Jalen Carter's penalty for spitting on Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott sends a message to the rest of the league.
Carter is losing $57,222 for the infraction, the equivalent of his game check for Week 1 because the NFL considers the punishment a one-game suspension with time served. The Pro Bowl defensive tackle didn't play a snap after he was ejected from Philadelphia’s 24-20 victory over Dallas on Thursday.
Carter is expected to be on the field when the Eagles face the Kansas City Chiefs in a Super Bowl rematch on Sunday. The team could impose its own discipline such as benching Carter for the first play, the first series or longer.
The NFL's distinction of a one-game suspension sets a precedent and makes it clear to players that spitting on an opponent will result in similar discipline. The NFL Players Association could view the discipline as a fine for future arguments.
Carter isn't appealing his penalty.
"I’m going to keep everything that I do with him private, regardless of if you see it on Sunday or not,” Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said Monday about his best defensive player. “Everything, every conversation, whether it’s a personal conversation, a disciplinary thing, all those things will always be handled privately. I just think that’s the way to go about doing team business and when you’re doing things with a football team.”
Carter apologized for being disqualified from the game. Players have been fined for spitting on opponents in the past, but there wasn't a case where anyone was suspended for doing it.
Until now — technically.
Carter’s infraction came moments after the franchise’s second Super Bowl banner was raised. He was penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct before the first snap from scrimmage while trainers were attending to an injury on the kickoff.
Carter approached Prescott after the quarterback had stepped up in the huddle, stood between two of his linemen and spit on the ground in the direction of Carter, who was several yards away.
The two players exchanged words before Carter spit on Prescott’s jersey and then backed away. Prescott quickly motioned to a nearby official, who threw the flag.
It was an easy call after the league made it clear that enforcing sportsmanship would be a point of emphasis this season.
“It was a mistake that happened on my side. It won’t happen again,” Carter said after the game. “I feel bad for just my teammates and fans out there. I’m doing it for them. I’m doing it for my family, also. But the fans, they showed the most love.”
Prescott said he simply spit straight ahead, explaining he does so often during games. His saliva landed near Carter, which raised his ire.
Prescott said Carter asked: “You trying to spit on me?”
“I wouldn’t spit on somebody. I’m definitely not trying to spit on you. We’re about to play a game,” Prescott said.
Carter has previously demonstrated a pattern of poor discipline.
He was penalized three times for unnecessary roughness last season and was also benched to start a game in a disciplinary move by Sirianni. One of Carter’s penalties in a game against Pittsburgh last December led to Sirianni having a heated conversation with defensive line coach Clint Hurtt, who stood in front of the player on the sideline when the coach approached him.
Carter also was fined $17,445 for an open-handed blow to the head of Washington Commanders center Tyler Biadasz in the NFC championship game.
The Eagles were only in position to draft Carter in 2023 with the ninth overall pick because several teams passed him up due to his role in a fatal car crash in college that killed a teammate, offensive lineman Devin Willock, and a Georgia recruiting staffer, Chandler LeCroy.
Carter received one year of probation and was fined $1,000 after pleading no contest to misdemeanor charges of reckless driving and racing related to the wreck.
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Philadelphia Eagles defensive tackle Jalen Carter (98) walks off the field after being disqualified for unsportsman like conduct before an NFL football game against the Dallas Cowboys Thursday, Sept. 4, 2025, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
Philadelphia Eagles defensive tackle Jalen Carter walks off the field after being disqualified for unsportsman like conduct before an NFL football game against the Dallas Cowboys Thursday, Sept. 4, 2025, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
Two Minneapolis residents who have been monitoring immigration officers' actions during the Trump administration's latest crackdown say they were detained without charge for several hours in distressing conditions, denied phone calls, and pressured to rat out protest organizers and people living in the country illegally.
The accusations leveled by Brandon Sigüenza and Patty O’Keefe suggest that the Department of Homeland Security is employing similar tactics in Minneapolis and St. Paul as it did during the crackdowns in Los Angeles, Chicago and New Orleans. Federal officers are again using roving patrols, warrantless arrests and aggressive tactics such as spraying chemical irritants, breaking car windows and recording protesters, including Renee Good and her vehicle in the moments before an ICE officer fatally shot her.
