first_published_at,last_published_at,title,slug,latest_revision_created_at,charges,legal_orders,updates,categories,links,equipment_seized,equipment_broken,targeted_journalists,authors,date,exact_date_unknown,city,state,latitude,longitude,body,introduction,teaser,teaser_image,primary_video,image_caption,arrest_status,arresting_authority,release_date,detention_date,unnecessary_use_of_force,case_number,case_statuses,case_type,status_of_seized_equipment,is_search_warrant_obtained,actor,border_point,target_us_citizenship_status,denial_of_entry,stopped_previously,did_authorities_ask_for_device_access,did_authorities_ask_about_work,assailant,was_journalist_targeted,charged_under_espionage_act,subpoena_type,subpoena_statuses,name_of_business,third_party_business,legal_order_target,legal_order_type,legal_order_venue,status_of_prior_restraint,mistakenly_released_materials,type_of_denial,targeted_institutions,tags,target_nationality,workers_whose_communications_were_obtained,politicians_or_public_figures_involved 2024-01-31 16:54:41.617437+00:00,2024-03-01 19:30:53.875825+00:00,Judge orders Oregonian to destroy Nike lawsuit documents,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/judge-orders-oregonian-to-destroy-nike-lawsuit-documents/,2024-03-01 19:30:53.780275+00:00,,,(2024-02-28 00:00:00+00:00) Judge allows Oregonian to keep Nike lawsuit documents,Prior Restraint,,,,,,2024-01-26,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"
A federal judge ordered The Oregonian on Jan. 26, 2024, to return documents related to a gender discrimination lawsuit against Nike and destroy any copies, after the plaintiff’s lawyer inadvertently sent them to a reporter on Jan. 19.
Judge Jolie A. Russo said in her order that the Portland, Oregon-based daily newspaper must agree “not to disseminate that information in any way; and to destroy any copies in its possession” by Jan. 31.
That publishing gag was vacated, or withdrawn, on Jan. 30 by another judge, who ruled that Russo must hold a hearing to allow The Oregonian to make arguments against the order before reviewing the issue again. The paper, in a Jan. 29 appeal, had argued that Russo did not allow the news organization to be heard in court, which it called a “quintessential due process violation.”
Russo held a hearing Jan. 30 and ordered the plaintiff’s attorneys to respond by Feb. 6 to arguments made by The Oregonian in its appeal.
“Prior restraint by government goes against every principle of the free press in this country,” Therese Bottomly, editor and vice president of content for The Oregonian, said in a statement emailed to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. “This is highly unusual, and we will defend our First Amendment rights in court.”
In its Jan. 29 appeal, The Oregonian argued that because it is a “non-party intervener” and has no stake in the outcome of the lawsuit, it is not subject to a protective order covering the documents.
“The Documents contain no national security implications, there is no risk of bodily harm or safety to any individual, and there are no competing constitutional rights at play—The Oregonian is the only one whose constitutional rights are on the line,” the filing read.
The Oregonian was writing an article, based on its independent reporting, about a culture of sexual harassment at Nike, when the attorney for the plaintiffs in the suit accidentally shared the documents in an email attachment.
The judge said the documents were subject to the case’s protective order, which makes them unviewable to the public. Other documents have been unsealed after a coalition of news outlets, including The Oregonian, filed a motion in court in April 2022.
A judge ordered The Oregonian to destroy documents about a gender discrimination lawsuit against Nike that were inadvertently released to the news outlet. The publishing gag, or prior restraint, has been withdrawn until another hearing can be held.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,struck down,True,[],The Oregonian,,,, 2022-08-01 20:02:20.219023+00:00,2023-09-29 13:39:49.447627+00:00,Photojournalist assaulted while reporting at Portland park,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-assaulted-while-reporting-at-portland-park/,2023-09-29 13:25:50.103509+00:00,,,"(2023-01-25 00:00:00+00:00) Photojournalist gets apology from assailant, drops assault charges",Assault,,,,Unidentified photojournalist 25 (KGW),,2022-07-25,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"An unidentified photojournalist with KGW News was assaulted while on assignment in Lents Park in Portland, Oregon, on July 25, 2022.
The station reported that the photographer was covering an community outreach event hosted by the group PDX Saints Love, which was providing a cooling station and water from July 25 to 29 amid a heatwave in the region.
Right now @pdxsaintslove and Portland Street Response are at Lents Park in SE Portland until 7pm. The plan is to hand out water/electrolytes/food and provide a cool spot every day this week from 11am-7pm. Organizers say they need more volunteers and always welcome ice donations. pic.twitter.com/C39pUVVKvy
— Christine Pitawanich (@CPitawanichKGW) July 25, 2022
According to the station, the photojournalist was finishing filming and was holding his camera by his side when one of the individuals attending the event became agitated and charged at him. The man jumped over a picnic table and chased the photojournalist toward his station vehicle, punching him before he was able to get into the car.
Though the photojournalist was able to enter the vehicle, KGW reported that the man opened the door before the journalist could lock it and punched him again. The event organizers then told the man to leave and he walked away.
The station reported that the unidentified photojournalist suffered several cuts and a bruised eye and received treatment by medics at the scene.
A second KGW journalist at the scene, not named in the report, called 911 and told officers which direction the suspect had fled. Portland Police Bureau officers found the man nearby a short while later and placed him under arrest. Joshua David Sears was arrested and charged with misdemeanor assault, which is punishable by a fine of up to $6,250, a year in jail or both.
In a statement to the outlet, KGW News Director Greg Retsinas said: “We are distressed at this unprovoked act of violence against our employees who were working to tell a positive story in the community. Thankfully, community members at the scene stepped in right away to assist and prevent more serious injury.”
Neither Retsinas or KGW reporter Christine Pitawanich, who tweeted about the event, responded to requests for comment.
Independent video journalist Mason Lake confirmed to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was assaulted by a group of individuals on June 24, 2022, in Portland, Oregon, while covering demonstrations in response to the U.S. Supreme Court decision that overturned the landmark case of Roe v. Wade.
Lake told the Tracker that he was livestreaming the speeches and capturing video of more than a thousand people marching toward downtown Portland when individuals assaulted him for reporting during the event.
“I went out there to stream the event because, sadly, there hasn’t been a lot of coverage in Portland because of all the hate that the press has gotten here lately,” Lake said.
Lake said he was wearing a vest labeled “press” on the front and back for the duration of the demonstration. He identified the individuals as being in black bloc, a technique of dressing in all black to avoid identification.
Lake said individuals came up behind him before shoving him and knocking his phone, which he was using to stream the event, out of his hand. He said his phone was not damaged but he lost a stylus and a phone case that were attached to it.
In Portland, OR over 1000 people gathered for speeches & to march in protest of the SCOTUS overturning Roe v Wade. Live stream link https://t.co/DrxR7Sj9Kx
— Mason Lake Media (@MasonLakePhoto) June 25, 2022
Cuts at the end when I am assulted by bloc for reporting. Another civil right but that one they don't care about.#RoeVsWade pic.twitter.com/lV6q2WPnQv
After he picked up his phone, Lake said one of the individuals grabbed him by the vest and forced him to leave the event.
“Everyone should have the right to be at these events, especially when it's in the middle of the city,” Lake said. “I take real issue with this and I know there’s a real danger in doing this but that’s why I keep coming out.”
Find press freedom violations documented by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker at reproductive rights demonstrations across the U.S. here.
Editor’s Note: This article has been updated with comment from Mason Lake.
At least two members of a KATU News crew were assaulted by a group of individuals while covering unrest in Portland, Oregon, following a high-profile jury verdict in Wisconsin on Nov. 19, 2021.
Protests began after a jury acquitted 18-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse of first-degree intentional homicide and four other felony charges for killing two men and wounding a third in Kenosha in August 2020. At that time, the city was the site of heightened Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests after a white police officer shot Jacob Blake, a Black resident, during a summer of ongoing civil unrest that followed the death of George Floyd, a Black man, at the hands of a white police officer in Minnesota in May. In 2020, Downtown Portland saw more than 100 straight days of protests, many centered around the Multnomah County Justice Center.
Protests were centered again around the justice center on Nov. 19. In a video published by KATU, an individual in black bloc — a technique of dressing in all black to avoid identification — can be seen crossing the street to where the news crew is standing and asks what the crew is filming. “The protest,” one of the journalists responds. The individual then asks why, to which the journalist responds, “To send a message for you.”
“You’re not trying to send our message,” the individual says. “You’re not here trying to get our message.”
During the interaction, approximately six other people approach the news crew, which begins to move down the street away from the protest. An individual appears to reach out and grab the journalist who was answering the questions, but a voice can be heard saying, “Let them walk.” At some point during the interaction, a smoke bomb appears to be activated in the center of the group.
Multiple individuals continued to walk alongside the crew, with one wrapping his arm around the first journalist, when a voice calls out “Stop filming,” to which a second person responds, “Yeah, we’re going to turn that camera off right now. We’re advising you to turn that camera off right now. Turn that fucking camera off right fucking now!”
As the camera operator attempts to continue walking away, another individual runs up to him screaming that he will break the camera. In the ensuing scuffle, there is an audible crack of something breaking.
KATU reported that the news crew was uninjured but the camera was damaged. Neither the station’s news director nor general manager could immediately be reached for comment. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker also documented the assault of one KATU photojournalist and damage to their equipment here.
The following day, Portland City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty released a statement upholding the right of the press to film and condemning the attack on the KATU news crew:
"I’m still learning the full details of what occurred last night but want to make it clear that attacking or intimidating the press is never acceptable, such as what happened to a KATU crew last night."
In 2020, the Tracker documented seven assaults of journalists covering protests surrounding the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha. Find documented aggressions against journalists following the November 2021 Rittenhouse verdict here and at Black Lives Matter protests here.
Individuals approach a KATU camera operator demanding that he stop filming during a protest in Portland, Oregon, that followed the high-profile acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse in Wisconsin on Nov. 19, 2021.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,private individual,None,None,False,False,None,None,private individual,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"court verdict, protest",,, 2021-11-22 02:34:25.452322+00:00,2023-10-12 19:32:54.937680+00:00,"KATU journalist assaulted, crew harassed in Portland protest",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/katu-journalist-assaulted-crew-harassed-in-portland-protest/,2023-10-12 19:32:54.821660+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Unidentified journalist 4 (KATU),,2021-11-19,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"A KATU News crew was assaulted by a group of individuals while covering unrest in Portland, Oregon, following a high-profile jury verdict in Wisconsin on Nov. 19, 2021.
Protests began after a Kenosha jury acquitted 18-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse of first-degree intentional homicide and four other felony charges for killing two men and wounding a third in August 2020. At that time, the city was the site of heightened Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests after a white police officer shot Jacob Blake, a Black resident, during a summer of ongoing civil unrest that followed the death of George Floyd, a Black man, at the hands of a white police officer in Minnesota in May. In 2020, Downtown Portland saw more than 100 straight days of protests, many centered around the Multnomah County Justice Center.
On Nov. 19, 2021, protests were centered again around the justice center. In a video published by KATU, an individual in black bloc — a tactic of dressing in all black to avoid identification — crosses the street to where the news crew is standing and asks, “What are you guys filming right now?” “The protest,” one of the journalists responds. The individual then asks why, to which the journalist responds, “To send a message for you.”
During the interaction, approximately six other people approach the news crew, which begins to move down the street away from the protest. An individual appears to reach out and grab the journalist who was answering the questions, but a voice can be heard saying, “Let them walk.” At some point during the interaction, a smoke bomb appears to be activated in the center of the group.
Multiple individuals continued to walk alongside the crew, with one wrapping his arm around the first journalist, when a voice calls out “Stop filming,” to which a second person responds, “Yeah, we’re going to turn that camera off right now. We’re advising you to turn that camera off right now. Turn that fucking camera off right fucking now!”
As the camera operator attempts to continue walking away, another individual runs up to him screaming that he will break the camera. In the ensuing scuffle, there is an audible crack of something breaking.
KATU reported that the news crew was uninjured but the camera was damaged. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented the assault of the camera operator and the equipment here. Neither the station’s news director nor general manager could immediately be reached for comment.
The following day, Portland City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty released a statement upholding the right of the press to film and condemning the attack on the KATU news crew:
"I’m still learning the full details of what occurred last night but want to make it clear that attacking or intimidating the press is never acceptable, such as what happened to a KATU crew last night."
In 2020, the Tracker documented seven assaults of journalists covering protests surrounding the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha. Find documented aggressions against journalists following the November 2021 Rittenhouse verdict here and at Black Lives Matter protests here.
An individual dressed in black appears to detonate a smoke bomb after confronting a KATU news crew that was documenting protests in Portland, Oregon, following the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse in Wisconsin on Nov. 19, 2021.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,private individual,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"court verdict, protest",,, 2021-11-23 16:20:46.811569+00:00,2024-02-29 19:18:17.697466+00:00,Multimedia journalist pushed by police officer while covering riot in Portland,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/multimedia-journalist-pushed-by-police-officer-while-covering-riot-in-portland/,2024-02-29 19:18:17.612154+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Grace Morgan (Independent),,2021-11-19,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent multimedia journalist Grace Morgan said that she was shoved by law enforcement officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, following the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse on Nov. 19, 2021.
National protests began after a jury acquitted 18-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse of first-degree intentional homicide and four other felony charges for killing two men and injuring a third in Kenosha, Wisconsin in August 2020.
At the time, Kenosha was the site of ongoing Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests after a white police officer shot Jacob Blake, a Black resident, nearly three months after George Floyd, a Black man, died at the hands of a white police officer in Minnesota in May.
According to The Associated Press, about 200 protesters gathered in Downtown Portland, near the Multnomah County Justice Center, and blocked streets, broke windows and damaged doors of city facilities. Portland police later tweeted that objects had been thrown at officers and the demonstrations declared a riot.
Press Release: Riot Declared After Violent, Destructive Crowd Gathers Downtown (Photo)
— Portland Police (@PortlandPolice) November 20, 2021
Link: https://t.co/BQKwWdoDyF pic.twitter.com/Fq0KxV0VUQ
Morgan, who was documenting the demonstrations, filmed a group of individuals confronting armed law enforcement officers in a parking garage. She told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker she was walking on the sidewalk when a Portland police officer pushed her with with the body of his long form gun and told her to “get on the fucking sidewalk.”
The garage doors keep dramatically opening and closing leading to bouts of short rushes and lots of yelling - an officer shoves me with his gun and tells me to “get on the fucking sidewalk”, while I am indeed on the sidewalk, and pushes me more so towards it. pic.twitter.com/glRPcYgsQL
— Grace Morgan (@gravemorgan) November 20, 2021
“He came running out of a parking garage and turned the corner, and sort of ran into me,” Morgan said. “I immediately put my hands up and said very loudly ‘I’m press, I’m press!’ and that’s when he shoved me backwards with his gun.”
Morgan also said she was wearing a ballistic vest with “PRESS” clearly displayed on the front along with a reflective press badge and several other press credentials on a belt loop when the incident occured.
In 2020, the Tracker documented seven assaults of journalists covering protests surrounding the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha. Find documented aggressions against journalists following the November 2021 Rittenhouse verdict here and at Black Lives Matter protests here.
Freelance journalist Sergio Olmos said he was subjected to secondary screening and questioning about his journalistic credentials while re-entering the United States in Portland, Oregon, on Oct. 18, 2021.
Olmos, who did not respond to a request for comment, wrote on Twitter shortly after 7 p.m. that he “went through an extended security check” by U.S. Customs and Border Protection after landing at Portland International Airport.
Just went through an extended security check at CBP at PDX where the officer asked, with notepad in hand, where I went to journalism school.
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) October 19, 2021
I said it was none of his business, and so out came my underwear from my backpack.
“The officer asked, with notepad in hand, where I went to journalism school,” Olmos wrote. “I said it was none of his business, and so out came my underwear from my backpack.”
In a subsequent tweet, Olmos said a CBP officer searched his bag for approximately an hour with a supervisor watching, and refused to provide Olmos his name when asked. It was not immediately clear from Olmos’s posts whether he plans to file a complaint with the CBP Office of Internal Affairs.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker has documented nearly 50 instances of journalists stopped at the border for secondary screening, asked intrusive questions about their work or been subjected to searches or seizures of their electronic devices. Find all instances of border stops here.
Reporters Katherine Revello of The Maine Wire and Evan Popp of the Beacon were barred from Maine’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly livestreams after the agency changed its media policy on Aug. 25, 2021, to exclude those it deemed to be “advocacy journalists.”
