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{
"title": "Photojournalist shot with chemical irritants amid Illinois immigration protests",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-shot-with-chemical-irritants-amid-illinois-immigration-protests/",
"first_published_at": "2025-10-20T19:29:43.684928Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-10-29T19:14:36.521733Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-10-29T19:14:36.439685Z",
"date": "2025-09-19",
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"city": "Broadview",
"longitude": -87.85339,
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"z7440\">Freelance photojournalist Audrey Richardson was shot with crowd-control munitions and tear-gassed while covering protests outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"63l9a\">The facility, where detainees are being held and processed ahead of deportation, has drawn escalating protests and federal response since early September, following the Department of Homeland Security’s <a href=\"https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/09/08/ice-launches-operation-midway-blitz-honor-katie-abraham-target-criminal-illegal\">launch</a> of Operation Midway Blitz.</p><p data-block-key=\"fr9eu\">Richardson told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was on assignment for nonprofit newsroom Block Club Chicago that day, and arrived at the facility shortly before 5 p.m.</p><p data-block-key=\"8fe59\">“It was calm at first,” she said. “Then, they would bring the detainees in and protesters would try to block the car, and that’s what would incite the pushback from ICE. It kept happening, and each time I feel like ICE got more aggressive.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6fl46\">Increasing numbers of officers would advance out of the facility to push back protesters, Richardson said. During one such rush, as officers were shoving everyone, she said that she was pushed into a large rock near the road, causing her to fall over.</p><p data-block-key=\"80aj3\">As evening arrived, Richardson said the federal officers deployed stun grenades and tear gas, while others stationed on the roof shot a barrage of pepper balls toward the crowd. That’s when she believes a munition hit her.</p><p data-block-key=\"1860k\">“I was shot in my left calf. It hurt really bad and there was a massive bruise for a few weeks,” Richardson told the Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"786p1\">She added that she doesn’t know whether she was deliberately targeted, noting that she was identifiable as press, or if she was caught in their indiscriminate spray of the crowd-control munitions.</p><p data-block-key=\"2kb44\">“It seems to have gone from zero to 100 so quickly,” Richardson said. “That one time they decided to come out in full force was just really scary. They were just throwing explosives at protesters. Afterward, they didn’t do it again, because people were injured and throwing up.</p><p data-block-key=\"1pei6\">“I think people were like, ‘OK, I don’t really want to go through that again,’” she added, noting that that was probably the officers’ goal.</p><p data-block-key=\"f08nq\">An array of Chicago-area journalists and others — including Block Club —<a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71559589/chicago-headline-club-v-noem/?filed_after=&filed_before=&entry_gte=&entry_lte=&order_by=asc#entry-21\"> sued</a> President Donald Trump and various U.S. agencies Oct. 6 over federal law enforcement’s violent response to ongoing anti-deportation protests outside the ICE facility.</p><p data-block-key=\"8stbv\">In an<a href=\"https://blockclubchicago.org/2025/10/07/block-club-chicago-news-organizations-sue-feds-over-first-amendment-violations/\"> article</a> announcing the lawsuit, Block Club wrote that it decided to pursue the case after <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?city=Broadview&targeted_institutions=Block+Club+Chicago\">four of its journalists</a>, including Richardson, were shot with pepper balls and tear-gassed.</p><p data-block-key=\"405jg\">“We intend to continue to report on the protests, but our ability to do so, to the standards that we hold ourselves to, continues to be impacted by our fears of violence and arrests of our employees and contractors,” said Stephanie Lulay, Block Club executive editor and co-founder. “We’re taking this step to protect our journalists and to assert our First Amendment right to report.”</p><p data-block-key=\"25rr3\">The journalists won a temporary restraining order Oct. 9, forbidding federal agents from dispersing, arresting, threatening or using physical force against journalists without probable cause of a crime. It says agents can order journalists to change locations if they give them time to comply.</p><p data-block-key=\"9mebo\">It also forbids the use of riot-control weapons and chemical munitions on those not posing an immediate threat to law enforcement; firing projectiles at the head, neck, groin, spine or female breast; or striking anyone with a vehicle. And it mandates that federal agents wear visible identification and body cameras.</p><p data-block-key=\"4qguc\">Hayden Johnson, counsel at Protect Democracy, part of the legal team for the plaintiffs, said, “Over the last weeks and months, Chicagoans have bravely sought to express and protect these freedoms in the face of severe government abuse. Today’s ruling recognizes that those efforts—peacefully opposing a federal incursion into your city and reporting the events—require the utmost constitutional protection.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"w6aqk\">Federal agents stand guard on top of a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025. Photojournalist Audrey Richardson was caught in chemical irritant and shot with pepper balls by officers that day.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"name": "Illinois",
"abbreviation": "IL"
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"Department of Homeland Security",
"immigration",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
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{
"title": "Freelancer struck by projectiles at Illinois anti-deportation protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/freelancer-struck-by-projectiles-at-illinois-anti-deportation-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-10-10T17:12:38.076398Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-10-29T19:14:53.307216Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-10-29T19:14:53.207199Z",
"date": "2025-09-19",
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"city": "Broadview",
"longitude": -87.85339,
"latitude": 41.86392,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"sh1f4\">Freelance reporter Leigh Giangreco was shot with multiple pepper balls by federal officers while covering protests outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"frtcs\">In a <a href=\"https://www.tiktok.com/@leighgiangreco0/video/7552015223092301070\">report</a> posted on social video platform TikTok, Giangreco said that she was on assignment for nonprofit newsroom Block Club Chicago covering protests that started that morning and stretched throughout the day, with the law enforcement response escalating in the evening.</p><p data-block-key=\"geth\">“Just before 7 o’clock, there were several ICE agents on top of the building, on the corner, who were shooting pepper bullets down at protesters,” Giangreco said. Describing the munitions as “non-lethal bullets,” she added that — from personal experience — they can leave a mark.</p><p data-block-key=\"ellsk\">“They are pretty painful: I got hit with at least two of them tonight,” she said. “They were shooting those down on protesters, really just raining them down.”</p><p data-block-key=\"4ihe7\">Giangreco reported that the federal officers also deployed tear gas into the crowd. “I will say I was also in the middle of these protests and the pepper spray was on the air, was getting in your eyes,” she said, adding, “it’s still in my throat now.”</p><p data-block-key=\"7506o\">An array of Chicago-area journalists and others — including Block Club — <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71559589/chicago-headline-club-v-noem/?filed_after=&filed_before=&entry_gte=&entry_lte=&order_by=asc#entry-21\">sued</a> President Donald Trump and various federal agencies Oct. 6 over the violent response by federal law enforcement to ongoing anti-deportation protests outside the ICE facility.</p><p data-block-key=\"bm2ic\">In an <a href=\"https://blockclubchicago.org/2025/10/07/block-club-chicago-news-organizations-sue-feds-over-first-amendment-violations/\">article</a> announcing the lawsuit, Block Club wrote that it decided to pursue the case after <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?city=Broadview&targeted_institutions=Block+Club+Chicago\">four of its journalists</a> were shot with pepper balls and tear-gassed.</p><p data-block-key=\"4i3um\">“We intend to continue to report on the protests, but our ability to do so, to the standards that we hold ourselves to, continues to be impacted by our fears of violence and arrests of our employees and contractors,” said Stephanie Lulay, Block Club executive editor and co-founder. “We’re taking this step to protect our journalists and to assert our First Amendment right to report.”</p><p data-block-key=\"b2i3g\">The journalists won a temporary restraining order Oct. 9, forbidding federal agents from dispersing, arresting, threatening or using physical force against journalists without probable cause of a crime. It says agents can order journalists to change locations if they give them time to comply.</p><p data-block-key=\"6mckd\">It also forbids the use of riot-control weapons and chemical munitions on those not posing an immediate threat to law enforcement; firing projectiles at the head, neck, groin, spine or female breast; or striking anyone with a vehicle. And it mandates that federal agents wear visible identification.</p><p data-block-key=\"53ohc\">Hayden Johnson, counsel at Protect Democracy, part of the legal team for the plaintiffs, said, “Over the last weeks and months, Chicagoans have bravely sought to express and protect these freedoms in the face of severe government abuse. Today’s ruling recognizes that those efforts—peacefully opposing a federal incursion into your city and reporting the events—require the utmost constitutional protection.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/AP25262760688986.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"fvib3\">A protester stands in front of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers outside an ICE facility in Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025. Photojournalist Leigh Giangreco was shot with multiple pepper balls while covering the demonstrations.</p>",
