A little over two weeks ago, Sean Charles Dunn, a 37-year-old paralegal, who has since been fired from the United States Department of Justice, hurled a Subway sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection agent on 14th Street in Washington, D.C.

The video of the incident spread quickly, and media coverage followed a predictable script: playful headlines, a few amusing commentaries, and a burst of memes that quickly circulated before the story faded out of the news cycle. The most striking cultural echo was a reworking of Banksy’s iconic street art piece, “Flower Thrower,” in which the protester was depicted hurling a sandwich instead of a bouquet.

But this framing misses a handful of important things.

Protest or Drunken Outburst?

At first glance, the episode appears to be nothing more than a drunken outburst. Dunn wasn’t leading a march, chanting slogans, and didn’t appear to be making a political statement. He seemed to be irritated and impulsive. From this angle, it’s understandable why the media framed the act as unserious.

Yet protest has always contained humorous and provocative elements. Think back to when activists cream-pied self-righteous politicians, business leaders, or cultural figures seen as hypocritical, powerful, or controversial. These acts mocked those in positions of power and knocked them off their pedestal just a tad. In this context, a pie in the face was never “just dessert.” It was symbolic resistance.

However, the sandwich event occupies an ambiguous space. On the one hand, it lacks the intentionality of satire. On the other hand, the state’s reaction has forced us to confront how fragile our current criminal justice system perceives itself to be when even a soggy hoagie is treated as a threat.

The Criminalization of Trivial Acts

Not only was Dunn arrested, but former Fox News host and current U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, Jeanine Pirro, suggested in a provocative video that Dunn would be charged with felony assault.

But law enforcement officers, especially those tasked with protest control, are trained to withstand far more than a flying sandwich. They routinely face bottles, eggs, and even rocks during demonstrations. To act as though a sandwich constitutes a serious projectile stretches credibility and makes cops (whether at the local or federal level) out to be whimps and the criminal justice system a joke.

More specifically, when the law treats a sandwich as a weapon, it elevates police fragility above common sense. This is not about public safety; it is about guarding the aura of authority. And the fact that federal prosecutors could not persuade a grand jury to approve a felony indictment means that the public is not buying any of this shit.

Media as Purveyors of Comic Relief

Back to the mainstream media. For its part, it chose the easy path: novelty and cuteness. A subway sandwich thrown at a cop? Perfect fodder for quippy headlines and viral sharing. It was framed as “cute,” an absurd blip in the daily churn. This trivialization also temporarily relieved the public of the burden of thinking about immigration enforcement overreach, protest policing, or the criminalization of minor acts. And it temporarily legitimized the charges by treating them as natural consequences of normal policing.

Why It Matters

We live in a time when public protest is increasingly criminalized. From bans on certain demonstrations to aggressive policing of even minor disruptions, the threshold for “threat” has sunk lower and lower. Why, just this week, a woman was arrested for spitting at a cop, and Pirro is also considering charging that person with felony assault.

It matters how we respond. In earlier eras, a pie in a politician’s face was understood as political theater, however unserious. It was disruptive, yes, but it was also a critique. Today, when every minor gesture can be weaponized and turned into a spectacle in the media, even the possibility of playful dissent is being squeezed out.

The Real Question

So, what is the proper takeaway from the sandwich thrower incident and how people and institutions responded to it?

Although it prompted some protesters to construct placards emblazoned with pithy slogans, and others to create and sell novelty t-shirts, we’ve yet to see a barrage of anti-ICE protesters arming themselves with subway sandwiches.

Dean’s action wasn’t a profound act of resistance.

And he does not deserve the designation of hero (despite the pun that tempts us to call him one).

Then again, we shouldn’t accept the popular narrative that Dean’s actions were meaningless. The episode shows how, during the Trump administration, the courts quickly want to criminalize minor acts, and how eagerly the press frames the acts as comical.

Meanwhile, neither entities act as if nothing bigger is at stake.

Until we grapple with these complementary issues, the next thrown sandwich, egg, or pie will be treated not as satire, not as politics, but as crime. And that should trouble us the most.

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