The agency reversed the policy on Oct. 6. Earlier that day, the Maine Policy Institute, a policy and lobbying organization and parent company to The Maine Wire, had publicized the initial policy change in a series of tweets.
1/4 @MEPublicHealth is not allowing our journalist at @TheMaineWire to participate in Maine CDC press briefings because the agency "can no longer accommodate 'advocacy journalists'".
— Maine Policy Institute (@MainePolicy) October 6, 2021
First off, @polisciwrites is not an advocacy journalist. Second, how does a govt agency determine
Lauren McCauley, editor of the Maine People’s Alliance-affiliated Beacon, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that Popp was notified by email on Aug. 25 that he could no longer attend the weekly news briefings.
In that email, CDC Communications Director Robert Long wrote that the agency could “no longer accommodate advocacy journalists,” and asked that any questions be directed to him.
Long did not respond to the Tracker’s requests for comment.
McCauley told the Tracker that Long later explained the change in policy during a phone call, saying it was done because the briefings had gotten too long and the agency needed to “preserve the CDC director’s time.”
According to McCauley, Beacon reporters had regularly attended the briefing without issues throughout the spring and summer.
McCauley told Maine’s Bangor Daily News that the decision to exclude Beacon reporters, “harms the public interest and is especially damaging for folks who too often are left out of the conversation already.”
Jacob Posik, the editor of The Maine Wire, said Revello was hired in late May as a news reporter to cover the regular briefings and had attended one held on July 28 after requesting a link from the Maine CDC to attend.
The once-daily briefings were halted by the agency during the summer as cases decreased, but weekly briefings began in early September as the Delta variant spread throughout the state, Posik told the Tracker.
But, according to Posik, The Maine Wire had stopped receiving media advisories about the briefings in early September.
Posik said the outlet has been highly critical of the state’s CDC data in their reporting of the pandemic and believes that the policy changed only after the outlet asked to attend the news briefings.
“Once we hired a full time news reporter to hold the administration accountable, they kicked us out and called us advocacy journalists,” he said.
Posik said that he contacted CDC communications director Long in September after not receiving an invitation to attend two consecutive briefings. After almost three weeks of messaging and calling state officials, Posik said he got an answer to his original inquiry from Long on Oct. 6 that stated “We are no longer able to accommodate advocacy journalists during the media briefings.”
“I responded to him by saying ‘Respectfully, that’s not how the First Amendment works — please show me a copy of the policy that you’re using to bar the attendance of my journalist to these briefings,’” Posik said.
Posik has filed Freedom Of Access Act requests for a copy of the state CDC’s media policy and for the agency’s internal emails and messages that could explain the policy change but said he has not yet received any documents.
During the Oct. 6 briefing, a reporter attending the livestream asked Maine’s Health asked Commissioner Jeanne Lambrew and CDC Director Dr. Nirav Shah how the CDC determines which outlets are allowed to ask questions during the briefings and how the policy agrees with the First Amendment.
Both Lambrew and Shah defended the agency’s policy to restrict the briefings by saying they were reserved for officials to “answer questions in the space of an hour from a set of credentialed reporters.”
McCauley and Posik confirmed to the Tracker that following the Oct. 6 briefing the agency sent an email to the outlets reinviting them to attend future briefings.
Freelance journalist Shane Burley was shot with an airsoft gun projectile while on assignment for digital outlet Truthout documenting clashes between right- and left-wing protesters in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 22, 2021.
Far-right demonstrators had planned for the “summer of love” protest in support of the “political prisoners” of the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection to take place downtown, The Intercept reported, but had moved the location that morning to an abandoned Kmart parking lot in east Portland following the announcement of several counterprotests.
The Portland Police Bureau announced ahead of the dueling demonstrations that officers would not intervene in any resulting clashes.
“You should not expect to see police officers standing in the middle of the crowd trying to keep people apart,” Chief Chuck Lovell said in a statement. “People should keep themselves apart and avoid physical confrontation.”
Burley told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he started the day covering the antifa counterprotest in downtown Portland, where approximately 200 young people in black bloc had gathered. When some in the crowd began talking about making their way to the far-right demonstration in the neighborhood of Parkrose, Burley said he drove over as well.
“I pull up into the parking lot on the south side and can see that [the Proud Boys] are mostly in front of the Kmart on the north side,” Burley said. “So I stop, I see KGW — which is an NBC affiliate — and I stop and I say, ‘Hey, I’m a reporter on assignment. What’s the safe way to go in here?’ And they’re like, ‘There is no safe way. They just flipped a van over there.’”
Burley said he parked at a Wendy’s across the street and then ran over to begin documenting the demonstration.
“Within a few minutes of being there, a couple of activist people came up behind me and they were shouting or something and then people started shooting what I think is paintballs,” Burley said. “I’m holding a bulletproof helmet, so I just put that in front of my face but I get hit five or six times.”
Shortly after 5 p.m. Burley posted a clip to Twitter of the incident, which begins with him swearing as he is struck.
I got hit with a paintball. They are shooting paintballs and pepper spray at press and demonstrators. pic.twitter.com/CgFYB5otcO
— Shane Burley (@shane_burley1) August 23, 2021
In another tweet, Burley clarified that he was not sure what type of projectile had struck him, but may have been a rubber ball fired from a paintball gun. He retweeted a video posted by Portland Tribune reporter Zane Sparling showing someone in fatigues firing a paintball gun at people off-screen.
“I was hit by this, they were aiming them at protesters and next at press. I clearly had a press badge on, as did all the press shot,” Burley wrote. The Tracker was not able to confirm whether other journalists were struck during the demonstration.
Burley told the Tracker he felt deliberately targeted because in addition to his press badge, the helmet he held in front of his face was labeled “PRESS” and he shouted out that he was press before and while he was being shot.
“There’s no way that he didn’t think that I was press, plus it was a press group that they opened fire on,” Burley said. “None of this was justifiable.”
Burley said he has not filed a police report about the incident.
Independent journalist Maranie Staab was assaulted multiple times and several pieces of her equipment were damaged while she was covering clashing demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 22, 2021.
Far-right demonstrators had planned for the “summer of love” protest in support of the “political prisoners” of the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection to take place downtown, The Intercept reported, but had moved the location that morning to an abandoned Kmart parking lot in east Portland following the announcement of several counterprotests.
The Portland Police Bureau announced ahead of the dueling demonstrations that officers would not intervene in any resulting clashes.
“You should not expect to see police officers standing in the middle of the crowd trying to keep people apart,” Chief Chuck Lovell said in a statement. “People should keep themselves apart and avoid physical confrontation.”
Staab told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker she was covering the planned demonstration for the Russian video news agency Ruptly and had arrived at the demonstration before its 2:30 p.m. start. Staab said that approximately 200 demonstrators had gathered, and the general mood was calm as the crowd listened to speeches from a platform.
At around 4 p.m., Staab said, tensions rose when left-wing counterprotesters in black bloc arrived; far-right demonstrators began firing airsoft guns and antifascists responded with fireworks and clouds of mace.
Staab told the Tracker that when both sides fell back, many of the journalists present found themselves in the middle of a no-man’s land between the two groups.
“I was first sprayed with something from behind — I didn’t see the person so I only saw it in a video — with what I thought was WD-40,” Staab said, referring to a rust-prevention spray. “It definitely wasn’t mace. Someone else said it was hornet spray or wasp spray or something.”
Footage of the incident shows an individual quickly running past her and deliberately targeting her with the spray.
Not long after the initial attack, Staab said, an antifa protester approached her and began belittling her personally, accusing her of endangering the community with her recent trip to Colombia and calling her a “slut.”
“That group has never liked being documented. There’s been 10 to 15 that have been on the ground pretty consistently for the past year,” Staab said. “There are people that take particular issue with me.”
Antifascists threatened to "smash cameras" of journalists, and targeted @MaranieRae personally.
— Ford Fischer (@FordFischer) August 23, 2021
She approached to speak to their group, and they shot paint and mace at her and threw her on the ground.
As she recovered, one shot more paint at both her and press helping her. pic.twitter.com/XKgDxvFc5D
Staab said the demonstrator told her to stop filming the group, but she refused.
“Pretty immediately someone grabbed my cellphone out of my hand — it was on a little, small gimbal — threw it on the ground and smashed it,” Staab said. “Then someone pulled me down by my camera strap, which was on my right arm.”
Staab said when she tried to get up, individuals also threw a paint-filled balloon at her and maced her. Several other journalists then led Staab away from the counterprotesters and aided her in rinsing her eyes.
“It is only because of my colleagues that I got out of there OK,” Staab said.
Journalist @MaranieRae has been injured, receiving treatment from medics now during street clashes between Proud Boys and Antifa in Portland. pic.twitter.com/RjBK5rP4YX
— Zane Sparling (@PDXzane) August 22, 2021
Footage captured by News2Share co-founder Ford Fischer shows that while the journalists were helping Staab, another individual approached the group of journalists and sprayed them with purple paint. Some of the paint obscured Fischer’s lens, hindering his ability to continue covering events that day. The Tracker has documented his equipment damage here.
In Fischer’s footage, Staab’s press credential can be seen on a lanyard around her neck. Staab told the Tracker she sat on a curb for at least an hour to an hour and a half recovering from the mace before she was able to safely leave the area and return home.
In addition to the deliberate damage to her cellphone, Staab said the gimbal it was on is gone, her fall caused a crack in her camera lens and her Canon DSLR body was damaged by the paint balloon.
“This rounded out a year for me and others where we’ve been assaulted by the police, by persons on the right and now this,” Staab said. “To me this is really just an underscore of how dangerous this job has become.”
Staab told the Tracker she doesn’t intend to file a police report about the incidents.
A demonstrator sprayed the camera of Ford Fischer, co-founder and editor-in-chief of News2Share, with paint while he was documenting demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 22, 2021.
Far-right demonstrators had planned for the “summer of love” protest in support of the “political prisoners” of the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection to take place downtown, The Intercept reported, but had moved the location that morning to an abandoned Kmart parking lot in east Portland following the announcement of several counterprotests.
The Portland Police Bureau announced ahead of the dueling demonstrations that officers would not intervene in any resulting clashes.
“You should not expect to see police officers standing in the middle of the crowd trying to keep people apart,” Chief Chuck Lovell said in a statement. “People should keep themselves apart and avoid physical confrontation.”
Fischer told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that far-right demonstrators had gathered and started drinking beer in the parking lot, with speeches beginning at approximately 2:30 p.m. After an hour and a half, Fischer said, tensions rose and conflicts began breaking out when some counterprotesters in black bloc arrived at the Kmart.
“Very suddenly everything changed tone,” Fischer said. “You had Proud Boys who were beginning to shoot paintballs and so forth at these antifascists, who were shooting mace and fireworks.”
At approximately 4:10 p.m., according to Fischer’s livestream, one of the counterprotesters approached independent journalist Maranie Rae Staab and began shouting at her. When Staab attempted to speak with the counterprotester, another protester grabbed and destroyed her phone while others threw her to the ground, maced and struck her with a paint balloon.
“We, the rest of the media, sort of pulled her away from them,” Fischer said. “As she was recovering, one person in black bloc approached and sprayed all of the press with paint again.”
Fischer said it appeared that the individual was using a fire extinguisher filled with paint, adapting what he said was a common leftist tactic of using paint balloons to mark “combatants” or damage electronic devices.
Antifascists threatened to "smash cameras" of journalists, and targeted @MaranieRae personally.
— Ford Fischer (@FordFischer) August 23, 2021
She approached to speak to their group, and they shot paint and mace at her and threw her on the ground.
As she recovered, one shot more paint at both her and press helping her. pic.twitter.com/XKgDxvFc5D
Fischer told the Tracker that his 4K video camera was caught in the paint spray, covering the lens with drops of paint that hindered the auto-focus and disrupted his coverage of the clashes.
“The end result is that a lot of the footage that came since then was blurry and obscured by paint,” Fischer said. “It was not long after that assault that the Proud Boys piled on this individual who appeared to be a leftist in a vehicle transporting water bottles.
“While there was a lot of incredible photography of that incident, I think that my video is probably still the best recording of that and frankly it’s quite impeded, it’s probably not as decisive or clear as to who did what as it would have been if that hadn’t happened.”
Fischer said that while he was able to clean most of the paint off the lens, there is still paint in the mechanisms on the side of the camera and he will need to have it professionally cleaned.
Fischer told the Tracker he has not filed a police report about the incident.
While documenting opposing demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, a demonstrator sprayed the camera of Ford Fisher, co-founder and editor-in-chief of News2Share, disrupting his ability to cover the clashes.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,private individual,None,None,False,False,None,None,private individual,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Donald Trump, election, Election 2020, protest",,, 2021-08-24 20:19:11.740579+00:00,2023-10-04 13:36:20.906228+00:00,Photojournalist aimed at with realistic AR-15 style airsoft gun in Portland,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalist-aimed-at-with-realistic-ar-15-style-airsoft-gun-in-portland/,2023-10-04 13:36:20.670356+00:00,,,(2021-09-23 00:00:00+00:00) Man convicted of menacing after pointing gun at journalist,Assault,,,,Justin Yau (Freelance),,2021-08-08,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"A man walking around downtown Portland, Oregon, aimed an airsoft gun modeled on an AR-15 rifle at freelance photojournalist Justin Yau on Aug. 8, 2021. The man was later arrested on charges of menacing and disorderly conduct, local NBC affiliate KGW reported.
According to KGW, right- and left-wing demonstrators had clashed earlier that day at a religious gathering in Tom McCall Waterfront Park led by a Christian musician known for his opposition to COVID-19 restrictions. The groups, which had also clashed the previous night, had brawled and used various weapons, including bear spray, airsoft guns and paintball guns, The Oregonian reported.
At about 11 p.m., several journalists including Yau and freelance journalists Nathan Howard and Sergio Olmos photographed a man walking through downtown with what they described as an AR-15 rifle. In footage captured by Olmos, the individual can be seen aiming the weapon directly at Yau as he continues to photograph the encounter. Yau did not respond to messages requesting comment.
A far-right extremist points his rifle at @wweek journalist Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) during a confrontation between anti-fascists and right-wing militia in Portland, Oregon on Sunday Aug. 8, 2021.
— Nathan Howard (@SmileItsNathan) August 9, 2021
For @GettyImages pic.twitter.com/IgMeGEzBra
According to The Oregonian, the man, identified as Mark Lee, called 911 claiming several people were following him and was told to walk to a nearby police precinct. Lee left the station that night, but police launched an investigation into the incident that ultimately led to Lee’s arrest on Aug. 12 on three counts of menacing and one count of second-degree disorderly conduct.
Police confirmed that Lee’s weapon was an airsoft gun, a sports gun designed to shoot plastic projectiles. The weapon was seized, along with a military-style tactical vest, gas mask and seven knives, KGW reported.
Independent video journalist Mason Lake said a Portland police officer shoved him with a baton and damaged his on-camera microphone while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on June 25, 2021.
According to The Oregonian, protesters gathered near the Oregon Convention Center after a Portland police officer shot and killed a man outside a Motel 6. Some demonstrators shouted for officers to quit their jobs, while officers stood facing the protesters with shields and batons. The Portland Police Bureau on Twitter said officers throughout the city responded to help with “scene security.” A few days earlier on June 16, all of the officers with the Portland Police Bureau's Rapid Response Team resigned together following news of investigations for excessive force, according to Oregon Public Broadcasting.
“The PPB maced & fired 40mm rounds into a crowd of protestors gathered on NE Grand Ave,” Lake wrote on Twitter at 12:04 p.m. on June 25, alongside a video of officers shoving and spraying demonstrators. At the 19-second mark, it appears that an officer physically knocked the camera, cutting the audio for the rest of the clip.
“I was on the front line and I was nearly bear-maced before being physically shoved by & officer with a baton,” Lake wrote the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker in a text message. “He hit/shoved me marking my neck & hitting my on-camera microphone damaging it.” He also tweeted a photograph of his neck with a red mark across the middle and said he had multiple “press” markings across his clothes and helmet, as well as a National Press Photographers Association badge on his front strap.
A PPB officer hit/shoved me with a baton, marking the skin on my neck & damaged my on-camera microphone while I was filming them push/mace the crowd of protestors gathered tonight by the Portland Convention Center after a shooting report. #portland #police #assault #press pic.twitter.com/rDlWYPiYSl
— Mason Lake Media (@MasonLakePhoto) June 25, 2021
“The officer issued no orders for press to move or go to designated area,” he added.
PPB didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment.