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
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"name": "Illinois",
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"chemical irritant",
"Department of Homeland Security",
"immigration",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
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{
"title": "Journalist grabbed, hit with pepper ball by federal agents at Illinois ICE protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-grabbed-hit-with-pepper-ball-by-federal-agents-at-illinois-ice-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-10-03T20:59:41.116298Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-10-29T19:15:52.040721Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-10-29T19:15:51.941756Z",
"date": "2025-09-19",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Broadview",
"longitude": -87.85339,
"latitude": 41.86392,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"1x8ig\">Journalist Steve Held said a federal agent grabbed him from behind as another shot him in the groin with a pepper ball while Held covered a protest outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"bdhsd\">Held, co-founder and reporter for the investigative outlet Unraveled Press, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that demonstrators had gathered for weeks outside the facility, where detainees are held and processed ahead of deportation.</p><p data-block-key=\"94gb1\">The demonstration that day was relatively calm, and there had been no dispersal order, when agents suddenly advanced on protesters, Held recounted. “It just popped off in that second.”</p><p data-block-key=\"7co7g\">Held watched ICE agents run after somebody near him. Then, one agent grabbed Held’s hoodie and swung him around from behind while another <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/peoplesfabric.com/post/3lza4jrfwis2e\">aimed a pepper ball gun at his crotch.</a></p><p data-block-key=\"fj1vs\">“I wasn’t even really sure what happened,” Held said. “I just knew I got whipped around and shot.”</p><p data-block-key=\"2ru3h\">Held said he believed at least one of the officers knew who he was, as he has been covering ICE activities since May. He was wearing a press badge at the time, but said the incident prompted him to get a helmet and other gear to mark himself as media.</p><p data-block-key=\"dj6su\">Even with the extra press-labeled apparel, though, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-tackled-arrested-by-federal-agents-at-illinois-ice-protest/\">Held was arrested</a> a week later while covering another protest outside the facility. His Unraveled co-founder <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-shot-in-the-face-with-pepper-ball-at-illinois-ice-facility-protest/\">Raven Geary</a> was also shot in the face with a pepper ball on Sept. 26.</p><p data-block-key=\"123bj\">Held said he believes the encounters are part of a broader effort by immigration and federal agents to intimidate journalists.</p><p data-block-key=\"1gfsv\">“They want to dissuade people from being there, from getting close,” he said. “Fewer press out there makes it easier for them to hide what they’re doing.”</p><p data-block-key=\"42ccm\">The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a Tracker request for comment. In a <a href=\"https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/09/26/days-after-dallas-terrorist-attack-ice-rioters-gather-outside-ice-broadview-il\">press release</a> on Sept. 26, DHS described the demonstrators as “rioters,” some of whom were reportedly chanting “shoot ICE.”</p><p data-block-key=\"ari9f\">“These violent threats and smears about ICE must stop,” said Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin. She also called on Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson to “condemn these riots and tone down their rhetoric about ICE.”</p><p data-block-key=\"f41h7\">Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson sent a letter to DHS, Block Club Chicago <a href=\"https://blockclubchicago.org/2025/09/26/ice-is-making-war-on-broadview-and-it-must-stop-suburban-mayor-says/\">reported</a>, accusing ICE officials of “making war” on her community. Thompson asked that the agency stop “deploying chemical arms such as tear gas, pepper spray, etc. against American citizens, our residents, and our first responders.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6q34i\">According to a Sept. 27 <a href=\"https://apigateway.agilitypr.com/distributions/history/6b822536-db77-4a76-9b14-68d7a0a4bfea?recipientId=85ec311b-1ff6-4e75-88f3-386d8c6bf080\">news release</a>, the village of Broadview said that in retaliation for Thompson’s letter, “ICE agents this morning informed the Broadview Police Department that there will be ‘a sh*t show’ in Broadview today.”</p><p data-block-key=\"f4cf8\">Indeed, federal officers responded to protests with chemical irritants and crowd-control munitions that day — <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-09-27&date_upper=2025-09-27&city=Broadview\">affecting multiple journalists</a>.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Held_pepper_ball.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"brl6u\">Pepper ball residue on Steve Held’s pants after he was grabbed and shot in the groin with the munition by federal agents while covering a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement protest in Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025.</p>",
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"name": "Illinois",
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"(2025-10-09 20:57:00+00:00) Chicago journalists win temporary restraining order against federal government",
"(2025-10-06 20:58:00+00:00) Chicago journalists sue over violent federal response to Illinois protests"
],
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{
"title": "Journalist shot with pepper balls at Illinois ICE facility protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-shot-with-pepper-balls-at-illinois-ice-facility-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-10-03T14:31:21.183852Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-10-29T19:15:16.796630Z",
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"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"0lqri\">Journalist Raven Geary was shot in the face and shoulder with pepper balls by federal officers while reporting on protests outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"dekqc\">Geary, co-founder and reporter for the investigative outlet Unraveled Press, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that demonstrators had been gathering for weeks outside the facility where detainees are being held and processed ahead of deportation. She said that the federal officers have been becoming more aggressive with both attendees and journalists covering the protests.</p><p data-block-key=\"euf4u\">“We’ve been seeing an escalation from them significantly over the last few weeks. And these agents specifically have threatened us as reporters, they’ve tried to intimidate us,” she observed.</p><p data-block-key=\"cgl6i\">On Sept. 19, multiple protests were organized to take place at the facility, Geary <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/unraveledpress.com/post/3lz7wtz6qzk2g\">reported</a>, with federal officers inside periodically shooting crowd-control munitions at the crowd, including at one point <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/unraveledpress.com/post/3lz7ybh7osk2h\">shooting directly at Geary’s feet</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"2ribo\">As the evening went on, Geary said <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/unraveledpress.com/post/3lza36gg5as2f\">both she</a> and her Unraveled Press co-founder, Steve Held, were shot with munitions at close range.</p><p data-block-key=\"22vra\">“They shot Steve in the groin, and I have that on video. The guy is like a foot away from him and just pops him in the crotch with the pepper ball gun,” Geary said. “And I got hit in the face and shoulder.</p><p data-block-key=\"bmc88\">“It was just another situation where they were just kind of indiscriminately shooting at people’s faces, groins, places they’re not supposed to at close range, and then pepper-spraying people in the face,” she added.</p><p data-block-key=\"2r6ac\">The chemical irritant powder in pepper balls is worse, in her opinion, than the liquid or gel in pepper spray, Geary said. “The powder just gets everywhere, and it comes and goes. You’ll get hit with a bunch of it and you’ll think you’re fine and then an hour later you’re still coughing it up.”</p><p data-block-key=\"6ge5m\">Geary told the Tracker they were able to continue covering the protest for several hours. She was struck, however, by how chaotic the federal officers were in their response, in comparison to the Chicago Police Department.</p><p data-block-key=\"4c7hg\">“With CPD, they use these very organized, military kind of formations: They’re holding on to each other, watching each other’s backs for their own safety,” she said. “And these guys are just scattered everywhere, doing whatever the hell they want, it’s just wild.”</p><p data-block-key=\"5g7cf\">ICE did not respond to a request for comment.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"kmcyq\">Protesters gather outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025. Journalist Raven Geary was shot in the face and shoulder with pepper balls by federal officers while reporting on the demonstration.</p>",
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"updates": [
"(2025-10-09 21:03:00+00:00) Chicago journalists win temporary restraining order against federal government",
"(2025-10-06 20:46:00+00:00) Chicago journalists sue over violent federal response to Illinois protests"
],
"case_statuses": [
"ongoing"
],
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"tags": [
"chemical irritant",
"Department of Homeland Security",
