NEW YORK CITY — The Manhattan Institute is conducting a yearlong campaign to pass state-level legislation that would reclassify minor protest-related crimes such as vandalism, blocking a roadway, or trespassing as felonies carrying 18-month prison sentences. Bills based on this framework were introduced in Utah and Arizona in early 2025.

Utah’s legislature passed HB 331 in early 2025, and Governor Spencer Cox signed it into law on March 24. The law increases penalties for "aggravated disorderly conduct" during protests, creates a new crime for "unlawfully advancing foreign organizations," and prohibits civilians from wearing masks at protests. Only two members of the Utah House of Representatives and Senate voted against the bill during its entire legislative trajectory.

In Arizona, model legislation drafted by the Manhattan Institute cleared the state House in early March 2025 on a 31–21 vote and awaits a Senate vote. The bill would make it a felony for two or more people to block a public thoroughfare. Arizona Democrats oppose the measure, and Governor Katie Hobbs vetoed a similar bill in 2024 that sought to criminalize roadway obstruction.

Tal Fortgang, a legal policy fellow at the Manhattan Institute, wrote: "When hundreds of people gather to commit disorderly conduct together, we are dealing with something completely different. That is what I call civil terrorism: mass commission of minor crimes to intimidate or coerce a population into adopting certain policies." He stated he focuses on anti-war, pro-Palestinian, and Black Lives Matter activists because "they constitute the overwhelming majority of groups engaged in this behavior."

Arizona state senator Catherine Miranda called the bill "an attack on all our First Amendment rights—the right to assemble, to free speech, to petition our government. It is meant to have a chilling effect on our right to speak out against a state or federal government that is repressing our civil rights and embracing authoritarianism."

Darrell Hill, policy director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona, said: "Arizona’s legislature has a history of targeting protesters, dating back to the movement against SB 1070 circa 2010. That’s when the state’s demographics began to change and there was an increasing use of the political process to target communities of color." He added, "It’s part of a narrative that the Trump administration is pushing, trying to equate left-wing protest activity with extremism and terrorism based simply on the viewpoints or the expressive activity that’s taken place."