Prominent civil rights activists Nekima Levy Armstrong and Chauntyll Allen were released from jail Friday after being arrested and charged for organizing a protest at a St. Paul church.
U.S. District Judge Laura M. Provinzino ordered Friday that Levy Armstrong, a civil rights attorney, and Allen, a St. Paul school board member, should be released from the Sherburne County jail, where they were being held in federal custody. Levy Armstrong and Allen were freed Friday afternoon, said their attorneys, Jordan Kushner and James Cook, respectively.
“Despite aggressive attempts by federal prosecutors to delay and derail the process, the courts stood firm in defense of constitutional rights, due process, and the rule of law,” Levy Armstrong and Allen said in a joint news release issued Friday by Levy Armstrong’s Racial Justice Network. “We are profoundly grateful that the judicial system upheld justice today, and we demand that this ruling be honored immediately and without further frivolous appeals.”
In a court filing arguing that Levy Armstrong and Allen should remain jailed, federal prosecutors said federal agents surveilled the women earlier this week and learned that Levy Arsmtrong had stayed at a hotel and saw Allen carrying luggage to her car. Prosecutors argued that the women had plans to flee, knowing that they were under investigation for the Jan. 18 church protest.
Kushner, as well as Jill Brisbois, who was representing Allen, refuted the claims, and wrote in a court filing that the women were staying at a hotel because their home addresses were leaked, and they were receiving death threats.
Provinzino wrote in his order Friday that prosecutors’ arguments were “simply speculative,” and that there was no evidence Levy Armstrong or Allen were a flight risk. The judge noted that they had no prior history of evading law enforcement.
“To the contrary, Defendants have strong ties to Minnesota and did not flee (in fact, they are staying at a hotel in downtown Minneapolis known to federal law enforcement) — despite knowing that they were being investigated,” reads Provinzino’s order.
Levy Armstrong and Allen were arrested Thursday by Homeland Security Investigations and FBI agents at the direction of U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi. U.S. District Judge Douglas L. Micko presided over Levy Armstrong’s first appearance Thursday, and ruled that she should be released because she wasn’t a threat to the public’s safety or at risk of skipping future court hearings, but that was postponed after federal prosecutors appealed the decision.
Their arrests came days after they organized a protest at Cities Church in St. Paul demanding that one of its pastors, David Easterwood, resign because he’s acting director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in St. Paul.
Levy Armstrong and Allen were charged with conspiracy to deprive others of their constitutional rights. A third activist, William Kelly, was also arrested Thursday and was also set to be released after appearing before a federal judge Friday afternoon.
Trump administration officials on Thursday, including Bondi and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, celebrated the arrests and posted several photos of Levy Armstrong and Allen in handcuffs. The White House’s X account posted a photo of Levy Armstrong’s arrest that appeared to be altered with AI to show her crying with an exaggerated expression on her face.
Kushner called the charges against Levy Armstrong and Allen political retaliation, citing the administration’s social media posts and video of the arrests that federal agents recorded on their cell phones. The arrests were an effort to intimidate and retaliate against protesters, and demonstrate an escalation in the administration’s tactics, he said.
“There wasn’t any crime committed, much less a federal felony. It’s a political persecution,” Kushner told Sahan Journal Friday. “It’s not based on enforcing the law or protecting anyone’s rights and they purposely made a spectacle of her arrest, which shows that this is all for political purposes.”
Levy Armstrong said in her Friday statement that she surrendered peacefully to federal authorities. She said she asserted her right to protest at Cities Church, and de-escalated the situation there, contradicting federal authorities’ narrative of the incident.
“I demanded dignity, humanity, and respect, not just for myself, but for every person who has ever been brutalized, silenced, or disappeared by unchecked government power,” Levy Armstrong said in the statement. “We stood in protest because families are being torn apart, communities terrorized, and constitutional rights trampled. And we will not be intimidated into silence.”