A group of police officers surround demonstrators during a protest on Oct. 1, 2020, in Portland, Oregon. Journalist Mason Lake was shoved by police and had equipment damaged while documenting protests there in June 2021.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:23-cv-01870,['ONGOING'],Civil,None,False,law enforcement,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,unknown,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,protest,,, 2021-06-15 16:27:47.567829+00:00,2023-08-31 20:57:50.251705+00:00,Independent journalist assaulted while covering Portland protest,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-journalist-assaulted-while-covering-portland-protest/,2023-08-31 20:57:50.138363+00:00,,,"(2023-08-21 16:34:00+00:00) Writer awarded $300,000 in lawsuit alleging assault, intimidation campaign",Assault,,,,Andy Ngo (Independent),,2021-05-28,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Andy Ngo, who identifies as an independent journalist and photographer and is an editor-at-large for the conservative news site The Post Millennial, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was assaulted while observing a protest in Portland, Oregon, on May 28, 2021.
Ngo is an out-spoken critic of antifa and has covered antifa demonstrations and protests since 2016, primarily publishing the videos taken on his GoPro to Twitter and YouTube. Ngo told the Tracker he does not wear press identification or badges while covering protests, and on the day of the assault was deliberately wearing clothing and ski goggles that would obscure his identity, citing his infamy in Portland’s “antifa community.”
Protesters had gathered in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center in downtown Portland on May 28 shortly before 9 p.m. to mark the one-year anniversary of racial justice protests in Portland, The Oregonian reported.
Shortly before midnight, Ngo said, an individual at the demonstration approached him and began asking him questions. When he did not respond and walked approximately a block away, Ngo said, multiple others again approached and questioned him, including asking why he looked so nervous. One of the individuals then pulled off his goggles and mask, revealing his identity.
Ngo said he attempted to leave, but some of the individuals chased him, knocked him to the ground and punched him repeatedly. Ngo said he then took refuge in The Nines, a nearby hotel. The crowd attempted to follow Ngo into the hotel, Willamette Week reported, and pulled on the front doors shouting, “You wanna kill us? You wanna kill us, Andy?”
In his statement on Twitter, Ngo wrote, “No journalist in America should ever face violence for doing his or her job. Yet on Friday, May 28, Antifa tried to kill me again while I was reporting on the ongoing protests and riots in Portland, Ore. for a new chapter of my book.”
Ngo wrote that a medic from Portland Fire and Rescue escorted him through a back entrance of the hotel to an ambulance. He was then taken to a hospital, where he was treated for multiple injuries; Ngo told the Tracker he received injuries to his left leg, right hand, hip and a burst blood vessel in his eye. Ngo said he has a follow up appointment to check whether a bone in his wrist was fractured. He said he filed a police report about the incident.
The Portland Police Bureau told the Tracker via email that the department does not release information about crime victims, and did not respond to a request for an update on the status of the case.
A 2019 Vox explainer article outlines the history between Ngo, The Proud Boys and antifa, and how Ngo is considered by some to be more of a provocateur than journalist. Ngo has faced significant criticism from activists over the past year, who say that his coverage — particularly his posting of the arrestees’ mugshots to Twitter — spurs death threats and harassment.
For the purposes of the Tracker, Ngo identifies as a journalist, has a track record of publication and said he was in the process of documenting a public event when he was attacked. For more about how the Tracker counts incidents, see our frequently asked questions page.
Independent journalist Justin Yau said he was attacked and shoved to the ground by an unidentified individual while covering a protest at Lents Park in Portland, Oregon, on April 16, 2021.
According to Willamette Week, Portland police fatally shot a man in the park that morning after receiving reports of a man pointing a gun. Demonstrators immediately gathered near the scene, yelling “shame on you," at police, which led police to declare an unlawful assembly shortly before noon, according to the article.
Yau, who has been published in the Los Angeles Times, Portland Mercury, ProPublica and Oregon Public Broadcasting, said at around 2 p.m., he was attacked by an individual while photographing the protest. Yau said he had a press credential issued by Willamette Week, which he was then on assignment for, clipped to his collar.
"I was standing and talking to a colleague, when the attacker shoved me to the ground,” Yau told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. “It was an unprovoked surprise attack. The attacker pushed my head while I was on the ground & tried to take my cameras, but was unsuccessful."
Yau said he didn’t know the person, and that accomplices stood by yelling phrases like “Don’t take pictures!” and stopping his colleague from protecting him.
Portland Tribune reporter Zane Sparling tweeted two photographs of the scene, writing that Yau was "bleeding after being shoved to the ground, hit multiple times."
Reporter @PDocumentarians bleeding after being shoved to the ground, hit multiple times while covering a protest in Portland right now pic.twitter.com/F1qVyUL1sa
— Zane Sparling (@PDXzane) April 16, 2021
Yau said the attacker grabbed his glasses, scratching his face in the process, and broke the hood of his 18-25-millimeter lens during the scuffle. Sparling's photograph also shows a pair of broken glasses on the ground.
“The injuries were minimal, [but] breaking my glasses made work really difficult for the rest of the day,” he told the Tracker.
Independent videographer Melissa Lewis said she was targeted and pushed by Portland police while documenting a protest in northeast Portland, Oregon, on April 12, 2021.
According to KOIN News, Portland's CBS affiliate, demonstrators gathered in Laurelhurst Park to hold a vigil for Daunte Wright, a 20-year old Black man who was shot by a white police officer in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, during a traffic stop. Wright’s death, on April 11, occurred as a former police officer in nearby Minneapolis was on trial in the death of George Floyd, rekindling a wave of protests against racial injustice and police brutality that had started nearly a year earlier.
Protesters marched to the Penumbra Kelly Building, the site of numerous previous demonstrations, where, according to Portland Police tweets, some members of the crowd smashed several windows and threw rocks, bottles, and other objects at officers. Police responded by deploying flashbang grenades, and the Portland Police Bureau eventually declared the scene a riot.
At 11:10 p.m., Lewis tweeted a video of a large group of Portland police officers pushing protesters in one direction. "Cops were VERY shove-y tonight," she wrote. " Not tolerant of walking backwards." As an officer is approaching her, as seen in the video, she says, "I'm moving as fast as I can," while recording and walking backwards, but he responds, "No, you're not. Turn around and move."
A few minutes later at 11:23 p.m., Lewis shares another video of the same scene, in which Lewis says the officer walks past her and says, "Melissa, stay still. Don't get in my way."
Lewis lets out a loud laugh, to which the officer responds by turning around and knocking her phone out of her hand. From the ground, the camera shows the officer and Lewis across from each other, at which point she picks up the phone.
"I don’t know that officer AT ALL,” Lewis told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. “I was also on the sidewalk. My phone was knocked from my hands. Then another officer behind me continued to push me with his baton horizontally and into a tree.”
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in a case brought by the ACLU. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent researcher and scientist Juniper Simonis said a Portland police officer shoved them in the chest as they covered a protest in Portland, Oregon, on April 12, 2021.
Simonis said they have been publishing information for several months about law enforcement’s use of chemical irritants at protests on Twitter, for a research and activist group called the Chemical Weapons Research Consortium, and with other outlets.
According to local CBS-affiliate KOIN6, demonstrators gathered outside the Penumbra Kelly Building in Northeast Portland as a response to the police killing of Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old Black man shot by an officer during a traffic stop in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota. Police declared the gathering a riot after protesters set fires and threw rocks, pieces of concrete, bottles and bricks. Officers responded with flash-bang grenades, tear gas and other crowd-control munitions.
Simonis said they were walking around and taking pictures of the officers at the scene when "at some point, they [officers] decide that they will brutalize the protesters west on Burnside. They roll up with a dozen vehicles and I counted," Simonis told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. "A whole bunch of officers jump off of riot vans and bull rush people. I was documenting them coming off and running."
At 10:20 p.m., Simonis said they were standing on the sidewalk and photographing when an officer comes up to them and "uses a 40mm rifle to shove my chest, while I have press credentials on my chest." Simonis said they were visibly displaying a press badge, a card they made that had their photograph with the publications they write for listed and the word “PRESS” in large letters. Simonis also was carrying a DSLR camera.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations last June, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction last July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
The Portland Police Bureau has repeatedly said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent researcher and scientist Juniper Simonis said they were hit in the head by a crowd-control munition fired by federal officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of April 11, 2021.
Simonis said they have been publishing information for several months about law enforcement’s use of chemical irritants at protests on Twitter, for a research and activist group called the Chemical Weapons Research Consortium, and with other outlets.
According to local ABC-affiliate KATU2, demonstrators gathered outside the Portland Immigration and Customs Enforcement building on the preceding Saturday night. Portland police officers arrived around 11:30 p.m. to help Federal Protective Services officers extinguish several burning wooden pallets outside the building that protesters had set on fire. Over the past several months, the ICE building has been the target of numerous protests in support of Black Lives Matter and against police violence and the administration’s immigration policies.
Simonis said they were with a group of journalists in front of the ICE building where plywood sheets covering an entrance had been burned. They said federal officers were firing at the groups through a gap in the plywood sheets.
"They [federal officers] were using cellphones to peek around the corner so they could see where we were," Simonis told the Tracker. "They were targeting us even though it seemed random."
Simonis said the officers fired several times, hitting Simonis in their lower left rib, lower back and face mask, with the last pepper ball ricocheting up and leaving a welt on their forehead.
"I had a bump there that was still tender a month later," Simonis added. Simonis said they were visibly displaying a press badge, a card they made that had their photograph with the publications they write for listed and the word “PRESS” in large letters. Simonis also carried a DSLR camera.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
James Croxton, managing editor of Oregon-based independent media collective DoubledSided541, was hit by what he described as pepper ball rounds, shot by a Federal Protective Service officer, as Croxton covered a protest in Portland in the early hours of April 11, 2021.
Croxton was covering a “few dozen protesters” gathered near the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland, he wrote in a piece for DoubleSided541 a few days later.
Croxton told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he did not believe he was deliberately targeted by the rounds that he said struck him around midnight that night: “Agent just opened the door and shot out. I happened to be across the street right in his sight.”
The journalist said he was wearing a “PRESS” jacket and badge at the time.
He added: “There’s no doubt that I was shot and injured. Still have the scar.”
Croxton was with independent researcher and scientist Juniper Simonis, who also reported to the Tracker that they were hit by rounds. Croxton works with Simonis on gathering research about law enforcement use of crowd-control munitions.
Croxton posted video on Twitter showing what appear to be FPS agents, along with the sound of firing. “Been hit in the right knee with some sort of projectile. Medics have provided an ice pack,” he wrote.
In his story on Double Sided Media Croxton posted photographs of the rounds that he says hit him as well as photos of what look like injury to his knees caused by crowd-control munitions.
The protest near the ICE facility began around 9 p.m. when protesters gathered around the building, took down a fence and a fire started, Croxton said.
“Just over a half an hour later, what began as a separate small fire on the side of the [ICE] entryway, turned into the entire side of it being engulfed,” he said.
According to reports from the night, the side of the ICE building was on fire and Portland Fire and Rescue officers were sent to the scene to put out the blaze.
“Agents tried to exit. Unsuccessful, they went across their driveway and out the side gate, running towards protesters and shooting both PepperBalls and FN 303 rounds,” wrote Croxton. FN 303 rounds are a “less lethal” form of crowd control munition.
The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the Federal Protective Service, has not responded to a request by Tracker for comment.
Independent video journalist Mason Lake said he was targeted with multiple crowd-control munitions by federal officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on March 11, 2021.
According to Oregon Public Broadcasting, demonstrators gathered outside the Mark Hatfield Federal Courthouse in downtown Portland to protest a proposed oil pipeline between Alberta, Canada, and Wisconsin that three Anishinaabe communities and environmental organizations say would violate native treaty rights. Over the course of two hours, multiple skirmishes erupted as protesters set fires and officers deployed crowd control munitions and arrested people, according to KOIN, a Portland CBS affiliate.
“I got shot up SO many times last night by DHS & Federal ICE & BORTAC officers,” Lake tweeted at 12:55 a.m. on March 12. Border Patrol Tactical Unit teams were previously deployed by the Trump administration during the height of the July protests in Portland, alongside U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Department of Homeland Security officers.
I got shot up SO many times last night by DHS & Federal ICE & BORTAC officers. Gassed also. As usual... So far 6 noticeable hits, see whats bruised in the morning 🤕🤕🤕 #portland #munitions #feds #shoot #press pic.twitter.com/7yv91cXLSQ
— Mason Lake Media (@MasonLakePhoto) March 12, 2021
Lake posted photos of bruises that he said came from at least six hits, even though “I was mark[ed] as press from all angles. The chest, back, thighs, foot,” he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker in an interview.
During one of the incidents, Lake said a federal officer shot him in the back with several high impact marking rounds. In a video posted to Youtube, sounds of rounds being fired can be heard at 0:17, right before Lake whips his camera around and marches up to the officer who shot him. At 2:30 a.m., Lake tweeted a similar video of a canister releasing what he identified as “HC Smoke,” which stands for hexachloroethane, a “common ingredient in smoke devices that the Environmental Protection Agency has classified as a likely carcinogen” and could be potentially deadly, according to The Oregonian.
“These rounds are meant to mark people for detainment. I was committing no crime whatsoever, I was not disobeying any orders given,” Lake told the Tracker. “This leads one to believe that the DHS officer was purely trying to deter me from filming the canister by inflicting physical harm onto me.”
Lake said he had press credentials from the National Press Photographers Association, nonprofit media cooperative Halospace Media and Boop Troop Eugene LLC, a live media outlet that covers protests and local events, in addition to visible press markings on his clothes.
DHS, which coordinated the ICE presence in Portland, did not respond to an emailed request for comment. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent videographer Mason Lake said he was hit with this crowd-control munition and others on March 11, 2021, while covering a demonstration in Portland against a proposed oil pipeline between Canada and the U.S.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"environmentalism, protest, shot / shot at",,, 2021-05-21 17:56:19.994245+00:00,2022-03-10 20:12:03.263864+00:00,Researcher documenting Portland protests hit by pepper ball,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/researcher-documenting-portland-protests-hit-by-pepper-ball/,2022-03-10 20:12:03.190894+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Juniper Simonis (Independent),,2021-03-11,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent researcher and scientist Juniper Simonis said they were targeted and hit by a pepper ball fired by federal officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on March 11, 2021.
Simonis said they have been publishing information for several months about law enforcement’s use of chemical irritants at protests on Twitter, for a research and activist group called the Chemical Weapons Research Consortium, and with other outlets.
According to local NBC-affiliate KGW8, a crowd gathered outside the Mark Hatfield Federal Courthouse in downtown Portland to protest against police violence shortly after the courthouse's surrounding fence had been taken down. The article says that around 9 p.m., photographs of smashed windows, burning flags and graffiti-sprayed walls surfaced online. Federal officers responded with tear gas, arrests and chemical munitions, according to CBS-affiliate KOIN6. Protests have been taking place in Portland regularly starting in spring 2020, partly linked to Black Lives Matter but also around issues such as defunding police, environmental actions and other social justice issues.
Around 11:30 p.m., Simonis said they were near the intersection of Southwest Fourth Avenue and South Salmon Street where federal officers had deployed what they identified as an "HC grenade," which stands for hexachloroethane. This common ingredient in smoke devices has been classified by the Environmental Protection Agency as a likely carcinogen, and could be potentially deadly, according to The Oregonian.
"I was shot in the right boob as I was picking it up and putting it in a container," Simonis told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. "The pepper ball left significant bruising over the next week."
Simonis documents and collects the physical items to add to a munitions library collection that the Chemical Weapons Research Consortium is developing into a research archive. Closer to midnight, Simonis found another HC grenade a block over near South Salmon Street and Southwest Fifth Avenue.
Simonis said they had a press badge, a card they made that had their photograph with the publications they write for listed and the word “PRESS” in large letters, visibly displayed. "They [officers] call me doctor and professor," they added. "They know who I am. I'm also a 6 feet 2 inches visibly trans person...they definitely targeted me."
Simonis also said they experienced negative symptoms in the days following this incident with the HT smoke. "That's why I'm researching it," Simonis said. "For me, that translated to diarrhea, massive lethargy for two days — very common with heavy metal poisoning — and I also had Costochondritis. That is basically inflammation of the cartilage around your sternum."
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
James Croxton, managing editor of Oregon-based DoubledSided541, which describes itself as an independent media collective, said he was hit when federal officers fired crowd-control munitions at a small group of journalists covering a March 11, 2021, protest near the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in Portland, Oregon.
The protest was one of many during March in the city’s Pearl District, a popular downtown area where former warehouses are converted to restaurants. The protests have resulted in streets being closed, fires, damage to city property and shop windows smashed, according to The Oregonian. Protests have been taking place in Portland regularly starting in spring 2020, partly linked to Black Lives Matter but also around issues such as defunding police, environmental actions and other social justice issues.