According to organizers and an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit, immigration officers have also been surveilling activists who have been observing their activities in the Twin Cities, violating their First Amendment rights. And Sigüenza, who like his friend O'Keefe is a U.S. citizen, said an immigration officer who questioned him Sunday even offered him money or legal protection if he gave up the names of organizers or neighbors who are in the country illegally.
“At one point, the officer said in vague terms that it looks like I’m in trouble, and he could possibly help me out,” Sigüenza said, noting he refused the offer.
DHS, which oversees Immigration and Customs and Enforcement and the Border Patrol, didn’t immediately respond to a Tuesday request for comment.
Sigüenza and O’Keefe, who are among an unknown number of Twin Cities residents observing the immigration officers in action, were detained Sunday while following ICE officers who were driving around and making arrests. The officers stopped in front of O’Keefe's car, fired pepper spray through her windshield vent and smashed her car's windows even though the doors were unlocked, the two told The Associated Press.
According to O’Keefe, the agents mocked her looks and laughed at her. She said they also brought up the killing of Good, a 37-year-old mother of three who was shot in the head last week by an ICE officer in front of her wife.
O'Keefe said the officer who sprayed their car Sunday threatened them, saying that “obstructing” their work was how Good got killed.
“It was very clear that they were trying to just humiliate me, break me down,” O’Keefe said.
Sigüenza and O’Keefe said they were arrested and taken in separate unmarked SUVs to the highly restricted federal facility on the edge of Minneapolis that's serving as the crackdown's main hub. They were put in adjacent cells reserved for U.S. citizens, one for men and the other for women. Each cell was also being used for other detainees and was no larger than 10 feet by 10 feet (about 9 square meters), with a concrete bench, flat-screen TV, two-way mirror and surveillance camera.
On their way to the cells, they saw other detainees who were screaming and wailing for help, though most were dejectedly staring at the ground, they said. In one instance, they observed a woman who was trying to use a toilet while three male agents watched. The overwhelming majority of detainees were Hispanic men, though some were East African — Minnesota is home to the country's largest Somali community.
“Just hearing the visceral pain of the people in this center was awful,” O’Keefe said. “And then you juxtapose that with the laughter we heard from the actual agents. ... It was very surreal and kind of shocking.”
Sigüenza said one of his cellmates had a cut on his head and the other had an injured toe, but neither was offered medical help. Their requests for water or to go to the bathroom outside their cells were also ignored, he said.
O'Keefe and Sigüenza were able to speak with lawyers, but only Sigüenza allowed to make a phone call — he called his wife.
Sigüenza, who is Hispanic, said DHS investigators took him to another room and offered him money or legal protection for any family members who might be in the country illegally in exchange for giving up the names of protest organizers or neighbors who don’t have legal immigration status. But he said he refused the offer, noting that he doesn't have any family members without legal status.
Sigüenza and O’Keefe, who have shared their story widely on social media, were let go by evening without charges.
Once they left the facility, they were again hit with chemical agents officers were using on protesters in the area.
“We were not charged with a crime,” said Sigüenza. “We were released and then tear-gassed on our way out.”
The conditions at immigration detention facilities around the country have been the subject of complaints, including a lawsuit over the one that served as the Chicago-area's operational hub that resulted in a judge’s oversight visit and an order to improve conditions.
DHS has defended the conditions in its facilities, saying detainees are fed and their medical concerns are addressed. And they've trumpeted the success of the immigration crackdowns, saying they've led to the arrests of thousands of people who are in the country illegally.
O’Keefe and Sigüenza believe their detention was meant to intimidate them and others critics of the immigration crackdown.
U.S. citizens’ and noncitizens’ rights differ slightly in immigration detention than in criminal detention, according to Lynn Damiano Pearson, an immigration attorney with the National Immigration Law Center. But detainees retain basic rights in both situations, including access to counsel and a phone, food and water, and privacy from the opposite gender when using the restroom.
Associated Press reporter Sophia Tareen contributed to this report.
Patty O'Keefe, a U.S. citizens who was arrested while following federal agents' vehicles and briefly held at a federal facility in Minneapolis, stands next to her car showing that her front driver's side window was smashed in, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
The car of Patty O'Keefe, a U.S. citizens who was arrested while following federal agents' vehicles and briefly held at a federal facility in Minneapolis, shows glass on the ground after her front driver's side window was smashed in, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
Patty O'Keefe, a U.S. citizens who was arrested while following federal agents' vehicles and briefly held at a federal facility in Minneapolis, stands next to her car showing that her front driver's side window was smashed in, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
