Chicago’s top federal prosecutor on Thursday dismissed all charges against the “Broadview Six,” a group of activists and local Democratic politicians arrested at a protest outside an ICE facility in 2025, citing gross misconduct in the case that was set to go to trial on Tuesday.
U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois Andrew Boutros dropped the case with prejudice — meaning the claim can never be filed against the group again. Boutros made the unexpected move after a sealed hearing reviewed unredacted grand jury transcripts.
Defense attorneys for the “Broadview Six” say the transcripts reveal that prosecutors axed members of the grand jury who refused to indict the defendants before presenting the case a second time. It is unclear how many grand jurors prosecutors removed.
Boutros, who was appointed by President Donald Trump, said his team had made significant “errors” while presenting the charges to the grand jury — though he said he was “completely unaware” of the misconduct until late April.
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U.S. District Judge April Perry, who presided over the case, called out Boutros for doubling down on his efforts to malign the defendants.
“You are significantly undercutting your mea culpa here by standing behind the charges and continuing to vilify these particular defendants,” Perry told Boutros. “Mea culpa” is a Latin phrase for “my fault” or “my mistake,” usually meaning an admission of liability in a courtroom context.
The indictment charged the group of activists and local politicians with felony conspiracy charges in October, but the government dropped those charges in April. The case then proceeded on two remaining misdemeanor offenses: forcibly impeding and interfering with a federal agent and simple assault of a federal officer.
The “Broadview Six” were arrested during a September protest outside an ICE facility in Broadview, Illinois. The group allegedly surrounded and made contact with an ICE agent’s vehicle outside of the building.
The defendants included social media influencer and former U.S. congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh and her campaign manager.
“The administration does things like this because it thinks that it can silence us, but it’s not going to work,” Abughazaleh said to reporters after all charges were dropped Thursday. “We fought back and we won.”
The grand jury transcripts have not been released, but multiple media outlets filed a motion to unseal the court proceedings, asserting the transcripts are a “matter of significant public concern.”
Defense Attorney Christopher Parente also called for transparency in the transcript review process and expressed concerns about the prosecutor’s timing in dismissing the original felony charges.
“After six months of high-profile litigation, the timing of the government’s sudden decision to drop the felony indictment for the remaining Broadview 6 co-defendants — in lieu of presenting the requested unredacted grand jury transcripts to the Court — raises red flags about the government’s presentation of the law to the grand jury,” Parente said in a statement May 4.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to correct a quote from U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois Andrew Boutros, who said that his team made “errors” while presenting charges to a grand jury.
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