Croxton, who also works for neighborhood news site Village Portland, said he was on 4th Ave., close to the Salmon St. intersection, when the small group of reporters came across what looked to be a canister of HC gas, a toxic smoke bomb used by the military, burning in the street. Local news outlet Oregon Live has covered incidents of HC gas reportedly being used by the Portland police to disperse protesters “two dozen times.” The gas contains hexaclorotethane and is toxic, Oregon Live reported.
Croxton said that he had been looking for evidence that police were using chemicals against protesters and the media; he said he has been documenting that in conjunction with the Portland-based research and activist group Chemical Weapons Research Consortium.
“Just a couple of seconds after I had walked up to the canister to document, the Federal Protective Service [part of Homeland Security] turned their pepper balls towards us and shot at our feet and ankles,” Croxton told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. He said some of the munitions also hit higher on his body, leaving “powder from impacts on my jacket.”
Croxton said the pepper balls caused him sharp, but temporary, pain as he walked back from the canister. “Fortunately, pepper ball pains go away relatively quickly,” he said.
In video footage of the incident, a small group of people with video cameras, some of whom are clearly wearing “PRESS” on their clothing, or wearing “PRESS” badges, are seen taking footage and don’t appear to be close to protesters. The sound of what appears to be munitions being fired can be heard.
Croxton said he believed he was deliberately targeted by law enforcement. “It is unmistakable that the FPS shot at the press. I am, at the very least, very identifiable and have clearly visible 'PRESS' markings.”
“I intentionally try my best to stand-out from the rest of the crowd. My press credentials are also light-colored and are made to be seen from a distance,” he said.
Croxton told the Tracker: “It's extremely disheartening to be targeted and, essentially, assaulted by the very people who are supposed to ‘protect us.’ I think I can speak for many more than just myself in saying that instances like this during the last year have radicalized our views towards law enforcement.”
The Oregonian reported that federal officers drove demonstrators away from the courthouse in downtown Portland that night after fires were started and the building was damaged.
Officers were deploying impact munitions, tear gas, flash-bang grenades and smoke bombs, the paper reported.
Since July, court rulings from the U.S. District Court in Oregon have barred law enforcement officers from the Portland Police Bureau and federal agencies from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests, as the Tracker has previously reported.
The DHS Office of Public Affairs has not responded to a Tracker request for a comment.
Independent videojournalist Mason Lake was assaulted by Portland police while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Feb. 27, 2021.
According to KGW8, a Portland-based NBC affiliate, an estimated 150 people gathered in The Fields Park in Portland’s Pearl District to protest the treatment of undocumented people held in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody, Willamette Week reported. At the ICE field office, protesters spray-painted the boarded-up office with slogans such as “No Kids in Cages,” as well as the names of Black people killed by police in recent months.
In a statement released shortly after midnight on Feb. 28, the Portland Police Bureau called the protest “destructive,” noted damage to buildings and warned that perpetrators would be subject to detention, arrest or targeted with crowd control devices such as tear gas.
Around 10:30 p.m. on the 27th, Lake said he was recording Portland police on bicycles as they pedaled quickly toward a crowd. One officer on a bike slammed into Lake, who was on foot with his camera, as seen at 0:08 in a video tweeted at 12:28 a.m. on Feb. 28 by independent journalist Melissa Lewis. Lake is hit by the officer, then surrounded by several officers on bikes, one of whom yells “Get off the street” at someone off camera. A voice can be heard yelling that Lake is press.
“You’ve just assaulted press. He was trying to get out of your fucking way,” the voice says.
In the video, Lake can be seen yelling at police as they close in around him. He continues arguing with them after he moves to the sidewalk, where he can be seen holding his camera and wearing large letters that say “PRESS” across his chest.
In an email interview with the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, Lake said the officer who slammed into him with a bike injured him. “His helmet slammed into my head, breaking skin.”
“He and other officers proceeded to hit my camera and shove me as I was encircled,” Lake told the Tracker. “I gestured at him and he hit my camera a second time.”
In a compilation video shared to YouTube, which included Lake’s own footage, he describes the incident in more detail. At around 0:37, he is audibly angry, yelling at the officers, “Keep hitting me, keep hitting me,” and in response to them telling him to move, he adds, “How am I gonna do it? You surrounded me.”
“Their justification for running me over was that I was ‘in the street,’” Lake told the Tracker. At 0:27 in the video, he yells at the officer, “You’ve been after me all night.” He later told the Tracker that he believes it was a targeted assault. He said that in addition to the PRESS marking on his chest, he had press credentials from the National Press Photographers Association, the nonprofit media cooperative Halospace Media and Boop Troop Eugene LLC, a live media outlet that covers protests and local events.
The PPB directed the Tracker to contact the City Attorney’s Office, which did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
A discarded shield calling for abolishing the Portland Police Bureau at a rally outside of a federal facility in Portland, Oregon, in January 2021. Journalist Mason Lake was assaulted by police while documenting another protest there a month later.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:23-cv-01870,['ONGOING'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,protest,,, 2021-03-05 15:16:05.186022+00:00,2022-09-09 14:47:31.268878+00:00,"Reporter hit with crowd-control munitions in Portland, treated for concussion",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/reporter-hit-with-crowd-control-munitions-in-portland-treated-for-concussion/,2022-09-09 14:47:31.201580+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Alissa Azar (Freelance),,2021-01-20,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent journalist Alissa Azar was hit with crowd-control munitions by federal officers while covering a protest in front of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in southern Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 20, 2021.
According to news reports, an estimated 100 people marched to the ICE facility around 9 p.m. and began chanting to protest the detention and caging of migrant children. At 9:30 p.m., federal officers declared the gathering an unlawful assembly.
Azar, who was live-tweeting during the protest, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker she was standing on the sidewalk across the street from the facility with a row of journalists when federal officers suddenly rushed outside from the ICE building. She said they deployed crowd-control munitions including pepper balls and tear gas for "almost 20 minutes straight" to push the crowd back.
Teargas currently flooding the neighborhood. Almost 20 minutes straight of teargas and munitions. pic.twitter.com/yQItLq5Gar
— Alissa Azar (@AlissaAzar) January 21, 2021
Azar said she left the ICE facility with a reporter with Full Revolution Media, John, who declined to provide his last name due to safety concerns. She heard of a different gathering happening two blocks away, but she said that when they arrived, there were no protesters, only a line of federal officers.
Those officers pushed Azar and the other reporter “back to the ICE building even though [officers at the ICE building were] asking people to leave," Azar told the Tracker. When she got back with the other members of the press, the officers "were just fumigating [us] directly in the face.” Azar said she did not know what the officers were spraying at the crowd.
“What’s scary about that machine is that you can’t look at the spent munitions to see what they’re deploying,” John added. The officers used what John described as a pesticide gun, similar in shape to a leaf blower, to release an unknown gas.
In a tweet posted at 11:46 p.m., Azar wrote that she "lost count of pushes" and her chest hurt, making it hard to breath. She told the Tracker she was wearing visible press markings on her clothes and helmet, as well as a National Press Photographers Association credential. John said he wore a helmet with press markings across the front and back.
"I had a flash bang thrown right at my ear," Azar told the Tracker. "I ended up passing out because I was trapped in the tear gas and it went through my gas mask." She said her friends then took her to Providence Portland Medical Center’s emergency room, where she was diagnosed with a concussion and torn muscle.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence, didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incident.
The ICE protest was one of many social justice demonstrations in Portland that have been ongoing since protests first broke out in May 2020 following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent videojournalist Mason Lake said he was targeted by various crowd-control munitions by federal officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 20, 2021.
According to The Oregonian, protesters gathered in South Portland’s Elizabeth Caruthers Park to push for more rapid policy changes than they believed President Joe Biden had promised during his inauguration that day. Later in the night, many marched a few blocks south toward the Immigration and Customs Enforcement building to oppose the detention of migrant children in cage-like quarters, the Oregonian reported. Demonstrators chanted “Abolish ICE” and spray-painted “Reunite families now” onto the building. In a video and tweet released shortly after 10 p.m. on Jan. 20, the Portland Police Bureau said it had declared the gathering an unlawful assembly and stated that its officers used crowd control munitions to get people to disperse.
Between 10 and 11 p.m., Lake said he was filming at the ICE building and standing next to other members of the press when Department of Homeland Security and ICE officers, whom he identified by their uniforms and badges, threw an explosive device at his foot.
“When the officer throws it, they do it right when I pan my camera to the left away from them,” Lake said in an interview with the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. “They don’t know it, but my camera is actually a wide angle. As soon as I pan, he throws it in an underhand chuck.”
He identified the device as an instantaneous blast munition, which rattled him because he didn’t have hearing protection, but did not otherwise injure him. In a video shared to YouTube, Lake uses another reporter’s footage, which shows a canister being thrown directly at his feet at 0:33. Lake said officers also used numerous other munitions, including riot control CS gas.
Lake said he had press credentials from the National Press Photographers Association, nonprofit media cooperative Halospace Media and Boop Troop Eugene LLC, a live media outlet that covers protests and local events, in addition to visible press markings on his clothes and helmet.
DHS, which coordinated the ICE presence in Portland, did not respond to an emailed request for comment. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Freelance journalist Michael Elliott said he was struck in the face with a pepper ball fired by federal officers while he covered a protest in front of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 20, 2021.
According to news reports, an estimated 100 people marched to the ICE facility around 9 p.m. and began chanting to protest the detention and caging of migrant children. At 9:30 p.m., federal officers declared the gathering an unlawful assembly.
Elliott, who says his work has been published by VICE, Oregon Public Broadcasting and Willamette Week, among others, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was photographing a protester from approximately 10 to 15 feet away shortly after 11 p.m. as they attempted to extinguish a tear gas canister using a Super Soaker water gun.
“Federal Officers began firing on the protester with the Super Soaker repeatedly hitting him with pepper balls,” Elliott said. Both he and the protester were ultimately pinned down, he said, as additional officers began firing rounds of tear gas, pepper balls and Skat Shells — a type of munition that produces fire and disperses chemical irritants — toward them. Elliott said one of the pepper ball rounds struck him during this volley.
Immediately, Elliott said, his eyes swelled shut and felt like they were on fire.
“Medics responded after witnessing the impact and noted a substantial cake of white dust on each of my eyelids,” Elliot told the Tracker
Elliott said that while he typically wears a gas mask, he had forgotten it that day as he left to document the protest.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence, didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incident.
The ICE protest was one of many social-justice demonstrations in Portland that have been ongoing since protests first broke out in May 2020 following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent journalist Jarrid Huber said he was struck in the head with a type of tear gas canister fired by federal officers while covering a protest in front of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in southern Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 20, 2021.
According to news reports, an estimated 100 people marched to the ICE facility around 9 p.m. to protest the detention of migrant children in cages. At 9:30 p.m., federal officers declared the gathering an unlawful assembly.
In Huber’s footage from that evening, federal officers can be seen leaving the ICE facility and lining up across the railroad tracks along the east side of the building. The line begins to advance toward the crowd — which appears to be retreating up South Moody Avenue — when the officers appear to open fire with crowd-control munitions without warning. As Huber turns and jogs away at around 37 minutes into the footage, he can be heard saying, “I got hit in the head.”
Huber told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was struck in the head with one of the three canisters of a Triple-Chaser, a type of tear gas canister that breaks apart to disperse tear gas across a wider area, when it ricocheted off the ground. Huber said that he was also struck multiple times in the chest with pepper balls and at least one baton round — a type of crowd-control munition that includes rubber bullets but also foam and wooden baton rounds.
Huber said he was wearing a body armor vest labeled with “PRESS” on the front and back, as well as a neck gaiter branded with the logo of Boop Troop Eugene and a press pass issued by the digital outlet. On its website, Boop Troop describes its coverage as focusing on “socio-economic issues, protests and educational awareness.”
According to Huber’s footage, he was able to continue filming for approximately two hours, saying on multiple occasions, “I feel fine.”
The following day, Huber posted on Facebook photos of abrasions on his temple and an update detailing the injuries he sustained.
“I have a mild concussion and trauma to the neck from my head being shot but they don’t believe there is any internal bleeding and my eye socket and temple seem to be okay other than small swelling and bruising,” Huber wrote. “They want me keeping a close eye on if symptoms get worse and I’m going to miss a few days of work.”
Huber told the Tracker he ultimately was unable to resume his protest coverage for two weeks.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence during the protest, didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incident.
The ICE protest was one of many social justice demonstrations in Portland that have been ongoing since protests first broke out in May 2020 following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent journalist Jarrid Huber suffered a concussion and neck trauma after being struck in the head, chest with crowd-control munitions while covering a demonstration outside an ICE facility in Portland on Jan. 20, 2021.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,no,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"chemical irritant, protest, shot / shot at",,, 2021-06-24 18:35:50.754928+00:00,2022-03-09 22:44:25.471564+00:00,Independent videographer struck with tear gas canister while covering Portland protest,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-videographer-struck-with-tear-gas-canister-while-covering-portland-protest/,2022-03-09 22:44:25.412753+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Melissa “Claudio” Lewis (Independent),,2021-01-20,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent videographer Melissa Lewis said she was struck with a tear gas canister fired by federal officers while covering a protest in front of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in southern Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 20, 2021.
According to news reports, an estimated 100 people marched to the ICE facility around 9 p.m. and began chanting to protest the detention and holding of migrant children in cages. At 9:30 p.m. federal officers declared the gathering an unlawful assembly, the Oregonian reported.
Lewis, who has sold her footage to ABC, The Daily Beast and Oregon’s Willamette Week, among others, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker she was filming as federal officers advanced on the crowd and one officer began using a strobe light.
In footage she posted to Twitter and labeled “Attack part 2,” a line of law enforcement officers can be seen shining lights toward the crowd. One officer turns on a strobe light and, as it flashes, Lewis appears to duck briefly behind a demonstrator’s shield. She then comes out from behind the shield and yells “You’re being sued for strobing epileptics!” Immediately after she speaks, an officer on the right-hand side of the line can be seen aiming and firing a projectile toward Lewis.
Attack part 2 pic.twitter.com/j0HIcol6Ey
— Melissa “Claudio” Lewis (@Claudio_Report) January 21, 2021
Lewis said she was struck in the upper thigh with what she believes was a Triple-Chaser, a type of tear gas canister that breaks apart to disperse tear gas across a wide area. Multiple other journalists also reported being struck with crowd-control munitions while covering protests that day, which the Tracker has documented here.
Of her comment about the strobe light and epileptics, Lewis said “I reminded them [law enforcement] about something that I am actively suing them for.”
Lewis and independent researcher and scientist Juniper Simonis are both plaintiffs in a November 2020 suit filed by Disability Rights Oregon against the City of Portland and 100 law enforcement officers. The suit says it aims to “stop local, state, and federal law enforcement from assaulting, brutalizing, and failing to reasonably accommodate people with disabilities during assemblies and protests.”
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal law enforcement presence, didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incident.
The ICE protest was one of many social justice demonstrations in Portland that have been ongoing since protests first broke out in May 2020 following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent photojournalist Sean Bascom was arrested while reporting on a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Jan. 5, 2021.
Protesters had gathered near the North Portland precinct of the Portland Police Bureau, demonstrating in reaction to the announcement that day that no charges would be filed against Wisconsin police officers involved in the shooting of Jacob Blake on Aug. 23, 2020.
Racial justice demonstrations had been held regularly in the city since the death of George Floyd during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25.
Bascom, a photojournalist whose work has been published by outlets such as the Portland Mercury and the Portland State Vanguard, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he’d been following the demonstrations near the police building on the corner of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Killingsworth Street. According to Bascom, some protesters had set a fire in a dumpster in the street, and another had removed a security camera from the fence around the precinct.
Bascom said at one point he went around to the side of the building and took some photographs through a fence of officers in the precinct’s parking lot. Several officers came over to the fence, Bascom said, with one asking if he was “real press.” He said he told them that he was a freelance photojournalist and explained how freelancing works and why he didn’t have a credential issued by a specific outlet.
Soon, more protesters gathered at that side of the fence, Bascom said, and police issued warnings, causing protesters to scatter. Police then moved up the street, he said, pushing protesters back from the area.
Bascom said that he was standing near other journalists and some protesters across the street from the precinct building in a parking area for several businesses when one sergeant pointed at him and directed officers to arrest him.
Bascom said that he had the word “PRESS” marked on his helmet, and he identified himself as a journalist as he was being arrested. He said he’d spoken with the sergeant who pointed him out for arrest earlier in the night, and the officer had said that he wasn’t a real member of the press.
