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{
"title": "Student photojournalist shot with crowd-control munitions at LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/student-photojournalist-shot-with-crowd-control-munitions-at-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2026-01-23T18:43:56.860680Z",
"last_published_at": "2026-01-27T18:43:35.111355Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2026-01-27T18:43:34.993636Z",
"date": "2025-09-01",
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"city": "Los Angeles",
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"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"389h4\">Student photojournalist Jake Crandall was pelted with impact projectiles at an immigration enforcement protest in Los Angeles, California, on Sept. 1, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"dviv8\">It was one of many protests that <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/article/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">began</a> June 6 in response to federal raids in and around LA of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gathered, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown.</p><p data-block-key=\"5v0hc\">After demonstrators clashed with LA law enforcement officers and federal agents, President Donald Trump called in the California National Guard and then the U.S. Marines over the objections of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass. Trump’s deployment of federal troops to LA was <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70496361/176/newsom-v-trump/\">ruled illegal</a> by a federal judge on Sept. 2.<br/></p><p data-block-key=\"ev6b2\">Crandall, on assignment for Santa Monica College’s The Corsair, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was photographing protesters outside the Metropolitan Detention Center, where immigrants were being detained.</p><p data-block-key=\"6g8s1\">The demonstrators were gathered in front of a gate outside the facility when Department of Homeland Security officers started firing crowd-control munitions through the holes of the gate.</p><p data-block-key=\"1u90b\">Crandall said he was wearing his press badge and standing at least 10 feet away from protesters when he was hit by pepper balls. He identified the projectiles from the residue left on his bulletproof vest.</p><p data-block-key=\"bi0ud\">“It was clear that DHS was shooting at me and not just the protesters," he told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"20eiv\">In a statement emailed to the Tracker at the start of the LA protests in June, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin urged journalists to be cautious while covering what she characterized as “violent riots,” and added that President Trump and Secretary Kristi Noem “are committed to restoring law and order.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"1zrll\">Federal officers stand behind a gate and one pepper-sprays the crowd, at right, during a protest on Sept. 1, 2025. Photojournalist Jake Crandall told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was hit with a projectile while covering the demonstration.</p>",
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"name": "California",
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"chemical irritant",
"Department of Homeland Security",
"immigration",
"protest",
"shot / shot at",
"student journalism"
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"Jake Crandall (The [Santa Monica College] Corsair)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Photojournalist assaulted, gear damaged by federal officers in Oregon",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-assaulted-gear-damaged-by-federal-officers-in-oregon/",
"first_published_at": "2025-12-19T14:36:47.504741Z",
"last_published_at": "2026-03-10T20:31:54.096503Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2026-03-10T20:31:53.846475Z",
"date": "2025-09-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Portland",
"longitude": -122.67621,
"latitude": 45.52345,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"6j9am\">Freelance photojournalist Hugo Rios was shoved, shot with crowd-control munitions and tear-gassed while documenting anti-deportation protests in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 1, 2025, according to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Oregon in November.</p><p data-block-key=\"6co8d\">The federal class-action <a href=\"https://www.aclu-or.org/cases/dickinson-et-al-v-trump-et-al/\">suit</a> — filed on behalf of Rios, freelance journalist <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?targeted_journalists=Mason+Lake&case_number=3%3A25-cv-02170\">Mason Lake</a> and three protesters — names President Donald Trump, the Department of Homeland Security and its head, Kristi Noem. It alleges indiscriminate, retaliatory violence by DHS agents at protests at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland.</p><p data-block-key=\"6som6\">“Despite the overwhelmingly peaceful activity, the Trump Administration has falsely characterized the building as ‘under siege’ and has authorized ‘full force’ in response,” the ACLU said in its summary of the case. “The lawsuit challenges these blatant attempts to retaliate against protesters and journalists and interfere with fundamental rights enshrined in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8sc33\">According to the <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.ord.190589/gov.uscourts.ord.190589.1.0.pdf\">Nov. 21 complaint</a>, Rios has worked as a freelance photojournalist for seven years and began documenting the anti-deportation protests in Portland in August. On Sept. 1, protesters gathered in a park in the South Waterfront district and, around midafternoon, marched toward the ICE building nearby.</p><p data-block-key=\"8q8ir\">“At the Portland ICE Building, the mood appeared to be positive,” the complaint said. “There was a DJ playing music, and people were dancing and chanting.”</p><p data-block-key=\"40cpl\">Rios — who was wearing a black helmet, goggles and a Velcro “Press” label, and carrying various pieces of professional gear — filmed the scene, leaving to eat dinner and returning after.</p><p data-block-key=\"d8bmh\">According to the suit, shortly before 10:30 p.m., as demonstrators were still dancing, DHS officers began walking toward the crowd, deploying crowd-control munitions and tear gas canisters without warning.</p><p data-block-key=\"l88b\">As Rios filmed those officers walking through a gate, half a dozen others were advancing toward the crowd from a nearby street. “Suddenly, without warning or verbal command, a DHS officer pushed Mr. Rios from behind,” the suit said.</p><p data-block-key=\"2ht86\">A few minutes later, another federal officer ordered Rios to move back. The photojournalist responded that he was “just filming,” but the officer said he didn’t care and shoved him back approximately four times, striking and damaging Rios’ camera in the process.</p><p data-block-key=\"b19gp\">According to the suit, around six minutes later, a DHS officer deployed a tear gas canister at Rios’ feet, though he was standing alone and away from the crowd at the time.</p><p data-block-key=\"3t1na\">“Given Mr. Rios’s isolation, the teargas attack appeared to be targeting him alone,” the suit alleged. “The attack frightened and shocked him. He felt frozen in place.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6ilug\">Multiple DHS officers then repeatedly shot Rios with crowd control munitions, including pepper balls, without warning, striking him nearly two dozen times and denting his battery pack.</p><p data-block-key=\"cmdm6\">“Mr. Rios desires to continue covering protests at the Portland ICE Building,” the lawsuit said. “However, he is hesitant due to his fear that he will be targeted by Defendants again, and that the Defendants will injure him even more severely than they did on the night of September 1.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8fb00\">Rios could not immediately be reached for comment, and DHS did not respond to an emailed request from the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"411at\">“Defendants must be enjoined from gassing, shooting, hitting and arresting peaceful Portlanders and journalists willing to document federal abuses as if they are enemy combatants,” the complaint says.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"948mv\">Federal agents respond to anti-deportation protests outside an ICE detention facility in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 1, 2025. Photojournalist Hugo Rios was shoved, shot with crowd-control munitions and tear-gassed while covering the demonstration.</p>",
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"actor": "law enforcement",
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{
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"equipment": "camera"
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{
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"equipment": "external battery"
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"state": {
"name": "Oregon",
"abbreviation": "OR"
},
"updates": [
"(2026-03-09 19:40:00+00:00) Oregon journalists extend restraining order against DHS",
"(2026-02-03 21:58:00+00:00) Oregon journalists win restraining order against DHS"
],
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"tags": [
"chemical irritant",
"Department of Homeland Security",
"immigration",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
],
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"Hugo Rios (Freelance)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Student journalist hit with pepper ball and pepper-sprayed at LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/student-journalist-hit-with-pepper-ball-and-pepper-sprayed-at-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-11-14T18:07:37.411359Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-11-14T18:07:37.411359Z",
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"date": "2025-09-01",
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"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"oe3mt\">Kayjel Mairena, a student journalist for Santa Monica College’s The Corsair, was shot in the head with a pepper ball and pepper-sprayed while covering an immigration protest in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Sept. 1, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"3g8ea\">It was one of many protests that <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">began</a> June 6 in response to federal raids in and around LA of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gathered, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. After demonstrators clashed with LA law enforcement officers and federal agents, President Donald Trump called in the California National Guard and then the U.S. Marines over the objections of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass.</p><p data-block-key=\"asv31\">Trump’s deployment of federal troops to LA was <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70496361/176/newsom-v-trump/\">ruled illegal</a> by a federal judge on Sept. 2.</p><p data-block-key=\"blc0k\">Mairena, the Corsair’s news editor, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was documenting the protest Sept. 1, outside the city’s Metropolitan Detention Center, where immigration detainees were being held. Despite wearing press credentials, he said he was struck in the head with a pepper ball and pepper-sprayed by Department of Homeland Security officers that day. It’s unclear whether he was directly targeted.</p><p data-block-key=\"k1m2\">In a statement emailed to the Tracker, Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin urged journalists to be cautious while covering what she characterized as “violent riots,” and added that Trump and Secretary Kristi Noem “are committed to restoring law and order.”</p><p data-block-key=\"f3nog\"><a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/student-reporter-hit-by-projectile-charged-by-police-horse-at-la-protest/\">On Oct. 18,</a> Mairena was documenting a protest in the same downtown area when he was struck in the side with an impact projectile fired by the Los Angeles Police Department and nearly trampled by a mounted officer.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"40yqj\">Law enforcement at an immigration protest in Los Angeles, California, on June 12, 2025. It was one of many protests continuing for months, including a Sept. 1 demonstration where reporter Kayjel Mairena was pepper-sprayed and struck by a pepper ball.</p>",
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"Department of Homeland Security",
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"shot / shot at",
"student journalism"
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],
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{
"title": "Photojournalist pepper-sprayed by DHS, struck with pepper balls at LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-pepper-sprayed-by-dhs-struck-with-pepper-balls-at-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-11-21T17:01:43.113550Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-11-21T17:01:43.113550Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-11-21T17:01:42.930576Z",
"date": "2025-09-01",
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"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"r07bb\">Freelance photojournalist Benjamin Hanson was pepper-sprayed in the face by a Department of Homeland Security officer while documenting a protest outside the Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Sept. 1, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"92buo\">Hanson, who was photographing for Middle East Images and filming for Royol News, was also struck with pepper balls later in the demonstration.</p><p data-block-key=\"69g42\">It was one of many protests that <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">began</a> June 6 in response to federal raids in and around LA of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gathered, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown.</p><p data-block-key=\"6b329\">After demonstrators clashed with LA law enforcement officers and federal agents, President Donald Trump called in the California National Guard and then the U.S. Marines over the objections of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass. Trump’s deployment of federal troops to LA was <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70496361/176/newsom-v-trump/\">ruled illegal</a> by a federal judge Sept. 2.</p><p data-block-key=\"bjqg9\">Hanson told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was photographing as protesters marched toward the detention center, where immigrants were being held. Federal agents had erected a fence around the facility, and at times demonstrators approached the gate and shook it.</p><p data-block-key=\"1os8n\">Hanson said he was standing with several other journalists when a DHS officer suddenly opened the fence and sprayed them.</p><p data-block-key=\"394gr\">“It got me right in the forehead,” said Hanson, who was wearing goggles at the time. When he removed them to wipe the spray away, it seeped into his eyes and left him incapacitated for approximately 30 minutes.</p><p data-block-key=\"4r3q2\">In a video reviewed by the Tracker, federal agents can be seen opening the fence and indiscriminately pepper-spraying the crowd.</p><p data-block-key=\"cl44t\">“When I saw the photo that a buddy of mine took, I said, ‘Wow, they did that on purpose,’” he said. “It was directly at my face.”</p><p data-block-key=\"4ucf9\">A fellow photographer also stopped working temporarily to help guide Hanson to an area where medics were flushing pepper spray from people’s eyes.</p><p data-block-key=\"4rm8b\">Later that day, Hanson said he was photographing a Border Patrol arrest when a DHS officer fired pepper balls, striking him in the leg and hitting several nearby protesters. In a video reviewed by the Tracker, agents can be heard yelling at people to get back before firing the projectiles.</p><p data-block-key=\"eul4j\">“I don’t think it was fair,” Hanson said, referencing the agents firing at him for documenting the arrest from a safe distance.</p><p data-block-key=\"5umsr\">In a statement emailed to the Tracker at the start of the LA protests in June, Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin urged journalists to be cautious while covering what she characterized as “violent riots,” and added that President Trump and Secretary Kristi Noem “are committed to restoring law and order.”</p><p data-block-key=\"16ik4\">While covering the protests earlier in the summer, Hanson was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-pushed-by-officer-while-documenting-la-freeway-protest/\">shoved by a California Highway Patrol officer</a> and had his <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalists-phone-knocked-to-the-ground-by-police-officer-at-la-protest/\">cellphone knocked out of his hand</a> by a police officer.</p></div>",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"4ft3k\">Photographer Benjamin Hanson, above in blue, gets his eyes washed out. He was pepper-sprayed by federal officers while documenting an immigration protest in Los Angeles, California, on Sept. 1, 2025.</p>",
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{
"title": "Photojournalist hit with chemical irritant, pepper-sprayed at LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-hit-with-chemical-irritant-pepper-sprayed-at-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-11-25T19:01:03.912990Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-11-25T19:01:03.912990Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-11-25T19:01:00.648121Z",
