On Tuesday’s Inside Politics, CNN attempt to give credence to a story that an unfortunate “disabled” woman was accosted and arrested by ICE for supposedly no reason while trying get to a doctor’s appointment. But a simple search of the woman’s name, Aliya Rahman, turns up a treasure trove proving that she had a long history as a professional liberal activist working with far-left organizations that promote “racial,” “criminal,” and “social justice.” With part of her focus being against law enforcement. “We’re hearing for the first time from Aliya Rahman, the woman ICE officers dragged from her vehicle while she shouted that she was disabled and trying to get to her doctor’s office,” announced host Dana Bash. What followed up was a soundbite of Rahman claiming that even someone without her cognitive processing problems would have an issue understanding the ICE agent’s order to move her car out of their way: I think even someone who doesn’t have the kind of auditory processing challenges I do would not know what to do with the sentence “move, I will break your effing window.” And then back and forth between, “move, get out,” trying to open my door, more threats of breaking a window, which I don’t understand the functional purpose of. And it’s not a warning, its a threat of violence, that really shouldn’t be packaged with an instruction.   CNN highlights a woman who they label as "disabled woman dragged out of her car and arrested by ICE," as if she was an innocent bystander. But the woman is Aliya Rahman, a fellow at a leftist activist group with a long history in progressive "racial and criminal justice… pic.twitter.com/eJdXtLGfgO — Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) January 20, 2026   But they never explained who Rahman was outside the incident in question. A simple Google search for her name turn up her employment page for New America, a left-wing organization, which listed her as their fellow from the Open Technology Institute. New America boasts about her: Her work was informed by a background in legislative, electoral, and community organizing for racial and criminal justice campaigns, fifteen years of software development for the social justice movement, and a former life as an educator and researcher working in public education and workforce development. Aliya served formerly as Program Director at Code for Progress, where she led the recruitment, in-residence training, and job placement of community organizers of color into full-time developer positions. She is also is the former Field Director of Equality Ohio, where she built a statewide field program focused on bridging gaps between racial justice organizers, LGBT rights groups, and labor. Prior to that, she worked for the Center for Community Change, first as their Ohio organizer in the passage of employment legislation supporting formerly incarcerated people, and later as a national circuit rider working with immigrant rights groups on voter engagement.     About themselves, New America openly declared they’re all about “equity” (Click “expand”): We are dedicated to realizing the promise of America in an era of rapid technological and social change. At New America, our research and policy recommendations focus on five key thematic areas: education and work; family economic security and wellbeing; global politics for people and planet; political reform and civic engagement; and technology and democracy. In each area of our work, we put equity at the center; elevate stories of people closest to the public problems we seek to solve; invest in the next generation of leaders; and intentionally engage with local perspectives. Taken together, these efforts advance toward our vision of a more equitable America that lives up to its values. Rahman's true identity was discovered back on January 14 by the New York Post, yet six days later, CNN was still trying to pull one over on their viewers. On the flip side of this, Bash gave the ‘conservatives pounce’ treatment to the story of a crazed leftist mob storming a church on Sunday and shouting down their service: [Y]ou're almost surely seeing exclusively on conservative media and in conservative algorithms is something else that happened in Minneapolis yesterday. There was a church service where protesters made a point of going to this church service and using that as a staging area for, you know, making their, um, the fact that they're not happy with ICE, known. And this is one of the things so far, maybe, maybe the thing that the Trump Justice Department is looking into whether federal laws were broken there.   CNN follows up by giving the 'conservatives pounce' treatment to the story of the leftist mob invading a church to assail parishioners on Sunday: "[Y]ou're almost surely seeing exclusively on conservative media and in conservative algorithms is something else that happened in… pic.twitter.com/9ywtfEnwLc — Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) January 20, 2026   “So, it's a battle of narratives, for sure,” griped Leigh Ann Caldwell, chief Washington correspondent for Puck News. “Republicans are going to focus on that, that you know, protesters, liberals are - don't respect ICE officers, Federal Law Enforcement, they don't even respect your Sunday church service where you're at.” Further in the conversation, CNN senior political analyst Nia-Malika Henderson made the comment that, “Barack Obama, he deported like 3 million people and no one got shot in the face, and you didn't, you know, see people getting ripped out of cars, and so that is the problem.” What Henderson’s snarky comment brushed over was the fact that the media back then were Obama’s lapdogs who refused to speak negatively about him; unlike with Trump, for whom they stoke and ferment hate and hysteria to the point where people try to obstruct ICE and try to kill them. NewsBusters Intern Nicholas Spinnato contributed to this blog. The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read: CNN’s Inside Politics with Dana Bash January 20, 2026 12:36:39 p.m. Eastern DANA BASH: We’re hearing for the first time from Aliya Rahman, the woman ICE officers dragged from her vehicle while she shouted that she was disabled and trying to get to her doctor’s office. Here she is with our colleague Laura Coates [Cuts to video] ALIYA RAHMAN: I think even someone who doesn’t have the kind of auditory processing challenges I do would not know what to do with the sentence “move, I will break your effing window.” And then