The legal team for 26 activists who were arrested on the Golden Gate Bridge in April filed a motion in San Francisco’s superior court today, demanding that the court disqualify San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins and her entire office, based on indications of her bias against Palestinian people, their advocates and supporters. The attorneys also filed a motion to dismiss the charges, citing international findings that Israel is engaged in genocide in Gaza. The motions are scheduled to be heard at the felony preliminary hearing on September 30 in Dept 20 at the 850 Bryant Street courhouse.
The 26 activists were arrested on April 15 for blocking southbound lanes of the bridge in an act of protest calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and an end to U.S. military aid to Israel. They were booked in jail on felony conspiracy and held for almost 48 hours before being released without charges. Four months later, on August 13, DA Jenkins filed 44 charges against each of the 26 defendants. Eight were charged with felony conspiracy and eighteen with misdemeanor conspiracy, all of them with 38 counts, each, of false imprisonment, plus five other misdemeanor charges.
The motion filed today cites a number of indications of bias by Jenkins and her office. Jenkins has twice met with and received gifts from the Israeli Consulate in 2023 and 2024. Israel’s is the only consulate she has met with more than once or accepted gifts from. In October, 2023, DA Jenkins posted a statement on X (formerly Twitter), falsely describing a demonstration that called for a ceasefire in Gaza as a “pro-Hamas rally” and baselessly accusing the demonstrators of vandalism. She also met with the Jewish Community Relations Council, a pro-Israel group that has criticized Alameda County DA Pamela Price for not aggressively prosecuting protestors.
In February, 2024, the San Francisco Standard revealed that San Francisco Assistant District Attorney Michael Menesini had sent emails containing virulent anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian rhetoric from his San Francisco government email address, describing Palestinians as “brutal Arab invaders,” “hate mongers,” and “Nazis” who need to be “sent back to their native homelands.”
The unusual nature of the charges also raise suspicion of bias.
“Protests on bridges are not uncommon, but the charges in this case are. This is the first time we have seen conspiracy charges in San Francisco based on a nonviolent protest, in at least 35 years,” said Center for Protest Law & Litigation attorney Rachel Lederman. “And this is only the second time local protestors have been charged with false imprisonment for blocking traffic, the first time being Brooke Jenkins’ recent prosecution of the Bay Bridge 78 – who were also protesting the genocide in Palestine. But here, Jenkins took this a step further by putting out a call over social media for motorists who were delayed by the protest to come forward, promising them monetary restitution.” The charging documents name 37 such “victims”.
The motion asks the court to disqualify Jenkins and her entire office, and for the California Attorney General to take over the case.
“It’s clear that DA Jenkins has an axe to grind against pro-Palestine activists and that personal bias has already interfered with her impartiality,” said Public Defender Nuha Abusamra. “These ludicrous charges are a brazen effort to intimidate or shut down the Palestine solidarity movement in San Francisco.”
In a separate legal motion, the Golden Gate Bridge 26 are asking the court to dismiss their charges in the “interests of justice”. “The protestors acted in conscience to stop the U.S. government’s complicity and facilitation of ongoing genocide in Gaza. Our motion urges the court to recognize that throughout U.S. history, protests, including disruptive demonstrations, have been a pivotal tool for demanding social and policy change – and to dismiss the case,” said Public Defender Elizabeth Camacho.
At the time of the protestors’ arrests for demonstrating on the bridge in April, the death toll in Gaza at the hands of the Israeli military stood at nearly 34,000 Palestinians, including approximately 14,500 children, since October 7, 2023. Current figures are at least 41,252 deaths, but the true numbers may be much higher. The motion details the unwavering support of the U.S. government in arming and funding the current attacks as well as the historic role of protestors in changing their government’s actions to right its wrongs in times of great conflict.
“Israel’s bombing campaign is the most destructive in modern history, obliterating most of Gaza’s life-sustaining infrastructure, including hospitals, schools, places of worship, cropland, livestock, the fishing fleet, water and sanitation infrastructure, roads, UN facilities, and residential and commercial buildings. 1.9 million Palestinians have been displaced, forcibly transferred into “humanitarian safe zones” where the Israeli military has nonetheless massacred civilians sheltering in tents,” the attorneys wrote in the motion. “Children drink from puddles and wade through pools of sewage amid a deadly heatwave and Gaza’s first polio outbreak in 25 years.”
“The Golden Gate Bridge is an iconic symbol,” said defense attorney Shaffy Moeel. “Protestors stood on the right side of history by acting to publicize the horrifying and unceasing slaughter of children by US weapons and American tax dollars, where it would have an impact. We are asking the court to dismiss the charges.”