"immigration",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Raven Geary (Unraveled Press)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Photojournalist targeted with pepper balls at Illinois ICE protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-targeted-with-pepper-balls-at-illinois-ice-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-10-21T20:46:41.271291Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-10-21T20:46:41.271291Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-10-21T20:46:41.125212Z",
"date": "2025-09-19",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Broadview",
"longitude": -87.85339,
"latitude": 41.86392,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"iuxp9\">Independent photojournalist Chana Shapiro was hit multiple times with pepper balls fired by federal officers while covering a protest outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"ck8ko\">The incident, which appeared targeted, took place during one of a series of demonstrations outside the facility, where detainees are held and processed ahead of deportation.</p><p data-block-key=\"709lv\">Shapiro told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she arrived shortly after dawn to cover the protest. Early on, she was photographing from a driveway, seated cross-legged, when an ICE truck drove forward until its grille was inches from her face before speeding into the crowd, deploying tear gas and moving through an opaque field of smoke.</p><p data-block-key=\"dnfno\">“The truck just plowed through,” Shapiro said. “It was very clear that they would have run over people if they had not gotten out of the way.”</p><p data-block-key=\"5crcf\">Later that morning, she lay close to a fence, with a camera bag, DSLR camera and press badge on her, to photograph chained detainees being loaded into vans.</p><p data-block-key=\"e9lre\">Within minutes, she felt pepper balls skid down her sides and clip her leg — “as if drawing a chalk outline.”</p><p data-block-key=\"98o24\">“I thought maybe they were shooting behind me into the crowd,” she said. “Then I heard someone scream something like, ‘You can’t shoot journalists,’ or ‘They just shot a journalist.’”</p><p data-block-key=\"ekau1\">One witness told Shapiro that a sniper positioned on the roof had tracked her for several minutes before firing, even as she was alone and away from protesters.</p><p data-block-key=\"285mc\">After being treated briefly by street medics, Shapiro said she ran back toward the fence without protective accessories and only her DSLR to continue documenting the scene.</p><p data-block-key=\"31tqh\">She was struck again. “I immediately felt something like marbles bursting down my shoulder and leg,” she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"7fc1u\">Shapiro also said tear gas and pepper spray seeped into cuts on her knees and elbows, which she had gotten from crawling to capture different shots.</p><p data-block-key=\"2nqhe\">“My body was really hurt and stung for the rest of the day. And then, because it kept happening, it kept exacerbating it,” she said.</p><p data-block-key=\"79u5u\">Unable to clean her gear, chemical residue stayed pressed against her skin, continually aggravating the wounds over a period of days as she returned to cover the protests. It ultimately turned her arms, legs, chest and shoulders “metallically red,” and sensitive — what she described as feeling like “electromagnetic salmon.”</p><p data-block-key=\"c6s4d\">“I think it’s notable that being a journalist out in front is not a deterrent, the way that it’s supposed to be,” she said of the violent response from law enforcement. “It was a pretty equal opportunity.”</p><p data-block-key=\"a2o1c\">At least five other journalists were assaulted by law enforcement at anti-deportation protests at the Broadview facility the same day, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_lower=2025-09-19&date_upper=2025-09-19&tags=protest\">according to Tracker data.</a></p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"qkiw1\">Independent photojournalist Chana Shapiro, above, was hit with pepper balls fired by federal agents as she covered a protest outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"state": {
"name": "Illinois",
"abbreviation": "IL"
},
"updates": [],
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"tags": [
"chemical irritant",
"immigration",
"protest",
"shot / shot at"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault"
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"targeted_journalists": [
"Chana Shapiro (Independent)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Journalist struck by officer barring lawmakers from NYC immigration facility",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-struck-by-officer-barring-lawmakers-from-nyc-immigration-facility/",
"first_published_at": "2025-09-29T14:21:42.063939Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-10-29T19:16:45.028717Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-10-29T19:16:44.936946Z",
"date": "2025-09-18",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "New York",
"longitude": -74.00597,
"latitude": 40.71427,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"9uytp\">Independent journalist and documentary filmmaker Michael Nigro was smacked in the face with his own equipment by a plainclothes officer while documenting inside the Jacob K. Javits Federal Building in New York, New York, on Sept. 18, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"43kht\">Nigro told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he has been covering the federal immigration court there almost daily since the end of May. State and local officials had gathered at the building that day to demand that they be permitted to inspect the detainment facilities on the premises.</p><p data-block-key=\"11ktt\">“We got word that there were going to be lawmakers entering the building to try to look at the 10th floor, which is the holding cells and where the judge said that they had to improve the conditions,” Nigro said, referring to a federal judge’s <a href=\"https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/new-york-democratic-politicians-arrested-ice-jail-manhattan-2025-09-19/\">recent citation</a> to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for inhumane conditions in the facility.</p><p data-block-key=\"6c6m1\">He said that while journalists are not permitted on those floors, the newsworthiness of the lawmakers’ visit led him and others to try to gain access. He arrived shortly after the officials.</p><p data-block-key=\"9uarf\">As the lawmakers positioned themselves in front of a door to the facility, a plainclothes officer — wearing a hat from a Second Amendment clothing company that read “The Pew/Pew Life” and shirt reading “Guns up giddy up” — prevented them from entering.</p><p data-block-key=\"f603\">“The lawmakers were making a very placid and calm and reasoned plea to enter to observe the holding cell or the detention rooms, whatever you want to call them,” Nigro said. The photojournalist added that he positioned himself right at the door, along with a number of other journalists, near the officer.</p><p data-block-key=\"784pf\">He told the Tracker that the halls in the building are always crowded, noting that “it can be a mosh pit or worse.” On this day, however, people were largely standing still, and he filmed for around 10 minutes, panning to the plainclothes officer who was talking through the door to tell someone not to open it because “there’s press outside, there’s lawmakers.”</p><p data-block-key=\"bqn99\">Nigro said that when he panned again, the officer snapped.</p><p data-block-key=\"e1ojg\">“I didn’t make any jerky movements. As soon as I turned, he just smacked the camera,” he told the Tracker. “I have this metal bracket on top that holds my cellphone and it went directly into my mouth and I thought he cracked my tooth. That sound that you get: metal on enamel.”</p><p data-block-key=\"chgv4\">He said he bent over and felt that his tooth was still intact. The officer falsely claimed that Nigro had hit him with the camera and, in <a href=\"https://x.com/swartmadison/status/1969390001361227792\">footage</a> captured by another journalist, told him, “Keep that out of my face.”</p></div>\n<div class=\"block-tweet\"><div class=\"tweet-embed\">\n <div>\n <blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">While elected officials demanded access to the 10th floor to observe conditions where migrants are held, an ICE agent struck a photographer’s camera (Michael Nigro) and then falsely claimed the photographer hit him: “You hit me in the face with it.” <a href=\"https://t.co/n14SmR1NjT\">pic.twitter.com/n14SmR1NjT</a></p>— Madison Swart (@swartmadison) <a href=\"https://twitter.com/swartmadison/status/1969390001361227792?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 20, 2025</a></blockquote>\n<script async src=\"https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"></script>\n\n\n</div>\n\n</div>\n</div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"9uytp\">“I calmly said, ‘No. I have a First Amendment right to shoot you,’” Nigro recounted.</p><p data-block-key=\"a5hu7\">The photojournalist said he didn’t have any further issues with the officer that day, but noted that the people inside the detainment facilities zip-tied the doors closed, put paper over the windows and placed duct tape over the seams so no photos could be taken.</p><p data-block-key=\"9d5rs\">Nearly a dozen lawmakers were ultimately arrested, Reuters <a href=\"https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/new-york-democratic-politicians-arrested-ice-jail-manhattan-2025-09-19/\">reported</a>, including New York City Comptroller Brad Lander.</p><p data-block-key=\"5csei\">Both Nigro and a second journalist identified the officer as an ICE agent, but ICE did not respond to a request for comment.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"zd4ln\">Journalist Michael Nigro, left, was struck in the face with his camera by an officer at the Federal Building in New York City on Sept. 18, 2025. Nigro was documenting elected officials who demanded to inspect the immigrant detainment facility there.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"name": "New York",
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"Department of Homeland Security",
"immigration",
"protest"
],
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"Assault"
],