back and forth between, “move, get out,” trying to open my door, more threats of breaking a window, which I don’t understand the functional purpose of. And it’s not a warning, its a threat of violence, that really shouldn’t be packaged with an instruction.” [Cuts back to live] BASH: And our panel is back here. John, you’ve been out a lot, around the country. I just wonder if what you’re hearing, even from Trump Supporters, matches what we’re seeing in our polling, which is not a lot of support. JOHN KING: Too far, too far. Donald Trump had a mandate when he won the election to have pretty aggressive immigration actions, including aggressive deportations, the American people were fed up. But, and it’s very important but, I would capitalize it in bold face this but, even Trump supporters when they watch this stuff say it is too much. And so, I do think the language – as you just heard the woman there yanked from the car, you’re going to see in Democratic ads this fall, I’m not going to repeat it here, the language used by the ICE officer who shot and killed Renee Good. And then there was another one captured the next day; ‘Don't you don't want to end up like that bleep, bleep, bleep.’ Suburban women decided the 2018 election because they thought about the 5 A.M. tweets and all the chaos of the first Trump term, and they said we have to have to run our families lives, and this is just over the line, it's too much, it's too much. I think that is, that's a common theme in our poll, that even people who support the president here support the president there think, whoa, you're over the top here. I do think there are, you know, again, the president had a mandate to fix the immigration system, the American people would support orderly deportations of people who are here illegally. There would be a debate about, do you have to commit a crime? You know, where's the line? I think would be a fair debate in our public. But the tone and the tenor, the repetitive nature of this, they're not one offs anymore, you know,  it's not, it's not a one situation, you know, and a lot of people have empathy for people in law enforcement. They have very stressful jobs. And so you can't – there but for the grace of God. Right? But when you see it again and again and again, I think the tone of this, given where key elections are decided, and given there are a lot of reluctant Trump voters who said, I want the border closed and I want a better economy, but I don't want that stuff again, that this is too far. BASH: And what you are going to see here, because we're going to show you everything, but you're almost surely seeing exclusively on conservative media and in conservative algorithms is something else that happened in Minneapolis yesterday. There was a church service where protesters made a point of going to this church service and using that as a staging area for, you know, making their, um, the fact that they're not happy with ICE, known. And this is one of the things so far, maybe, maybe the thing that the Trump Justice Department is looking into whether federal laws were broken there. Let's listen. [Cuts to video] HARMEET DHILLON (DOJ, assistant attorney general for human rights): The attorney general reached out to me about this yesterday when I was on an airplane, and before I landed, we'd already scrambled the jets and gotten prosecutors assigned to this, as well as reached out to the FBI and had agents assigned and the U.S. Attorney's office in Minneapolis assigned to this. So, here are already several law enforcement officials working on this as of yesterday evening. LEIGH ANN CALDWELL: So, it's a battle of narratives, for sure. Republicans are going to focus on that, that you know, protesters, liberals are - don't respect ICE officers, Federal Law Enforcement, they don't even respect your Sunday church service where you're at. But, I will say that the images that ICE has been very aggressive in promoting, themselves, as John said, looks like it could start to backfire. On Capitol Hill. You know, I reported over the weekend that that Democratic leadership are, are, are thinking about a probe - a quiet - they're quietly thinking right now about a probe into DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, starting their own investigation, regardless of what Republicans want to do, because they think that the politics are much better for them on immigration. The border is closed, Trump took that issue away. And if they win back the majority, they want to be ready, really on day one, to have some sort of accountability and oversight of this DHS. BASH: Yeah, and now they're also blaming and going after, and since the end of last week, threatening to or pursuing prosecution of the Democratic Governor of Minnesota, the mayor of Minneapolis, ICE, the social media post that they put up on Sunday, “Tim Walz and Jacob Frey are responsible for whipping these mobs into a frenzy and allowing them to run rampant. We won't be deterred.” This is specifically about the church protests, and I should say that Walz has said that he does not support protesters interrupting houses of worship. NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON: And possibly our former colleague Don Lemon, too, who was there as a journalist filming what was happening there. The complaints that the protesters have is that they say that a pastor at that church is cooperating with the ICE agents who were there. I think average Americans simply don't understand why they're there and why it's getting so out of control. If you think about Barack Obama, he deported like 3 million people and no one got shot in the face, and you didn't, you know, see people getting ripped out of cars, and so that is the problem. This is an administration that likes to govern through image, through image of strength. Right? And we've seen that particularly with with, with DHS and some of these apprehensions. But as you know, John has said, Americans believe they've gone too far. And Democrats don't even really need to message very much on it because they can just see it on their television. DAVID CHALIAN: Although, as you see, Democrats could also, even though that may be wise advice, they also can easily form a circular firing squad amongst themselves, sort of debating the future of ICE - HENDERSON: Abolishing ICE, yeah. CHALIAN: And how that created political problems for them a few years ago. BASH: Alright, we’re going to have to take a quick break. Thank you all, appreciate it.