"date": "2025-09-01",
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"city": "Los Angeles",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"tqwvf\">Photojournalist Jill Connelly was struck in the back with a chemical irritant and pepper-sprayed by a Department of Homeland Security officer while covering an immigration protest in Los Angeles, California, on Sept. 1, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"45j03\">It was one of many protests that <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">began</a> June 6 in response to federal raids in and around LA of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gathered, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown.</p><p data-block-key=\"63ma3\">After demonstrators clashed with LA law enforcement officers and federal agents, President Donald Trump called in the California National Guard and then the U.S. Marines over the objections of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass. Trump’s deployment of federal troops to LA was <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70496361/176/newsom-v-trump/\">ruled illegal</a> by a federal judge Sept. 2.</p><p data-block-key=\"3stgo\">Connelly, a freelancer on assignment for Zuma Press, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she and other journalists were photographing near the downtown Metropolitan Detention Center, where immigrants were being held.</p><p data-block-key=\"eadun\">Connelly was wearing a helmet identifying her as press, along with a media credential on a lanyard around her neck, and was carrying two SLR cameras.</p><p data-block-key=\"anfdm\">While covering the protest, Connelly worked along a narrow sidewalk near the detention center, photographing protesters on one side and a mass of armored federal officers behind a black fence on the other, according to a declaration she wrote for the American Civil Liberties Union and provided the Tracker. Connelly, who is not a party to a lawsuit, said she provided the declaration only to document the events.</p><p data-block-key=\"c9j9h\">“You can see it is pretty clear we are all press,” she wrote of images accompanying her declaration. “We are taking photos behind a fence and in no way threatening or interfering with the officer.”</p><p data-block-key=\"ben7j\">A section of the fence briefly popped open as protesters shook it, though no one attempted to pass through and most stepped back, the declaration states.</p><p data-block-key=\"62t9t\">Connelly said she turned away to move to a new position when she was suddenly shot in the back by a projectile that released a chemical irritant, triggering immediate, intense burning.</p><p data-block-key=\"6ghpa\">The declaration’s photographs show the moment she was hit and the white powder residue that streaked across her clothing afterward.</p><p data-block-key=\"bk7gb\">Shortly after, officers began pepper-spraying the crowd.</p><p data-block-key=\"4p7cb\">“I was struck by the indiscriminate way they were shooting the chemical agent, because they were not simply directing it at the protesters but instead spraying in a wide sweep at everyone on the other side of the fence, including a bunch of photojournalists who were separated from the protesters,” Connelly wrote.</p><p data-block-key=\"3mp6j\">Among those sprayed was freelance photographer <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-pepper-sprayed-by-dhs-struck-with-pepper-balls-at-la-protest/\">Benjamin Hanson</a>, who was hit directly in the face with the irritant, which seeped into his eyes and left him incapacitated for approximately 30 minutes.</p><p data-block-key=\"dtcg7\">Connelly said she heard no warnings before officers opened fire with the spray. As the burning intensified, she decided to leave the area. The pain continued for hours, despite attempts to wash the irritant from her skin, according to the declaration.</p><p data-block-key=\"69s3f\">“I pride myself on doing my job well but also evaluating when a situation feels too unsafe to remain in and leaving if necessary,” Connelly wrote. “Before this year, I had never been hit with any chemical irritants or less-lethal weapons, despite having covered protests for many years.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6i3of\">While Connelly said she didn’t feel either incident was an intentional attack against the press, she emphasized the need for the department to be trained on how to work with the media during high-intensity situations.</p><p data-block-key=\"1u8r4\">“I don’t so much feel targeted as the untrained DHS officers randomly spray a crowd that isn’t threatening, is on the other side of a fence and are exercising their First Amendment rights,” she wrote in an email.</p><p data-block-key=\"70dn0\">At the outset of the LA protests in June, Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin urged journalists in a statement to be cautious while covering what she characterized as “violent riots,” and added that President Trump and Secretary Kristi Noem “are committed to restoring law and order.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"evi8d\">A Department of Homeland Security agent pepper-sprays a group of journalists covering a protest in Los Angeles, California, on Sept. 1, 2025. Photographer Jill Connelly was among those impacted by the spray.</p>",
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{
"title": "Investigative reporter told to stop contacting police in California city",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/investigative-reporter-told-to-stop-contacting-police-in-california-city/",
"first_published_at": "2025-09-10T19:07:49.551228Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-09-10T19:07:49.551228Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-09-10T18:21:10.296179Z",
"date": "2025-08-27",
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"city": "Santa Ana",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"fd63c\">Ben Camacho, an investigative reporter and co-founder of The Southlander, was ordered to stop reaching out for comment from police officers in Santa Ana, California, in a cease and desist letter sent by the city’s police union on Aug. 27, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"8c5eb\">Camacho told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he is one of the few journalists who has done investigative reporting on the Santa Ana Police Officers’ Association and has written numerous articles critical of the police department.</p><p data-block-key=\"5ovpu\">When he received the email from the union, Camacho said, “I just kind of immediately laughed at it and then sent it to my attorneys.”</p><p data-block-key=\"mq75\">The letter, reviewed by the Tracker, alleged that Camacho had “begun to harass and attempt to intimidate certain members of the SAPOA,” but did not identify affected officers nor specific instances of the unacceptable conduct.</p><p data-block-key=\"2a2qg\">“You have telephoned certain officers and emailed them demanding they answer your questions and to respond to your frivolous requests,” it continued. “This must stop.”</p><p data-block-key=\"1ao83\">Camacho said that, while he doesn’t know for sure what prompted the letter, he had worked on several recent stories involving two Santa Ana Police Department officers who are under investigation by the California Attorney General’s Office for their shooting of an unarmed individual in December 2024.</p><p data-block-key=\"d8jes\">“As I continued to look into the officers involved, I later learned that one of those officers, one month after killing one person, he was involved in another incident where he shot and killed somebody, although this person had a knife. Still, a police shooting,” Camacho said. “That sparked my interest because it surprised me that he’s under investigation, yet he’s still on active duty.”</p><p data-block-key=\"f7cvk\">After going through his normal reporting process, Camacho said he published an article about the back-to-back shootings in June 2025. Later that month, the same officer was also involved in the beating of an unarmed teenager.</p><p data-block-key=\"56plu\">Camacho told the Tracker he was able to obtain a copy of an incident report through public records requests, and reached out to the officer in June through his city email address.</p><p data-block-key=\"750u7\">“I emailed him once or twice, just to see if he would comment. And then I ended up just sending him my questions after not hearing back, on just the off chance that he later wants to reply,” he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"5p0bj\">Camacho reached out for comment again at the beginning of August, after the family of the victim shot by police in December 2024 announced its plans to file a federal lawsuit against the two officers, as well as the city.</p><p data-block-key=\"dt5sm\">“I didn’t hear back. I think I emailed them once more the next day. In that email, I indicated to the one that I did have a phone for, that ‘I’m going to call you in about an hour if I don’t hear back, it’s just because I’m on deadline. Keep an eye out for my number in the signature and let me know if you are refusing to comment.”</p><p data-block-key=\"5jdu1\">The officer answered when he called, Camacho said, but after he identified himself and said he was a reporter for Caló News — the outlet he was on assignment for that day — the call abruptly ended.</p><p data-block-key=\"6hve\">“I didn’t know if it was a call drop or if he hung up, so I gave him the benefit of the doubt and called back, but then it went straight to voicemail,” he told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"1gt0r\">Camacho said he went through a similar process trying to contact a third officer involved in a traffic stop at issue in a lawsuit quickly settled by the city in July.</p><p data-block-key=\"5j6d8\">“The cease and desist doesn’t specify who or what or when or where, but of recent interactions, those are the three,” he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"cj2as\">In a letter to the police union in response, Camacho’s attorney Shakeer Rahman wrote that its demands were “ridiculous.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8eeg5\">“There is no lawful basis to gag a person from ever communicating with government officials, let alone from communicating with an entire police force. That would be unconstitutional,” Rahman wrote. “And it is a bedrock journalistic practice to offer a person an opportunity to comment on forthcoming news reporting about them.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9pj0e\">Camacho told the Tracker that it was a clear attempt to stop him from continuing to report on the police department entirely.</p><p data-block-key=\"rt56\">“They’re framing journalism as a criminal act,” he said. “They’re framing my reasonable efforts to reach someone and make sure that they truly have a chance to comment or answer questions as a criminal act. That is not just anti-First Amendment, that is anti-democracy. And I think it’s a symptom of a larger problem we’re seeing right now under the rise of really harsh authoritarianism.</p><p data-block-key=\"4gqak\">“But this is not my first rodeo, I’ve dealt with bigger fish,” he added, referring to a <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/los-angeles-sues-journalist-in-attempt-to-claw-back-photos-of-police-officers/\">pair of</a> <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/los-angeles-sues-journalist-in-attempt-to-claw-back-photos-of-police-officers/\">lawsuits</a> filed against him by the city of Los Angeles.</p><p data-block-key=\"3l5mt\">The Santa Ana Police Officers’ Association did not respond to a request for comment.</p></div>",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"r86ds\">Attorneys for the Santa Ana Police Officers’ Association in California sent a cease and desist letter to investigative reporter Ben Camacho on Aug. 27, 2025, alleging that he had harassed various officers when he attempted to contact them.</p>",
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{
"title": "San Francisco journalist grabbed, pepper-sprayed by federal agents",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/san-francisco-journalist-grabbed-pepper-sprayed-by-federal-agents/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-28T13:05:27.174720Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-10-29T19:25:52.667239Z",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"lid1d\">Eddie Kim, a reporter for the Gazetteer San Francisco, was grabbed by the throat, pushed and sprayed with a chemical irritant while reporting on protests outside an immigration court in San Francisco, California, on Aug. 20, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"f6mbl\">Protests in California began in early June in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. While concentrated in Los Angeles, protests have continued throughout the state, centered around operations by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.</p><p data-block-key=\"c0t55\">In an account for the Gazetteer, Kim <a href=\"https://sf.gazetteer.co/i-reported-from-an-ice-action-on-sansome-and-all-i-got-was-a-face-full-of-pepper-spray\">wrote</a> that he arrived at the San Francisco Immigration Court at 9:30 a.m. on Aug. 20 after he was alerted that a detainee was being transferred.</p><p data-block-key=\"duau0\">“By the time I got there, a melee was already unfolding among law enforcement agents, protesters, drivers, and passersby,” he wrote. “With agents hitting bikes with batons, cars honking, a bus stuck in the road, and pedestrians filming and shouting, tensions were through the roof.”</p><p data-block-key=\"dq4dv\">Kim told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that officers impeded his ability to report on the scene almost as soon as he arrived.</p><p data-block-key=\"8bbsq\">“From the moment I got there and started recording to the moment I got pepper-sprayed was just about six-and-a-half minutes,” he said.</p><p data-block-key=\"adm62\">Kim said that as he crossed the street to get to the other side of the vehicles, a Department of Homeland Security officer rushed toward him and told him to get out of the street.</p><p data-block-key=\"7oikb\">“Then when I said, ‘I am a member of the press and documenting the scene,’ they basically put their hands on my chest,” he told the Tracker. “As they were pushing, I felt his fingers kind of grabbing me around my face and throat, and I got shoved that way.</p><p data-block-key=\"52m87\">“And once I was getting near the sidewalk, somebody else — a Customs and Border Protection agent with a baton and vest — came up toward me and, holding his baton horizontal with two hands, shoved me in the chest.”</p><p data-block-key=\"669ud\">Kim told the Tracker that — with officers from multiple federal agencies milling around the vehicles — the scene was disorderly at best, judging from years of covering demonstrations.</p><p data-block-key=\"bnmep\">“There are ways to create formations, create lines, to keep people back. There are dispersal orders that can be used. There are more coherent warnings that are given,” Kim said. “But it was so chaotic, so disorganized, that it really started to look like individuals — individual ICE agents, individual DHS, CBP officers — were making their own decisions on what to do.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2o1ht\">As demonstrators continued their attempts to block the ICE transport vans from departing, federal agents responded aggressively, a stark change from the law enforcement response June 24 when, Kim <a href=\"https://sf.gazetteer.co/a-front-row-view-to-an-ice-abduction-turns-into-chaos-at-jackson-square\">reported</a>, agents had adopted a more defensive approach to the protesters gathered outside ICE’s San Francisco headquarters.</p><p data-block-key=\"58urk\">“The language and behavior was more aggressive and, in many cases, preemptive,” Kim wrote. “Several protesters were thrown to the ground. Some people were pepper-sprayed without provocation.</p><p data-block-key=\"bn4gc\">“One of those people was me.”</p><p data-block-key=\"93nhb\">Kim wrote that he was following a loose formation of federal agents as they walked away once ICE transport vans were able to successfully leave the area. While several people on the sidewalk began shouting “Shame!” and insults at the agents, he said it seemed that the action had slowed.</p><p data-block-key=\"21o3f\">A lone ICE agent then grabbed a protester’s bike, attempting to yank it away. As Kim moved forward to film the interaction, the agent retrieved his pepper gel — a concentrated form of chemical irritant — and sprayed the protester and then Kim in the eyes.</p><p data-block-key=\"5tp6t\">“The searing pain came as quickly as the attack itself. I fell to the ground near Sansome and Pine streets, more surprised than seriously hurt,” Kim wrote. “I felt the thick liquid smearing on my face as I attempted to wipe away as much of it as possible.”</p><p data-block-key=\"80u5c\">He added that multiple people nearby came to his aid, flushing his eyes with water. Kim told the Tracker that he wasn’t able to see properly for 20 minutes, at which point he was able to walk to the Gazetteer office nearby, where he spent another hour recovering.</p><p data-block-key=\"5k2lh\">“What happened to me, the cyclist protester, and others is a sign that individual federal agents are now willing to proactively employ brute force against people who are not attacking them or even entering their personal space,” he wrote.</p><p data-block-key=\"f1iho\">Kim told the Tracker that he is working with his editor to determine how to pursue a formal complaint against the officers.</p><p data-block-key=\"c8po6\">ICE and its San Francisco Field Office acknowledged receipt when reached via email, but did not respond as of press time.</p><p data-block-key=\"t1ic\"><i>Editor’s Note: This article has been updated with additional comments and details from Eddie Kim.</i></p></div>",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"zlcun\">Eddie Kim, a reporter for the Gazetteer San Francisco, wrote about his experience being assaulted and sprayed with a chemical irritant while covering an immigration protest outside a courthouse in San Francisco’s Financial District on Aug. 20, 2025.</p>",