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"Michael Nigro (Independent)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Federal officers aim rifle, pepper-spray videographer at Oregon ICE protest",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/federal-officers-aim-rifle-pepper-spray-videographer-at-oregon-ice-protest/",
"first_published_at": "2025-09-26T19:00:33.120981Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-10-29T19:16:52.145900Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-10-29T19:16:52.040155Z",
"date": "2025-09-13",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Portland",
"longitude": -122.67621,
"latitude": 45.52345,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"7vl1w\">Independent filmmaker Mason Lake said federal agents aimed at him with a rifle, then later pepper-sprayed him and damaged his camera and microphone while he was covering an immigration enforcement protest in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 13, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"dn97v\">Lake, a Portland-based videographer and founder of the independent outlet Channel Heed, was <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQ6kgnpybWA\">documenting a protest</a> outside the nearby U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility. At around 9:30 p.m., Department of Homeland Security agents aimed a rifle laser at Lake, he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.</p><p data-block-key=\"a433c\">“They took the time to put it right between my eyes,” he said. “I see this as an escalation of not only the threat they’re willing to reach for, but an escalation of what they know they’re able to get away with.”</p><p data-block-key=\"3r6bu\">Later, nearing midnight, officers were clearing the facility’s driveway to allow staff cars to exit. Video from Lake shows how they advanced on the crowd and began <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE4-yCJ8FU8\">deploying pepper spray indiscriminately.</a></p><p data-block-key=\"en55o\">Lake, whose hair was soaked in pepper spray, said medics — also affected by the spray — helped him decontaminate afterward, and that he unintentionally recontaminated himself when removing his gas mask.</p><p data-block-key=\"2e2qp\">“My cameras and I took a full blast,” he said, noting that he was clearly marked as press with multiple badges, along with press identifiers on his vest and helmet. One camera, valued at over $700, and his microphone were both hit, and he said the gear remains chemically contaminated despite cleanup efforts.</p><p data-block-key=\"amh9e\">The Tracker has documented <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?targeted_journalists=Mason+Lake\">16 other incidents</a> since 2020 in which Lake has reported being assaulted while covering Portland protests.</p><p data-block-key=\"60ku1\">“I definitely have felt targeted,” Lake said. “They really don’t like cameras being pointed at them.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/Screenshot_2025-09-25_at_12.14.54.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.png",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"2txpn\">A federal officer pepper-sprays a crowd outside an immigration detention center in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 13, 2025. Videographer Mason Lake had a rifle aimed at him and was hit by the spray while covering the protest, damaging his equipment.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "camera"
},
{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "recording equipment"
}
],
"state": {
"name": "Oregon",
"abbreviation": "OR"
},
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"chemical irritant",
"Department of Homeland Security",
"immigration",
"protest"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
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"targeted_journalists": [
"Mason Lake (Independent)"
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},
{
"title": "Two charged with placing incendiary device under Utah news vehicle",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/two-charged-with-placing-incendiary-device-under-utah-news-vehicle/",
"first_published_at": "2025-09-15T16:59:04.188289Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-09-15T16:59:04.188289Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-09-15T16:58:05.034777Z",
"date": "2025-09-12",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Salt Lake City",
"longitude": -111.89105,
"latitude": 40.76078,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"87el5\">The FBI has charged two Utah men with allegedly placing an incendiary device under a news vehicle from broadcast station KSTU in Salt Lake City on Sept. 12, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"14ipc\">KSTU <a href=\"https://www.fox13now.com/news/crime/fbi-arrests-2-after-incendiary-device-left-under-fox-13-news-vehicle\">reported</a> that the device was determined to be real and, according to officials, the bomb had been lit but “failed to function.” No injuries were reported.</p><p data-block-key=\"aiab6\">As a result of the device’s type and location, it was deemed a “significant threat to public safety,” according to the television station, and the investigation was taken over by the FBI.</p><p data-block-key=\"a91jt\">Two suspects — identified as Adeeb Nasir and Adil Justice Ahmed Nasir of the nearby suburb of Magna — were arrested late Sept. 13. According to jail records reviewed by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, both face multiple felony charges, including attempted aggravated arson, threat of terrorism, possessing weapons of mass destruction and possessing an incendiary device.</p><p data-block-key=\"e45np\">It was not immediately clear whether the news vehicle was deliberately targeted or what the suspects’ motives may have been.</p><p data-block-key=\"ftbpo\">In a statement published by the news outlet, KSTU Station Manager Leona Wood said, “FOX 13 News is working closely with law-enforcement and our risk management team, with the safety of our employees as our top priority.”</p><p data-block-key=\"86uoc\">Neither KSTU, the FBI nor the Salt Lake City Police Department responded to requests for comment as of press time.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
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"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"sthz8\">Utah broadcaster KSTU reported a bomb was placed under one of the TV station’s news vehicles in Salt Lake City on Sept. 12, 2025. The incendiary device “failed to function” and no injuries were reported. Two men have since been arrested by the FBI.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"state": {
"name": "Utah",
"abbreviation": "UT"
},
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"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [
"KSTU"
],
"tags": [
"bomb / bomb threat"
],
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Other Incident"
],
"targeted_journalists": [],
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},
{
"title": "TV reporter harassed, camera damaged while reporting in California",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/tv-reporter-harassed-camera-damaged-while-reporting-in-california/",
"first_published_at": "2025-09-12T18:49:13.443959Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-09-12T18:49:13.443959Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-09-12T18:49:13.220915Z",
"date": "2025-09-04",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Chico",
"longitude": -121.83748,
"latitude": 39.72849,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"6flmx\">KNVN reporter Nathan Espindula’s news camera was damaged when a man harassed him with racial slurs while he was reporting in Chico, California, on Sept. 4, 2025, the television station <a href=\"https://www.actionnewsnow.com/news/action-news-now-reporter-harassed-in-altercation-after-live-broadcast/article_24a98d28-202a-4c09-9186-61237b8e5948.html\">reported.</a></p><p data-block-key=\"2q07d\">Espindula had just finished a live segment around 6 a.m. when a man approached, threatening him and shouting racist terms for a Hispanic individual.</p><p data-block-key=\"6uu73\">“I started hearing someone yelling slurs at me, and as soon as I noticed that, I ran into the car and locked the car,” Espindula told KNVN. “And then the individual approached me, yelling and going across the car.”</p><p data-block-key=\"443ak\">Espindula said the man threatened to find out where he lives and continued shouting racist and profane insults, which Espindula recorded on his phone. His camera equipment was damaged during the incident.</p><p data-block-key=\"4mi2a\">Espindula did not respond to a U.S. Press Freedom Tracker request for comment. But as a fellow reporter noted on the station’s account of the incident, “What began as a routine live report on a community event turned into a frightening confrontation for one of our colleagues.”</p><p data-block-key=\"5rngs\">The suspect, identified as Kiano Sen Saechao, has pleaded not guilty to a <a href=\"https://law.justia.com/codes/california/code-pen/part-1/title-11-6/chapter-2/section-422-6/\">felony civil rights violation</a> for the property damage, which is classified as a hate crime, according to Butte County court records.</p><p data-block-key=\"b03lt\">A preliminary hearing in the case is scheduled for Sept. 25.</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"k0aqf\">Nathan Espindula, seen above in a standup shot, said his news camera was damaged by a man who harassed him with racial slurs while he was reporting in Chico, California, on Sept. 4, 2025.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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{
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"name": "California",
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},
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"Nathan Espindula (KNVN)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Journalist ejected from Capitol Hill news conference on Epstein files",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-ejected-from-capitol-hill-news-conference-on-epstein-files/",
"first_published_at": "2025-09-09T15:56:34.552853Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-09-09T15:56:34.552853Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-09-09T15:52:41.455719Z",
"date": "2025-09-03",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Washington",
