On April 18, a federal grand jury charged three members of the African People’s Socialist Party with “acting as agents of the Russian government within the United States without prior notification.” The members are APSP Chairman Omali Yeshitela, as well as members Penny Joanne Hess and Jesse Nevel. The charges include illegally pushing Russian propaganda and disinformation about Ukraine across Missouri, Georgia, and Florida. All three members face up to 10 years in prison for allegedly acting as illegal agents of Russia without notifying the US attorney general, and up to five years for allegedly conspiring to have US citizens act as illegal agents.
Three Russian nationals have also been indicted. The indictment alleges that Aleksandr Viktorovich Ionov, founder of an organization called the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia, conspired to “carry out Russia’s malign influence campaign” through US groups such as APSP. In addition to Ionov, Aleksey Sukhodolov and Yegor Popov have also been indicted.
These charges come almost a year after the FBI raided the homes of APSP leaders, a group which also leads an organization called the Uhuru Movement. At the time, Omali Yeshitela described how FBI agents terrorized him and his wife outside their own home, and conducted similar raids in Uhuru-affiliated locations across the country.
According to the indictment, Ionov tried to promote “Russia’s invasion” of Ukraine within APSP, appearing on video calls hosted by the party.
Of the indictment, Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division said, “Russia’s foreign intelligence service allegedly weaponized our First Amendment rights—freedoms Russia denies its own citizens—to divide Americans and interfere in elections in the United States.” The indictment, based entirely on APSP members expressing their free speech rights, casts doubts as to whether First Amendment rights are truly protected in the US.
On March 18, Yeshitela spoke at an anti-war demonstration in Washington DC, and shared his story about the July 2022 FBI raid. “We are here today to tell them that they don’t have enough flashbang grenades in their arsenals to stop the struggle of Black people and the oppressed peoples of the world to win our freedom,” Yeshitela said, referring to the flashbang grenades FBI agents deployed on his home.
“They have declared that Black people are so stupid that it takes Russians to tell us that we are oppressed. I have never known a moment of Black freedom for my entire life,” he said. “They intend to indict us, but our responsibility is to put them on trial.”
This indictment follows in the US government tradition of persecuting those fighting for Black liberation, especially Black leaders who oppose war. In February 1951, Black socialist historian W.E.B. Dubois was indicted, arrested, and arraigned in federal court for circulating a petition opposing nuclear weapons. On June 12, 1956, world-famous musician and communist Paul Robeson was called to testify in front of the infamous House Committee on Un-American Activities for his political beliefs, including those in favor of the Soviet Union.
Richard Arens, a secretary of the Committee, asked Robeson, “Tell us whether or not you have changed your opinion in the recent past about Stalin.”
Robeson responded, “I have told you, mister, that I would not discuss anything with the people who have murdered sixty million of my people, and I will not discuss Stalin with you.” Sixty million is a widely-circulated estimate of the victims of the Atlantic Slave Trade.
“You would not, of course, discuss with us the slave labor camps in Soviet Russia,” Arens countered.
“I will discuss Stalin when I may be among the Russian people someday, singing for them, I will discuss it there. It is their problem,” Robeson said.