Video posted on Twitter by photojournalist Justin Yau shows Bascom, wearing a black helmet marked “PRESS” with a camera hanging around his neck, being arrested.
Portland Police has just exited the building and conducted targeted arrests. At least one person with cameras and Press markings have been arrested. Officers say the charge is trespassing. #PortlandProtest #PDXProtest #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/2cZNn1yxpu
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) January 6, 2021
Bascom said police handcuffed his wrists behind his back and brought him into the PPB precinct. He said that officers bagged up his personal belongings and that he was held in a cell for about 20 minutes, before being released with a citation for trespassing and interfering with a police officer.
Bascom said that the charges had been dropped and he never needed to appear in court.
A spokesperson for the Multnomah County district attorney confirmed that the state declined to prosecute and that the case is closed. The PPB did not respond to a request for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Photojournalist Sean Bascom captures the moment when a Portland Police Bureau sergeant singles him out for arrest while he was covering protests on Jan. 5, 2021. Bascom said the charges were subsequently dropped.
",arrested and released,Portland Police Bureau,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2021, protest",,, 2021-01-13 22:15:12.710242+00:00,2023-10-27 21:48:18.641950+00:00,"Journalist assaulted, her phone and finger smashed while covering Portland eviction protest",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-assaulted-her-phone-and-finger-smashed-while-covering-portland-eviction-protest/,2023-10-27 21:48:18.542312+00:00,,,,"Assault, Equipment Damage",,,cellphone: count of 1,Genevieve Reaume (KATU),,2020-12-08,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"KATU ABC 2 reporter Genevieve Reaume was assaulted and had her phone smashed by individuals participating in an eviction protest in Portland, Oregon, on Dec. 8, 2020.
Reaume and KATU ABC 2 photojournalist Ric Peavyhouse were covering a protest against the feared eviction of a Black and Indigenous family from their foreclosed home in North Portland. Activists had been camping out at the property on North Mississippi Avenue — known as the “Red House” — for months when law enforcement came in on the morning of Dec. 8 to try to take control of the house. As more protesters poured into the area, there were clashes with law enforcement before officers withdrew. Protesters ultimately built barricades blocking streets in the area.
Speaking to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, Reaume says she and Peavyhouse had spent an hour in the early afternoon of Dec. 8 interviewing people in the neighborhood before deciding to enter the barricaded zone. As they came upon a barricade, Reaume says they were approached by protesters trying to block their cameras with umbrellas and telling them they could not film there. After they walked away and let the situation calm down, they decided once more to enter the area.
“Immediately somebody started yelling, ‘Film crew,’” Reaume said. “That’s when a dozen or so, a dozen and a half people started coming over towards us, surrounding Ric’s camera with their umbrellas and their bodies.”
Aware that Peavyhouse’s camera was blocked by protesters, Reaume pulled out her cellphone and began to record video. As she attempted to film, she says a man kept pushing her and trying to grab her phone. When he succeeded in knocking it out of her hand, he then smashed it on the ground and pushed her away again as she tried to retrieve it.
“I finally was able to get my hand onto it and he just stomped on my hand,” she told the Tracker.
Reaume’s left middle finger was cut open, an injury that she had to have glued shut at an urgent care. The incident left her work phone inoperable and with a cracked screen.
Sorry for the blood. Hand isn’t broken, thankfully! Wound was glued up at urgent care. pic.twitter.com/YktY4XCrLC
— Genevieve Reaume (@GenevieveReaume) December 9, 2020
In a video captured by Peavyhouse, umbrellas can be seen trying to block his camera in the run up to the assault while a voice is heard yelling, “There’s a film crew coming through. They’re not our friends. Hide your faces! Don’t trust them! Film crew walking through!”
As the protesters surround the journalists and tell them to leave, a woman can be heard saying, “We got cameras we need.”
In Reaume’s shorter video of the confrontation, she can be heard explaining to protesters that “this is our job.”
“I don’t care. This is our life,” responds one. “Your job is hurting us,” says another.
Then, the phone appears to tumble to the ground, landing with its camera facing skyward as an individual brings their foot down on the device.
As Reaume and Peavyhouse moved to leave the area following the assault, protesters followed them, with some taunting her and shouting, “Bye, bitch!” and “Fuck your hand!”
Contacted by the Tracker, the Portland Police Bureau did not comment on the incident.
Reaume said she believes she and Peavyhouse had not been wearing anything branded with their station’s name, though they still very obviously looked like a TV news crew, she said.
Other Oregon news outlets noted a general hostility toward the press inside the barricaded zone.
According to Oregon Public Broadcasting, protesters inside the barricaded zone banned “anyone from taking photos or videos, including pedestrians and neighbors out walking” while limiting livestreamers to a designated area.
And the Oregonian reported that a building in the area had “Fuck Press” spray-painted on it.
Videographer Garrison Davis was shoved by armed pro-police demonstrators, including one who bumped the journalist’s smartphone with a rifle butt while he covered a Nov. 19, 2020, rally in downtown Portland, Oregon, the journalist tweeted and told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
Protests had been held In Portland on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Tensions also were high in Portland and cities throughout the U.S. in the wake of President Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 presidential election.
Davis worked as an independent journalist throughout much of the unrest and in November began co-hosting “Uprising: A Guide From Portland,” a podcast focusing on protests in Portland, for iHeartRadio.
On Nov. 19, about 30 people gathered in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center for a “Back the Blue” rally, Davis told the Tracker. He tweeted that participants expressed messages of support for Trump, law enforcement and the Second Amendment, and espoused conspiracy theories about vaccines for COVID-19 and other topics.
He posted that the event drew counterprotesters who gathered on the opposite side of South Third Avenue from the rally. Members of the opposing groups yelled taunts across the street at each other and eventually counterprotesters crossed the divide to the right-wing rally to confront participants.
“A few of the antifascist counter demonstrators cross the street,” Davis wrote in a Twitter post. “Members of the back the blue crowd start shoving people around.”
Davis recorded a Back the Blue protester wearing a gas mask and a camouflage helmet and vest confronting him and demanding that he move away from the rally.
“I will take that fucking camera. Back up,” the individual said before shoving Davis, which was captured in a video that Davis posted at about 2 p.m. Davis told the Tracker that the assailant pushed him with a metal rod.
“The back the blue/Maga crowd continue to shove me around. I am very clearly marked press,” Davis wrote in the Twitter thread.
Davis also captured footage of the same assailant extending the stock on a rifle and clipping the weapon to his vest. Davis gets into another scuffle with that individual, who at one point bumps the journalist’s smartphone with the butt of his rifle.
“I don’t like you. Get the fuck out of here,” the assailant says to Davis.
Davis and reporter Sergio Olmos, who reported on the event for Oregon Public Broadcasting, captured footage of police officers taking the armed assailant into custody. It isn’t clear whether officers issued a citation to the individual, whom officers released, as shown in footage that Olmos posted to Twitter. The person returned to the rally without his rifle.
A Portland Police Bureau spokesperson was unable to confirm or deny if officers arrested the armed individual or issued a citation.
Davis told the Tracker he spent about two hours covering the rally and that several different protesters shoved and threatened him during his time there. He captured footage of one individual carrying a shield trying to shove the journalist out of the area.
“Get off the sidewalk,” the individual says to Davis.
In another exchange, an individual wearing a purple hoodie and a black face mask approaches Davis and demands that he back away from the rally.
“Get your ass back, motherfucker. Step back, dude,” the individual said to Davis.
“You’re not the police, you can’t move me,” Davis replied. “You’re not the cops.”
The demonstration culminated with shoving matches between members of the opposing groups, and members of both groups deploying pepper spray.
The Portland Police Bureau didn’t respond to a request for information about any arrests or citations issued to anyone involved with the rally or the counterprotest.
Olmos posted a video of an officer writing a citation for at least one individual after officers told people, including Davis, that they would be cited for standing in the street. Davis didn’t receive a citation, he told the Tracker.
Freelance photojournalist Clementson Supriyadi was assaulted and arrested by Oregon State Police while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Nov. 5, 2020.
In Portland, protests had been held on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
At around 8 p.m., Supriyadi arrived at a demonstration at Arbor Lodge Park in North Portland, where protesters had gathered to call for cuts to the Portland Police Bureau’s budget.
Protesters first marched to the home of Portland City Commissioner Dan Ryan, who had voted against cutting the police budget, and vandalized his property. By the time they began marching towards the Portland Police Association office, the protest had been declared an “unlawful assembly.”
When Supriyadi started following a group of protesters across a street, OSP officers pulled up in a van beside him, got out of the vehicle and told him he was under arrest, he said.
“Their van and truck snuck up on everyone,” Supriyadihe told the Tracker. “I was in the middle of the street trying to catch up.”
In a video of the arrest posted on Twitter by independent journalist Garrison Davis, people can be heard yelling that Supriyadi is press.
Police left and the march moved on.
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) November 6, 2020
Just now, officers charged the crowd from behind and arrested a member of the press on the sidewalk. #Portland #PortlandProtests pic.twitter.com/fskd6KNjDx
“I told them I was press, but at that point they were taking me down,” said Supriyadi, adding that he had been wearing a press pass.
The officers placed him on the ground and zip-tied his hands behind his back, said Supriyadi. That’s also when he believes his camera, a Fujifilm X100f, was damaged. They searched his backpack and his pockets, then moved him to a law enforcement vehicle.
Supriyadi wasn’t taken to a police precinct for processing, but instead was given a ticket and released, he said. He was charged with disorderly conduct and interfering with a peace officer.
Supriyadi said he has a court date for these charges scheduled for Nov. 24, but he hopes the charges will be dropped before then.
Supriyadi said he wasn’t very surprised about being arrested. “At every level of law enforcement that have been coming out to the protests, they hinder the press from doing what they’re trying to do,” he said.
After being released, he noticed that his camera lens was wobbly, though the camera still works. He believes the damage to his camera, which he had been carrying in his pocket, occurred when the officers laid him down on the ground.
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon didn’t include the OSP when it filed the cases. But the rulings should also apply to state police, said Matthew Borden, a partner at BraunHagey & Borden LLP who is cooperating counsel with the ACLU on the case. He told the Tracker that the “plaintiffs will likely seek relief if OSP refuses to agree not to target or disperse journalists and legal observers."
The OSP declined to comment on Supriyadi’s arrest. Portland City Attorney Tracy Reeve didn’t return a request for comment.
Garrison Davis, an independent journalist, said he was pushed by law enforcement officers in separate incidents while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Nov. 4, 2020.
Davis was documenting two protests in progress; one group was calling for every vote cast in the U.S. presidential election to be counted, while another expressed a combination of dismay with the electoral system and support for the Black Lives Matter movement. Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
While the protests were organized separately, the two groups converged briefly at one point in the night. After some of the protesters in the election-focused group smashed windows of downtown businesses, law enforcement officers declared the protests a “riot” around 6:45 p.m.
Several law enforcement agencies were involved in policing the protests, with the Portland Police Bureau, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and Oregon State Police all working together after Oregon Gov. Kate Brown ordered a “unified command” to respond to protests. The Oregon National Guard was also activated to help with enforcement.
At around 7:20 p.m., Davis posted footage on Twitter of law enforcement officers tackling someone in the Pearl District downtown.
Multiple officers tackle someone on the sidewalk, then officers continue to shove people (me included) around on the sidewalk. #Portland #PortlandProtests pic.twitter.com/3tpM3WLrJT
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) November 5, 2020
When Davis crossed the street to film the arrest, state troopers officers “arrived and decided to push people out of the area,” he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, adding that he was pushed as well. Throughout the night, law enforcement officers pushed him four times, he said.
“They were using their batons [to push people],” said Davis, who was wearing a helmet with the words “press” on it as well as a press pass.
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon didn’t include the OSP when it filed the cases. But the rulings should also apply to state police, said Matthew Borden, a partner at BraunHagey & Borden LLP who is cooperating counsel with the ACLU on the case. He told the Tracker that the “plaintiffs will likely seek relief if OSP refuses to agree not to target or disperse journalists and legal observers."
The OSP declined to comment on the shoving incidents. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Documentary filmmaker Lance Bangs was pushed by law enforcement officers while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Nov. 4, 2020, according to videos posted on social media.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
There were two main demonstrations in Portland on Nov. 4, with one group calling for every vote cast in the U.S. presidential election to be counted and another expressing a combination of dismay with the electoral system and support for the Black Lives Matter movement. While the protests were organized separately, the two groups converged briefly at one point in the night. After some protesters smashed windows of downtown businesses, law enforcement officers declared the protests a “riot” at around 6:45 p.m.
Several law enforcement agencies were involved in policing the protests, with the Portland Police Bureau, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and Oregon State Police all working together after Oregon Gov. Kate Brown ordered a “unified command” to respond to protests. The Oregon National Guard was also activated to help with enforcement.
The initial round of shoving incidents occurred a little after 8 p.m. near the corner of Southwest Park Ave. and Southwest Washington Street, where a group of journalists got caught up in a push by law enforcement officers to clear protesters from the area.
Bangs was shoved by an officer while taking footage for Vice News. Video posted at 11:18 p.m on Twitter by Tess Owen, a senior reporter for Vice who was covering the protests with Bangs, captures law enforcement officers yelling “Move!” at protesters. Bangs was “repeatedly jabbed in back by an officer assigned to unified command, who then dragged him to the ground,” Owen tweeted.
In a follow-up tweet, Owen posted a video that she said shows Bangs being “dragged to the ground by an officer with the Unified Command.” The video appears to capture a law enforcement officer pushing as the camera goes askew. People can be heard saying, “You’re dragging him,” and, “He got pushed down.”
Video 2/2 that shows when @lancebangs was dragged to the ground by an officer with the Unified Command pic.twitter.com/ldIV0XvVyc
— Tess Owen (@misstessowen) November 5, 2020
Bangs, Owen and Vice News didn’t return requests for comment from the Tracker.
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon didn’t include the state police or National Guard when it filed the cases.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the continuing ACLU litigation. The Oregon State Police didn’t respond to a request for comment on the shoving incidents.
Independent journalist Bethany Kerley said she was pushed by law enforcement officers covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Nov. 4, 2020.
There were two protests in progress; one group was calling for every vote cast in the U.S. presidential election to be counted, while another expressed a combination of dismay with the electoral system and support for the Black Lives Matter movement. Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
While the protests were organized separately, the two groups converged briefly at one point in the night. After some of the protesters in the election-focused group smashed windows of downtown businesses, law enforcement officers declared the protests a “riot” around 6:45 p.m.
Several law enforcement agencies were involved in policing the protests, with the Portland Police Bureau, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and Oregon State Police all working together after Oregon Gov. Kate Brown ordered a “unified command” to respond to protests. The Oregon National Guard was also activated to help with enforcement.
At around 8:15 p.m., Kerley said she encountered a line of law enforcement officers on a street corner in the Pearl District. Footage of the incident, which Kerley filmed and provided to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, shows officers using their batons to shove protesters and members of the press back. Kerley was shoved multiple times by a state trooper and pushed up against a boarded-up window.
“I got thrown up against a window and pushed into other people multiple times by the officers,” Kerley tweeted after the incident.
The cops came in and got us in a choke point. When they came in I got thrown up against a window and pushed into other people multiple times by the officers. I was able to get out and now I'm with the large press group again.#PortlandProtests #PDXprotests #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/oTglG0RqAc
— TopQualityDumpsterFire (@Piggyboo_Playa) November 5, 2020
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon didn’t include the OSP when it filed the cases. But the rulings should also apply to state police, said Matthew Borden, a partner at BraunHagey & Borden LLP who is cooperating counsel with the ACLU on the case. He told the Tracker that the “plaintiffs will likely seek relief if OSP refuses to agree not to target or disperse journalists and legal observers."
The OSP declined to comment on the shoving incidents. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent photojournalist Mason Lake said he was pushed by law enforcement officers while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Nov. 4, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
There were two main demonstrations in Portland on Nov. 4, with one group calling for every vote cast in the U.S. presidential election to be counted and another expressing a combination of dismay with the electoral system and support for the Black Lives Matter movement. While the protests were organized separately, the two groups converged briefly at one point in the night. After some protesters smashed windows of downtown businesses, law enforcement officers declared the protests a “riot” at around 6:45 p.m.
Several law enforcement agencies were involved in policing the protests, with the Portland Police Bureau, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and Oregon State Police all working together after Oregon Gov. Kate Brown ordered a “unified command” to respond to protests. The Oregon National Guard was also activated to help with enforcement.
The initial round of shoving incidents reported occurred a little after 8 p.m. near the corner of Southwest Park Ave. and Southwest Washington Street, where a group of journalists got caught up in a push by law enforcement officers to clear protesters from the area.