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{
"title": "University of Central Oklahoma halts student paper’s print publication",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/university-of-central-oklahoma-halts-student-papers-print-publication/",
"first_published_at": "2025-11-19T21:06:28.495389Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-12-03T18:14:46.500389Z",
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"date": "2025-08-14",
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"city": "Edmond",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"gcrtf\">The Vista, a student newspaper at the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond, was formally forced to halt print publication on Aug. 14, 2025, after school administrators criticized its news coverage.</p><p data-block-key=\"f21bm\">This fall marks the first semester since the paper’s founding in 1903 that the publication won’t be printed, <a href=\"https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/education/2025/08/19/uco-oklahoma-the-vista-student-newspaper-ending-print-edition/85722686007/\">said</a> Joe Hight, the university’s journalism ethics chair.</p><p data-block-key=\"40qf1\">An early 2025 cost-cutting initiative at the public university, third-largest in the state, prompted discussions about ceasing weekly print publication in favor of digital-only distribution, according to an <a href=\"https://theindependentviewuco.com/629/opinion/whos-obstructing-the-view/\">account</a> in The Independent View, a newly launched student publication.</p><p data-block-key=\"3nf83\">Hight, interim chair of the school’s Student Media Advisory Board, said the board instead opted in a May vote to reduce the print frequency to biweekly and use money from a separate endowment fund to support additional publications.</p><p data-block-key=\"7enm3\">But Elizabeth Maier, dean of the university’s College of Liberal Arts, determined to end print operations entirely, mandating the publication operate as a digital-only operation, the View reported. The advisory board ultimately approved the plan in August.</p><p data-block-key=\"cendn\">Kenna Attaway, who took over as editor-in-chief of The Vista this fall, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she thinks halting print publication was ultimately a business decision. “I don’t think that the paper was taken away as a form of retaliation,” she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"aoojp\">According to Leslie Briggs, an attorney with Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, however, the university’s decision to halt print publication — as well as remove The Vista’s racks from campus facilities — amounts to “egregiously anti-free speech conduct” in retaliation for “rigorous news coverage of university affairs.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9fi15\">The decision to stop printing The Vista came after university administrators “<a href=\"https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/2025/10/09/the-vista-university-central-oklahoma-student-newspaper-print-edition/86600148007/\">repeatedly expressed dissatisfaction</a> with editorial decisions” made by The Vista, Briggs wrote in an October <a href=\"https://www.rcfp.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/2025-10-07-RCFP-letter-to-University-of-Central-Oklahoma.pdf\">letter</a> to the university.</p><p data-block-key=\"7qrms\">The stories in question <a href=\"https://www.cjr.org/news/one-battle-after-another-student-newspapers-censorship-crisis.php\">covered</a> efforts to install Narcan vending machines on campus, the university’s handling of a student’s suicide in 2024, and the Student Association’s failed vote of confidence in university President Todd Lamb before his official inauguration.</p><p data-block-key=\"2bm8i\">“Any possible notion that UCO’s decision was animated even slightly by concerns over budget is firmly negated by the fact that UCO refused to allow The Vista to accept outside funding to allow continued publication,” Briggs wrote. “That is not cost-saving — it’s censorship.”</p><p data-block-key=\"7ns47\">University spokesperson Adrienne Nobles told the Tracker that The Vista “operates with full editorial independence.” She added that the university’s general counsel “found no evidence to support accusations of retaliation” and that “the allegations outlined in the letter are without merit.”</p><p data-block-key=\"878d0\">Attaway told the Tracker that during the fall semester, The Vista has continued covering the university with a critical lens, and that the administration has not tried to interfere in the coverage.</p><p data-block-key=\"4ev58\"><i>Update: This article was revised to include comments from Vista Editor-in-Chief Kenna Attaway.</i></p></div>",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"0ta5z\">The Vista, a student newspaper at the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond, was formally forced to halt print publication on Aug. 14, 2025, with its April 29 edition the final entry in its digital archive.</p>",
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"state": {
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},
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"The [University of Central Oklahoma] Vista"
],
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],
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"Other Incident"
],
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},
{
"title": "Journalist shoved by LAPD while covering pro-immigrant car caravan",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-shoved-by-lapd-while-covering-pro-immigrant-car-caravan/",
"first_published_at": "2025-09-09T14:52:47.181380Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-09-09T14:52:47.181380Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-09-09T14:48:43.786253Z",
"date": "2025-08-12",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"ykzr6\">Freelance journalist Sean Beckner-Carmitchel was shoved by a police officer while covering a pro-immigrant car caravan in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 12, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"d24av\">Protests in LA began in early June in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown.<a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\"> Raids</a> at<a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\"> Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a<a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\"> July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"4v2rv\">Beckner-Carmitchel <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/acatwithnews.bsky.social/post/3lwa5vuyewc2j\">reported</a> that the caravan, organized by several unions and immigrant rights groups, made its way from MacArthur Park toward the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown.</p><p data-block-key=\"dmaf1\">“As the car caravan arrived on Alameda and Temple, they were met by an LAPD blockade,” Beckner-Carmitchel <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/acatwithnews.bsky.social/post/3lwabglj5y22j\">wrote</a>. “A union representative attempted to negotiate with an officer, who repeatedly is saying ‘we don’t want any conflict’ on this street.”</p><p data-block-key=\"qq0s\">Beckner-Carmitchel was following as Los Angeles Police Department officers then approached the driver of the lead vehicle — a semitruck pulling a band in an unwalled trailer — when another officer suddenly turned and shoved him, the journalist <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/acatwithnews.bsky.social/post/3lwabzfvft22j\">reported</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"devse\">He was able to continue <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/acatwithnews.bsky.social/post/3lwb2hhk7h22m\">covering</a> <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/acatwithnews.bsky.social/post/3lwb6dwti4k2z\">protests</a> as they continued into the night.</p><p data-block-key=\"c5drb\">Two days later, Beckner-Carmitchel <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/acatwithnews.bsky.social/post/3lwfxpqqyac2q\">wrote</a> that he had been diagnosed with a rib fracture, likely as a result of being <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-struck-with-baton-detained-amid-la-immigration-protest/\">struck with a baton</a> on Aug. 8.</p><p data-block-key=\"e36rb\">“It hurts a *lot* and I pride myself on being a pretty tough soldier in the journalism industry. But I’ll likely be out of commission for at least a few days,” he wrote. “Extremely frustrating that there are things I could be writing about, photographing or filming and instead I’ll be sitting on my couch.”</p><p data-block-key=\"fgg5u\">The LAPD did not respond to a request for comment.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"bl1i7\">A police officer turns toward freelancer Sean Beckner-Carmitchel moments before shoving the journalist, who was reporting on a pro-immigrant car caravan in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 12, 2025.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"name": "California",
"abbreviation": "CA"
},
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"tags": [
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"protest"
],
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"categories": [
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],
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{
"title": "Journalist shoved by officer during LA immigration protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-shoved-by-officer-during-la-immigration-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-26T17:25:12.707939Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-26T17:25:12.707939Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-26T17:25:12.489984Z",
"date": "2025-08-12",
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"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"k06ne\">Lexis-Olivier Ray, an investigative reporter with L.A. Taco, was shoved by a police officer and blocked from filming parts of an immigration enforcement protest in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 12, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"e1bmn\">Protests in LA began in early June in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"2lglk\">In a video posted to the social platform <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/acatwithnews.bsky.social/post/3lwavv3jwnc2f\">Bluesky</a>, an LA police officer can be seen demanding that Ray move back while he identifies himself as media and holds his badge up.</p><p data-block-key=\"9s83d\">“Get back, get on the sidewalk,” the officer said before pushing him. “Walk faster.”</p><p data-block-key=\"dk8g4\">Ray told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the Los Angeles Police Department had blocked off parts of the area in advance of a planned vigil near the Metropolitan Detention Center. When he asked officers at the scene why the streets were closed, he said he was unable to get a clear explanation.</p><p data-block-key=\"6mhak\">After protesters arrived from a march that began several miles away at MacArthur Park, police ordered cars out of the intersection and began clearing the street in front of the detention center. That’s when a motorcycle officer approached him.</p><p data-block-key=\"5bf07\">“I was filming them from what was a pretty safe, reasonable distance,” Ray said. “One officer, he got in my face, initially told me to back up, and then he shoved me.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8ts33\">Ray said he and other journalists had difficulty crossing police lines and accessing areas where confrontations between protesters and law enforcement were unfolding. Officers, he said, forced reporters to remain in one area and restricted their movement.</p><p data-block-key=\"9s6re\">“It was pretty clear that if we didn’t, we’d be arrested,” he said. “There’s definitely things that we missed because we were not able to move around freely.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2u9ue\">The LAPD did not respond to an emailed request for comment. In a statement posted earlier to the <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">social platform X</a>, the department’s Central Division said it will continue to support the First Amendment rights of all people. “However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced,” it read.</p><p data-block-key=\"4c7nl\">The LA Press Club filed a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.1_3.pdf\">motion</a> Aug. 13 to hold the city of LA in contempt for violating a temporary restraining order in place to protect journalists while they’re covering protests, citing the Aug. 8 <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Assault\">assaults</a> of journalists, as well as the <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">detention</a> of multiple members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"dtsg\">“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”</p><p data-block-key=\"52v7k\">In June, Ray was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/reporter-struck-with-pepper-balls-while-covering-la-immigration-protest/\">struck by pepper balls fired by federal law enforcement</a> (over which he later sued), and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/sheriffs-deputy-searches-journalists-bag-during-la-immigration-protest/\">a sheriff’s deputy searched his backpack</a>. The Tracker has documented other incidents in which Ray was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-repeatedly-shoved-while-covering-la-reproductive-rights-protests/\">shoved,</a> <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/la-taco-reporter-detained-while-covering-echo-park-protest/\">detained,</a> <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-tackled-equipment-damaged-while-covering-dodgers-celebrations/\">tackled</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/multiple-journalists-covering-protests-los-angeles-assaulted/\">struck with a baton</a> while covering protests and gatherings in LA.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"cs90o\">A Los Angeles Police Department officer shoved journalist Lexis-Olivier Ray, at center, during an immigration protest in Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 12, 2025.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
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"state": {
"name": "California",
"abbreviation": "CA"
},
"updates": [],
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"tags": [
"immigration",
"protest"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Lexis-Olivier Ray (L.A. Taco)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Denver schools subpoena TV station for reporting materials",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/denver-schools-subpoena-tv-station-for-reporting-materials/",
"first_published_at": "2025-12-11T21:36:01.580531Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-12-11T21:36:01.580531Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-12-11T21:36:01.399128Z",
"date": "2025-08-11",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Denver",
"longitude": -104.9847,
