Cleared ‘Broadview 6’ immigration protesters seek evidence of White House pressure to indict

Attorneys for the now-cleared “Broadview Six” defendants are seeking any possible evidence of pressure from White House officials on the U.S. attorney’s office in Chicago to secure an indictment against the group of Democratic activists, local elected officials and candidates this past fall.

The defendants, who were indicted in October after attending an immigration protest in the early weeks of the Trump administration’s Operation Midway Blitz mass deportation campaign, had been set to face trial late last month. But trial was abruptly canceled, and all charges dropped, amid allegations of prosecutorial misconduct.

In a filing late Thursday afternoon, defense attorneys asked U.S. District Judge April Perry for permission to conduct discovery to reveal communications and any other evidence that would explain how the group went from six protesters among a crowd of hundreds and to defendants facing a rare felony conspiracy charge.

They say they also plan to seek evidence of what they called a “cover-up” of the alleged prosecutorial misconduct, which was discovered just days before trial when Perry read unredacted grand jury transcripts.

“The requested discovery is essential to guarantee the Defendants a full and fair opportunity to demonstrate the bad faith, vexatious, and/or frivolous nature of this misguided prosecution,” the defense filing reads.

Among evidence sought by the former defendants: Any emails, texts and cellphone data between Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche or his direct report, Aakash Singh, and U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros’ office in Chicago.

In a rare move last month, Boutros himself appeared in Perry’s courtroom to announce the charges would be dropped and take responsibility for prosecutors’ behavior. Since then, a growing number of prominent Illinois Democrats have called for Boutros’ resignation, including U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth.

Blanche last week came to Boutros’ defense, writing in a social media post that since taking office 14 months ago, the U.S. attorney “has steadfastly advanced President Trump’s mission to make Chicago and Northern Illinois safe for the American people.”

Blanche cited an increase in indictments in the Northern District of Illinois and named prominent defendants charged during his term, including the undocumented immigrant accused of killing 18-year-old Loyola University Chicago student Sheridan Gorman in March.

“This Department fully supports U.S. Attorney Boutros and his efforts to combat violent crime, drug trafficking, immigration violations, and fraud, and we look forward to more great work from his office,” Blanche’s statement concluded.

In response, Boutros thanked Blanche “for his strong and unwavering support” in a social media post that blasted previous leadership of the Chicago U.S. attorney’s office as “doing less than even the bare minimum” before he took over.

The office has bled talent in the last year, with an unprecedented exodus of prosecutors, including most section chiefs in the criminal division. Two of those section chiefs, former assistant U.S. attorneys Amarjeet Bhachu and Sarah Streicker, helped bring down political kingpins including ex-Chicago Alderman Ed Burke and ex-Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.

As the case was collapsing late last month, Perry told prosecutors that the trust she normally extended to them “has been broken” both by what she read in the grand jury transcripts, and because it had previously been obscured from her in redacted transcripts the government gave her.

“We all took the government attorneys’ word on a great many things,” Perry said. “I, at the time, was operating on a presumption of regular grand jury proceedings, which these were very clearly not. So based upon what I’ve seen in the grand jury transcripts, the calculus has changed and it has changed considerably.”

The former defendants’ request to see any communications from Singh is notable for his involvement in another unsuccessful high-profile collapse immigration-related case — that of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador last year.

The Broadview Six defense attorneys cited communications between Singh and top prosecutors involved not just in Abrego Garcia’s case, but also recent indictments against former FBI Director James Comey and former CNN journalist Don Lemon.

Singh was also the subject of a New York Times story in March that detailed internal directives from the DOJ to prosecutors to aggressively pursue charges against immigration protesters. Singh was quoted as telling deputies on a January conference call to “go big … and go loud” in order to garner headlines.

In a statement Thursday, Chris Parente, a lawyer for one of the former Broadview Six defendants, said the group is seeking evidence about how the indictment was secured because “the public has a right to know exactly what happened in the cover-up of the grand jury misconduct by the U.S. Attorney's Office in Chicago.”

“We also need to know whether or not the orders to pursue this sham political prosecution came from Washington, and how closely officials in the main Department of Justice were tracking or encouraging developments in this case,” he said.