In this episode, Koki sits down with PRA Principal Research Advisor Steven Gardiner to discuss the recent March 2026 verdicts in the federal Prairieland case tried in North Texas. The jury found nine protesters guilty of a variety of charges, ranging from providing material support to terrorists to conspiracy to use and carry an explosive, concealing a document or record, and discharging a firearm. The charges stem from an investigation following a noise demonstration and confrontation with local law enforcement outside a North Texas ICE detention center on July 4, 2025.
In court, the case hinged on accusations that these defendants belonged to an antifa cell and thus engaged in domestic terrorism, premised on the 2025 Executive Order “Designating Antifa as a Domestic Terrorism Organization.”
Steven and Koki discuss the details of the case and trial, other instances of legal persecution of anti-ICE protestors, what these cases tell us about the Trump administration’s authoritarian project, and implications for ongoing resistance organizing—including concrete advice from Steven on how to mitigate risk without demobilizing.
Steven Gardiner is the Principal Research Advisor and former Research Director at Political Research Associates. He has been researching and writing in opposition to the politics of An attitude toward social identities that can be mobilized to justify discrimination, state/vigilante violence, and exploitation. Learn more , violence, and authoritarianism since the early 1990s. In 2004, Gardiner received a PhD in cultural anthropology from Cornell University. Since earning his doctorate, he has taught more than 20 different courses at eight universities in the United States, Pakistan, and the UAE.
Episode Resources
- It Could Happen Here, “Prairieland and Antifa Terrorism,” Apple Podcasts, March 23, 2026.
- Ava Thompson, “Timeline: What we know about events surrounding the Prairieland ICE detention center shooting trial,” KERA News, February 24, 2026.
- Steven Monacelli, “How the Prairieland ‘Antifa’ Verdict Threatens the Anti-Trump Resistance,” Texas Observer, March 19, 2026.
- Political Research Associates, “All Eyes on Minneapolis: Lessons on Resisting Authoritarianism,” Inform Your Resistance, February 3, 2026.
- Shane Burley, “The Great 2020 Antifa Scare,” Political Research Associates, July 13, 2021.