"latitude": 39.73915,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"rs6kl\">TV station KUSA received a subpoena from the Denver, Colorado, school district on Aug. 11, 2025, seeking communications it had for a story with former Principal Kurt Dennis.</p><p data-block-key=\"elar9\">Dennis was fired from a Denver middle school <a href=\"https://www.9news.com/article/news/education/dps-denver-public-schools-fires-principal-after-9news-story-safety-concerns/73-3dfea19d-de73-40ef-9458-437c89b280ea\">after sharing student information</a> with the station and later filed a federal lawsuit claiming the district violated his First Amendment rights.</p><p data-block-key=\"10f3g\">As part of the lawsuit, Denver Public Schools sought KUSA’s unaired footage and communications with Dennis to determine whether he had unlawfully disclosed student information. The district had pointed to a redacted form in the broadcast that differed from the one Dennis submitted in his lawsuit.</p><p data-block-key=\"6rqj9\">During a Dec. 8 court hearing, Dennis’ attorney David Lane admitted that his client had provided the outlet with documents showing a student’s personal identifying information, <a href=\"https://www.coloradopolitics.com/2025/12/08/federal-judge-rejects-dps-attempt-to-obtain-9news-sourcing-documents-in-first-amendment-case/\">Colorado Politics</a> reported.</p><p data-block-key=\"asoq9\">That admission prompted U.S. District Judge John Kane to quash the subpoena, noting the district could obtain the information directly from Dennis.</p><p data-block-key=\"f0lki\">“Mr. Dennis is one of two parties in possession of the documents — the other being KUSA — and he has produced them,” Kane said, according to Colorado Politics. “I do not hold that overriding the reporter’s privilege in this case is appropriate.”</p><p data-block-key=\"lcf2\">Dennis spoke to KUSA shortly after a high school student shot two administrators in 2023 during a routine pat-down. He told the station that another student with serious criminal allegations was subject to the same protocol at his school, but the district denied his requests to expel or block the student from attending school in person.</p><p data-block-key=\"5m3ir\">Dennis had tried to redact the student’s name, but had failed to maintain the student’s anonymity, KUSA attorney Steven Zansberg told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker in a statement.</p><p data-block-key=\"5fp0i\">Zansberg called the subpoena “legally deficient” and “utterly frivolous” once Dennis provided the documents he had shared with the station.</p><p data-block-key=\"aa3oj\">“Once Dennis confessed that previously contested fact, there was absolutely no legal basis for DPS to continue pursuing its ‘fishing expedition’ subpoena against the station,” Zansberg wrote.</p><p data-block-key=\"1vkg5\">Bill Good, a spokesperson for the school system, told the Tracker in a statement that the district filed the motion to prove Dennis violated the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act and state juvenile records laws by giving unredacted documents to the media.</p><p data-block-key=\"dhq0i\">Good called the process a win, noting the school system received additional documentation from the former principal’s counsel that had not been previously shared.</p><p data-block-key=\"6oitv\">“DPS does not believe it would have received these additional materials absent its attempt to compel 9News to comply with a lawfully issued subpoena,” he wrote.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screenshot_2025-12-11_at_12.44.13.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"zuoad\">A portion of a subpoena issued to TV station KUSA in Denver, Colorado, on Aug. 11, 2025, seeking its communications with a former school principal over documents he shared with the outlet.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"release_date": null,
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
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"actor": null,
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"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
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"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
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"legal_order_venue": "Federal",
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"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
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"state": {
"name": "Colorado",
"abbreviation": "CO"
},
"updates": [],
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"targeted_institutions": [
"KUSA"
],
"tags": [],
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"categories": [
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],
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},
{
"title": "Photojournalist struck with baton, detained amid LA immigration protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-struck-with-baton-detained-amid-la-immigration-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-18T15:07:13.664152Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-18T15:07:13.664152Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-18T15:06:59.500763Z",
"date": "2025-08-08",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"pkclc\">Freelance photojournalist Sean Beckner-Carmitchel was pushed, struck with a baton and detained by police while documenting anti-deportation protests in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025. He was ultimately released without being charged.</p><p data-block-key=\"bqp3i\">Protests in LA began in early June in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"84jdc\">On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70553115/44/los-angeles-press-club-v-city-of-los-angeles/\">a court order</a> protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.</p><p data-block-key=\"3fefd\">In a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.6.pdf\">declaration</a> filed in connection with a Los Angeles Press Club lawsuit against the city, Beckner-Carmitchel said he covered the protest and subsequent march, and was carrying a professional camera and had his press credential on a lanyard attached to his pants.</p><p data-block-key=\"ep9qi\">He wrote that approximately 100 demonstrators gathered outside the detention center and protested “in a spirited, non-violent way.”</p><p data-block-key=\"cn0vq\">“At some point, I saw the LAPD officers form a line in the street in front of the MDC and start screaming at the protesters to ‘Move back’ as officers marched with their batons drawn,” Beckner-Carmitchel wrote. “As the LAPD line moved toward the protesters, I saw officers shove quite a few people to the ground. I did not hear any instructions for media. I saw LAPD officers strike multiple journalists with batons, and shove and push journalists in the street in a span of a few minutes.”</p><p data-block-key=\"32lui\">During a pause in the officers’ advance, Beckner-Carmitchel wrote that he approached the police line and asked to speak to a supervisor or public affairs officer, but was told to move back. He tried again, saying that he wanted to remind them of the <a href=\"https://codes.findlaw.com/ca/penal-code/pen-sect-409-7/\">penal code</a> that protects journalists covering protests, given that multiple members of the press had already gotten hurt.</p><p data-block-key=\"8nu7f\">“An LAPD officer responded by shoving me and hitting me in my ribs on my left side with his baton. I still have sore ribs a day later and a small bruise,” he wrote.</p><p data-block-key=\"5eqm5\">The use of force continued for nearly an hour before officers formed a kettle, a tactic used to surround and control a crowd, around a small group of journalists and demonstrators.</p><p data-block-key=\"f7vt1\">Beckner-Carmitchel asked for a supervisor or public information office nearly a dozen times and was cuffed while live on YouTube, with an officer telling him he could “bitch” however he wanted. He was held for one to two hours, he wrote, and when asked for his identifying information, he “pointedly told the officer that my ID was in my wallet in my right pocket, beneath my press pass.”</p><p data-block-key=\"rp4q\">He was then given a card that read, “Detained during an illegal assembly. Failed to disperse after multiple dispersal orders.” A lieutenant eventually approached him to ask if he was media and, when he said yes, to show her his press credentials.</p><p data-block-key=\"8la6f\">“Lt. Stelter lectured me and the other journalists who had been detained that we were at fault because we stayed in the crowd of protesters,” Beckner-Carmitchel wrote, adding that he was released without charges. “When I was in the process of being uncuffed and allowed to leave, I began filming again, and an officer told me I was still under detainment and was not permitted to film.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2vru9\"><a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photographer-assaulted-detained-while-covering-la-protest/\">Two</a> <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-pushed-detained-by-police-at-la-immigration-protest/\">journalists</a> without physical press badges were taken to a police station and later released.</p><p data-block-key=\"6raqc\">The LAPD did not respond to an emailed request for additional comment. In a <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954033509586309303\">statement</a> posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”</p><p data-block-key=\"98fbi\">“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">continued</a>. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”</p><p data-block-key=\"11emg\">Beckner-Carmitchel disputed the department’s characterization of the protest. “From my vantage point, I did not see the protesters act violently or throw anything at officers when the officers arrived,” he wrote in his declaration. “I did not hear any declaration of an unlawful assembly or dispersal order at this point. As the LAPD line moved toward the protesters, I saw officers shove quite a few people to the ground.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2jrjh\">The LA Press Club filed a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.1_3.pdf\">motion</a> Aug. 13 to hold the city of Los Angeles in contempt for violating the temporary restraining order it had obtained as part of its lawsuit, citing the Aug. 8 <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Assault\">assaults</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">detentions</a> of Beckner-Carmitchel and other members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"75oph\">“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”</p><p data-block-key=\"7ta0i\">In an Aug. 14 <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/acatwithnews.bsky.social/post/3lwfxpqqyac2q\">post on social media</a>, Beckner-Carmitchel wrote that he had been diagnosed with a rib fracture, likely as a result of being struck with a baton on Aug. 8.</p><p data-block-key=\"1rd29\">“It hurts a *lot* and I pride myself on being a pretty tough soldier in the journalism industry. But I’ll likely be out of commission for at least a few days,” he wrote. “Extremely frustrating that there are things I could be writing about, photographing or filming and instead I’ll be sitting on my couch.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/IMG_5153.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"c258y\">Journalist Sean Beckner-Carmitchel, center in red, was detained alongside other members of the press while documenting immigration protests in Los Angeles on Aug. 8, 2025. Officers also pushed and struck him in the ribs with a baton that evening.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "Los Angeles Police Department",
"arrest_status": "detained and released without being processed",
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"state": {
"name": "California",
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},
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"tags": [
"immigration",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
"Assault"
],
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"Sean Beckner-Carmitchel (Freelance)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Photojournalist struck with baton, press credential damaged at LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-struck-with-baton-press-credential-damaged-at-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-13T16:29:05.478101Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-28T17:45:37.456528Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-28T17:45:37.351185Z",
"date": "2025-08-08",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"ey72h\">Independent photojournalist Nick Stern was pushed by police and then, after retrieving his damaged press credentials, struck in the face with a baton in Los Angeles, California, while covering anti-deportation protests on Aug. 8, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"e7qo4\">Protests in LA began in early June in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"2tv46\">On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70553115/44/los-angeles-press-club-v-city-of-los-angeles/\">a court order</a> protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.</p><p data-block-key=\"9vohr\">Stern told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that it was the first demonstration he had gone to cover since his leg was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/munition-strikes-photojournalist-at-la-protest-shrapnel-surgically-removed/\">severely injured</a> while documenting a protest in Compton on June 7, and he planned to be very cautious.</p><p data-block-key=\"a60ai\">“It’s been incredibly frustrating for me watching this go down and not being able to get there and document it,” he said. “My plan was to go and, if it looked like things were getting sideways or if an unlawful assembly order was called, to either leave the area or get to an area which I considered very safe.</p><p data-block-key=\"d1rt6\">“I wasn’t given that option,” he added.</p><p data-block-key=\"8qb8t\">After the crowd began its march toward downtown, Stern said he instead drove the two miles, as he is still recovering from an emergency surgery and is incapable of walking the distance.</p><p data-block-key=\"3h28e\">Three police vehicles arrived, and LAPD officers exited with batons and crowd-control weapons drawn.</p><p data-block-key=\"4na8q\">“Within a matter of minutes, dozens of police started to form skirmish lines,” he said. “There was no unlawful assembly or dispersal order called. They just started laying into people.”</p><p data-block-key=\"ff474\">Stern told the Tracker he attempted to move away from the line and was pushed from behind by police, then fell into a group of people and onto the ground. When he got up, he realized that the cord holding his press credential around his neck had broken and his press pass was on the ground behind the advancing officers.</p><p data-block-key=\"6gkgs\">“I went back to retrieve it, and said, ‘I’m press, I need to get my badge. It’s down there on the ground.’ The first cop just pushed me aside,” Stern said. After telling another officer the same, a third picked it up and passed it to Stern.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-aligned_image\"><figure class=\"inline-media right\">\n \n\n\n<img src=\"https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Stern_assault_88_-_1.width-828.jpg\" width=\"633\" height=\"907\" alt=\"COURTESY NICK STERN\">\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n\t\t\t<p data-block-key=\"vqjgv\">Independent photojournalist Nick Stern’s Los Angeles Press Club credential, still caked with blood after an LAPD officer struck him in the face with a baton amid immigration protests in downtown LA on Aug. 8, 2025.</p>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<span\n\t\t\t\t\tclass=\"media-attribution\"\n\t\t\t\t> — COURTESY NICK STERN\n\t\t\t\t</span>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t</figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"ey72h\">“I then showed the cop who was immediately in front of me my press ID again, at which point one of the cops then brought a baton across my face, causing a laceration to my chin,” he recounted.</p><p data-block-key=\"5rtq6\">Multiple journalists covering the protest told the Tracker that Stern appeared dazed from the strike. Soon afterward, he and three colleagues left together to find an open urgent care center, but were unsuccessful.</p><p data-block-key=\"4qfha\">Stern said that his wife — a nurse and wound care specialist — later examined his injury and said that while it should have received stitches, it had stopped bleeding and would heal with strong antibiotic cream.</p><p data-block-key=\"1r5vl\">The LAPD did not respond to an emailed request for additional comment. In a <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954033509586309303\">statement</a> posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”</p><p data-block-key=\"dtdua\">“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">continued</a>. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”</p><p data-block-key=\"3of9t\">Stern disputed the department’s characterization of the protest. “It was peaceful: There were people with drums, people chanting, people with banners. I saw no acts of violence, no acts of criminal damage or vandalism or conflict or anything,” Stern told the Tracker. “We just met this line of brutality.</p><p data-block-key=\"a2ft4\">“In 2020, with the George Floyd, Black Lives Matter protests, LAPD and law enforcement were universally condemned about their brutality, their tactics, their lack of planning, their lack of strategy and the way they were brutalizing people. And since then, they’ve gotten worse.”</p><p data-block-key=\"fa14h\">The Los Angeles Press Club filed a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.1_3.pdf\">motion</a> Aug. 13 to hold the city of Los Angeles in contempt for violating the temporary restraining order in place to protect journalists while they’re covering protests, citing the Aug. 8 <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Assault\">assaults</a> of Stern and others, as well as the <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">detention</a> of multiple members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"6gjne\">“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”</p><p data-block-key=\"ba5ui\"><i>Editor's Note: This article was updated Aug. 14, 2025, to include details of the contempt motion filed by the LA Press Club and Status Coup.</i></p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Stern_CA_assault__ED_8_8.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"qoprl\">A Los Angeles police officer uses a baton to strike photojournalist Nick Stern, bottom left, as Stern holds up his press credentials amid immigration protests on Aug. 8, 2025. Stern was pushed and struck in the face, and his credentials were damaged.</p>",
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{
"quantity": 1,
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}
],
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"name": "California",
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},
