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Eliazar Cisneros flashed a smile after the courtroom deputy read the verdict.

Five defendants were cleared of civil liability after being accused of political intimidation — violence, even — over their involvement in the Trump Train that targeted a Joe Biden campaign bus heading to Austin in 2020.

But not Cisneros. He was the only defendant found responsible for conspiracy under a 150-year old federal civil rights law named after the Ku Klux Klan. The jury ordered him to pay $10,000 to compensate the bus driver and $30,000 in punitive damages to the three plaintiffs.

Seemingly unbothered, Cisneros turned to supporters and friends in the courtroom and made a joke about needing to borrow some money.

The verdict came after a full day of jury deliberations, a two-week trial in an Austin federal courthouse and a three-year legal saga. The jury of seven was asked to weigh in on a potent question in today’s explosive political environment: Where is the line between free speech and intimidation?

Lawyers representing three people on the Biden campaign bus as it drove up a Texas highway days before the 2020 election tried to convince the jury that the members of the Trump Train went too far — that they violated federal and state laws by conspiring to follow the bus, coordinating in real time with others to surround it as drivers honked and slowed it down to 15 miles per hour, blocking interstate traffic and resulting in a collision. Multiple drivers on I-35 that day called 911 to report the dangerous maneuvering of the Trump Train.

The incident led Democrats to cancel two campaign events that day. Eventually, they’d point to those cancellations as evidence they were prevented from supporting their candidate in an act of political intimidation by the Trump supporters — a violation of the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871.

“I felt like I was being held hostage,” said former state Sen. Wendy Davis, one of the plaintiffs in the case. Davis, a Democrat and well-known abortion rights advocate, was on the bus to campaign for a U.S. Congress seat representing parts of Central Texas and to help campaign for Biden at a series of events in Texas. The other plaintiffs include David Gins, a Biden campaign staffer, and the bus driver, Timothy Holloway.

Besides Cisneros, the defendants in the case included San Antonio resident Dolores Park, a self-described “single-issue voter” on ending abortion; Steve Ceh — a pastor at a small church he started around the 2020 election — and his wife, Randi; and Joeylynn and Robert Mesaros, who call themselves the “Free Speech Defenders” on their website. Two other defendants, Hannah Ceh and her now-husband, Kyle Kruger, settled last year, issuing a public apology.

The defendants’ lawyers argued there was no conspiracy, no coordination. These were merely Trump supporters who showed up that day to express support for their president by waving Trump and American flags. They barely knew each other.

Francisco Canseco, Cisneros’ lawyer, compared the Trump Train to a high school pep rally.

“It was a rah-rah group that sought to support and advocate for the candidate of their choice in a very, very loud way with flags and honking of horns and yelling and screaming,” he told the jury.

Ultimately, the jury found that only Cisneros’s actions crossed the line from political expression into something more threatening.

“They found the ring leader liable,” said John Paredes, a lawyer for Protect Democracy, which represented those on the bus. “I think their issue was whom to pin the blame on in this incident, not ‘is this incident okay?’ The jury said it’s not okay.”

A fervent patriot

Cisneros, a U.S. Navy veteran turned chef, wasn’t always into politics. He initially thought Trump was a joke. But ahead of the 2016 election, his girlfriend was supporting Hillary Clinton so he started to support Trump to get under her skin, he told the jury.

He blamed Clinton for the 2012 attack on U.S. diplomats in Benghazi, which he took to heart because of his military service. He started to realize he aligned with Trump’s Republican Party, including his policies on the border, “defending the unborn,” and backing law enforcement amid outcry of police brutality. He felt that Democrats were hypocrites.

“When you see a party that says it’s okay to kneel during the national anthem, burn the flag — but [if they see someone] set fire to a [Black Lives Matter] flag and you’ll have hell to pay?” Cisneros testified. Democrats, he said, were trying to divide the country.

By 2020, Cisneros was all in on Trump. Ahead of the election, he learned the MAGA faithful in San Antonio were getting together to form Trump Trains to show their support for the president.

He became an active participant and eventually started driving his black Ford 150 to New Braunfels to join another Trump Train group that was started by the Cehs. The group there had exploded in popularity as residents tried to find ways to build community during the pandemic, sometimes drawing between 500 to 1,000 vehicles, defendants testified. Every week, the Cehs would lead the members of the Trump Train in the National Anthem and a prayer and then pass out maps for members to follow. Trucks would weave through the predetermined routes waving Trump flags and blasting music.

That same year, Cisneros was seen patrolling the streets of San Antonio with a long gun during Black Lives Matter protests. He testified that he needed to protect the city from Antifa, an umbrella term often used to describe left-wing, anti-fascist activists who resist white supremacists at political events. Cisneros also got into a scuffle in San Antonio when he drove his truck into a crowd of Black Lives Matter protesters, yelling at them to get out of the street. He said a police officer showed up at his house following the incident, but he was never charged.

“We were at a time where I was pissed off,” Cisneros told the jury. “I don’t get you guys painting me as a horrible person when I’m not. When you have people who tried to destroy our country? I’m unbelievably patriotic.”

As he stepped off the witness stand, Cisneros hugged the American flag standing behind his chair, prompting a scolding from the judge.

“Operation Block the Bus”

Cisneros and his friend, Jason Peña, were hanging out one evening in late October 2020 when they saw a flier advertising the Biden bus tour. They laughed and brainstormed ways to welcome the bus to Texas, according to Cisneros’ account of the events. Peña called it “Operation Block the Bus” on social media.

Peña looped in members of the New Braunfels Trump Train, while Cisneros contacted Edward Niño with the Alamo City Trump Train in San Antonio.