Lake was documenting law enforcement officers arresting someone on the ground when he got shoved, he told the Tracker. A video of the incident published on Twitter by freelance journalist Sergio Olmos shows police and state officers pushing multiple protesters and apprehending someone on the ground. The footage captures a state trooper pushing Lake, wearing a helmet marked “press” on the back and sides, several times before finally pushing him to the ground about 25 seconds into the video.
“I was shoved to the ground,” Lake told the Tracker. “My hand and knuckle had a bruise on it, so I think a baton hit me.”
In response to the Tracker’s inquiries on this incident, Stephan Bomar, public affairs director of the Oregon Military Department, which oversees the National Guard, said in a statement: “It appears as though during this chaotic situation that all remained safe and secure.”
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon didn’t include the state police or National Guard when it filed the cases.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the continuing ACLU litigation. The Oregon State Police didn’t respond to a request for comment on the shoving incidents.
Police stand in front of protesters the day after Election Day in Portland, Oregon, on Nov. 4, 2020. Journalist Mason Lake was shoved by police while documenting protests there that day.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:23-cv-01870,['ONGOING'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,unknown,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, election, Election 2020, protest",,, 2021-10-14 17:09:27.425086+00:00,2023-07-17 16:21:57.424142+00:00,Journalist documenting Portland protest shoved by law enforcement officers,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-documenting-portland-protest-shoved-by-law-enforcement-officers/,2023-07-17 16:21:57.301545+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Maranie Staab (Freelance),,2020-11-04,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Freelance journalist Maranie Staab said she was pushed by law enforcement officers while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Nov. 4, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
There were two main demonstrations in Portland on Nov. 4, with one group calling for every vote cast in the U.S. presidential election to be counted and another expressing a combination of dismay with the electoral system and support for the Black Lives Matter movement. While the protests were organized separately, the two groups converged briefly at one point in the night. After some protesters smashed windows of downtown businesses, law enforcement officers declared the protests a “riot” at around 6:45 p.m.
Several law enforcement agencies were involved in policing the protests, with the Portland Police Bureau, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and Oregon State Police all working together after Oregon Gov. Kate Brown ordered a “unified command” to respond to protests. The Oregon National Guard was also activated to help with enforcement.
The initial round of shoving incidents reportedly occurred a little after 8 p.m. near the corner of Southwest Park Ave. and Southwest Washington Street, where a group of journalists got caught up in a push by law enforcement officers to clear protesters from the area.
In footage of the incident posted on Twitter, Staab — wearing a black T-shirt and vest marked “press” — can be seen getting shoved about 18 seconds into the video.
“I was filming the same arrest everyone else was,” Staab told the Tracker. “It was an aggressive arrest. I was standing out of the way, not interfering, with a press vest on. But that did not stop officers from turning around and shoving me out of the way.”
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon didn’t include the state police or National Guard when it filed the cases.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the continuing ACLU litigation. The Oregon State Police didn’t respond to a request for comment on the shoving incidents.
A member of a press collective called the 45th Parallel Absurdist Brigade said they were pushed by law enforcement officers while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Nov. 4, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
There were two main demonstrations in Portland on Nov. 4, with one group calling for every vote cast in the U.S. presidential election to be counted and another expressing a combination of dismay with the electoral system and support for the Black Lives Matter movement. While the protests were organized separately, the two groups converged briefly at one point in the night. After some protesters smashed windows of downtown businesses, law enforcement officers declared the protests a “riot” at around 6:45 p.m.
Several law enforcement agencies were involved in policing the protests, with the Portland Police Bureau, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and Oregon State Police all working together after Oregon Gov. Kate Brown ordered a “unified command” to respond to protests. The Oregon National Guard was also activated to help with enforcement.
The initial round of shoving incidents reportedly occurred a little after 8 p.m. near the corner of Southwest Park Ave. and Southwest Washington Street, where a group of journalists got caught up in a push by law enforcement officers to clear protesters from the area.
The member of the 45th Parallel Absurdist Brigade, who asked to remain anonymous, was pushed by a police officer several times upon arrival at the scene. A video posted on Twitter shows law enforcement officers running down the street as protesters back away. A Portland police officer then pushes the journalist several times.
The journalist told the Tracker that there was a crush of people around the arrest. “They were pushing and I couldn’t back up,” the journalist said. “They were shoving us into a wall of bodies.”
About three hours later, the journalist was pushed again by what appears to be a member of the National Guard. A video posted on Twitter a little after 11 p.m. shows members of the National Guard and the police walking down Southwest Taylor Street and shouting, “Keep moving!”
“I was walking on the sidewalk with other media and was filming the line [of officers],” said the journalist. “All of a sudden I heard, ‘You’re going too slow,’ and felt this yank.”
In another video tweeted a few minutes later, the journalist wrote, “Being on the heels of the people in front of me was not fast enough, they begin grabbing me and others by the backpacks and shoving us back through the line.”
In response to the Tracker’s inquiries on this incident, Stephan Bomar, public affairs director of the Oregon Military Department, which oversees the National Guard, said in a statement: “It appears as though during this chaotic situation that all remained safe and secure.”
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon didn’t include the state police or National Guard when it filed the cases.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the continuing ACLU litigation. The Oregon State Police didn’t respond to a request for comment on the shoving incidents.
Independent journalist Mason Lake said he was shot three separate times with crowd-control munitions by federal law enforcement officers while he was covering a protest outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of Oct. 29, 2020. The pepper balls also damaged his video camera, he said.
Lake, a videographer, was covering one of the many Portland protests against law enforcement violence that first erupted after the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
The protest began late on Oct. 28, as demonstrators rallied at Elizabeth Carruthers Park, in the South Waterfront district of Portland, and stretched past midnight. The protesters marched several blocks south to the ICE building, chanting against the Trump administration’s immigration policies, including the separation of children from parents that took place from 2017 to 2018 and the lack of progress in reuniting all of the families.
When demonstrators arrived outside the ICE building shortly before midnight, federal officers warned them they were trespassing and fired tear gas to disperse the crowd, according to the local news station KOIN.
Lake, who was marked as press on a helmet and a vest and carried his press identification with him, was shot three separate times with crowd-control munitions after midnight and caught them all on video that he later posted on YouTube. He said he believes he was targeted by the federal agents because he was filming them.
In the first incident, at around 1:27 a.m., Lake captured federal officers advancing down the street in a cloud of tear gas and shooting crowd-control munitions. At about seven seconds in, Lake is heard cursing after being shot with what he believes were pepper balls.
“I was shot in the back of my thigh when we were backing up from the line they were pushing us from,” Lake told the Tracker. “It also hit my back.”
In the second incident, at around 1:34 a.m., Lake approached a tear gas canister on the ground, and was then fired at. He responded by cursing at the federal agents.
“They shot me in the chest with the pepper rounds, and then my camera got hit with a pepper round, got hit with a pellet, and then another pepper round. And the mic itself got hit with a pepper round,” Lake told the Tracker.
His Canon EOS 6D Mark II camera was damaged, with the audio connection and hot shoe needing cleaning and maintenance. The mic also needed work after being hit with a pepper ball.
“I had to send in the camera for work. The camera took some damage, though thankfully not too much,” he said.
In the third incident, at 1:58 a.m., Lake is hit with crowd-control munitions as he walks towards federal officers stationed outside the ICE facility. At about six seconds in, Lake can be heard yelling that he was shot in the face. He then turns his camera to show where a mark was left on his helmet.
Lake told the Tracker it was a pepper round that hit him that time as well.
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
Independent videographer Garrison Davis was struck with a crowd-control munition in the early morning hours of Oct. 29, 2020, while he covered a protest outside the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland, Oregon.
Protests had been held on an almost nightly basis in Portland since late May, in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Videographer Davis has covered many of the Portland protests, and in November 2020, after this incident, he began co-hosting a podcast, “Uprising: A Guide From Portland,” for iHeartRadio.
According to Davis, a group of about 100 protesters assembled at Elizabeth Caruthers Park in South Portland just before midnight on Oct. 29; they marched a few blocks south to the ICE building, a frequent site for demonstrations to protest conditions for the facility’s inmates and to call for the agency’s abolition.
The group stopped in front of a driveway into the facility, Davis told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. He said about 10 journalists were covering the gathering.
Davis captured footage of armed Federal Protective Service agents, who are part of Homeland Security, in riot gear, emerging from the building on two separate occasions and arresting a protester each time.
Following the second arrest, the agents began firing tear gas and other crowd-control devices at the crowd and marching toward them as they backed down South Moody Avenue, according to tweets and videos Davis posted on his account.
Davis told the Tracker that because of his work he has a gas mask that offers decent protection in such situations. “If you put it on ahead of time it’s not the worst,” he said.
Davis told the Tracker that he was struck on the knee with what he believed to be either a rubber bullet or a tear-gas canister.
“Teargas and Stun Grenades in Portland streets,” Davis wrote in a Twitter post. “I’ve been shot in the leg with either a rubber bullet or canister.”
Davis said he did not seek medical attention but that he walked with a limp for a few days after the protest.
Davis said he was wearing a press badge on a lanyard and a helmet with “PRESS” in white letters on one side. He said that, while an agent used a loudspeaker to threaten protesters and journalists with arrest if they were caught trespassing on federal property, the agents on the street did not issue a warning before setting off crowd-control munitions.
Davis and other people filming the scene edged to the east side of the street to keep cameras on the agents as protesters moved north. He said that it appeared agents were firing munitions toward the journalists.
“They were doing it kind of for fun, it seemed,” Davis said.
The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment.
Demonstrators and Federal and local police clash at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland, Oregon, on Oct. 29, 2020
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest, shot / shot at",,, 2020-12-13 13:12:31.456089+00:00,2020-12-13 13:12:31.456089+00:00,Independent photojournalist threatened by man with a gun in Portland,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-photojournalist-threatened-man-gun-portland/,2020-12-13 13:12:31.415956+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Maranie Staab (Freelance),,2020-10-24,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"An unidentified man threatened independent photojournalist Maranie Staab with a gun as she covered protests in downtown Portland, Oregon on Oct. 24, 2020.
Staab, whose photos of the protests in Portland have been published by Reuters, The New Yorker and Agence France-Presse, was documenting one of the protests that have been held almost nightly in the city in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
On the night of Oct. 24, Staab was covering demonstrations near the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building, which has increasingly become a focus of the demonstrations, in South Portland.
At around 11 p.m., two men drove by in an unmarked vehicle, said Staab. She was filming at the time because there had been “suspicious vehicles driving around” and “a lot of intimidation happening,” she told the Tracker.
In a video she tweeted, the driver of the car can be seen pointing the gun through his passenger side window and calling her a “bitch.”
“I had my phone up making video and happened to catch him pointing a handgun directly at me,” Staab recalled.
After threatening Staab. the men got out of their car a few hundred feet away and then started to threaten protesters, yelling phrases like “All lives matter!” and “Back the blue!” One of the men said he was military, but there is no evidence to verify that claim, according to Staab. In a different video Staab tweeted, protesters can be heard chanting “Black lives matter!” in response.
The men continued to aggravate protesters until members of the crowd helped de-escalate the situation, she said.
Freelance photojournalist Cole Howard tweeted several photographs of the situation. “The man in the green sweatshirt though not affiliated with the protest de-escalated the situation,” he wrote.
While Staab didn’t file a police report, she said she has been actively working to identify the individuals and is speaking to an attorney to discuss potential legal action.
Independent photojournalist Sean Bascom said he was hit with crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on the early morning of Oct. 18, 2020, despite a court order banning federal agents from targeting press.
Protests had been held In Portland on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. A temporary restraining order in early July barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents later that month. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
A number of protests in Portland have targeted federal government buildings, and on the evening of Oct. 17, protesters marched on the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in South Portland, in a demonstration that stretched into the early hours of Oct. 18.
Bascom told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was struck by pepper balls fired by federal agents stationed at the ICE building. Around 2:15 a.m, Bascom posted footage on Twitter of the agents firing pepper balls as they moved. His shoes got covered in residue from the munitions as agents fired at him, he told the Tracker. Without a gas mask on, he couldn’t see as he retreated.
“I was clearly marked as press. I have a high-vis vest on, ‘press’ clearly marked on my helmet,” he said.
The federal agents pushed protesters and the press onto Southwest Moody Avenue, just north of the facility, where they then used tear gas. In a video posted by Bascom on Twitter, federal agents can be seen firing pepper balls through clouds of tear gas that filled the street. One hit him in the lower chest, near his lowest rib, and left a paintball-sized welt, he said.
“They gassed it and just started firing pepperballs into the smoky gas. Like we couldn’t see them, and they definitely couldn’t see us,” he told the Tracker. “And it was mostly press that was closest to them, because that’s who gets close to them.”
To Bascom, the actions of the federal agents towards himself and other members of the press “wasn’t explicitly targeting, it was more disregarding,” he said.
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents. ICE, which operates under the DHS, referred the Tracker to the DHS for comment.
Independent photojournalist Maranie Staab said she was hit with crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on the early morning of Oct. 18, 2020, despite a court order banning federal agents from targeting press.
Protests had been held In Portland on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. A temporary restraining order in early July barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents later that month. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
A number of protests in Portland have targeted federal government buildings, and on the evening of Oct. 17, protesters marched on the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in South Portland, in a demonstration that stretched into the early hours of Oct. 18.
Staab told the Tracker that around midnight she was on an adjacent street outside the ICE building, documenting a standoff between protesters and officers in an alleyway. Staab said she was behind the first row of protesters when officers started to rush at the group, shooting pepper balls while running.
“I was shot numerous times. I took one to the knee that put me on the ground,” she said. “They continued to shoot at me while I was on the ground. I was pretty messed up because they got my finger too.”
Staab added that she was clearly marked as press, yet officers continued to fire at her. She posted images of her injuries on Twitter, including welts on her lower back and knees and a splint on her right middle finger. She later told the Tracker that the finger had been severely sprained.
Additionally, her new camera stopped working out of the blue and was in repair for more than two weeks, Staab said. When she received the $700 repair bill, it stated that damage was caused by “corrosion due to paint and chemical substances.”
“It’s whatever they’ve been gassing us with. It’s getting into equipment and literally causing corrosion to camera,” Staab said. “I was not OK there for a little while, but the reality is I’m tough, because I realize that anything that I’m going through is nothing compared to what people have and continue to go through at the hands of the police. I have every intention to continue doing this work.”
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents. ICE, which operates under the DHS, referred the Tracker to the DHS for comment.
Independent journalist Brian Conley was hit with crowd-control munitions fired by law enforcement officers while covering a protest at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in Portland, Oregon, on Oct. 17, 2020.
Racial justice protests had been held regularly in Portland since the May 25 police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Several protests in the city have targeted federal government buildings, and on the evening of Oct. 17, protesters marched on the ICE building in South Portland.
Conley was filming a standoff between federal agents and protesters when the agents began firing pepper balls and moving forward in an attempt to clear the street. Conley was pushed by one of the agents and then tripped over a person who was already on the ground. Tumbling to the ground, Conley dropped his phone. When he got up and tried to retrieve it, he said officers fired pepper balls at him.
“He barreled directly into me, knocked me into the ground,” Conley told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker when describing how the officer pushed him down. “Then when I went to get my phone, he started shooting the ground around me.”
Conley said he had press markings on his body armor and was visibly filming close to the agents when the incident occurred.
In a video Conley uploaded to Twitter at 11:43 p.m., the footage goes dark as Conley drops his phone and heavy pepper-ball fire can be heard before he picks it up again.
“I’m press, buddy! I’m press. You can’t shoot me!” he yells at one officer after he retrieves his phone. He then approaches another federal agent and says: “Tell your buddy to leave me alone.”
Here's that moment when DHS officers rush the crowd, I try to back up while still shooting, get knocked over a photographer, and if you listen closely you may hear the pepper balls shot at my phone as I retrieved it from the ground. pic.twitter.com/uQZOSlcQ8N
— Brian Conley (@BaghdadBrian) October 18, 2020
Conley told the Tracker he had “pretty bad” shoulder pain after the incident as well as a knot around the area where the back of his skull meets his neck.
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents from the Tracker. ICE, which operates under the Department of Homeland Security, responded by telling the Tracker to contact the Department of Homeland Security.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Photojournalist Cole Howard said he was sprayed with chemical irritants by law enforcement officers during a protest at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in Portland, Oregon, on Oct. 17, 2020.
Racial justice protests had been held regularly in Portland since the May 25 police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Several protests in the city have targeted federal government buildings, and on the evening of Oct. 17, protesters marched on the ICE building in South Portland.