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],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
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],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Journalist struck with baton, finger injured amid protests in downtown LA",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-struck-with-baton-finger-injured-amid-protests-in-downtown-la/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-14T18:15:59.589915Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-09-12T20:23:22.180099Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-09-12T20:23:21.935929Z",
"date": "2025-08-08",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"tk99l\">Status Coup journalist Tina-Desiree Berg was shoved and struck multiple times with a baton by police, injuring her finger, while reporting on immigration protests in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"1137h\">Protests in LA began in early June in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"am1m6\">On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70553115/44/los-angeles-press-club-v-city-of-los-angeles/\">a court order</a> protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.</p><p data-block-key=\"6sbqv\">Berg told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that once the march reached the detention center, protesters gathered largely in the street in front of the building.</p><p data-block-key=\"9cng9\">When police arrived, she said officers spoke to the organizer, who then announced that if everyone got on the sidewalk, they’d be fine. Berg said that, despite moving to comply, the police suddenly “went ham for no reason.”</p><p data-block-key=\"56tso\">“There was no warning. They didn’t call an unlawful assembly at all,” she told the Tracker. Multiple journalists found themselves “sandwiched” between protesters and the advancing police line, Berg said. “It was almost like they were way more aggressive with us than they were to the protesters.”</p><p data-block-key=\"7l7h1\">When a fellow journalist was knocked to the ground, Berg said she went to try to help. It was either just before or after that Berg was struck in the arm and back with a baton, bruising her and leaving welts on her arm. The pinkie finger of her left hand was also split open.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-aligned_image\"><figure class=\"inline-media right\">\n \n\n\n<img src=\"https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Berg_CA_assault_8_8_-_2.width-828.jpg\" width=\"828\" height=\"1104\" alt=\"COURTESY TINA-DESIREE BERG\">\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n\t\t\t<p data-block-key=\"zgpot\">Status Coup journalist Tina-Desiree Berg photographed the laceration to her pinkie finger after she was struck and pushed by police while documenting immigration protests in downtown LA on Aug. 8, 2025.</p>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<span\n\t\t\t\t\tclass=\"media-attribution\"\n\t\t\t\t> — COURTESY TINA-DESIREE BERG\n\t\t\t\t</span>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t</figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"tk99l\">“It was wild: At first, I didn’t even realize I was injured. And then I looked down and there was blood dripping everywhere,” she said, noting that she’s not certain how it happened. “Honestly, it was such chaos. It could have been a baton, it could have been something else.”</p><p data-block-key=\"cehev\">Berg told the Tracker she wasn’t carrying most of her usual protective gear — just ballistic goggles and a small respirator — and had left her helmet in her car.</p><p data-block-key=\"4sugr\">She left the protest soon after, alongside multiple other journalists who had been injured — including <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-struck-with-baton-press-credential-damaged-at-la-protest/\">photographer Nick Stern</a> — to find an open urgent care center, but were unsuccessful.</p><p data-block-key=\"co1nu\">Berg said that, while having covered demonstrations in Southern California for years, this was the first time she had sought medical care.</p><p data-block-key=\"5vtnd\">“I’ve never felt the need before. I’m pretty tough, so if I’m going to the doctor, you know it’s bad,” she said. After flushing the wound and applying antibiotic cream and a stitchless wound closure, she was told to repeat the process as needed to keep it clean.</p><p data-block-key=\"d0id8\">The injury was expected to keep her out of the field and off the job for approximately two weeks, Berg said. “I can’t go out until my fingers heal. I just don’t want an infection.”</p><p data-block-key=\"eekrs\">The LAPD did not respond to an emailed request for additional comment. In a <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954033509586309303\">statement</a> posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”</p><p data-block-key=\"eff80\">“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">continued</a>. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8u6mc\">Berg disputed the department’s characterization of the protest. “Nobody was throwing anything. They didn’t give a warning, didn’t call an unlawful, and then they just swept in and started beating people,” she said. “I have the strong belief that until these individual officers are held accountable for their actions, there will be no change.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2aa1i\">The Los Angeles Press Club filed a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.1_3.pdf\">motion</a> Aug. 13 to hold the city of Los Angeles in contempt for violating the temporary restraining order in place to protect journalists while they’re covering protests, citing the Aug. 8 <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Assault\">assaults</a> of Berg and others, as well as the <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">detention</a> of multiple members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"fs6o\">“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"o3nf3\">Status Coup journalist Tina-Desiree Berg, after being struck with a baton by a Los Angeles police officer amid anti-deportation protests in downtown Los Angeles on Aug. 8, 2025, filmed while cleaning blood from her injured hand.</p>",
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"name": "California",
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},
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"(2025-09-10 12:46:00+00:00) LA Press Club wins order protecting reporters from LAPD violence"
],
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],
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],
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},
{
"title": "Photojournalist’s phone knocked to the ground by police officer at LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalists-phone-knocked-to-the-ground-by-police-officer-at-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-11-20T22:18:30.526698Z",
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"longitude": -118.24368,
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"n4uiq\">Freelance photojournalist Benjamin Hanson had his phone knocked from his hand by a police officer wielding a baton and was then pushed, damaging his camera lens, while covering an immigration enforcement protest in Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"6h63n\">It was one of many protests that <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">began</a> June 6 in response to federal raids in and around LA of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gathered, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown.</p><p data-block-key=\"dvck2\">After demonstrators clashed with LA law enforcement officers and federal agents, President Donald Trump called in the California National Guard and then the U.S. Marines over the objections of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA Mayor Karen Bass. Trump’s deployment of federal troops to LA was <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70496361/176/newsom-v-trump/\">ruled illegal</a> by a federal judge Sept. 2.</p><p data-block-key=\"7hm71\">The demonstration near the downtown Metropolitan Detention Center — where immigrants were being held — unfolded as Los Angeles Police Department officers pushed protesters away from the area, Hanson told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. He said he was on assignment for Middle East Images as a photographer and for Royol News as a videographer at the time.</p><p data-block-key=\"b928q\">Hanson, who was filming the interaction with his phone and carrying two cameras, said he was wearing three press badges when a police officer deliberately knocked the phone out of his hand. In the video reviewed by the Tracker, officers are yelling at the crowd to move as one with a baton smacks Hanson’s phone to the ground.</p><p data-block-key=\"95srk\">“You can clearly see I’m a member of the press,” Hanson said.</p><p data-block-key=\"1f6tg\">When he bent down to retrieve his phone, he was then pushed — either by an officer or a protester caught in the police effort to push the crowd back. When he fell, he landed on his camera, denting his camera lens.</p><p data-block-key=\"214uf\">Though the lens is still usable, Hanson said he can no longer attach filters to it.</p><p data-block-key=\"7fm3g\">On other days while covering the protests, Hanson was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-pushed-by-officer-while-documenting-la-freeway-protest/\">shoved by a California Highway Patrol officer</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-pepper-sprayed-by-dhs-struck-with-pepper-balls-at-la-protest/\">pepper-sprayed</a> by a Department of Homeland Security officer.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"hds14\">A video still captures the moment before a baton-wielding police officer knocks photographer Benjamin Hanson’s cellphone out of his hand while he was documenting a protest in Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025.</p>",
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{
"title": "Agency photojournalist pushed to ground, lens damaged at LA-area protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/agency-photojournalist-pushed-to-ground-lens-damaged-at-la-area-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-18T15:47:02.308269Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-18T15:47:02.308269Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-18T15:41:09.787846Z",
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"city": "Los Angeles",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"chf3n\">Shutterstock photojournalist Chelsea Lauren was shoved to the ground with a baton by police, damaging her telephoto lens, while documenting anti-deportation protests in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"7hka5\">Protests in LA began in early June in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"6kc6r\">On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70553115/44/los-angeles-press-club-v-city-of-los-angeles/\">a court order</a> protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.</p><p data-block-key=\"12emu\">Lauren told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker she arrived at the Home Depot and followed the march in her car with a couple of other journalists, arriving at the detention center shortly before the protesters.</p><p data-block-key=\"7enf3\">“There were probably 15 or 20 of them there already, because they basically have a 24-hour camp going across from the MDC,” Lauren said. “The protests met up and, you know, everybody was kind of staying behind the bollards that were the designated ‘do not cross’ point.”</p><p data-block-key=\"326a3\">As demonstrators shouted and flashed lights at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents outside the building, multiple police cruisers pulled into the middle of the street.</p><p data-block-key=\"el9s3\">“They basically asked everyone to get away from the cars and onto the sidewalks, and people actually listened,” she said. “We thought, ‘Oh, OK, cool. That de-escalated, we’re good. And then almost immediately after that, the police made a line and just started pushing.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8d2ek\">The officers used their batons to push back the crowd, including members of the press. As officers repeatedly shouted “Back up!” Lauren said she just kept repeating, “I’m trying, I’m trying.”</p><p data-block-key=\"e7stl\">“One of them decided he didn’t think I was backing up fast enough. And he put his baton into my ribs and knocked me to the ground,” she told the Tracker. “I’m on the ground, seeing all of them with their batons over me and they’re about to hit me, and I’m scooting back on my butt while trying to get up, my cameras are dragging on the ground.”</p><p data-block-key=\"577dq\">A fellow journalist, Tina-Desiree Berg, and a protester helped Lauren get up, but Berg was <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-struck-with-baton-finger-injured-amid-protests-in-downtown-la/\">injured in the process</a>. Lauren told the Tracker that, meanwhile, her knee was skinned, her ankle bruised and her telephoto lens damaged when she fell.</p><p data-block-key=\"3co9k\">Lauren left the protest soon after, alongside Berg, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-struck-with-baton-press-credential-damaged-at-la-protest/\">photographer Nick Stern</a> and filmmaker <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/documentarian-hit-with-police-baton-equipment-damaged-at-la-protest/\">Rocky Romano</a>, who were also injured. They attempted to find an open urgent care center, but they were unsuccessful.</p><p data-block-key=\"f7a9b\">She returned to the protest after dropping off the others, having learned that police had corralled and detained <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">multiple members of the press</a>, alongside the remaining protesters, using a technique called kettling.</p><p data-block-key=\"j97g\">The LAPD did not respond to an emailed request for additional comment. In a <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954033509586309303\">statement</a> posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”</p><p data-block-key=\"7m6st\">“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">continued</a>. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”</p><p data-block-key=\"eg3cg\">Lauren disputed the department’s characterization of the protest. “There was no escalation on the protester side that I noticed,” she told the Tracker. “From the minute police pulled up, to the minute a bunch of us were assaulted was only seven minutes. There’s no way they gave a dispersal order first.”</p><p data-block-key=\"cc4co\">The Los Angeles Press Club filed a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.1_3.pdf\">motion</a> Aug. 13 to hold the city of Los Angeles in contempt for violating the temporary restraining order in place to protect journalists while they’re covering protests, citing the Aug. 8 <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Assault\">assaults</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">detentions</a> of multiple members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"8g8p1\">“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"l232f\">Shutterstock photojournalist Chelsea Lauren, bottom center, being shoved to the ground by Los Angeles police officers, damaging her telephoto lens, while covering anti-deportation protests outside a federal building in downtown LA on Aug. 8, 2025.</p>",
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"tags": [
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"protest"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Chelsea Lauren (Shutterstock)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Documentarian hit with police baton, equipment damaged at LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/documentarian-hit-with-police-baton-equipment-damaged-at-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-18T02:39:25.838279Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-18T02:39:25.838279Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-18T02:39:25.741482Z",
"date": "2025-08-08",