"longitude": -77.03637,
"latitude": 38.89511,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"v73f2\">Independent journalist Michael Tracey says he was ejected from a Capitol Hill news conference in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 3, 2025, after he asked a question about the credibility of a Jeffrey Epstein accuser.</p><p data-block-key=\"8ajsh\">Tracey told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the office of Rep. Ro Khanna, a Democrat from California, had invited him to attend the news conference. Tracey is based in Jersey City, New Jersey, and writes about U.S. politics on <a href=\"https://www.mtracey.net/\">Substack</a>. He said he confirmed that he would attend the event the day before.</p><p data-block-key=\"4ii2a\">The news conference, held outside the Capitol, aimed to pressure lawmakers to vote for the release of the files from the Justice Department’s Epstein investigation. Multiple U.S. representatives from both parties were joined by a group of Epstein’s accusers, who told of the sexual abuse they say they faced from the convicted sex offender, who took his own life in 2019 while in federal custody facing sex trafficking charges.</p><p data-block-key=\"91j55\">At the news conference, Tracey questioned attorney Bradley Edwards about his late client Virginia Giuffre, who had been one of the most vocal Epstein accusers before her death by suicide in April 2025. In 2022, Giuffre had <a href=\"https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/08/us/alan-dershowitz-virginia-giuffre-allegations-dropped\">dropped</a> her allegations of sexual abuse against attorney Alan Dershowitz, saying she “may have made a mistake.” (Dershowitz had denied the allegations.)</p><p data-block-key=\"cmlum\">“I asked Bradley Edwards, why should the public regard this person as having unimpeached credibility?” Tracey said. “You’re supposed to ask critical or skeptical questions.” Edwards did not answer the question, according to <a href=\"https://x.com/mtracey/status/1963317647015379179#m\">video</a> of the encounter, and moved on to another journalist.</p><p data-block-key=\"5o6d4\">Khanna then interjected and addressed Tracey’s question. After the journalist asked a follow-up, Tracey said Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican from Georgia, urged the U.S. Capitol Police to eject him.</p><p data-block-key=\"bp9pk\">Capitol Police officers obliged, Tracey said, and escorted him away. Neither Greene’s office nor the police responded to requests for comment.</p><p data-block-key=\"9vmnl\">“They threw me out. They threatened me with arrest,” said Tracey, who added that he did not resist. “I was ejected based on the content of the question.”</p></div>",
"introduction": "",
"teaser": "",
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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"30nh4\">Rep. Thomas Massie speaks at a Capitol Hill news conference in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 3, 2025, calling for the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files. Journalist Michael Tracey was removed after he questioned an Epstein accuser’s credibility.</p>",
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"Federal government: Legislature"
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"Denial of Access"
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"Michael Tracey (Independent)"
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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",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Santa Ana",
"longitude": -117.86783,
"latitude": 33.74557,
"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",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-10-29T19:25:52.565438Z",
"date": "2025-08-20",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "San Francisco",
"longitude": -122.41942,
"latitude": 37.77493,
"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>",
"introduction": "",
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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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"immigration",
"protest"
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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",
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"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>",
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
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"state": {
"name": "California",
"abbreviation": "CA"
},
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"categories": [
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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",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"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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"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>",
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"name": "California",
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"categories": [
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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",
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"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": "",
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"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",
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": "2025-08-08",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
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"stopped_previously": false,
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
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"state": {
"name": "California",
"abbreviation": "CA"
},
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"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"immigration",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Sean Beckner-Carmitchel (Freelance)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"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>",
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"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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{
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"name": "California",
"abbreviation": "CA"
},
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"tags": [
"immigration",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Assault",
"Equipment Damage"
],
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"Nick Stern (Independent)"
],
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},
{
"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,
"latitude": 34.05223,
"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": "",
"teaser": "",
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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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},
{
"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",
"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=\"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": "",
"teaser": "",
"teaser_image": "https://media.pressfreedomtracker.us/media/images/aabb8c92fed2e8cdcc3bb884c99a4a7b4.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
"primary_video": null,
"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>",
"arresting_authority": null,
"arrest_status": null,
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"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
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"actor": "law enforcement",
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
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"links": [],
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{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "camera lens"
}
],
"state": {
"name": "California",
"abbreviation": "CA"
},
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"case_statuses": [],
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"tags": [
"immigration",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"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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"longitude": -118.24368,
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"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>",
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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",
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"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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"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"it3nw\">Photographer Nate Gowdy’s wrists after he was released from his zip-tie restraints. Gowdy and other journalists were detained by Los Angeles Police Department officers while covering a protest in LA on Aug. 8, 2025.</p>",
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"authors": [],
"categories": [
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"Assault",
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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",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-14T18:54:49.562272Z",
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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>",
"introduction": "",
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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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"date": "2025-08-08",
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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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"primary_video": null,
"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",
"release_date": null,
"detention_date": "2025-08-08",
"unnecessary_use_of_force": false,
"case_number": null,
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"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
"is_search_warrant_obtained": false,
"actor": null,
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"assailant": "law enforcement",
"was_journalist_targeted": "yes",
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"state": {
"name": "California",
"abbreviation": "CA"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
"target_nationality": [],
"targeted_institutions": [],
"tags": [
"immigration",
"kettle",
"protest"
],
"politicians_or_public_figures_involved": [],
