the van and tried to rescue the person who was exercising their First Amendment rights.” In a post on X, she said an ICE agent “tried to run down dozens of protesters over with an SUV” as they walked on a public crosswalk. She said the vehicle followed them for roughly 100 yards until finally ICE “barraged us with pepper balls.” Clergy members, protesters and journalists sued the Trump administration over its use of chemical agents at Broadview, arguing they are excessive and unnecessary for crowd control. Advertisement In October, U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis, an Obama appointee, issued a temporary restraining order against agents at Broadview using tactics such as tear gas and pepper spray. After news reports emerged showing federal agents using the munitions anyway, Ellis then ordered that all agents wear body cameras. (Arguments over a request for a preliminary injunction meant to totally stop pepper ball use by Department of Homeland Security agents will be held in Chicago this week.) Abughazaleh told HuffPost that she has heard from many of her prospective constituents in Chicago who believe her indictment is an attempt by the administration to intimidate her. HuffPost reached out to the Broadview ICE facility for comment and did not receive an immediate response. “I think the Trump administration was trying to do what they always do, which is act like the big man that they’re scary and do whatever they want,” she said. Advertisement “They are attacking me for my First Amendment rights and trying to paint me as a threat, and the message that a lot of people seem to have received is that the administration is scared,” added Abughazaleh, a 5-foot-tall 26-year-old who said she finds it laughable that the U.S. government is painting her as a threat. “I think it backfired on them in a way.” Abuzalageh launched her run for the seat, which covers the far north of Chicago and many of its more upscale suburbs, as a primary challenge to incumbent Rep. Jan Schakowsky, an 81-year-old progressive. After Schakowsky announced her retirement in May, other candidates came streaming into the race. She’s now one of the leading candidates, alongside Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss, another progressive. Both have raised more than $1 million for their campaign so far, though another six candidates have raised at least $250,000. Biss and other candidates have also protested at Broadview, and he has slammed the charges against Abuzalageh as “frivolous” and “designed to scare residents into submission.” Advertisement Abuzalageh’s indictment hasn’t stopped protests at Broadview. The demonstrations are largely peaceful. “I often bring my knitting,” Abughazaleh said. “But that’s not the picture Trump wants to paint, because he wants people to be scared of immigrants and people who stand with immigrants.” Abughazaleh, the daughter of an immigrant, grew up as a Republican. Then she had an epiphany. “I realized that a lot of this country is built on keeping us angry at each other instead of angry at people who are actually causing these problems: the billionaires and oligarchs who are using our lives as a means to their own self-enrichment,” she said. Advertisement The Trump administration is hellbent on further dividing Americans and punishing or imprisoning those who dare to exercise their rights, Abughazaleh said. Her campaign has been unapologetic about its positions against authoritarianism and fascism, and she is focused on creating a country where everyone has access to affordable housing, health care and groceries. “One where everyone has equal rights, one where everyone can not just survive but thrive. And the thing is — these are all possible,” she said. “We have built a system where when you say these things, it’s treated as a pipe dream. But this is the status quo in many of our peer countries.” The pursuit and detention of undocumented immigrants in Chicago under the Trump administration’s Operation Midway Blitz is unconscionable, according to the candidate. Advertisement “I absolutely would characterize ICE as secret police, and it is absolutely imperative that we abolish ICE. Any governmental entity that can be turned on the populace this way does not deserve to exist,” she said. “Here in Chicago and in the surrounding suburbs, ICE is very real to us in a way that it might not be in other states. Almost everyone has had a personal run-in with ICE, or someone they love has had a personal run-in with ICE. We are seeing tear gas in residential neighborhoods. People being taken out of their apartment building in the middle of the night by men who are propelled down by helicopters. This is a city that did not ask ICE to do this and does not want them here.” Abughazaleh commended the “defiance” that she sees in her district. When ICE comes in with tear gas or pepper balls, the community patrols the street and uses whistles to alert each other when agents are in the area. If she wins, Abughazaleh says one of her priorities will be to fight for limits on Customs and Border Protection’s jurisdiction, which is currently considered to be 100 miles away from any international border, including lakes and oceans. That figure should be reduced to 5 miles, Abughazaleh said, and she thinks she can get “small government conservatives” to consider such a change. Advertisement Also on her agenda: getting to the bottom of who the masked men are disrupting people’s lives on Trump’s orders. Abughazaleh said she’s concerned about far-right extremist iconography being on things like masks or bumper stickers on ICE vehicles. “If you are going into communities and terrorizing people, if you’re abducting people off the streets, you need to be held accountable. There will need to be trials,” she said. She’s also concerned with the president’s weaponization of the Justice Department. All the damage that has been done must be unwound. Advertisement “It’s going to take a lot of resources, but just as everything worth having takes work and takes effort, this is worth it,” she said. “We need to ensure that we have transparency, that we are investigating what happened behind the scenes in this administration and any extremism in the Justice Department. We need to depoliticize it and take that same approach across the whole of government.” It won’t be enough to simply restore dollars or jobs that have been cut, she said before adding that there will need to be a “proactive, people-first approach” to repairing institutions left hobbled by the Trump administration. The stakes are too high for anything else, she said. Just look at the political violence on the rise and its emanation predominantly from the far right. Advertisement “The old playbook is gone,” she said, even if Democrats find that “scary to admit.” She continued, “But we aren’t going to get anywhere if we keep trying to live in the past. We have to recognize what the threat is now, and we have to recognize that our responsibility is to protect each other, and if you’re a representative, you have to protect the people you represent.” Abughazaleh has also been critical of her own party. “The Democratic Party currently has, in many polls, lower approval ratings than Trump — which is extremely low — and that’s because [the party’s] own supporters feel not just left behind but betrayed. I think that people have lost faith in the political system and rightly so,” she said. “Politicians in general are bought out by big donors, the system is built to make it way more accessible to run for office if you’re rich and if you know rich people or you owe favors to rich people.” According to the Pew Research Center, 67% of Democrats say they are not pleased with how Democrats are responding to the Trump administration. Advertisement “We have to go back to the roots of progressive populist politics. I’m thinking about the New Deal era, with actually delivering something while also evolving to be modern and fit the modern age,” Abughazaleh said. “It’s not about plugging in a meme and hoping votes come out. It’s about actually communicating with folks and then translating that communication to real-time effects on the ground.” ReportingWhat'sReal Your SupportFuelsOur Mission Your SupportFuelsOur Mission Join HuffPost Today This Election Day we’re cutting through the noise. With no billionaire influence or angles, we’re here to inform voters and help you make sense of the election day chaos. By becoming a member you help power this mission. We remain committed to providing you with the unflinching, fact-based journalism everyone deserves. Thank you again for your support along the way. We’re truly grateful for readers like you! Your initial support helped get us here and bolstered our newsroom, which kept us strong during uncertain times. Now as we continue, we need your help more than ever. We hope you will join us once again. We remain committed to providing you with the unflinching, fact-based journalism everyone deserves. Thank you again for your support along the way. We’re truly grateful for readers like you! Your initial support helped get us here and bolstered our newsroom, which kept us strong during uncertain times. Now as we continue, we need your help more than ever. We hope you will join us once again. Support HuffPost Already a member? Log in to hide these messages. The public must put greater pressure on politicians, she said. “If Democrats actually listened to voters,” she said, “there’s a chance that Kamala Harris would be in the White House right now.”
