DOJ Brief Defends White House's Altered Armstrong Arrest Photo as Protected Speech, Emptywheel Reports

Emptywheel reproduces passages from a DOJ filing in the Nekima Levy Armstrong prosecution: an October 12 opposition to a motion to dismiss, signed by Ned Hedley, one of the AUSAs who reports to Harmeet Dhillon. The quotations below come from Emptywheel’s reproduction; the filing itself was not read.

The brief says the White House’s earlier re-post of Secretary Noem’s X post contained an altered photo of Armstrong’s arrest photo to depict her as crying. It argues “None of the text accompanying the arrest photos appears to be inaccurate in any respect.” It cites Cohen v. California for the proposition that “the First Amendment protects not only the cognitive content of speech, but also the emotive content of speech.” And it says the post was “quickly accompanied by a ‘community note’ indicating that the photo was altered”.

Emptywheel adds that on January 22, after Armstrong’s arrest, Dhillon retweeted the altered image the White House released of Armstrong.

The prosecution is recorded at 2026-01-29–cities-church-protest-federal-indictment-18-usc-241-face-act; the defense’s earlier motions at 2026-08-27–minnesota-15-discovery-hearing-vindictive-prosecution-presumption-of-regularity and 2026-08-31–cities-church-defendants-file-dozens-of-motions-selective-prosecution-92-customs-summonses.