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"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"8oubi\">Documentary writer, director and producer Rocky Romano was pushed by police and hit with a baton while covering an immigration raid protest in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"4gv7u\">Protests in LA began in <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">early June</a> in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"bqqkv\">On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70553115/44/los-angeles-press-club-v-city-of-los-angeles/\">a court order</a> protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.</p><p data-block-key=\"f9895\">Romano was filming for his production company, Winters Rock Entertainment, when LAPD officers charged a crowd outside the detention center. Officers did not issue a dispersal order before pushing the group of protesters and journalists, Romano told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"6osfp\">“They just started batoning everybody, including the press, shoving us,” he said. “They were just hammering people.”</p><p data-block-key=\"3daec\">Romano said he believes he was shoved and struck in the arm and side with a police baton. Romano was carrying a gimbal and a Sony FX3 camera, both of which were damaged when he was knocked to the ground and other journalists fell on top of him.</p><p data-block-key=\"2vj3n\">“My knees were bloody, my elbows were bloody, my hand was bloody,” he said. “My back and my hip were just killing me.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-aligned_image\"><figure class=\"inline-media right\">\n \n\n\n<img src=\"https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Image-1.width-828.jpg\" width=\"828\" height=\"545\" alt=\"COURTESY SEAN BECKNER-CARMITCHEL\">\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n\t\t\t<p data-block-key=\"jt86h\">Documentarian Rocky Romano, at left in black helmet, was knocked to the ground as LAPD officers pushed a crowd of protesters and press on Aug. 8, 2025.</p>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t<span\n\t\t\t\t\tclass=\"media-attribution\"\n\t\t\t\t> — COURTESY SEAN BECKNER-CARMITCHEL\n\t\t\t\t</span>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t</figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"8oubi\">Despite wearing visible press credentials, a helmet labeled “Press” and carrying professional gear, Romano said the officers did not discriminate. The police line kept advancing, even as one journalist <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-struck-with-baton-press-credential-damaged-at-la-protest/\">held up a press badge and shouted</a> he was press.</p><p data-block-key=\"1i2vp\">“It was such a remarkable show of violence towards the press,” Romano said. “It definitely adds another layer of psychological fear.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8kgkb\">The LAPD did not respond to a Tracker request for comment about the detained journalists. In a <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954033509586309303\">statement</a> posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”</p><p data-block-key=\"847p\">“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">continued</a>. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6v0ki\">The Los Angeles Press Club filed a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.1_3.pdf\">motion</a> Aug. 13 to hold the city of Los Angeles in contempt for violating the temporary restraining order in place to protect journalists while they’re covering protests, citing the Aug. 8 <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Assault\">assaults</a> of Romano and others, as well as the <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">detention</a> of multiple members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"8p66n\">“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"sdldq\">Los Angeles Police Department officers push forward during an immigration enforcement protest in downtown LA on Aug. 8, 2025. Documentarian Rocky Romano was hit with a baton and knocked to the ground during a scuffle at the demonstration.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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{
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},
{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "camera equipment"
}
],
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"name": "California",
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},
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"tags": [
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"protest"
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
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},
{
"title": "Photographer assaulted, detained while covering LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photographer-assaulted-detained-while-covering-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-13T19:19:27.610650Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-18T14:10:04.251730Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-18T14:10:04.126450Z",
"date": "2025-08-08",
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"city": "Los Angeles",
"longitude": -118.24368,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"rahlo\">Independent photojournalist Nate Gowdy was assaulted and detained by police while documenting a protest against immigration raids in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"1sc25\">Protests in LA began in <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">early June</a> in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"8eblc\">On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70553115/44/los-angeles-press-club-v-city-of-los-angeles/\">a court order</a> protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.</p><p data-block-key=\"5qvd\">Gowdy, who was visiting from Seattle, Washington, said he had been photographing the Aug. 8 protest with his partner, fellow journalist <a href=\"/all-incidents/photojournalist-pushed-detained-by-police-at-la-immigration-protest/\">Carrie Schreck</a>. The two began documenting the demonstration as protesters started to march. The protest remained peaceful, Gowdy said, until the LAPD arrived.</p><p data-block-key=\"9ep0a\">“They basically lined up and without any provocation, in order to move people, started just swinging their batons indiscriminately,” he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"6ciah\">Gowdy watched as one journalist, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-struck-with-baton-press-credential-damaged-at-la-protest/\">Nick Stern</a>, waving his press badge to officers, was struck in the face with a police baton. Gowdy himself was <a href=\"https://www.instagram.com/reel/DNIYacDx5nT/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link\">thrown to the ground</a> by several officers, scraping his elbow and damaging the metal connectors on the strap holding his spare camera lenses.</p><p data-block-key=\"f69f\">“They were so aggressive and wild-eyed and violent,” he said of the LAPD.</p><p data-block-key=\"4s9bj\">After police declared the protest an unlawful assembly, officers pushed demonstrators farther from the detention center. Gowdy and Schreck had stopped photographing and were leaving the area when they were suddenly kettled, or herded by police, along with a handful of journalists and demonstrators, just three blocks from Schreck’s apartment.</p><p data-block-key=\"epdbv\">Some had press credentials, but Gowdy said officers ignored them.</p><p data-block-key=\"34bnt\">“They said they didn’t care, and that everyone should have to line up against the wall,” Gowdy recalled.</p><p data-block-key=\"2ctdf\">The journalists’ hands were placed in zip-tie restraints. While some were released, Gowdy and Schreck remained detained for not having physical press badges. Despite carrying camera gear and being vouched for by their colleagues, the officers questioned their legitimacy and denied their requests to speak with a public information officer.</p><p data-block-key=\"7vsvi\">Gowdy offered to show digital credentials and suggested a quick online search to verify his work with major news outlets, but was told he’d be cited for failure to disperse. He and Schreck were taken to a nearby police station and eventually released after more than two hours in custody.</p><p data-block-key=\"c6hgp\">Gowdy said such traumatic encounters can discourage journalists from covering protests.</p><p data-block-key=\"8dn2m\">“In this case, the law was on our side,” he said. “But they didn’t seem to know the law, or they willfully disregarded it in order to intimidate and harass us.”</p><p data-block-key=\"df147\">Gowdy said he doesn’t wear a press badge when he covers protests in Seattle, after it made him a police target. Covering the <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-photojournalist-shoved-off-railing-during-capitol-riot/\">Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection</a>, he saw how press credentials can also attract threats from demonstrators. Still, he said this incident convinced him to carry one just in case.</p><p data-block-key=\"56aoi\">The LAPD did not respond to a Tracker request for comment about the detained journalists. In a <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954033509586309303\">statement</a> posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”</p><p data-block-key=\"cgjrc\">“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">continued</a>. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”</p><p data-block-key=\"d9s92\">The Los Angeles Press Club filed a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.1_3.pdf\">motion</a> Aug. 13 to hold the city of Los Angeles in contempt for violating the temporary restraining order in place to protect journalists while they’re covering protests, citing the Aug. 8 <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">detentions</a> of Gowdy and others, as well as the <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Assault\">assaults</a> of multiple members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"11q76\">“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”</p><p data-block-key=\"14tnt\"><i>Editor's Note: This article was updated Aug. 14, 2025, to include details of the contempt motion filed by the LA Press Club and Status Coup.</i></p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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{
"title": "Independent journalist shoved, detained while covering LA protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-journalist-shoved-detained-while-covering-la-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-13T21:04:45.901954Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-14T18:54:49.661261Z",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"5woxq\">Journalist Melanie Buer was shoved multiple times and detained by officers while covering a protest against immigration raids in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"6em4n\">Protests in LA began in <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">early June</a> in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"878hv\">On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70553115/44/los-angeles-press-club-v-city-of-los-angeles/\">a court order</a> protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.</p><p data-block-key=\"1sbkl\">Buer, an independent journalist, was documenting protesters marching to the detention center. About a half-hour after demonstrators arrived there, LAPD officers formed a skirmish line. While Buer and other journalists were photographing the line, law enforcement began advancing on them.</p><p data-block-key=\"74efh\">“Almost without warning, police officers began using batons on anyone within the vicinity, of which there were many journalists,” Buer told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"badpp\">She described aggressive shoving by police and witnessed journalists being struck with batons, pushed and trampled. Though not seriously hurt, Buer was shoved into pylons multiple times. An officer swung a baton at her back but missed.</p><p data-block-key=\"qfe3\">“They were swinging the batons like baseball bats,” said Buer, who posted a video of the assault to <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/melbuer.bsky.social/post/3lvwxnq4mbc2r\">social media.</a></p><p data-block-key=\"7gpcl\">The use of force continued for nearly an hour before officers formed a kettle, a tactic used to surround and control a crowd, around a small group of journalists and demonstrators. When Buer and others identified themselves as reporters and asked to leave, officers refused.</p><p data-block-key=\"5adjc\">“They disregarded that we were media, told us to walk to the wall and that we would be put under arrest,” said Buer, who was wearing her International Federation of Journalists press badge. “One officer said, ‘The statutes don’t matter.’”</p><p data-block-key=\"66nce\">She and several other journalists were placed in zip-tie handcuffs and held for about 90 minutes. Officers took their information, photographed them and eventually released them without charges. <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photographer-assaulted-detained-while-covering-la-protest/\">Two journalists</a> without physical press badges were taken to a police station and later released.</p><p data-block-key=\"9igol\">Buer was previously <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/omaha-police-shove-detain-freelance-journalist-during-protest/\">detained by Omaha police</a> while covering a protest in 2020, but said this was the first time it had happened to her in LA.</p><p data-block-key=\"105nj\">“Myself and other reporters were doing nothing that would warrant this,” Buer said. “So I’m just going to keep reporting as I report.”</p><p data-block-key=\"fp5sc\">The LAPD did not respond to a Tracker request for comment about the detained journalists. In a <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954033509586309303\">statement</a> posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”</p><p data-block-key=\"bgngk\">“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">continued</a>. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”</p></div>",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"j22i8\">Journalist Melanie Buer, in middle wearing her press credential, stands facing police as an officer takes her photo. Buer and other press were detained by Los Angeles Police Department officers while covering a protest in LA on Aug. 8, 2025.</p>",
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{
"title": "Photojournalist pushed, detained by police at LA immigration protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-pushed-detained-by-police-at-la-immigration-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-18T02:45:49.852472Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-18T02:45:49.852472Z",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"ffjto\">Freelance photojournalist Carrie Schreck was pushed by police officers and detained while covering a protest against federal immigration raids in downtown Los Angeles, California, on Aug. 8, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"38ggm\">Protests in LA began in <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/us/la-protests-national-guard-trump.html\">early June</a> in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas in and around the city where immigrant day laborers gather, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. <a href=\"https://laist.com/brief/news/federal-agents-westlake-home-depot-penske-moving-van\">Raids</a> at <a href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-08-08/federal-agents-target-day-laborers-in-raids-at-van-nuys-home-depot\">Home Depots</a> in early August took place seemingly in defiance of a <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70594806/87/pedro-vasquez-perdomo-v-kristi-noem/\">July 11 court order</a> temporarily prohibiting federal agents from using discriminatory profiling.</p><p data-block-key=\"352jv\">On Aug. 8, two days after an immigration raid in the parking lot of a Home Depot in LA’s Westlake neighborhood, protesters gathered at the store and marched to the Metropolitan Detention Center downtown. The demonstrators and the journalists covering them encountered a violent response from Los Angeles Police Department officers, violating <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/70553115/44/los-angeles-press-club-v-city-of-los-angeles/\">a court order</a> protecting the press from arrest, assault or other interference.</p><p data-block-key=\"7reeb\">Schreck was on assignment for Redux Pictures, an independent syndication photo agency, when LAPD officers began pushing protesters and journalists with batons, she told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. Police then kettled the crowd — a tactic used to trap and control groups — striking both demonstrators and members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"6k10j\">Schreck said she was shoved, and then watched as officers threw her partner, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photographer-assaulted-detained-while-covering-la-protest/\">photographer Nate Gowdy</a>, to the ground. When they and other media tried to leave, they were blocked by advancing police lines. Eventually, officers detained the two of them and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">other journalists</a>, despite some wearing visible press badges.</p><p data-block-key=\"alhpj\">“I give a lot of leeway to people, and I try to be understanding in the moment of why they make decisions they make,” Schreck said. “But it’s unacceptable.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9pf08\">Schreck, who had not yet received her physical press credentials, carried professional gear and digital documentation of her work, including a letter from Redux confirming her assignment.</p><p data-block-key=\"2be59\">“I showed it to them and they said, ‘Yeah, but where’s the ID?”</p><p data-block-key=\"etjd4\">While some credentialed journalists were released, officers questioned whether Schreck and Gowdy were legitimate members of the press. California station KABC-TV <a href=\"https://abc7.com/post/16-people-cited-unlawful-assembly-declared-during-downtown-los-angeles-protest-friday/17488273/\">reported</a> that the LAPD claimed two people, identified later as Schreck and Gowdy, were detained at the protest for “pretending to be media.”</p><p data-block-key=\"dki6s\">Schreck said she was frisked twice, had her hands zip-tied, and was placed in a police vehicle before being taken to a nearby station, where she and Gowdy were eventually released after more than two hours in custody.</p><p data-block-key=\"fffam\">“The entire experience makes me doubt that police understand or care about their own rules at all,” she said. Schreck said her credential arrived by mail afterward, and she plans to bring copies with her on assignment in the future.</p><p data-block-key=\"22vqa\">The LAPD did not respond to a Tracker request for comment about the detained journalists. In a <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954033509586309303\">statement</a> posted to the social platform X, the department’s Central Division wrote that an unlawful assembly was declared “due to the aggressive nature of a few demonstrators.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9cpg4\">“The protest went into the late night hours with people refusing to disperse,” it <a href=\"https://x.com/LAPDCentral/status/1954195124831097112\">continued</a>. “Central Division will continue to support 1st Amendment rights of all people. However, if violence or criminal activity occurs, laws will be enforced.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2976h\">The Los Angeles Press Club filed a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511/gov.uscourts.cacd.974511.63.1_3.pdf\">motion</a> Aug. 13 to hold the city of Los Angeles in contempt for violating the temporary restraining order in place to protect journalists while they’re covering protests, citing the Aug. 8 <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Arrest%2FCriminal+Charge\">detentions</a> of Schreck and others, as well as the <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-08-08&date_upper=2025-08-08&city=Los+Angeles&categories=Assault\">assaults</a> of multiple members of the press.</p><p data-block-key=\"4rilk\">“Defendants’ actions evince a blatant disregard for the First Amendment and an unwillingness or an inability or both on the part of the City to take steps necessary to ensure compliance with this Court’s Injunction,” the motion read. “What will it take to get the LAPD to respect the constitutional rights of journalists?”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"bs9ak\">Freelance photographer Carrie Schreck, second from left, is ringed by police while she and other press are detained during an anti-deportation protest in downtown Los Angeles on Aug. 8, 2025.</p>",