"authors": [],
"categories": [
"Arrest/Criminal Charge",
"Assault"
],
"targeted_journalists": [
"Carrie Schreck (Redux Pictures)"
],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
"type_of_denial": []
},
{
"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": "2025-10-30T15:08:21.582750Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-10-30T14:55:50.258888Z",
"date": "2025-08-05",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"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": "",
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"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": [],
"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)"
],
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},
{
"title": "Trump, his administration move to punish outlets during second term",
"url": "https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/trump-administration-allies-move-to-punish-outlets-during-first-weeks-in-office/",
"first_published_at": "2025-01-30T20:43:36.335430Z",
"last_published_at": "2025-08-07T15:05:38.087717Z",
"latest_revision_created_at": "2025-08-07T15:00:00.125938Z",
"date": "2025-08-01",
"exact_date_unknown": false,
"city": "Washington",
"longitude": -77.03637,
"latitude": 38.89511,
"body": "<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"63pix\">From the first weeks of President Donald Trump’s second term, he and his administration have taken steps to punish and intimidate news outlets that have covered them unfavorably. We’re documenting Trump’s direct actions in this regularly updated report.</p><p data-block-key=\"coqi2\">Read about how Trump’s appointees and allies in Congress are striving to chill reporting, revoke funding, censor critical coverage and more <a href=\"/blog/trump-allies-pursue-multipronged-campaign-against-the-press/\">here</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"cv9ql\"><i>This article was first published on March 14, 2025.</i></p><hr/><p data-block-key=\"aq2uo\"></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=\"#Aug. 1\">Aug. 1, 2025 | Corporation for Public Broadcasting to shutter following Trump funding cuts\r\n</a>\r\n<p><a href=\"#July 15\">July 15, 2025 | Trump administration, Congress target public broadcasting</a>\r\n<p><a href=\"#June 29\">June 29, 2025 | Trump says journalists will be forced to reveal sources in pursuit of Iran report leakers</a>\r\n<p><a href=\"#June 3\">June 3, 2025 | White House asks Congress to repeal $1.1 billion in funding to public media</a>\r\n<p><a href=\"#May 1\">May 1, 2025 | Trump signs executive order eliminating funding to NPR, PBS</a>\r\n<p><a href=\"#April 14\">April 14, 2025 | White House plans to formally ask Congress to cut PBS, NPR funding</a> \r\n<p><a href=\"#March 14-2\">March 14, 2025 | Trump signs executive order gutting government-funded news outlets</a> \r\n<p><a href=\"#March 14-1\">March 14, 2025 | Trump says negative press coverage ‘illegal’ during speech at DOJ</a></p></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><p data-block-key=\"3ocum\"></p><hr/><p data-block-key=\"a5gu5\"></p></div>\n<div class=\"block-raw_html\"><a id=\"Aug. 1\" name=\"Aug. 1\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"ztgt6\">Aug. 1, 2025 | Corporation for Public Broadcasting to shutter following Trump funding cuts</h4><p data-block-key=\"dj7ua\">The Corporation for Public Broadcasting announced Aug. 1, 2025, that it would cease its operations after Congress passed President Donald Trump’s request to cancel the $1.1 billion in funding earmarked for the organization for the next two years.</p><p data-block-key=\"4ekj1\">CPB and the public broadcasters it supports have been a target of Trump’s second administration since its earliest days. In a <a href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/articles/2025/04/the-npr-pbs-grift-has-ripped-us-off-for-too-long/\">statement</a> published April 14, the White House asserted that NPR and PBS “spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as ‘news’” and that funding them is a waste of taxpayer money.</p><p data-block-key=\"2ldkv\">Trump <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/trump-administration-allies-move-to-punish-outlets-during-first-weeks-in-office/#June%203\">attempted to fire</a> three CPB board members in April, despite lacking the authority to do so under the law that established the private, nonprofit corporation. Just days later, on May 1, he signed an executive order instructing the CPB to cease federal funding for the public media outlets. In June, Trump filed the <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/trump-administration-allies-move-to-punish-outlets-during-first-weeks-in-office/#June%203\">rescission request</a> to Congress that would cancel already approved funding for the corporation.</p><p data-block-key=\"63ctp\">CPB President and CEO Patricia Harrison said in a <a href=\"https://cpb.org/pressroom/Corporation-Public-Broadcasting-Addresses-Operations-Following-Loss-Federal-Funding\">statement</a> Aug. 1 that, after more than 60 years, the corporation had begun winding down its operations, “despite the extraordinary efforts of millions of Americans who called, wrote, and petitioned Congress to preserve federal funding for CPB.”</p><p data-block-key=\"118s0\">“Public media has been one of the most trusted institutions in American life, providing educational opportunity, emergency alerts, civil discourse, and cultural connection to every corner of the country,” Harrison said. “We are deeply grateful to our partners across the system for their resilience, leadership, and unwavering dedication to serving the American people.”</p><p data-block-key=\"652ff\">While CPB and the three board members targeted by Trump sued to protect them from being fired, two have since withdrawn their claims and resigned their positions on CPB’s board of directors.</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=\"July 15\" name=\"July 15\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"vjjz1\">July 15, 2025 | Trump administration, Congress, target public broadcasting</h4><p data-block-key=\"6m6j0\">The Trump administration filed a federal lawsuit on July 15, 2025, against the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — which provides funding to NPR, PBS and their local affiliates — in an attempt to oust the three Democratic board members.</p><p data-block-key=\"d8ipg\">Trump had <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/trump-administration-allies-move-to-punish-outlets-during-first-weeks-in-office/#June%203\">attempted to fire</a> the board members in April, and just days later, on May 1, signed an executive order instructing the private nonprofit corporation to cease federal funding for the public media outlets.</p><p data-block-key=\"85dld\">NPR<a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/media/2025/05/27/npr-lawsuit-trump-executive-order-funding-cuts/\"> sued</a> to halt the order, calling it “textbook retaliation.” NPR CEO Katherine Maher<a href=\"https://www.npr.org/2025/05/27/g-s1-69017/npr-and-katherine-maher-ceo-of-npr-statement\"> wrote</a>, “The intent could not be more clear — the Executive Order aims to punish NPR for the content of news and other programming the President dislikes.”</p><p data-block-key=\"4lmog\">The following month, Trump further targeted government support for the public broadcasters through a <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/trump-administration-allies-move-to-punish-outlets-during-first-weeks-in-office/#June%203\">rescission request</a>, asking Congress to cancel $1.1 billion in already-approved funding.</p><p data-block-key=\"571tq\">The House approved the package in a close vote — <a href=\"https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2025168\">214-212</a> on June 12.</p><p data-block-key=\"ot3j\">In a <a href=\"https://taps.pressfreedomtracker.us/post/cfa69aeac4dd/\">July 10 post</a> on the social platform Truth Social, Trump called on Senate Republicans to grant the request, especially as it pertains to the broadcasters.</p><p data-block-key=\"79ts2\">“It is very important that all Republicans adhere to my Recissions Bill and, in particular, DEFUND THE CORPORATION FOR PUBLIC BROADCASTING (PBS and NPR), which is worse than CNN & MSDNC put together,” Trump wrote. “Any Republican that votes to allow this monstrosity to continue broadcasting will not have my support or Endorsement.”</p><p data-block-key=\"c6lpn\">The Senate approved the request in a 51-48 vote early morning July 17, despite concerns from members of Congress that it surrendered the legislative branch’s power of the purse, The New York Times <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/17/us/politics/senate-vote-trump-bill-pbs-npr-foreign-aid.html\">reported</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"61miv\">One holdout, Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota, voted in favor after he was assured by Trump officials that unspent funds would be used “to continue grants to tribal radio stations without interruption” for next year, according to the Times.</p><p data-block-key=\"foith\">The House gave final approval for the White House’s request early July 18, The Associated Press <a href=\"https://apnews.com/article/pbs-npr-budget-cuts-trump-republicans-b0044285659ab708e23eb2dc2f3eabfa\">reported</a>, making it the first successful rescissions request to Congress in decades.</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 29\" name=\"June 29\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"0wuzj\">June 29, 2025 | Trump says journalists will be forced to reveal sources in pursuit of Iran report leakers</h4><p data-block-key=\"497pl\">In an interview with Fox News aired on June 29, 2025, President Donald Trump said that journalists could and should be forced to reveal their sources so that those behind the leaks of classified intelligence on U.S. strikes on Iran could be prosecuted.</p><p data-block-key=\"d03h3\">Following the airstrikes earlier in June, several news outlets — including <a href=\"https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/24/politics/intel-assessment-us-strikes-iran-nuclear-sites\">CNN</a>, <a href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/24/us/politics/iran-nuclear-sites.html\">The New York Times</a> and <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/06/24/us-iran-bomb-assessment-nuclear-sites-not-destroyed/\">The Washington Post</a> — reported that a preliminary assessment found that the bombings had set Iran’s nuclear program back by months, not “obliterated” it as Trump had been asserting.