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Sam O’Hara was walking his 10-year-old rescue dog Lincoln, a daschund mix, near Dupont Circle in Washington, DC, in late August when he saw two National Guard members patrolling the area.
“The thought just kind of dawned on me that they look like stormtroopers,” the 35-year-old O’Hara said.
So he opened Spotify on his phone, called up the iconic "Imperial March" theme from "Star Wars" and began playing it aloud.
O'Hara doesn't own a light saber but said he's seen all of the "Star Wars" movies and has “always identified with the rebellion."
The John Williams-composed song symbolizes Darth Vader and the evil Galactic Empire. Playing it behind troops and recording the interactions to post on TikTok was a creative and peaceful way, he thought, to protest what he described as the National Guard’s unnecessary and anxiety-inducing presence in the city.
President Donald Trump deployed the military to address crime and homelessness in the nation’s capital in August, though the effort was met with resistance from many Washington residents.
“I’m not anti-National Guard or anti-military,” O’Hara said. “I have lots of respect for people that joined the force and decided to enlist to protect our country. My problem is that people are here under orders that I do not agree with, and that’s what I’m protesting.”
The National Guard troops he approached that first day took it in stride, he said, adding that others in subsequent encounters responded with smiles and waves.
But Sept. 11 was different.
The events of that day prompted the American Civil Liberties Union to sue authorities on O’Hara’s behalf for alleged violations of his First and Fourth Amendment rights, among other claims.
According to an Oct. 23 complaint against the city and Ohio National Guard, O'Hara began walking behind four Ohio guard members in the Logan Circle neighborhood and played the song – just as he'd been doing for weeks.
Less than two minutes later, an Ohio National Guard sergeant “turned around and threatened to call D.C. police officers to ‘handle’ Mr. O’Hara if he persisted,” the complaint said.
O’Hara continued his protest, at which point DC metro police were called to the scene and put him in handcuffs on the basis of his supposed harassment of the troops, according to the lawsuit. He rejected the accusation during the incident, and the complaint reiterates his assertion that he was neither harassing the troops nor interfering with their duties.
O’Hara complained about the tightness of the handcuffs, which were on for between 15 and 20 minutes, but no efforts were made to loosen them, according to the complaint.
“The law might have tolerated government conduct of this sort a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away,” the complaint said. “But in the here and now, the First Amendment bars government officials from shutting down peaceful protests, and the Fourth Amendment – along with the District’s prohibition on false arrest – bars groundless seizures.”
Both the city’s attorney general’s office and the National Guard’s Joint Task Force in Washington said they could not comment on pending litigation.
First Amendment protects protesting, recording officials
Music has long been used as a form of protest and solidarity, whether by enslaved people singing spirituals or demonstrators chanting during the Civil Rights movement, Georgetown Law School constitutional law Professor David Cole said.
O’Hara was continuing that longstanding tradition with his actions, exercising his constitutional rights both to protest and record government actors carrying out their duties in public, he said.
There are limits to those rights, however.
The government is allowed to implement content-neutral time, place and manner restrictions, and a protest can’t interfere with law enforcement’s duties. But Cole saw no evidence that O’Hara had violated those limits based on the information presented in the ACLU complaint.
“He made fun of the function they were serving, and they were offended by that – that’s it,” he said. “There’s no claim that somehow they couldn’t do their job because someone was making fun of them.”
ACLU attorney Michael Perloff echoed Cole’s sentiments, saying O’Hara’s actions were “perfectly in line with the types of actions that courts have held the First Amendment protects.”
“I don’t think this is ... a borderline case,” he said.
Incident, lawsuit 'was not on my bingo card for 2025'
O’Hara moved to DC in 2015, having previously lived in Massachusetts and Florida, and since then has participated in numerous protests, including the 2017 Women’s March and the People’s Climate March later that year.
He’s lived in various neighborhoods including Adams Morgan, Capitol Hill and Dupont Circle, calling the city “very formative” in his adult life.
He also described it as “gorgeous” and “wonderful.”
In other words, a far cry in O'Hara's view from how Trump has characterized the city in justifying his move to call in the troops. He’s referred to the city as “dirty and disgusting” and unsafe, though its crime rates have declined in recent years.
O'Hara said he's received “overwhelmingly positive” responses to his form of protest and that some TikTok users have even expressed interest in taking similar actions in cities like Portland, where Trump is also pushing to deploy troops.
“It’s the people that don’t live in Washington, DC, that I think are being negative in the comments, that don’t understand what it’s like to live in a city that was beautiful, and then one day to have ... armed National Guard members carrying giant rifles standing in front of your metro station,” he said. “It just feels insane.”
Though he said being at the center of a First Amendment lawsuit against his beloved city “was not on my bingo card for 2025,” his sense that he's part of a bigger movement challenging the Trump administration outweighed his preference for a quiet, private life.
He hopes the lawsuit will be resolved quickly, and he’d love to see the involved law enforcement and military personnel receive training on protesters’ rights. He’d also appreciate an apology, but he’s “not holding my breath.”
Cole said the lawsuit could have implications beyond O’Hara’s individual case.
“It’s about ensuring more broadly that law enforcement, whether it be local police or National Guard, respect our constitutional rights, even when we are using our constitutional rights in ways that offend them,” Cole said. “If the government learns that lesson, that would be a good thing.”
BrieAnna Frank is a First Amendment reporter at USA TODAY. Reach her at bjfrank@usatoday.com.
USA TODAY's coverage of First Amendment issues is funded through a collaboration between the Freedom Forum and Journalism Funding Partners. Funders do not provide editorial input.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: He got cuffed after playing the 'Imperial March' at National Guard. Now, he's suing.
Reporting by BrieAnna J. Frank, USA TODAY / USA TODAY
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