A woman facing political intimidation charges for being part of a mob of former President Donald Trump supporters that surrounded a Biden-Harris campaign bus on a busy Texas interstate in 2020 claims she was exercising her free speech and had no intention of blocking the bus's progress.
Randy Sze and her husband, Steve Sze, are among six people accused of crowding along Interstate 35 on Oct. 30, 2020, as buses traveled to a campaign event.
“We used our First Amendment rights to drive on the highway,” Randy Seh told the San Antonio Express-News on Monday, as the second week of the trial began. “We drove the 'Trump Train,' and that was cool.”
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Former state senator Wendy Davis, left, and bus driver Tim Holloway, center, arrive at the “Trump Train” trial at the U.S. Federal Court in downtown Austin, Texas, on Sept. 12, 2024. Davis and other plaintiffs who were on a Biden-Harris campaign bus traveling on Interstate 35 in 2020 are suing passengers on the “Trump Train” for trying to run them off the road. (Jay Janner/American Statesman/USA TODAY Network via Imagn Images)
She described the event as an “our team versus your team” political exercise and insisted she was not trying to intimidate anyone.
The trial began last week, with the seven-person jury hearing testimony from plaintiffs including former Texas Senator Wendy Davis, who said she felt “held hostage in a way” and that the bus driver felt “under attack” and feared for her life.
Davis and the driver, along with campaign volunteers and staff, are suing six Trump supporters who were part of a motorcade of dozens of pickup trucks and cars flying large Trump flags that converged on the bus days before the 2020 presidential election.
The plaintiffs allege that Trump supporters are responsible for acts of violence and political intimidation in violation of state and federal law under the Enforcing Act of 1871, also known as the Ku Klux Klan Act. The law was enacted by Congress during Reconstruction after the Civil War to prevent political violence and intimidation and to protect black men's voting rights by banning political violence.
The plaintiffs allege that the group drove recklessly and attempted to run a bus off the road. In one incident, recorded on video, a “Trump Train” pickup truck and a Biden campaign SUV collided while traveling behind a bus, but no one was injured. The defendants deny reckless driving and claim that it was a campaign staffer in a white SUV that caused the collision on the highway. Video leading up to the collision shows the SUV driving between lanes of traffic multiple times.
The lawsuit, filed in 2021, seeks punitive and compensatory damages.
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A pickup truck flying the flag of former President Donald Trump lined up next to the Biden-Harris campaign bus. (John Hinojosa via Storyful)
The lawyers argue that the defendants — Chess and Robert and Joeylynn Meszaros, Eliazar Cisneros and Dolores Park — were simply “very vocal” supporters of Trump. They also argued that their clients' actions were free speech and that the case was a coordinated effort to “siphon money from conservatives.”
Plaintiffs' attorney Sam Hall tried to show Monday that Se knew the motorcade was blocking the bus's progress, pointing to posts in the Facebook group that read, “We're surrounded” and “They wouldn't stop! Too pro-Trump, we're heading straight to Austin.”
Hall asked Randy Se why he didn't use his authority as an administrator of the Facebook group to remove such posts. Se cited users' First Amendment free speech rights. Hall also pointed out that Se had included the hashtag “#BlocktheBus” in the post, according to the San Antonio Express-News.
According to the outlet, New Braunfels resident Randi Sze and her husband created the Facebook page in 2020 after moving from Las Vegas. The couple had previously participated in “flag runs,” a motorcade in support of then-President Trump's reelection campaign.
The tradition has continued in New Braunfels, where the “Trump Train” has grown to consist of hundreds of cars, she said. On the evening of Oct. 29, the night before the bus accident, a “Trump Train” including nearly 1,000 cars was in operation, she said.
“Every week it got bigger and bigger,” she told the outlet.
Hall asked Randy Ce if the previous “Trump Train” had a target or was “organized to stop something,” to which Ce responded, “It sounds like you're saying something happened, but I don't know what you're talking about.”
In 2020, a supporter of former President Donald Trump in a pickup truck tails a Biden-Harris campaign bus. (John Hinojosa via Storyful)
Randi Sze expected the Oct. 30 “Trump Train” to be similar to others the couple has organized in the past, but said she wasn't supposed to be part of the motorcade and only briefly joined the group because it happened on her way home from work, according to the San Antonio Express-News.
Hall also showed, via screenshots of texts, how Choi updated members of the Facebook group with information about the bus's location that she had received through text message exchanges with other “Trump Train” organizers.
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He also revealed posts in which she referred to Democrats in the group as “democrats” and called them “the epitome of evil,” according to the outlet.
Steve Seymour also took the stand on Monday. Hall showed a video of the defendant calling October 30th a “good day” at a pro-Trump rally and calling the people on the bus “socialists.” According to the San Antonio Express-News, the defendant said the Trump Train was made up of “a lot of prayer, a lot of faith, a family atmosphere.”
The trial is scheduled to resume on Tuesday.