"arresting_authority": "Los Angeles Police Department",
"arrest_status": "detained and released without being processed",
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"detention_date": "2025-08-08",
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{
"title": "Deposition order issued for student reporting on wrongful imprisonment case",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/deposition-order-issued-for-student-reporting-on-wrongful-imprisonment-case/",
"first_published_at": "2025-10-30T15:08:21.582750Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-11-21T21:44:40.285991Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-11-21T21:44:40.091393Z",
"date": "2025-08-05",
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"city": "Detroit",
"longitude": -83.04575,
"latitude": 42.33143,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"w0191\">Former student journalist Sam Krevlin was subpoenaed in connection with a civil suit in Detroit, Michigan, on Aug. 5, 2025, ordering him to appear remotely to testify about journalistic work he conducted at Northwestern University seven years earlier.</p><p data-block-key=\"35rt8\">Krevlin, who did not respond to requests for comment, was an undergraduate at the university’s Medill School of Journalism in Evanston, Illinois, in 2018 when he was selected to participate in the Medill Justice Project, now known as the Medill Investigative Lab. According to court filings, he was assigned to the team reporting on Kenneth Nixon, who claimed he was innocent of the 2005 homicide for which he had been incarcerated.</p><p data-block-key=\"dqp7r\">The team’s reporting was <a href=\"https://www.freep.com/story/news/2018/10/27/kenneth-nixon-life-sentence/1739835002/\">published</a> by the Detroit Free Press in October 2018. Nixon was <a href=\"https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/wayne/2021/02/18/detroit-kenneth-nixon-prison-trial-unfair/4488703001/\">exonerated and released</a> from prison two years later, 16 years after his conviction.</p><p data-block-key=\"8t4cv\">In June 2023, Nixon filed a <a href=\"https://loevy-content-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2023/06/Kenneth-Nixon-v.-Detroit-et-al.pdf\">federal lawsuit</a> with claims against the city of Detroit — which were later dismissed — and members of its police department, alleging that they framed him.</p><p data-block-key=\"cjbou\">As part of pretrial discovery in that suit, in March 2025 the defendants <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/subpoena-issued-for-student-reporting-on-wrongful-imprisonment-case\">sent Krevlin a subpoena</a> for his “entire case file”: email, letter or text communications with sources; interview recordings and transcripts; notes; and any documents received via public records requests.</p><p data-block-key=\"c6jds\">After initial objections and communications in April, attorneys for the police defendants “went dark,” according to Krevlin’s attorneys. Months later, they issued Krevlin a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691.1.5.pdf\">new subpoena</a>, ordering him to sit for a deposition later that month but without any requests for records.</p><p data-block-key=\"kim\">Attorneys for Krevlin, who now lives in New York, first raised objections to the request Aug. 18 and then filed an official <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691.1.1.pdf\">motion to quash</a> Sept. 3.</p><p data-block-key=\"dm430\">In a <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691.12.0.pdf\">response</a> filed two weeks later, attorneys for the defendants argued that Krevlin had waived his privilege by <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691.12.5.pdf\">discussing</a> his reporting with an investigator for the county prosecutor’s Conviction Integrity Unit in 2020. They also asked that the court order Krevlin to comply with both the deposition and production subpoenas.</p><p data-block-key=\"96o5h\">Krevlin’s attorneys <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691/gov.uscourts.nysd.648691.13.0.pdf\">objected</a> to that request, arguing that the information sought could be obtained from nonprivileged sources; that the requested materials are in the possession of the university, not Krevlin; and that Nixon’s exoneration wasn’t solely on the basis of Krevlin’s reporting and interview with police informant Stanley January Jr.</p><p data-block-key=\"dkdno\">“To the extent the Detroit Free Press Article was the catalyst to question the veracity of Mr. January’s testimony this does not make it the crux of the CIU’s recommendation to overturn Mr. Nixon’s conviction,” Krevlin’s attorneys wrote.</p><p data-block-key=\"ck6ab\">In October, attorneys for the defendants asked U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett to set a date for oral arguments or to issue a ruling on Krevlin’s motion to quash, citing the ramifications the decision may have for their ongoing discovery efforts. As of publication, no such date or ruling has been entered.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Krevlin_MI_subpoena_85.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"q2zfw\">A portion of an Aug. 5, 2025, subpoena issued to Sam Krevlin for a deposition about his reporting as a student journalist working on Northwestern University’s Medill Innocence Project in Evanston, Illinois, in 2018.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": "Federal",
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Michigan",
"abbreviation": "MI"
},
"updates": [
"(2025-11-19 15:44:00+00:00) Deposition order for student reporting in exoneration case partially struck down"
],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"student journalism"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Subpoena/Legal Order"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Sam Krevlin ([Northwestern University] Medill Investigative Lab)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "New York Times Building vandalized with pro-Palestinian protest message",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/new-york-times-building-vandalized-with-pro-palestinian-protest-message/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-12T21:16:04.104557Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-12T21:16:04.104557Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-12T21:15:56.996147Z",
"date": "2025-07-30",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "New York",
"longitude": -74.00597,
"latitude": 40.71427,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"nhrsc\">The New York Times Building in New York City was vandalized after unidentified individuals spray-painted the entrance and windows on July 30, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"8ptnb\">Red paint defaced the front entrance of the news organization’s Midtown Manhattan headquarters, while white spray paint on its windows read: “NYT lies Gaza dies.”</p><p data-block-key=\"f378h\">The act followed the publication of an editor’s note correcting <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/24/world/middleeast/gaza-starvation.html\">an article</a>, “Gazans Are Dying of Starvation,” which included a photograph of Mohammed Zakaria al-Mutawaq, a Palestinian child in Gaza suffering from severe malnutrition.</p><p data-block-key=\"oues\">The note said the Times had since learned from the child’s doctor that he had preexisting health conditions, a detail the newspaper said would have been included in the caption if the information had been known before publication.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-video\">\n\n<figure class=\"inline-media full-width\">\n <div style=\"padding-bottom: 176.99115044247787%;\" class=\"responsive-object\">\n <iframe width=\"113\" height=\"200\" src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/uDZURV59kwQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen title=\"The New York Times building vandalized with red paint and the words 'NYT Lies Gaza Dies'\"></iframe>\n</div>\n\n \n <figcaption class=\"inline-media__caption\">\n \n <p data-block-key=\"ce78e\">Images of vandalism at The New York Times Building in New York City on July 30, 2025.</p>\n \n \n <p>DAILY MAIL VIA YOUTUBE</p>\n \n </figcaption>\n \n</figure>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"nhrsc\">Flyers left at the scene criticized the Times’ coverage of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, accusing it of downplaying both the causes and the scale of the famine as the war with Israel continues, <a href=\"https://www.amny.com/new-york/manhattan/nyc-neighborhoods/midtown-manhattan/probe-new-york-times-midtown-headquarters-graffiti-vandalism/\">amNY reported.</a></p><p data-block-key=\"25uie\">In a statement shared with the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, Charlie Stadtlander, managing director of external communications, said the Israel-Gaza war has sparked intense global debate, and the Times often faces pressure from groups seeking to influence its coverage.</p><p data-block-key=\"alrqh\">“While we support the right of groups and individuals to express their point of view, we will not let advocacy groups sway us from covering the conflict fully and fairly,” he wrote. “Nor do we condone acts of vandalism.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/combined_image_side_by_side.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"jmjcp\">Screenshots show images of vandalism at The New York Times Building in New York City on July 30, 2025.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": "private individual",
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [
{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "building"
}
],
"state": {
"name": "New York",
"abbreviation": "NY"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [
"The New York Times"
],
"tags": [
"Israel-Gaza war"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Equipment Damage"
],
"targeted_journalists": [],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Kari Lake targets press as senior adviser for U.S. Agency for Global Media",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/kari-lake-targets-press-as-senior-adviser-for-us-agency-for-global-media/",
"first_published_at": "2025-07-01T21:23:37.153234Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-09-04T20:18:50.120862Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-09-04T19:09:52.647761Z",
"date": "2025-07-22",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Washington",
"longitude": -77.03637,
"latitude": 38.89511,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"uwxu3\">After President Donald Trump began his second term, senior adviser to the U.S. Agency for Global Media Kari Lake joined Trump in taking steps to intimidate leakers and news outlets that have covered him and his administration unfavorably. We’re documenting her efforts in this regularly updated report.</p><p data-block-key=\"44h40\">Read about how Trump’s appointees and allies in Congress are striving to chill reporting, revoke funding, censor critical coverage and more <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/blog/trump-allies-pursue-multipronged-campaign-against-the-press/\">here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"end4j\"><i>This article was first published on July 1, 2025.</i></p><hr/><p data-block-key=\"91i6j\"></p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><p><a id=\"top\" name=\"top\"></a></p>\r\n<div class=\"article-content__block rich-text\"><p data-block-key=\"258po\">\r\n<p><a href=\"#July 22\">July 22, 2025 | Lake ends visa program for VOA journalists, criticizes editorial independence</a>\r\n<p><a href=\"#June 25\">June 25, 2025 | Kari Lake urges Congress to eliminate Voice of America, gut oversight agency</a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"uwxu3\"></p><hr/><p data-block-key=\"ethfe\"></p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><a id=\"July 22\" name=\"July 22\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"hrh4j\">July 22, 2025 | Lake ends visa program for VOA journalists, criticizes editorial independence</h4><p data-block-key=\"d4aa6\">Kari Lake, senior adviser to the U.S. Agency for Global Media, announced during an <a href=\"https://americasvoice.news/video/FlcmdsLXRHSZhcc/?related=playlist\">interview</a> with the conservative channel Real America’s Voice on July 22, 2025, that she was ending the visa program used to hire foreign journalists employed by Voice of America.</p><p data-block-key=\"6s9gb\">“Over the past couple of decades, especially the past 15 years, this agency has turned into telling anti-American story,” Lake said. “This agency started hiring non-Americans — people from foreign countries — many people, hundreds upon hundreds, from countries that are hostile to America.”</p><p data-block-key=\"f090a\">Lake went on to say that she was ending the J-1 visa program and cutting the workforce of the agency by 85%. “Our goal is to shut the entire agency down, as per the instructions of President Trump.”</p><p data-block-key=\"b6fbn\">She <a href=\"https://x.com/KariLake/status/1948152474856276266\">asserted</a> on the social platform X that “foreign influence has infiltrated the Voice of America,” baselessly claiming that some staffers pose a security risk. But VOA has recruited journalists from all over the world for decades, The Atlantic <a href=\"https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/08/kari-lake-deports-voice-of-america-journalists/683832/\">reported</a>, who may now face persecution, imprisonment or worse in their home nations as a result of their work in the U.S.</p><p data-block-key=\"edm7p\">Lake also <a href=\"https://x.com/KariLake/status/1948385289841316350\">lamented</a> the news outlet’s editorial independence from the administration.</p><p data-block-key=\"7ru8g\">“With the editorial firewall at Voice of America, they could go completely rogue, and the President couldn’t pick up the phone and stop them. There are no guardrails. There’s no editorial control,” Lake wrote. “This is a rogue, taxpayer funded agency, and we need to ensure that it’s no longer doing damage to America.”</p><p data-block-key=\"bu3ab\">During an Aug. 25 hearing over litigation concerning her efforts to dismantle the federally funded broadcaster, U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth <a href=\"https://www.npr.org/2025/08/26/nx-s1-5506283/judge-order-kari-lake-sworn-deposition-voice-of-america-oath-usagm\">ordered</a> Lake to submit to questioning under oath by Sept. 15, saying that her repeated failure to provide requested information was “verging on contempt of court.”</p><p data-block-key=\"65tej\">Lake has persisted in her multipronged efforts to dismantle the international broadcaster, most recently by attempting to fire its director, Mike Abramowitz. Lamberth <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.278809/gov.uscourts.dcd.278809.76.0.pdf\">ruled</a> Aug. 28 that the action was unlawful, citing statutes that require a majority vote from the bipartisan board tasked with limiting political influence on federally funded newsrooms.</p><p data-block-key=\"67r8\">“This dispute arises from yet another twist in the saga of the U.S. Agency for Global Media’s efforts to dial back the operations of Voice of America contrary to statutory requirements,” Lamberth wrote.</p><p data-block-key=\"ba1di\">He also granted an injunction barring Abramowitz’s removal without approval from the International Broadcasting Advisory Board, which has not had a quorum since President Donald Trump removed six of its members in January.