</p><p data-block-key=\"dt7k9\">Trump doubled down on the claim <a href=\"https://youtu.be/YdqKZDJQoDw\">during his interview</a> with Fox News host Maria Bartiromo on June 27, lamenting the coverage the strikes had received.</p><p data-block-key=\"bve19\">“They did obliterate it, it turned out. Then we had to suffer the fake news, where the fake news in CNN and The New York Times was saying, ‘Well, maybe it wasn’t as good as Trump said. Maybe it wasn’t totally obliterated, but it was destroyed,’” Trump said. “You know, just horrible. And I could see it happening and they tried to build that into a story.”</p><p data-block-key=\"avqub\">Trump added that those behind the leak should be prosecuted and, when asked whether his administration would be able to identify them, indicated that he has no issue forcing journalists to identify their sources.</p><p data-block-key=\"837as\">“We can find out. If they wanted, they could find out easily. You know, you go up and tell the reporter, ‘National security: Who gave it?’ You have to do that. And I suspect we’ll be doing things like that,” Trump said.</p><p data-block-key=\"4g10a\">White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt discredited CNN’s reporting on the assessment in a <a href=\"https://x.com/PressSec/status/1937599769544982577\">post on the social platform X</a>, writing “FAKE NEWS CNN STRIKES AGAIN.”</p><p data-block-key=\"c8s10\">“This alleged ‘assessment’ is flat-out wrong and was classified as ‘top secret’ but was still leaked to CNN by an anonymous, low-level loser in the intelligence community,” Leavitt continued.</p><p data-block-key=\"e5e4o\">In a <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/07/02/trump-journalists-source-leaked-iran-intelligence/\">statement to the Post</a>, Leavitt accused the newspaper of “helping people commit felonies by publishing out-of-context leaks.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9hfr8\">Trump’s <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_upper=2021-01-19&tags=Department+of+Justice&categories=Leak+Case\">administrations</a> have <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/tulsi-gabbard-targets-press-leakers-as-national-intelligence-director/#March%2014\">routinely</a> <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/pete-hegseth-targets-news-outlets-leakers-as-defense-secretary/\">sought</a> <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/kash-patel-targets-press-leakers-as-fbi-director/\">to punish</a> <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/kristi-noem-targets-press-leakers-as-homeland-security-secretary/\">leakers</a> and have <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/pam-bondi-targets-journalists-leakers-as-us-attorney-general/\">demonstrated</a> a <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/?date_upper=2021-01-19&tags=Department+of+Justice&categories=Subpoena%2FLegal+Order\">willingness</a> to disregard journalists’ First Amendment protections in order to do so.</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 3\" name=\"June 3\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"mev26\">June 3, 2025 | White House asks Congress to repeal $1.1 billion in funding to public media</h4><p data-block-key=\"1a7qc\">The Trump White House budget office asked Congress on June 3, 2025, to cancel $1.1 billion in funding already approved for public broadcasting, multiple media outlets reported.</p><p data-block-key=\"cmc15\">The request, <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/trump-administration-allies-move-to-punish-outlets-during-first-weeks-in-office/#April%2014\">drafted in April</a>, calls for the elimination of two years’ worth of funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which in turn partially funds NPR and PBS. Only a simple majority vote is needed to approve the request.</p><p data-block-key=\"7tu6a\">The Washington Post <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/06/03/trump-asks-congress-repeal-9-billion-npr-pbs-global-aid/\">reported</a> that Russell Vought, head of the Office of Management and Budget, proposed the cuts in a letter to Trump, writing, “federal spending on CPB subsidizes a public media system that is politically biased and is an unnecessary expense to the taxpayer.”</p><p data-block-key=\"fvecm\">Trump, individuals in his administration and allies in Congress have repeatedly targeted public broadcasters since his return to office in January.</p><p data-block-key=\"3j4la\">Trump <a href=\"https://x.com/RapidResponse47/status/1904610620659687944\">said</a> during a March 25 meeting with U.S. ambassadors that he would “love” to eliminate funding for the public broadcasters. In April, he <a href=\"https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114264549657133828\">called on Republicans in Congress</a> to defund and disassociate themselves from “THE RADICAL LEFT ‘MONSTERS’ THAT SO BADLY HURT OUR COUNTRY,” and the White House <a href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/articles/2025/04/the-npr-pbs-grift-has-ripped-us-off-for-too-long/\">asserted in an official statement</a> that NPR and PBS are publishing “trash” and have engaged in a “grift.”</p><p data-block-key=\"e3e7g\">In April, Trump attempted to illegally fire three CPB board members and just days later, on May 1, signed an executive order instructing the private nonprofit corporation to cease federal funding for the outlets.</p><p data-block-key=\"dve0t\">NPR <a href=\"https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/media/2025/05/27/npr-lawsuit-trump-executive-order-funding-cuts/\">sued</a> to halt the order, calling it “textbook retaliation.” NPR CEO Katherine Maher <a href=\"https://www.npr.org/2025/05/27/g-s1-69017/npr-and-katherine-maher-ceo-of-npr-statement\">wrote</a>, “The intent could not be more clear — the Executive Order aims to punish NPR for the content of news and other programming the President dislikes.”</p><p data-block-key=\"43olm\">Within Congress, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/rep-marjorie-taylor-greene-targets-press-as-doge-subcommittee-chair/\">has led a campaign</a> against the broadcasters and Rep. Ronny Jackson <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/rep-ronny-jackson-targets-press-as-member-of-congress/#March%2027\">introduced a bill</a> to eliminate all direct and indirect government funding for NPR and PBS.</p><p data-block-key=\"6dfi1\">In a <a href=\"https://www.npr.org/2025/04/15/nx-s1-5352827/npr-pbs-public-media-trump-rescission-funding\">statement</a> published when the draft recision request became public, NPR said eliminating funding for CPB would have a devastating impact on communities that rely on public broadcasting each day.</p><p data-block-key=\"7hho\">“We serve the public interest,” the outlet wrote. “It’s not just in our name — it’s our mission.”</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=\"May 1\" name=\"May 1\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"8udpj\">May 1, 2025 | Trump signs executive order eliminating funding to NPR, PBS</h4><p data-block-key=\"4s8m1\">President Donald Trump signed an <a href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/05/ending-taxpayer-subsidization-of-biased-media/\">executive order</a> on May 1, 2025, instructing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to cease federal funding for NPR and PBS, citing their alleged “biased and partisan news coverage.”</p><p data-block-key=\"3limi\">In a <a href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/articles/2025/05/president-trump-finally-ends-the-madness-of-npr-pbs/\">news release</a> the following day, the White House accused the news outlets of using “millions of dollars in taxpayer funds each year to spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as ‘news.’”</p><p data-block-key=\"a70ca\">Patricia Harrison, president and CEO of CPB, issued a <a href=\"https://cpb.org/pressroom/Corporation-Public-Broadcasting-Statement-Regarding-Executive-Order-Public-Media\">statement</a> pushing back against the executive order, citing provisions expressly forbidding government actors from attempting to direct the corporation’s work.</p><p data-block-key=\"d2077\">“CPB is not a federal executive agency subject to the President’s authority,” Harrison wrote. “Congress directly authorized and funded CPB to be a private nonprofit corporation wholly independent of the federal government.”</p><p data-block-key=\"eoev4\">Trump’s executive order came just days after he directed a staff member to email three of CPB’s five board members to alert them that they had been removed from their positions. The board as a whole and the targeted members — Diane Kaplan, Laura Ross and Thomas Rothman — <a href=\"https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.279991/gov.uscourts.dcd.279991.1.0.pdf\">sued</a> Trump on April 29, seeking a judicial declaration that the order is unenforceable, as the president has no power to remove them.</p><p data-block-key=\"edl4d\">“Put simply, Congress conceived CPB as a vehicle for infusing federal money into public broadcasting without the introduction of government direction or control,” the suit states. “Moreover, Congress protected the CPB from the executive branch by withholding from CPB any form, pure or quasi, of legislative, judicial, or regulatory power.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9mfat\">White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers dismissed CPB’s assertions in a <a href=\"https://www.npr.org/2025/04/29/nx-s1-5381045/cpb-board-members-trump-lawsuit-npr-pbs\">statement to NPR</a>. “As numerous courts have repeatedly affirmed, the Constitution gives President Trump the power to remove personnel who exercise his executive authority,” Rogers said. “The Trump Administration looks forward to ultimate victory on the issue.”</p><p data-block-key=\"73dcs\">District Judge Randolph Moss has <a href=\"https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69966304/corporation-for-public-broadcasting-v-trump/\">ordered</a> both sides to file arguments on CPB’s motion, which seeks a temporary restraining order to prevent Trump’s order from taking effect.