‘Land of the free?’: Outrage after US protester arrested on live TV

Outrage flooded social media after a video showed an activist being arrested mid-interview at a pro-Venezuela protest, fuelling questions about the state of free speech in the United States.

In the now-viral clip taken from Grand Rapids, Michigan, 22-year-old teacher and activist Jessica Plichta can be heard criticising US foreign policy towards Venezuela, arguing that American involvement abroad is inseparable from domestic accountability.

"This isn’t just a foreign issue," she said moments before her arrest. "It’s our tax dollars being used to commit war crimes, and it’s the responsibility of the people to resist a Trump administration committing crimes both at home and against people in Venezuela."

Seconds later, local police move in. As she is escorted to a patrol vehicle, Plichta repeatedly states, "I am not resisting arrest."

Local outlet WZZM, the city’s ABC affiliate, later reported that police said Plichta was arrested for obstructing a roadway and failing to obey a lawful command. In footage from the scene, an officer tells a bystander that demonstrators had been instructed to relocate their protest to the sidewalk, and alleged that the group instead blocked intersections until the march concluded.

“The group refused lawful orders to move this free speech event to the sidewalk and instead began blocking intersections,” police said in a statement cited by WZZM.

Plichta, an organiser with Grand Rapids Opponents of War and the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, had just returned from Venezuela, where she attended the People’s Assembly for Peace and Sovereignty of Our America summit, according to the station.

She later told Zeteo that she does not believe the timing of her arrest was coincidental.

"I was the only person arrested out of roughly 200 people - and it happened immediately after I finished speaking about Venezuela," she said.

Plichta was held at the Kent County Jail for approximately three hours before being released. She said she has not yet been informed of any formal charges.

Irony

The footage quickly ignited a wave of backlash online, with several social media users pointing out the irony of an arrest unfolding mid-interview at a protest against US intervention in Venezuela, a country frequently cited by American officials as a symbol of authoritarian repression. 

This is the kind of stuff they accuse Nicolas Maduro of doing to his population. https://t.co/zsGXX6DsxW

— Nick Cruse 🥋 (@SocialistMMA) January 5, 2026

"It's incredible how propagandized US citizens are that the vast majority of them think that VENEZUELA is the country with a reprehensible civil rights record," one social media user wrote on X.

"The US is an oligarchic dictatorship," one social media user posted. 

Another social media user posted that he never wants to hear "the West condemn a Global South country as 'authoritarian'" again.

Others pointed to the US’s image as the “land of the free”, saying the arrest reflected the Trump administration’s increasingly hostile approach to free speech.

"We are at the point in this country where police openly grab people off the streets - while they are speaking to the press or protesting -  and it’s not registering as even a blip of the growing crisis of speech repression in this country," journalist Sana Saeed posted on X. "No national resistance, just permission."

They really need to rethink that whole “land of the free” slogan. https://t.co/ozy78IrlIC

— Abier (@abierkhatib) January 5, 2026

Some commentators warned that the moment was being dangerously normalised, particularly after the aggressive policing of Gaza protests for two years.

"The First Amendment doesn’t die all at once," one post on X reads. "It gets strangled in moments like this."

Political commentator Hasan Piker argued that the "Israel protests, the response and the media coverage legitimizing the apprehensions played a role in normalizing" violations of the US Constitution's First Amendment, such as Plichta's arrest.

The incident also led many social media users to accuse Trump supporters, who claim to champion free speech, of selective outrage.

"If the free speech brigade on the right really cared about free speech, they’d be going mad about this ridiculous police-state assault on free speech and protest," journalist Mehdia Hassan wrote on X. "But they don’t care so they say nothing and reserve their ire for the next Dr Seuss or M&M controversy."

This administration is going to war on free speech and no Trump supporters will say anything because they also hate free speech https://t.co/pZkMv1Ppmw

— evan loves worf (@esjesjesj) January 5, 2026

One social media user on X offered a different perspective on the moment, arguing that protesters must "adjust with the times" and stop giving interviews that reveal their identities.