According to Niño, who testified in the trial, he and Cisneros thought it would be a “funny photo op” to show the Trump trucks following the Biden bus.

On Oct. 30, Cisneros waited by the side of I-35 outside of San Antonio for hours ready to video the oncoming convoy.

The first trucks started whizzing by, flags waving, horns honking. Then, the bus.

“Seems like they need an escort,” Cisneros said in the video with a smirk.

He let out a piercing howl, hopped in his truck and joined the convoy. He posted a video declaring he was going to follow the bus north to Austin. Niño credited Cisneros with keeping tabs on the bus location and updating others on its whereabouts.

Overall, more than 50 vehicles joined in surrounding the bus, plaintiffs testified. Their moves were captured by videos taken by participants and passersby.

In one instance, Robert Mesaros is seen exiting onto the shoulder of the highway and then quickly pulling onto the road in front of the bus as it passed. Plaintiffs argued he was brake checking the bus to slow it down, a dangerous move. But Mesaros said he pulled off the road to check a flag and thought the bus driver’s prolonged honking was signaling for him to get back on the road.

At some point, Cisneros is seen on video speeding up alongside a white car following the campaign bus. The white car was driven by a Biden campaign volunteer who was a college student at the time. The two cars collided, but kept driving.

Later, Cisneros would triumphantly post on social media that he “slammed that fucker.” But at the trial, Cisneros and his lawyer contended it was the driver of the white car who was trying to drive Cisneros off the road.

Cisneros testified he pulled ahead of the bus and onto the shoulder, assuming he and the driver of the white car would exchange contact information. But the white car didn’t stop. So Cisneros kept driving with the bus to its final destination in Austin, where he confronted the driver of the white car, but local police separated them.

He said he tried reaching out to San Marcos police about the collision, but was told the FBI was handling the case now. Cisneros said he reached out to the FBI and agreed to talk. But when he told a friend of his plan, he said, the friend suggested he record the conversation.

When the FBI refused to let Cisneros record their interview, Cisneros said he stopped talking to them. During her testimony, Davis said that when she was interviewed by the FBI about the Oct. 30 incident, the FBI told her they had been looking at Cisneros for a while.

It’s unclear whether the FBI is still investigating the incident.

On the bus

Davis and Gins, a Biden staffer, were leaving from a campaign event in San Antonio and heading toward Texas State University in San Marcos. Then it would be onward to the AFL-CIO in Austin. The bus was wrapped with Biden and his running mate Kamala Harris’ names, and said “Battle for the soul of the nation” in big white letters.

Davis and Gins testified about how scared they were by the vehicles surrounding them, unsure what the drivers’ intentions were and what they might be capable of. Holloway testified he was unable to leave the highway and even if he could, he was afraid what might happen if they were stopped at a red light on the frontage road.

“This felt like we were a target, like we were being hunted,” Gins told the jury, adding that he remembered the look of exasperation on Holloway’s face.

Holloway, a native of Washington D.C., was contracted to drive the campaign bus throughout the state of Texas on a multi-day tour. He had been driving buses this size for 15 years, often for high-profile clients, including recording artists Lil Wayne, Bruno Mars and Erykah Badu. Holloway called himself “feather foot.” In more than 2 million miles of driving he’d never gotten into an accident.

As the bus made its way through Texas, they naturally came across Trump supporters, but none of the plaintiffs felt unsafe, they said.

By the time they reached Austin, Holloway had a splitting headache and his stomach was in knots. He and the backup bus driver immediately left the state for Nashville, he testified.

Holloway said he stopped driving buses for almost a year. Davis started hiring private security for events. Gins, who is 11 years sober, said he had never come closer to having a drink than the night after that ride up I-35. He said his anxiety got so bad that he had to decline a chance to participate in the presidential motorcade during Biden’s inauguration a few months later.

The plaintiffs said the conspiracy was evident because the Trump Train members celebrated their actions and declared victory after preventing Biden campaign events from occurring.

“Texas welcomes Biden/Harris,” Cisneros posted on social media. “We serve Brisket, Sausage, Leg quarters, Whataburger and 35 in tires . . . What would you like?”

Ultimately, the jury said only Cisneros participated in a conspiracy.

“Mr. Cisneros was found liable for conspiracy, which means that there were others the jury found conspired with him. They just were not named in the lawsuit,” Paredes, one of the plaintiff’s lawyers, told reporters outside the courthouse. “We take the jury as having said that certain conduct — forced intimidation and threats when people are voting and campaigning and supporting the candidates of their choice for office — are not acceptable and are illegal under American law.”

“It’s not over”

As they exited the courtroom, the defendants hugged family and friends who had shown up in support of the group.

Joeylynn Mesaros cried. Her husband, Robert, seemed stunned as he exited the courtroom in a baseball hat that said “In God We Trust.”

Joeylynn Mesaros said the jury must have seen through the “rigged” trial in their decision to clear most of the defendants from liability.

“They came in from Washington D.C. We’re just here with a legal pad and a pen and a couple of prayers,” she told reporters.

For her and the other plaintiffs, the jury’s decision was vindication that the lawsuit had unfairly targeted them for their political views, sensationalizing what happened on the road that day.

For Cisneros, the fight continues. Immediately after the verdict was read, his lawyer asked the judge to throw out the jury’s decision regarding his client. He has 30 days from the verdict to file an appeal to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, largely considered the most conservative circuit court in the country.

Last year, one of the defendants asked the appeals court to toss the case, which it refused to do — but at least one judge on the court raised doubts with how the district judge in Austin interpreted the Klan Act, a sign that the court might be sympathetic to Cisneros if he appeals the ruling.

“It’s not over,” Canseco, Cisneros’ lawyer, told reporters as he walked out of the courtroom.

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