Jessica Mendoza

Reid was held by federal authorities for roughly two days.

She says she wasn't allowed to make a phone call during that time.

Prosecutors ultimately charged Reed with misdemeanor assault of an officer, a lesser offense that doesn't require going through a grand jury.

Reed was acquitted of that misdemeanor charge at trial.

The Wall Street Journal investigation found that in most cases where citizens were accused by the government, the outcome was similar to Reed's story.

181 citizens were accused by the government on X of attacking federal officers, but close to half of them were never even charged at all.

As for the rest?

There were a handful of cases where the government was successful in getting a conviction.

Fifteen people mentioned in government posts pleaded guilty before going to trial.

Ten of those people pleaded guilty for lesser offenses than what the government initially charged them with.

Since Hannah and her team published their investigation, one person has been found guilty at trial of attempted murder of an officer who was assisting federal law enforcement.

What has the DHS said about the fact that many of these cases don't bear out in court?

When the courts decide that these folks are not guilty or the charges are dismissed, I mean, does the government go back online and kind of address that?

Whether or not these accusations made their way to court, video has often played a big role in contradicting the government's case.

Over and over again, videos that Hannah's team reviewed showed interactions with immigration agents that cast doubt on the way that federal officials had initially talked about them.

— In other words, the Wall Street Journal found that most of the assault allegations against American protesters posted on X were unsubstantiated.

Even federal prosecutors themselves acknowledged that in some cases, the evidence to back up these charges wasn't there.

What is DHS and ICE's goal here?

It doesn't sound like getting a conviction is ultimately it because they were doing this regardless of whether, you know, the charges really went anywhere.

So what is behind this push to crack down on the way that Americans act around immigration officers and authorities?