MINNEAPOLIS — A group of Twin Cities protesters accused of conspiring to impede immigration enforcement efforts in Minnesota pleaded not guilty to their charges during a hearing that drew several dozen demonstrators to the federal courthouse.

Appearing in a packed courtroom in downtown Minneapolis, 14 people recently indicted with conspiring to impede or injure a federal officer entered not guilty pleas. A 15th defendant, Kyle Wagner, did not appear because he remains jailed after being charged in February.

The federal indictment alleges the group conspired to impede immigration officers through a number of methods, including tracking officers and setting up blockades around the Whipple Federal Building.

Federal prosecutors targeted the group Direct Action Minnesota and several of its subgroups, including the Black Cat Workers’ Collective, which the government alleges has ties to the leftist movement antifa — an umbrella term that’s short for antifascist.

Much of Wednesday’s proceedings focused on the voluminous amount of evidence in the criminal case.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Sommer Lindsay Honeycutt said the government is continuing to process 20 terabytes of data, the majority being Signal chats between the defendants that serve as a basis for the indictment. Honeycutt and Assistant U.S. Attorney Kristian Weir asked the court for a 90-day deadline extension to process the materials into hard drives before handing it over to the defense.

“All of that takes a significant amount of time,” Weir said.

The defense argued the U.S. government did not meet with them prior to formally asking the court for more time to provide access to the evidence.

“We can’t even begin to think about how to respond to the case until we’ve seen the discovery,” said Surya Saxena, an attorney for defendant Nat Kim.

U.S. District Judge David Schultz said he wouldn’t immediately grant the government’s request for a 90-day extension. Instead, he asked attorneys from each side to meet outside of court to discuss deadlines and other parameters around the evidence, including redactions of sensitive information.

The majority of the 94-page indictment against the protesters details group chats sent through the messaging app Signal. Wagner, Isaac Auman Sant, Beth Morgan and Natasha Rakotz face additional charges that include interstate stalking, assault on a federal officer and destruction of government property in the case, though the indictment does not directly assert that federal agents were injured as a result of the group’s actions. U.S. Attorney Daniel Rosen previously said the charges stem from the group’s plans.

“Whether or not they actually at the end of the day caused bodily harm is not the measure of whether or not they committed a federal crime,” Rosen said when the indictment was unsealed.

The case has drawn intense scrutiny by critics who allege the federal prosecution is politically motivated, with the White House using the Justice Department to enforce the president’s agenda.

A case against protesters charged with felony conspiracy in Chicago recently collapsed after allegations of prosecutorial misconduct surfaced. But a 100-year prison sentence was also recently issued to the leader of a group in Texas alleged to have antifa ties after a jury convicted him and several others of supporting terrorism during an attack on an immigration facility last year.

Demonstrators gathered outside the federal courthouse described the charges as a political attack against the community, including many defendants who are local workers union members, for having anti-immigration enforcement views and organizing non-violent protests.

Treasure Thoreson, one of the 15 defendants and a Minneapolis special education teacher, said the case “is all about intimidation and repression.”

Thoreson and many others who spoke said the charges are intended to chill protest efforts including those who wish to do so peacefully and are not committing a crime by simply being in a Signal chat.

“We are here today proud to state not guilty to wild accusations from a government that has shown clearly that their vision of America is one that is racist, xenophobic, and anti-worker,” Thoreson said. “Don’t stop being good neighbors.”

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(Louis Krauss of the Minnesota Star Tribune contributed to this report.)

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