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><div class=\"article-content__block rich-text\"><p data-block-key=\"258po\">\r\n<p><a href=\"#top\"><i>Back to Top</i></a></p></div>\r\n<a id=\"June 25\" name=\"June 25\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"uwxu3\">June 25, 2025 | Kari Lake urges Congress to eliminate Voice of America, gut oversight agency</h4><p data-block-key=\"bsdgt\">Kari Lake, senior adviser to the U.S. Agency for Global Media, testified before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs on June 25, 2025, and urged Congress to gut Voice of America and the other federally-funded news organizations that she oversees.</p><p data-block-key=\"32g8o\">During the <a href=\"https://foreignaffairs.house.gov/hearing/spies-lies-and-mismanagement-examining-the-u-s-agency-for-global-medias-downfall/\">hearing</a>, which was titled “Spies, Lies, and Mismanagement: Examining the U.S. Agency for Global Media’s Downfall,” Lake said in her opening statement that USAGM was unsalvageable, later referring to it as “a rotten piece of fish.”</p><p data-block-key=\"5l6bt\">“Within days in my role as senior adviser, it became increasingly clear that reform was nearly impossible,” Lake said. “The agency was incompetent and mismanaged and deeply corrupt, politically biased and, frankly, a serious threat to our national security.”</p><p data-block-key=\"3oclg\">Lake went on to defend proposed cuts to the agency and the global news organizations it funds, including Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia and Radio y Televisión Martí. She also called on members of Congress to amend the laws mandating VOA’s existence.</p><p data-block-key=\"e26rv\">“What is going out on VOA airwaves — it’s outrageous, and it has to stop,” she said, adding that much of the reporting being published by VOA and other USAGM-funded outlets is “biased” and “corrupt.”</p><p data-block-key=\"322dn\">Lake’s statements mirrored <a href=\"https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114746687764542304\">those</a> <a href=\"https://taps.pressfreedomtracker.us/post/c61b2e99f685/\">made</a> <a href=\"https://taps.pressfreedomtracker.us/post/58c3a55600e1/\">by</a> President Donald Trump since at least 2023. In a <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/trump-administration-allies-move-to-punish-outlets-during-first-weeks-in-office/#March%2014-2\">late-night executive order</a> on March 14, 2025, Trump eliminated all USAGM functions not required by law. The following day, the White House posted a news release that railed against “the Voice of Radical America” and the director of VOA confirmed that nearly the entire staff of the news organization had been suspended.</p><p data-block-key=\"4uduq\">A federal judge <a href=\"https://apnews.com/article/voice-of-america-trump-a1ed0ad37917055a1565da5325bd4fd8\">ordered</a> the administration to halt efforts to fire or furlough employees at the news agency at the end of March, and another judge <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/22/us/politics/judge-trump-voice-of-america.html\">reversed</a> VOA’s closure April 22, calling it “arbitrary and capricious.”</p><p data-block-key=\"3m0g0\">Lake <a href=\"https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/arizona/2025/04/25/kari-lakes-agency-appeals-voa-restart-ruling/83257698007/\">appealed</a> the ruling two days later, blocking operations at the outlet from restarting and, days before the June Congressional hearing, <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/20/us/politics/voice-america-layoffs.html\">issued hundreds of termination notices</a> to VOA and USAGM staff.</p><p data-block-key=\"6pf2e\">The layoffs were rescinded June 27 after errors were discovered that could have derailed efforts to dismantle the organization, <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/27/us/politics/trump-voa-layoffs-errors.html\">according to The New York Times</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"cocac\">No news has been published on <a href=\"https://www.voanews.com/\">VOA’s website</a> since March.</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><div class=\"article-content__block rich-text\"><p data-block-key=\"258po\">\r\n<p><a href=\"#top\"><i>Back to Top</i></a></p></div></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/AP25063688411091.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"lf2ic\">Kari Lake, senior adviser for the U.S. Agency for Global Media, speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Oxon Hill, Maryland, on Feb. 21, 2025.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
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"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "District of Columbia",
"abbreviation": "DC"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [
"Alhurra",
"Alhurra-Iraq",
"Radio Free Asia",
"Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty",
"Radio y Televisión Martí",
"Sawa Iraq",
"Sawa Levant",
"Voice of America"
],
"tags": [
"Donald Trump"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Chilling Statement"
],
"targeted_journalists": [],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "Illinois community journalist says fee for library meeting space is retaliatory",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/illinois-community-journalist-says-fee-for-library-meeting-space-is-retaliatory/",
"first_published_at": "2025-08-12T20:27:43.743088Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-12T20:27:43.743088Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-12T20:18:54.796114Z",
"date": "2025-07-22",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Elmwood Park",
"longitude": -87.80923,
"latitude": 41.92114,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"6sv5g\">In a move a community news editor called retaliation for his reporting, journalist Kevin Gosztola was notified on July 22, 2025, that he must now pay for previously free community meeting space at a public library in Elmwood Park, Illinois.</p><p data-block-key=\"9r9co\">Gosztola runs the <a href=\"https://www.elmwoodparkadvocate.org/\">Elmwood Park Advocate</a>, a Substack newsletter that covers local news in the Chicago suburb. (Full disclosure: Gosztola has also previously worked as a contractor for the Freedom of the Press Foundation, of which the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is a project.)</p><p data-block-key=\"fcu7i\">In June and July, Gosztola hosted meetings with community members at the Elmwood Park Public Library to discuss local issues, he told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"4idbl\">When he first reserved the room to host the meeting, he said he filled out a form that asked him to check whether his organization was a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit. Gosztola described the Advocate as a nonprofit, but conceded it is not officially registered as such, and so he checked “no” on the form.</p><p data-block-key=\"29p03\">For the first two meetings, Gosztola said he was not asked to pay a fee to reserve the library rooms to host his meetings.</p><p data-block-key=\"8evcr\">But when Gosztola tried to reserve the same room for an August meeting, he said the library director, Michael Consiglio, notified him via email July 22 that he would need to pay $100.</p><p data-block-key=\"5g1ju\">“I would like to inform you that I am waiving any previous charges that may have been incurred during past reservations but were not invoiced. This gesture is being extended as a courtesy,” Consiglio said in the email, which was reviewed by the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"atk42\">Gosztola said he believes the change is in retaliation for the newsletter’s perceived alignment with local opposition political candidates and the mistaken belief that it will focus on electing them in the future.</p><p data-block-key=\"clpu5\">“They’re infringing upon my access to the meeting room as a journalist, which I’ve been using to further my newsgathering activities,” Gosztola told the Tracker. “They think that this newsletter is some kind of a threat to them politically, that it will be used to help furnish and support opposition candidates when elections come around in the town.”</p><p data-block-key=\"8lnka\">Consiglio disputed Gosztola’s characterization. “I want to state unequivocally that these claims are entirely unfounded and without merit,” he wrote the Tracker. “The decision to enforce the policy had nothing to do with the content of Mr. Gosztola’s reporting or his political views. It was prompted solely by community concerns and my duty to apply Library policies fairly and without exception.”</p><p data-block-key=\"oj5b\">Gosztola said he met on July 28 with Consiglio, who told him that a group of people, including library board President Chris Pesko, had pressured Consiglio to begin charging Gosztola for using the room. Pesko did not reply to a request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"2h7u6\">Consiglio acknowledged to the Tracker that “several concerned residents” contacted him in mid-July, questioning why Gosztola and the Advocate were allowed to use the library’s meeting space without paying a fee.</p><p data-block-key=\"uief\">“After reviewing the Library’s publicly posted Meeting Room Policy, I concluded that the standard fee must be applied consistently to all individuals and organizations that do not meet the definition of a community-based nonprofit,” Consiglio said.</p><p data-block-key=\"93mgi\">Gosztola was asked to pay the fee, Consiglio said, because the Advocate is not a recognized nonprofit.</p><p data-block-key=\"c9qgn\">The library policy, last updated in 2024, <a href=\"https://elmwoodparklibrary.org/sitemedia/documents/about-eppl/library-policies/operating/EPPL_Meeting_Room_Policy_2024.pdf\">says</a> that while Elmwood Park government agencies and nonprofit community groups do not have to pay to reserve rooms, “for-profit organizations” must pay $100 per hour to use the space.</p><p data-block-key=\"dqatf\">Gosztola said that although the Advocate is not an officially registered nonprofit, it also isn’t accurate to call it a for-profit organization. The newsletter is free to subscribers, he said, and it has received less than $100 in donations. “I don’t make a lot as a journalist,” he added.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Gosztola_IL_other.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"sr8jt\">The Elmwood Park Advocate, a Substack newsletter for the Chicago suburb of Elmwood Park, Illinois, was notified on July 22, 2025, that it will be charged for use of the local library’s meeting space, a move it believes is retaliatory.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": null,
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
"case_type": null,
"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
"border_point": null,
"target_us_citizenship_status": null,
"denial_of_entry": false,
"stopped_previously": false,
"did_authorities_ask_for_device_access": null,
"did_authorities_ask_about_work": null,
"assailant": null,
"was_journalist_targeted": null,
"charged_under_espionage_act": false,
"subpoena_type": null,
"name_of_business": null,
"third_party_business": null,
"legal_order_venue": null,
"status_of_prior_restraint": null,
"mistakenly_released_materials": false,
"links": [],
"equipment_seized": [],
"equipment_broken": [],
"state": {
"name": "Illinois",
"abbreviation": "IL"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Other Incident"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Kevin Gosztola (Elmwood Park Advocate)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"title": "WSJ reporter pulled from press pool in retaliation for Epstein article",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/wsj-reporter-pulled-from-press-pool-in-retaliation-for-epstein-article/",
"first_published_at": "2025-07-23T15:48:54.623220Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-07-23T15:48:54.623220Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-07-23T15:30:53.528801Z",
"date": "2025-07-21",
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"city": "Washington",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"i1434\">The Wall Street Journal was removed from the White House press pool on July 21, 2025, in retaliation for the paper’s exclusive reporting on a letter allegedly written in 2003 by President Donald Trump to Jeffrey Epstein, a disgraced financier charged with sex trafficking of minors.</p><p data-block-key=\"8ssnp\">A July 17 Journal <a href=\"https://www.wsj.com/politics/trump-jeffrey-epstein-birthday-letter-we-have-certain-things-in-common-f918d796?mod=hp_lead_pos7\">article</a> described entries in a leatherbound book compiled for Epstein’s 50th birthday in 2003, including a letter allegedly from Trump that was typed within the drawn outline of a woman and included the sign-off, “may every day be another wonderful secret.” No copy of the letter was included in the article.</p><p data-block-key=\"fptlm\">Trump immediately took to his social platform, Truth Social, to <a href=\"https://taps.pressfreedomtracker.us/post/e47d09a0c23b/\">refute</a> the reporting and condemn the newspaper and the editor behind the article. On July 18, the president followed through on threats to <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/blog/media-in-the-courthouse/#July-18-2025-WSJ\">sue the Journal</a> and News Corp — the paper’s parent company — as well as its founder Rupert Murdoch and its CEO Robert Thomson.</p><p data-block-key=\"d34i8\">A spokesperson for the paper’s publisher, Dow Jones, <a href=\"https://www.wsj.com/business/media/trump-sues-wall-street-journal-publisher-dow-jones-over-jeffrey-epstein-article-0257afee\">told the Journal</a>, “We have full confidence in the rigor and accuracy of our reporting, and will vigorously defend against any lawsuit.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2aju6\">The Wall Street Journal’s White House correspondent, Tarini Parti, was then booted from the press pool for Trump’s planned trip to Scotland from July 25-29. Politico <a href=\"https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/21/journal-removed-white-house-pool-epstein-00465548?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR5jfP1b7JBtBEvtH0zaLtR0UiZRzdtR3VySq3zh-lj6QTGGKKtgqrumM4n1yA_aem_jXROFLRL1lzfwtwGlhXZ4w\">reported</a> that Parti was set to serve as the print pooler for the final two days of the trip and was removed even though she was not an author on the Epstein article.</p><p data-block-key=\"efnjr\">The White House had previously <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/white-house-wrests-control-of-presidential-press-pool-from-correspondents/\">wrested control</a> of the presidential press pool from the White House Correspondents’ Association in February, breaking with more than a century of practice.</p><p data-block-key=\"9tvfn\">In a statement to Politico, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that no news outlets are guaranteed special access to the president in his private workspaces.</p><p data-block-key=\"9cu7c\">“Due to the Wall Street Journal’s fake and defamatory conduct, they will not be one of the thirteen outlets on board,” Leavitt said. “Every news organization in the entire world wishes to cover President Trump, and the White House has taken significant steps to include as many voices as possible.”</p><p data-block-key=\"eriih\">A White House spokesperson declined to comment to Politico concerning whether the Journal would be barred from further press pools as well.</p><p data-block-key=\"7ro1q\">Dow Jones declined to comment when reached by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. Parti did not respond to a request for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"au28p\">The WHCA criticized the move in a statement, saying it is a clear attempt to punish a news outlet for coverage it doesn’t like.</p><p data-block-key=\"25rlj\">“Government retaliation against news outlets based on the content of their reporting should concern all who value free speech and an independent media,” wrote Weijia Jiang, CBS News correspondent and the association’s president. “We strongly urge the White House to restore the Wall Street Journal to its previous position in the pool and aboard Air Force One for the President’s upcoming trip to Scotland.”</p><p data-block-key=\"45d5j\">Freedom of the Press Foundation, of which the Tracker is a project, also condemned the decision. “It’s highly disturbing that a U.S. president has so little respect for the First Amendment that he’s willing to punish news outlets that don’t toe the line,” Seth Stern, FPF’s advocacy director, said.</p></div>",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"djcwu\">White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks with reporters at the White House in Washington, D.C., on July 21, 2025. She announced that day that The Wall Street Journal had been pulled from the press pool for the president’s trip to Scotland.</p>",
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"state": {
"name": "District of Columbia",
"abbreviation": "DC"
},
"updates": [],
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"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
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"tags": [
"Donald Trump"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [
"Federal government: White House"
],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Denial of Access"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Tarini Parti (The Wall Street Journal)"
],
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"type_of_denial": [
"Government event"
]
}
]