Howard told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was following the crowd that evening when it arrived at the ICE building. He said protesters were attempting to tie balloons to the gate of the facility when federal agents moved in to confront them.
“This one specific officer had a can of mace and unloaded it into my face,” he said. “He aimed at me and then he aimed over. So it wasn’t like I was the only one who was hit in that moment.”
But he said it was definitely a direct blast, even though he was wearing press credentials, including a big press badge on his body armor and another on his backpack.
“I was very obviously press,” he added.
Howard captured the moment the officer sprayed him in a photo.
1 of my first shots of the night. A DHS officer blasts mace into a crowd of protesters and press (including myself). Prior to fleeing the attacks, protesters were hanging balloons on the fence of ICE HQ, which led to this reaction.#PortlandProtests #PDXprotests #jornalismo #pdx pic.twitter.com/9NQZALjtay
— Cole Howard (@RedheadNomad) October 18, 2020
A video shot by journalist Justin Yau and uploaded at 9:09 p.m. showed Howard getting sprayed in the face with a chemical agent at close range as he tried to take photos.
Howard had a gas mask with him, but wasn’t anticipating getting hit with a chemical agent at that point and wasn’t wearing it. After being helped to safety about a block away, he said it took him 10-to-15 minutes to regain vision that was good enough for him to work. He said his skin burned for the next day.
“I always feel like my eyes are kind of foggy after that for a while,” he said. “But I don’t know if that’s something that’s proven on paper or just me feeling disoriented.”
Howard feels that he was targeted initially by the officer, but that they changed their aim when they realized aiming at a journalist “wasn’t going to look good on paper.”
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents from the Tracker. ICE, which operates under the Department of Homeland Security, responded by telling the Tracker to contact the Department of Homeland Security.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Independent journalist Alissa Azar said she was harassed and assaulted by Portland police while covering a protest in front of the Police Bureau North Precinct on Oct. 10, 2020.
The protest was among the many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
At 10:22 p.m. on Oct. 10 Azar tweeted a video of officers surrounding protesters, yelling at and aggressively pushing them around. At the 1:10 time mark, an officer approaches Azar saying, “If you want to film, you can do it from down there,” pressuring them to walk away from the scene. Another officer suddenly charges at them, yelling, “Move! I don’t care what the TRO says.”
Azar told the Tracker she was physically pushed and was wearing her National Press Photographers Association pass, as well as a helmet and vest with press markings.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent journalist Melissa Lewis said she was harassed and assaulted by Portland police while covering a protest in front of the Portland Police Bureau North Precinct on Oct. 10, 2020.
The protest was among the many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
Lewis tweeted a video at 11:20 p.m. that captures the initial rush of officers toward the demonstrators.
“I was maced, pushed behind a barrier, forced to jump the barrier, and then forced down the sidewalk under threat of violence,” Lewis told the Tracker.
She said she had a press badge and large press markings on her backpack and helmet.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent video journalist Mason Lake is pressing charges after he said a Portland, Oregon, police officer grabbed and physically moved him to the sidewalk, away from filming a mass arrest at a protest on Oct. 10, 2020.
Lake filed a lawsuit in June 2022 against the City of Portland and two police officers, identified as John Doe 1 and 2. In the complaint, Lake alleges that while covering protests in 2020 and 2021, Portland police in seven separate incidents shoved, pepper-sprayed, threatened, pinned, grabbed and punched him, and damaged his equipment.
He is seeking $200,000 in compensatory damages. For jurisdictional reasons, an amended complaint was moved from state to federal court on Dec. 12, 2023.
The alleged assault took place against a backdrop of social justice protests around the country in the summer of 2020 following the police murder of George Floyd that May. In Portland, protests brought thousands to the streets continuously throughout that period.
“When someone like me or other independent press are actually in between police officers and protesters, they (police officers) don’t like that,” Lake told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker in a March 2024 interview. “I do believe the police knew who I was, and I do very much believe they were trying to get rid of me.”
By pressing charges, Lake said he hopes to set a legal precedent for press freedom cases in the future, adding, “I didn’t break any laws. I never contributed to anything (illegal), like breaking windows or anything like that.”
When contacted, the Portland Police Bureau said they could not comment on ongoing litigation but referred the Tracker to the city attorney, Robert L. Taylor. Taylor did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
Police officers shoving a group of protesters back before arresting many of them at an Oct. 10, 2020, protest in Portland, Oregon. Video journalist Mason Lake was shoved away from the scene shortly after a police officer saw him filming.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:23-cv-01870,['ONGOING'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,,,, 2021-03-24 17:10:13.752925+00:00,2021-03-24 17:10:13.752925+00:00,Photojournalist’s hearing damaged by flash-bang grenade thrown by federal agent,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photojournalists-hearing-damaged-by-flash-bang-grenade-thrown-by-federal-agent/,2021-03-24 17:10:13.716037+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Mathieu Lewis-Rolland (Freelance),,2020-10-06,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent photojournalist Mathieu Lewis-Rolland’s hearing was damaged when a federal officer threw a flash-bang grenade at him while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon on Oct. 6, 2020.
Lewis-Rolland, whose work has been published by Reuters, Agence France-Presse and other news outlets, was covering one of the many Portland Black Lives Matter protests that had been ongoing for months following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. A temporary restraining order in early July, barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, was expanded to include federal agents later that month. Lewis-Rolland is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit.
On the evening of Oct. 6, protesters marched to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building on South Macadam Avenue in south Portland, according to Oregon Public Broadcasting. Federal Protective Service officers, who were guarding the building, declared an unlawful assembly, according to a statement from the Portland Police Bureau. When a protester threw a smoke bomb onto the roof of the building, agents began using flash bang grenades and tear gas to disperse demonstrators, OPB reported.
Lewis-Rolland told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was standing in front of the ICE building around 11 p.m. when the federal officers opened the door and rolled a flash-bang grenade toward him.
In one video posted on Twitter by photographer Clementson Supriyadi, Lewis-Rolland can be seen in a fluorescent yellow vest. He moves to the side of a walkway leading to the entrance of the building as law enforcement officers emerge through the door. One agent throws a metal canister toward Lewis-Rolland, who does not appear to be standing near any protesters or other people. The flash-bang grenade explodes a few feet from the photographer, spewing white fog.
Lewis-Rolland told the Tracker the agents gave no warning.
“I couldn't even react,” he said. “It happened so fast.”
In another video from a different angle, posted on Twitter by Garrison Davis at 10:57 p.m., Lewis-Rolland can be seen in the very first seconds, jumping as the device explodes. He staggers a few steps, before falling to the ground.
Federal Agents have stormed out of the ICE building. Stun Grenades and Teargas being used. #blacklivesmatter #ICE #AbolishICE #portland #PortlandProtests pic.twitter.com/kofM8IUQaj
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) October 7, 2020
Lewis-Rolland told the Tracker that after the explosion, he was dizzy for the rest of the night. He said he sought medical help for the damage to his hearing in his left ear and was treated with prednisone.
They prescribed me prednisone. Hoping it gets better 🤞
— Mathieu Lewis-Rolland (@MathieuLRolland) October 10, 2020
Lewis said he didn’t return to news coverage for a month after the incident. Nearly six months later, he said he still has very loud tinnitus in his left ear because of the blast, and loud noises cause his hearing to crackle.
In addition to the bright yellow vest, Lewis-Rolland told the Tracker he was wearing a black helmet marked “PRESS” and carrying two large cameras.
The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent video journalist Mason Lake is pressing charges after he said he was threatened and shoved by a Portland, Oregon, police officer on Oct. 2, 2020.
According to court documents, Lake also alleges that after the assault, some of the officer’s pepper spray hit him.
Lake filed the lawsuit in June 2022 against the City of Portland and two police officers, identified as John Doe 1 and 2. In the complaint, Lake alleges that while covering protests in 2020 and 2021, Portland police in seven separate incidents shoved, pepper-sprayed, threatened, pinned, grabbed and punched him, and damaged his equipment.
He is seeking $200,000 in compensatory damages. For jurisdictional reasons, an amended complaint was moved from state to federal court on Dec. 12, 2023.
The alleged assault took place against a backdrop of social justice protests around the country in the summer of 2020, following the police murder of George Floyd that May. In Portland, protests brought thousands to the streets continuously throughout that period.
Lake says that by pressing charges, he hopes to set a legal precedent for press freedom cases in the future. “I was really just trying to report what I saw, record it, and share as much as I could,” he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker in a March 2024 interview. “I didn’t break any laws. I never contributed to anything (illegal), like breaking windows or anything like that.”
When contacted, the Portland Police Bureau said it could not comment on ongoing litigation but referred the Tracker to the city attorney, Robert L. Taylor. Taylor did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
A police officer pointing at journalist Mason Lake moments after the independent videographer was shoved and threatened at an Oct. 2, 2020, protest in Portland, Oregon.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:23-cv-01870,['ONGOING'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"chemical irritant, protest",,, 2021-01-12 19:56:05.347852+00:00,2022-05-12 20:12:49.460270+00:00,Social media journalist arrested while covering protests in Portland,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/social-media-journalist-arrested-while-covering-protests-portland/,2022-05-12 20:12:49.385356+00:00,"obstruction: disorderly conduct in the second degree (charges dropped as of 2020-09-30), obstruction: interfering with a peace officer (charges dropped as of 2020-09-30)",,,Arrest/Criminal Charge,,,,Chris Khatami (Freelance),,2020-09-28,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Social media journalist Chris Khatami was arrested while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 28, 2020. The journalist was held for several hours and charged with interfering with a peace officer and disorderly conduct.
That night, protesters gathered outside the Portland Police Union building in North Portland as part of ongoing demonstrations against racial injustice and police violence. Khatami hosts an entertainment show on the platform Twitch and has been documenting and livestreaming the city’s protests on social media for several months. He told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was on North Lombard Street filming on his phone what had been a “very uneventful night.”
I am almost at the Portland Police Association for tonight’s BLM protest. I will be covering it here and on Facebook. This is my twitter thread. (Running late of course) pic.twitter.com/fpt76wFV4L
— Ra's Al Crood (@ChrisKhatami) September 29, 2020
At around 11 p.m., Khatami said he was walking across an intersection and filming when he was grabbed from behind by police officers and told he was under arrest because the street had been declared off limits. A police statement said law enforcement declared the gathering an unlawful assembly after protesters started throwing objects at officers, according to news reports.
Khatami told the Tracker he had printed out papers that said “press” and taped them to his sleeves and vest. He said he also told the officers he was a member of the press. The officers asked if he was affiliated with any organization and Khatami told them he was an independent journalist, he said.
Since July, law enforcement officers from the Portland Police Bureau and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests.
Despite identifying himself as a member of the media, the officers placed him in zip ties and put him in the back of a police van, he said. About an hour later, he and others arrested at the protests were taken to a police precinct in downtown Portland.
After being held for several hours, he was released early the next morning, Khatami said. He was one of 24 people charged with “Interfering with a Peace Officer” and “Disorderly Conduct in the Second Degree,” according to government records. At an arraignment the next day, officials declined to prosecute him for the charges, Khatami said.
When asked for comment, a PPB Public Information Officer directed the Tracker to the city attorney's office. The city attorney's office did not respond to an email requesting comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
Independent journalist Alissa Azar was shoved and hit with batons by law enforcement officers while she was covering a protest in downtown Portland, Oregon, during the early morning hours of Sept. 27, 2020.
The protest was among the many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
On the night of Sept. 26, several hundred protesters gathered in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center for a demonstration that lasted into the early morning hours, according to local news station KGW8. After an unlawful assembly was declared around 11:30 p.m., law enforcement officers “began bull-rushing and pushing protesters, press, and legal observers,” the article said.
A little after midnight, Azar was pushed around, hit with batons and shoved to the ground by officers while covering the demonstration, she told the Tracker.
“Before we knew it, a few riot vans came in and arrested three people just for standing in the street,” she said, noting that officers from the Portland Police Bureau, Oregon State Police and Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office were working together under a unified command.
“They pushed us SO far. And by pushed I mean literally sprinting as fast as they could after us...I saw countless people get pushed and hit,” Azar tweeted at 12:25 a.m.
In a follow-up tweet, she wrote, “I got told to move and to ‘use my brain’ and ‘self accountability’ for saying I’m moving. I then got pushed to the ground, picked up by my backpack strap & pushed again then told to ‘stop flopping around.’ Wrist is already bruising and swelling & hurt my ankle.”
I got told to move and to “use my brain” and “self accountability” for saying I’m moving. I then got pushed to the ground, picked up by my backpack strap & pushed again then told to “stop flopping around.” Wrist is already bruising and swelling & hurt my ankle 😎
— Alissa Azar (@AlissaAzar) September 27, 2020
Azar sustained a minor concussion, numerous bruises, a thumb injury that required medical attention and a cracked phone screen, she said.
She had been wearing a vest and helmet, both labeled with press markings, she said, as well as a National Press Photographers Association press pass.
In a joint statement on that day’s demonstrations, MCSO Sheriff Mike Reese and OSP Superintendent Travis Hampton praised officers for maintaining safety and order while allowing people to exercise their rights.
When reached by email about this incident, the PPB declined to comment, citing pending litigation. MCSO didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment.
OSP spokesperson Timothy Fox told the Tracker that “if someone feels that excessive or improper force was used against them,” they may report it to the Office of Professional Standards for investigation.
Independent journalist Rodrigo Melgarejo was shoved by Portland police while covering a protest in downtown Portland, Oregon, during the early morning hours of Sept. 27, 2020.
The protest was among the many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
On the night of Sept. 26, several hundred protesters gathered in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center for a demonstration that lasted into the early morning hours, according to local news station KGW8. After an unlawful assembly was declared around 11:30 p.m., law enforcement officers “began bull-rushing and pushing protesters, press, and legal observers,” the article said.
“Police push tonight was one of the most brutal show of force by the Portland Police,” Melgarejo tweeted at 3:57 a.m. “Pushing and shoving press members on the ground.”
Police push tonight was one of the most brutal show of force by the Portland Police. Pushing and shoving press members on the ground. in this video, Brent Taylor is seen making an arrest in the midst of the chaos. @NLG_Portland @uspresstracker pic.twitter.com/gT7ioazVI4
— Rodrigo Melgarejo (@Mestizo43) September 27, 2020
In the video, officers in riot gear can be seen aggressively pushing people and repeatedly shouting, “Move!” Melgarejo gets shoved about seven seconds into the video, though it's unclear if the officer directly hits the camera with a baton or uses the baton to push someone into the camera. About 10 seconds later, an officer can be seen grabbing someone from behind and slamming them to the ground.
Melgarejo was wearing a ballistic vest and black helmet, both marked as “press,” he told the Tracker.
In a different video, Melgarejo is walking alongside other members of the press when one officer yells at a person wearing a large “press” sign on their chest, "Do you know how many projectiles we take from people wearing press?” the officer asks. “Police your own.”
When reached by email about this incident, the Portland Police Bureau declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
Independent photojournalist Sean Bascom was pushed by officers several times, he said, including once when he was knocked down over another person while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, early on the morning of Sept. 27, 2020.
Bascom was documenting one of the many protests that had been ongoing for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists. Olmos provided a declaration in support of the class-action lawsuit involving a previous incident.
On Sept. 26, a rally organized by the Proud Boys far-right extremist group drew some 800 people to Portland, while at least 1,000 counterprotesters gathered nearby, The Oregonian reported. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown had declared a state of emergency ahead of the rally, putting officers from the Portland Police Bureau, Oregon State Police and the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office under a unified command. After those protests ended, left-leaning demonstrators gathered downtown later that night, according to The Oregonian, and police declared an “unlawful assembly” around 11:40 p.m.
Videos posted on social media into the early morning of Sept. 27 show police pushing many people who were marked as “press.”
Bascom, whose work has been published in outlets including the Portland Mercury and the Portland State Vanguard, said he was pushed by law enforcement officers at several points during the protest.
In a live video shot just after midnight on Sept. 27, journalists can be seen walking away from law enforcement officers before the camera shakes. That was when an officer knocked him down over another person, Bascom told the Tracker.
Later, the video shows officers once again starting to push Bascom and other journalists, ordering them to move down the street. They can be heard telling Bascom to “Go faster!” and “Stop interfering and move!”
— Sean Bascom (@baaascom) September 27, 2020
Bascom repeatedly tells them he is a journalist. One officer responds, saying. “I understand that you’re press, but you have to move.” As Bascom walks backwards filming the officers, one tells him, “Turn around so you don’t trip.”