</p><p data-block-key=\"aqc9u\">Trump’s executive order and attempt to remove CPB board members were the latest attacks on public broadcasting by his administration or allies in Congress. Earlier, the White House <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/trump-administration-allies-move-to-punish-outlets-during-first-weeks-in-office/#April%2014\">drafted a recision request</a> to revoke $1.1 billion in approved funding for the corporation, FCC Chair Brendan Carr <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/brendan-carr-targets-news-outlets-as-chair-of-the-fcc/#Jan%2029\">launched investigations</a> into PBS and NPR over their advertising and sponsorship practices, and Reps. <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/rep-ronny-jackson-targets-press-as-member-of-congress/#March%2027\">Ronny Jackson</a> and <a href=\"https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/rep-marjorie-taylor-greene-targets-press-as-doge-subcommittee-chair/\">Marjorie Taylor Greene</a> have demeaned the outlets and threatened their funding.</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=\"April 14\" name=\"April 14\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"qezxr\">April 14, 2025 | White House plans to formally ask Congress to cut PBS, NPR funding</h4><p data-block-key=\"bfp4o\">The Trump White House plans to formally ask Congress to cancel $1.1 billion in funding already approved for public broadcasting, multiple news outlets reported on April 14, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"94l7i\"><a href=\"https://www.npr.org/2025/04/15/nx-s1-5352827/npr-pbs-public-media-trump-rescission-funding\">According to NPR</a>, the White House has drafted a rescission request that calls for the elimination of two years’ worth of funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which in turn partially funds NPR and PBS.</p><p data-block-key=\"fnilc\">The administration intends to send it to Congress when lawmakers return from a two-week recess on April 28. Only a simple majority vote is needed to approve the request.</p><p data-block-key=\"2oum8\">In a <a href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/articles/2025/04/the-npr-pbs-grift-has-ripped-us-off-for-too-long/\">statement</a> published April 14, which did not mention the draft request, the White House asserted that NPR and PBS are publishing “trash” and have engaged in a “grift.”</p><p data-block-key=\"79mab\">“For years, American taxpayers have been on the hook for subsidizing National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), which spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as ‘news,’” the statement said. “As President Trump has stated, taxpayer funding of NPR’s and PBS’s biased content is a waste.”</p><p data-block-key=\"di1s6\">Trump <a href=\"https://x.com/RapidResponse47/status/1904610620659687944\">said</a> during a March 25 meeting with U.S. ambassadors that he would “love” to eliminate funding for the public broadcasters, and in an April 1 <a href=\"https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114264549657133828\">social media post</a> called on Republicans in Congress to “DEFUND AND TOTALLY DISASSOCIATE THEMSELVES FROM NPR & PBS, THE RADICAL LEFT ‘MONSTERS’ THAT SO BADLY HURT OUR COUNTRY.”</p><p data-block-key=\"a2fle\">In a statement published by NPR, the outlet said, “Eliminating funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting would have a devastating impact on American communities across the nation that rely on public radio for trusted local and national news, culture, lifesaving emergency alerts, and public safety information.</p><p data-block-key=\"2ri6t\">“We serve the public interest. It’s not just in our name — it’s our mission.”</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=\"March 14-2\" name=\"March 14-2\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"3ocum\">March 14, 2025 | Trump signs executive order gutting government-funded news outlets</h4><p data-block-key=\"8bsve\">In a late-night executive order, President Donald Trump eliminated all functions not required by law for the United States Agency for Global Media, along with a half-dozen other federal agencies, referring to them as “unnecessary governmental entities.”</p><p data-block-key=\"1cbav\">The USAGM oversees Voice of America and the office that manages Radio and TV Martí, as well as provides funding for private international broadcasters Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia and the Middle East Broadcasting Networks.</p><p data-block-key=\"2frfm\">Michael Abramowitz, director of Voice of America, confirmed in a March 15 <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/abramowitzmj/posts/pfbid02ocNQehfifbHeAAv5qDWW55BSkwEhB9L91UyxfsJBApKw38j2fzY4DdLkc7SorUJUl\">statement</a> on his personal Facebook page that he and nearly the entire staff of the news organization — more than 1,300 journalists, producers and support staff — had been suspended.</p><p data-block-key=\"fn0a6\">“I am deeply saddened that for the first time in 83 years, the storied Voice of America is being silenced,” Abramowitz wrote. “VOA needs thoughtful reform, and we have made progress in that regard. But today’s action will leave Voice of America unable to carry out its vital mission.”</p><p data-block-key=\"9ji7j\">No articles have been published on the VOA website since around 2 p.m. on March 15. The Independent <a href=\"https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-media-voice-america-bloody-saturday-b2716583.html\">reported</a> that by the following night, many of the employees placed on leave had been fired, including <a href=\"https://x.com/liamjscott/status/1901416015352811693\">press freedom reporter Liam Scott</a>.</p><p data-block-key=\"e5i1s\">NPR <a href=\"https://www.npr.org/2025/03/15/nx-s1-5329244/bloody-saturday-voiceofamerica-radio-free-asia-europe-trump-kari-lake\">reported</a> that USAGM also severed its contracts with the private international broadcasters it funds.</p><p data-block-key=\"8n9hf\">In a March 15 <a href=\"https://www.whitehouse.gov/articles/2025/03/the-voice-of-radical-america/\">news release</a>, the White House railed against “The Voice of Radical America,” and said Trump’s executive order “will ensure that taxpayers are no longer on the hook for radical propaganda.”</p><p data-block-key=\"4pou4\">Elon Musk, head of the new Department of Government Efficiency, had <a href=\"https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1888574212316582230?lang=en\">called</a> for the USAGM news outlets to be shut down in early February, writing, “It’s just radical left crazy people talking to themselves while torching $1B/year of US taxpayer money.”</p><p data-block-key=\"5f0g7\">Grant Turner, a former senior executive at USAGM, called the cuts “Bloody Saturday” and told NPR, “It took decades to build this goodwill and an audience of hundreds of millions every week. Seeing arsonists just set fire to it all is awful.”</p><p data-block-key=\"cmu5k\">Steve Capus, the president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, said in a statement shared with NPR, “The cancellation of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s grant agreement would be a massive gift to America’s enemies.”</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=\"March 14-1\" name=\"March 14-1\"></a></div>\n<div class=\"block-rich_text\"><h4 data-block-key=\"3ocum\">March 14, 2025 | Trump says negative press coverage ‘illegal’ during speech at DOJ</h4><p data-block-key=\"5mqt4\">President Donald Trump called the critical news coverage of his administration “illegal” and “corrupt” during a speech at the Department of Justice on March 14, 2025.</p><p data-block-key=\"5d8fd\">Amid his <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6i41Av4eYO8\">nearly hourlong remarks</a>, Trump said that many judges, including those on the Supreme Court, “take tremendous abuse” from news outlets, including The New York Times, The Washington Post and broadcast networks, likening the coverage to judicial interference. “It’s truly interference in my opinion and it should be illegal and it probably is illegal in some form,” Trump said.</p><p data-block-key=\"ecl8u\">He went on to claim that CNN and MSNBC are “political arms of the Democrat Party.”</p><p data-block-key=\"vpnv\">“These networks and these newspapers are really no different than a highly paid political operative and it has to stop, it has to be illegal,” Trump said.</p><p data-block-key=\"d5tm7\">As Trump decried his perceived enemies in the media, justice system and nonprofit sector, he advanced the DOJ as a tool to exact his personal vengeance. He asserted that he is the chief law enforcement officer — which The Associated Press <a href=\"https://apnews.com/article/trump-bondi-patel-justice-fbi-retribution-ec275e730c6e75f2d6ee29eeec30fa07\">reported</a> is technically Attorney General Pam Bondi — and as such will demand “full and complete accountability for the wrongs and abuses that have occurred.”</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/2025-03-15T003457Z_176944555_RC29.2e16d0ba.fill-1330x880.jpg",
"primary_video": null,
"image_caption": "<p data-block-key=\"7bspe\">President Donald Trump speaks to reporters before boarding Air Force One as he departs from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on March 14, 2025.</p>",
"arresting_authority": null,
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"Media",
"Middle East Broadcasting Networks",
"National Public Radio",
"PBS News",
"Radio Free Asia",
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"Radio y Televisión Martí",
"The New York Times",
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"tags": [
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{
"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": "",
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"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,
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"status_of_seized_equipment": null,
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{
"quantity": 1,
"equipment": "building"
}
],
"state": {
"name": "New York",
"abbreviation": "NY"
},
"updates": [],
"case_statuses": [],
"workers_whose_communications_were_obtained": [],
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"targeted_institutions": [
"The New York Times"
],
"tags": [
"Israel-Gaza war"
],
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"categories": [
"Equipment Damage"
],
"targeted_journalists": [],
"subpoena_statuses": null,
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}
]
