On the morning of April 23, around 7 a.m., the FBI, along with other local and state police, battered down the doors of four residences across Ann Arbor, Canton, and Ypsilanti, Michigan. The homes belonged to pro-Palestine student organizers at University of Michigan.
The raids were the latest move by the University of Michigan and the state against student organizers following the protest encampments last spring. The school has seen particularly harsh repression of campus protests against Israel’s war on Gaza.
While no arrests were made, all electronics were seized into FBI custody and at least two DNA samples were collected, according to local attorneys representing the subjects of the raids. The warrants were from Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office and signed by a judge in the 45th District Court in the small town of Oak Point, Michigan, but attorneys also say they have yet to see probable cause for the search and seizures. Nessel, a Democrat, still has not unsealed and shared the affidavits for the warrants with lawyers or the residents they raided.
“These raids were very much seen as an escalation by the state attorney general.”
“These raids were very much seen as an escalation by the state attorney general, who’s expressed quite a bit of an extreme reaction against the students’ activism on the University of Michigan campus,” said John Philo, executive and legal director of the Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice, the group representing the targets of the raids. “In terms of probable cause for the warrants, it’s entirely unknown at the moment. The search warrants were issued based on a complaint and the judge has ordered for the affidavit to be suppressed. It’s a terribly unusual thing.”
Nessel, who asked the FBI to carry out the raids, has positioned herself publicly as one of President Donald Trump’s biggest opponents. She also has extensive personal, political, and financial ties to the University of Michigan, which bypassed local prosecutors by enlisting Nessel to crack down on pro-Palestine protesters.
According to Philo and Liz Jacob, also of the Sugar Law Center, the FBI presented warrants in Ann Arbor and Canton before entering the premises, but refused to show any at the Ypsilanti residence.
“Folks were shocked, especially to see that the FBI was executing an attorney general warrant,” Jacob told The Intercept in an interview. “I’ve never seen that in my experience, and we have not seen that in Michigan around pro-Palestine protests or on any other protests, to my knowledge.”
Following the raids, officials denied any connection to the students’ political protest, claiming the FBI was becoming involved in a “vandalism investigation.” In its official press release following the raids, Nessel’s office claimed the 12 “coordinated” vandalism incidents that occurred across the state — including graffiti that read “Free Palestine” — totaled to damages of $100,000.
Student organizers have cast doubt on Nessel’s denial that the raids were not related to their pro-Palestine protest.
“This is about the occupation and the genocide of Palestinians, and the fact that the state does not care about Americans in any way,” said Ira, a Muslim organizer with TAHRIR, a coalition that advocates against the University of Michigan’s complicity in the genocide against Palestinians, who asked to use only their first name for fear of retaliation from the school. “It’s not just about us being targeted right now. All of these people — not just the Trump administration, but these Democrats — who are claiming to fight for Americans are the ones who are attacking and repressing us.”
“Shotgun Approach”
Last October, Nessel filed felony criminal trespass charges against seven student protesters who were arrested last May at a University of Michigan encampment. Those charges were dropped in May, just before a judge was to decide whether or not to disqualify Nessel over alleged bias. Nessel cited “legal delays and controversies surrounding the case” as to why she dropped the charges.
Local organizers, however, fear that the FBI raids are only a stepping stone to something bigger — and that the dropping of the charges is only a temporary relief.
Affidavits are typically sealed in cases when there is a confidential informant working with law enforcement who could be compromised. Philo said this would be difficult to understand in this case, especially considering that none of the students raided have any prior criminal activity or pending criminal charges or accusations against them. For what has been alleged, the warrants appeared to be an extreme measure for a vandalism investigation, according to both Sugar Law Center and student organizers who spoke with The Intercept.
“The scope and scale of what is alleged does not seem to warrant three law enforcement agencies descending on the homes of students, who by all calculations and known facts, have been accused of a crime in the past,” said Philo, who describes his clients as “pretty diligent and responsible students.”
The attorney general’s raid executed a “shotgun approach” to further chill protest in solidarity with Palestine, he said.
“To do this in that context with the FBI, state troopers, and local law enforcement,” he said, “sends a clear message that this is well beyond trying to determine who committed spray painting incidents.”
While it may be considered unusual for the FBI to become involved in a vandalism investigation, it is not uncommon for the FBI to join forces with local and state law enforcement agencies to work in a joint terrorism task force context, said Mike German, who worked as a special agent in the FBI for six years and is now a fellow at the Brennan Center’s liberty and national security program.
“In that context, it’s not uncommon for a situation — where a person is alleged to have violated some state law — for them to use the state authorities to pursue that angle of investigation while also gathering evidence for a future terrorism investigation,” he explains.
While German does not have any specific information about the Michigan cases, he says this does follow a pattern aligned with the government’s increased surveillance of citizens coupled with the FBI’s lax approach to far-right violence. He added that the raids in Michigan appear to be part of a broader escalation and expansion of power of the FBI since the September 11 attacks, particularly with the passing of more and more domestic terrorism statutes at federal and state levels. Just having increased powers, German said, created a motivation for using them.
“It has created an insatiable appetite for information,” he said. “Anywhere that they can get data and information to put into their databases, they’ll take those opportunities.”