In a video Bascom uploaded to Twitter around 1 a.m., officers can be seen pushing Bascom and other journalists with batons as they try to clear the crowd. About 80 seconds into the video, an officer grabs a photographer by his body armor and flings him back towards where Bascom is retreating. In his tweet, Bascom described the officers as being from both the OSP and the PPB.
OSP & PPB bull rush indiscriminately for one block pic.twitter.com/LTXWJdZRpI
— Sean Bascom (@baaascom) September 27, 2020
“Normally there is an avenue for us to go, for press to step aside and exist and document. But on that night it was like building-to-building, wall-to-wall police and pushing, and there was nowhere for anybody to go,” he told the Tracker.
Bascom, who was wearing a high-visibility vest with press markings that night, said officers appeared to be targeting members of the press.
Afterwards, the ACLU called for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate police treatment of journalists, The Oregonian reported.
Gov. Brown tweeted on Sept. 27 that she asked the individual law enforcement agencies to investigate any allegations about the use of force against members of the press or public. In a statement on behalf of the three agencies, the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office said it was aware that video had been taken of several incidents involving force, which would be reviewed to determine whether any officers violated law enforcement policies, according to The Oregonian.
A spokesperson for the PPB declined to comment, citing ongoing litigation. A spokesperson for the OSP said they weren’t aware of the incidents.
Freelance journalist Michael Elliott said he was repeatedly shoved by law enforcement officers, damaging his camera, while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, early on the morning of Sept. 27, 2020.
Elliott told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was documenting one of the many protests held for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
On Sept. 26, a rally organized by the Proud Boys far-right extremist group drew some 800 people to Portland, while at least 1,000 counterprotesters gathered nearby, The Oregonian reported. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown had declared a state of emergency ahead of the rally, putting officers from the PPB, Oregon State Police and the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office under a unified command. After those protests ended, left-leaning demonstrators gathered downtown later that night, according to The Oregonian, and police declared an “unlawful assembly” around 11:40 p.m.
Videos posted on social media into early the morning of Sept. 27 show police pushing many people who were marked as “press.”
Elliott, who says his work has been published by VICE, Oregon Public Broadcasting and Willamette Week, among others, told the Tracker he was one of the journalists repeatedly shoved by officers using their batons shortly after midnight. At least six other journalists also reported being shoved, pushed or grabbed by law enforcement officers that night.
“I was literally pleading with the law enforcement [officers] to stop pushing me because they were pushing me into protesters who were pushing back,” Elliott said. “They were relentlessly pushing us, a group predominantly of press, and the press was essentially trampling each other at that point.”
Elliott added he believes that at some point during the incident, one of the officer’s batons struck his camera, cracking the glass of his camera’s viewfinder. He said that in addition to his camera, he was wearing a press credential around his neck and a helmet labeled “PRESS.”
The following day, the ACLU called for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate police treatment of journalists, The Oregonian reported.
Gov. Brown tweeted on Sept. 27 that she asked the individual law enforcement agencies to investigate any allegations about the use of force against members of the press or public. In a statement on behalf of the three agencies, the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office said it was aware that video had been taken of several incidents involving force, which would be reviewed to determine whether any officers violated law enforcement policies, according to The Oregonian.
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. A spokesperson for the Oregon State Police said they weren’t aware of the incidents.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter Sergio Olmos was pushed by an officer into a tree, according to his social media posts, while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, early on the morning of Sept. 27, 2020.
Olmos was documenting one of the many protests that had been ongoing for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists. Olmos provided a declaration in support of the class-action lawsuit involving a previous incident.
On Sept. 26, a rally organized by the Proud Boys far-right extremist group drew some 800 people to Portland, while at least 1,000 counterprotesters gathered nearby, The Oregonian reported. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown had declared a state of emergency ahead of the rally, putting officers from the Portland Police Bureau, Oregon State Police and the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office under a unified command. After those protests ended, left-leaning demonstrators gathered downtown later that night, according to The Oregonian, and police declared an “unlawful assembly” around 11:40 p.m.
Videos posted on social media into early the morning of Sept. 27 show police pushing many people who were marked as “press.
Olmos captured footage of officers pushing journalists. He tweeted a video at 12:24 a.m. showing police officers pushing a crowd up a street, writing that OSP and PPB officers were pushing journalists, protesters and legal observers with batons.
Immediately after, he tweeted, “This reporter is pushed into a tree.”
The video posted with the tweet shows police pressing people along a street. An officer in riot gear can be seen pushing the back of someone with a camera in a vest labeled “press.” The Tracker couldn’t identify the journalist.
Then another officer can be heard in the video saying, “Go, go, go, get moving!” After Olmos replies, “I’m press,” the camera abruptly shakes and continues to record as it hits the ground, looking up the trunk of a tree. When Olmos leans over to pick up the device, his black vest, labeled with “press” in white letters, is visible.
This reporter is pushed into a tree pic.twitter.com/mXP5Ar1pLN
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) September 27, 2020
Olmos didn’t respond to a request for comment.
OPB news director Anna Griffin retweeted Olmos’ video, noting that the enforcement actions against a journalist violated the temporary restraining order in the ACLU case. “I’d also love to hear elected officials explain why a reporter from my organization was subject to violence at the hands of law enforcement when judges have made it very clear this is not acceptable,” she wrote.
Afterwards, the ACLU called for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate police treatment of journalists, The Oregonian reported.
Gov. Brown tweeted on Sept. 27 that she asked the individual law enforcement agencies to investigate any allegations about the use of force against members of the press or public. In a statement on behalf of the three agencies, the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office said it was aware that video had been taken of several incidents involving force, which would be reviewed to determine whether any officers violated law enforcement policies, according to The Oregonian.
A spokesperson for the PPB declined to comment, citing ongoing litigation. A spokesperson for the OSP said they weren’t aware of the incidents.
A livestreamer was punched and shoved to the ground while covering a Sept. 26, 2020, rally in Portland, Oregon. The attacker was filmed kicking the journalist in the face, taking his phone and throwing it over a fence.
Journalists covering the Sept. 26 rally of the Proud Boys, a far-right group, Portland’s Delta Park, captured images of a man assaulting the livestreamer, who goes by the name Jovanni, the Daily Beast reports. The event attracted between 200 and 300 people, according to Oregon Public Broadcasting.
Independent journalist Zack Perry told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that at one point during the rally he witnessed members of the crowd yelling at Jovanni and trying to chase him out of the event. A man clad in jeans, gray shirt and a ballcap punched Jovanni in the eye but the livestreamer managed to get away, according to Perry and a Twitter post by Jovanni.
Jovanni did not respond to the Tracker’s requests for comment.
Perry, Jovanni and two other journalists tried to walk out of the event as a group, but Jovanni’s assailant “kept stalking us and berating us, blaming us for killing Jay Bishop and for burning down the city of Portland,” Perry said.
“Jay Bishop” is an alias for Aaron Danielson, a “friend and supporter” of the right-wing, Vancouver, Washington-based Patriot Prayer group who was shot and killed on Aug. 29, 2020, during a clash of left-wing groups and supporters of President Donald Trump in downtown Portland, the Oregonian reports.
“He pushed me very aggressively multiple times and punched me in the back of the head on two separate occasions but we just kept walking,” Perry said. After Perry was struck, the journalist said he stepped away in order to get “some distance to see if I could capture footage of him fucking with us better.”
The Tracker documented the assaults of Perry and independent journalist Justin Katigbak here.
At that point, Perry said, the assailant who had punched Jovanni earlier assaulted him a second time, throwing him into a fence and kicking him in the face.
Portland Tribune reporter Zane Sparling posted a video on Twitter of the attack at about 4 p.m. in which the man is seen kicking Jovanni in the face, snatching his phone from his hand and throwing the device over the fence. The assailant then falls to the ground himself.
Perry said that both journalists and rally attendees then moved to separate the assailant from Jovanni and that he and other journalists took the livestreamer to be seen by medics on hand at a nearby Black Lives Matter protest.
Jovanni tweeted on Sept. 27 that he went to the hospital and learned that he suffered a concussion from the attack. He said that he was unable to recover his phone but that a “homie got me a temporary.”
The Portland Police Bureau tweeted that the department was investigating the on-camera assault and called on witnesses to come forward. But a department spokesperson told the Tracker that investigators were unable to get in touch with Jovanni to look into the matter further.
“I have not been notified that there has been any change to that case. As far as I can tell it remains inactive,” Portland Police Sgt. Kevin Allen told the Tracker on Feb. 1, 2021.
Two independent photojournalists and a livestreamer were assaulted by an individual at a Sept. 26, 2020, rally in Portland, Oregon, according to interviews and multiple filmed accounts of the incident.
National leaders of the Proud Boys, which the Southern Poverty Law Center designates as a hate group, organized the rally, which drew between 200 and 300 people to Portland’s Delta Park, Oregon Public Broadcasting reports.
Journalists and others at the rally posted videos online showing a man shoving around independent journalists Zack Perry and Justin Katigbak.
The same assailant was also recorded throwing a livestreamer to the ground, kicking him in the face and throwing the journalist’s phone over a fence. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented the assault on the livestreamer, who goes by the name Jovanni, and damage to his equipment here.
Perry told the Tracker that prior to the assaults, a “huge chunk of the crowd” moved away from a stage erected in the park to chase after Jovanni. A Proud Boys member working security at the event managed to keep the crowd at bay to allow Jovanni to leave, Perry said.
Perry, Jovanni and other journalists walked away from the scene together. But the man followed after them, “stalking us and berating us” and blaming them for “burning down the city of Portland,” Perry said.
The assailant “pushed me very aggressively multiple times and punched me in the back of the head on two separate occasions but we just kept walking,” Perry said.
Katigbak told the Tracker that he began to follow the group after he noticed that the assailant was pursuing the two journalists, recording the altercation with a Nikon Z6.
“I noticed this guy was going after them and I followed to video,” Katigbak said.
Instagram user Gabby Albano posted a video of the assailant following Perry and Jovanni and giving Perry a shove from behind. The Tracker has documented that incident here.
Soon after that exchange, the man shoved Jovanni into a nearby fence and kicked him in the face while he was down before tossing the livestreamer’s phone over the fence.
In Albano’s video, a man wearing a black polo shirt with yellow trim — colors associated with the Proud Boys — is seen trying to restrain the assailant.
The assailant paces for about one minute before turning his sights on Katigbak. The assailant then shoves the journalist into a tree, causing Katigbak to fall to one knee.
In a video posted by Portland Tribune reporter Zane Sparling, Katigbak is seen getting to his feet when another rally attendee, wearing combat gear with a rifle strapped to his vest, shoves the journalist several times before others step between them.
Perry told the Tracker he did not file a complaint. Katigbak said he filed a report with the Portland Police Bureau regarding the assault but that he has not followed up with the department in the months since.
PPB spokesman Derek Carmon told the Tracker on Feb. 1, 2021, that no one has been arrested in relation to Katigbak’s alleged assault and no suspects have been identified.
Independent photojournalist John Rudoff was shoved to the ground by police while he was photographing an arrest during a protest in Portland, Oregon, late on Sept. 26, 2020.
Rudoff, whose work has been published in The New York Times, The Nation and Rolling Stone, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he hit the ground “so hard that my teeth hurt” and that his camera lens was significantly damaged.
Rudoff was documenting one of the many protests that had been ongoing for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. The Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists. Rudoff is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit.
Earlier in the day on Sept. 26, a rally organized by the Proud Boys far-right extremist group drew some 800 people to Portland, while at least 1,000 counterprotesters gathered nearby, The Oregonian reported. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown had declared a state of emergency ahead of the rally, putting officers from the Portland Police Bureau, Oregon State Police and the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office under a unified command. After those protests ended, left-leaning demonstrators gathered downtown later that night, according to The Oregonian, and police declared an “unlawful assembly” around 11:40 p.m.
Rudoff told the Tracker that he was following a crowd of protesters around 11:45 p.m. when several police officers ran up the sidewalk and tackled a demonstrator. Rudoff crossed the street and ran to document the arrest, along with several other journalists and photographers.
When Rudoff started taking photographs, standing at least 10 feet back, two officers put their hands on him and pushed him backwards, he said. He didn’t have time to put a foot back to catch his balance, and he landed on his right hip and the right side of his back. The right side of his head got slammed to the ground, he said.
“All the teeth in my mouth hurt from the impact of my helmet on the sidewalk,” he said.
Video posted on Twitter at midnight by Mike Baker of The New York Times shows officers running alongside a wall and tackling an individual to the ground. About 20 seconds into the video, Rudoff, wearing a bright yellow backpack, can be seen standing several yards back from the arrest, holding a camera up to take a photograph. Then two officers approach him, put their hands on his shoulder, and push him to the ground.
Aggressive arrests, baton jabbing and knocking a photographer to the ground. pic.twitter.com/OXdGhfOs3k
— Mike Baker (@ByMikeBaker) September 27, 2020
Rudoff said he was protected from the impact because he was wearing a helmet and body armor. He continued to work for about 20 more minutes before going home. He didn’t require any medical attention, he said, but was sore for the next few days.
His 24-70mm Canon lens, the shorter of two lenses he had with him that night, was significantly damaged and had to be repaired, he said.
Rudoff said he believes PPB officers pushed him, but that it’s possible it was a state trooper.
He doesn’t know whether he was targeted because he was a member of the press, saying it’s possible he was pushed because he was a civilian approaching a police action. However, he believes it’s more likely he was shoved because he was a clearly marked journalist photographing a violent arrest. “That would be the argument, that I was targeted because I was able to record what they were doing,” he said.
Rudoff noted that he had “press” written on his helmet and body armor, press identification around his neck, and professional-grade cameras.
Attorneys involved with the ACLU suit are aware of the incident on Sept. 26, he said.
The ACLU called for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate police treatment of journalists that night, The Oregonian reported. Matt Borden, a lawyer on the ACLU case, was quoted as saying the incident involving Rudoff “violates basic human decency in addition to the Court’s injunction.”
Brown tweeted on Sept. 27 that she asked the individual law enforcement agencies to investigate any allegations about the use of force against members of the press or public. In a statement on behalf of the three agencies, the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office said it was aware that video had been taken of several incidents involving force, which would be reviewed to determine whether any officers violated law enforcement policies, according to The Oregonian.
A spokesperson for the PPB declined to comment, citing ongoing litigation. A spokesperson for the OSP said they weren’t aware of the incidents.
A law enforcement officer grabbed independent photojournalist Maranie Staab by her backpack and shoved her while she was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, late on the night of Sept. 26, 2020.
Staab was documenting one of the many protests that had been ongoing for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
Earlier in the day on Sept. 26, a rally organized by the Proud Boys far-right extremist group drew some 800 people to Portland, while at least 1,000 counterprotesters gathered nearby, The Oregonian reported. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown had declared a state of emergency ahead of the rally, putting officers from the Portland Police Bureau, Oregon State Police and the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office under a unified command. After those protests ended, left-leaning demonstrators gathered downtown later that night, according to The Oregonian, and police declared an “unlawful assembly” around 11:40 p.m.
Shortly before midnight, Staab was standing next to several other journalists when an officer grabbed her by her backpack and shoved her away.
Independent journalist Rodrigo Melgarejo captured the incident in a video posted on Twitter. Staab, wearing a black vest clearly marked with “press” in large white letters, can be seen standing next to several other people wearing press vests as police officers tell people to leave. An officer abruptly reaches toward her from her right, spins her around by her backpack and pushes her forward.
Retweeting Melgarejo’s video later that day, Staab wrote, “@PortlandPolice continue to unlawfully target members of the Press. While they’re clearly marked. And on the sidewalk. And in no way interfering. This is an affront to our Constitution & democracy. This is taxpayer funded abuse.”
@PortlandPolice continue to unlawfully target members of the Press.
— Maranie R. Staab (@MaranieRae) September 28, 2020
While they’re clearly marked.
And on the sidewalk.
And in no way interfering.
This is an affront to our Constitution & democracy.
This is taxpayer funded abuse. #protectandserve #pdx #policebrutality https://t.co/pyhLiT4p77
After the incident, police began rushing a group of journalists who were on the sidewalk, Staab told the Tracker, adding that she and other members of the press were pushed and shoved back by police.
Staab believed she was targeted because she was a journalist, she said.
The ACLU called for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate police treatment of journalists that night, The Oregonian reported. Photojournalist John Rudoff was also pushed to the ground by police while covering the same protest, shortly before midnight. Melgarejo and journalists Sergio Olmos and Sean Bascom were also shoved by law enforcement in the early hours of the morning.
Brown tweeted on Sept. 27 that she asked the individual law enforcement agencies to investigate any allegations about the use of force against members of the press or public. In a statement on behalf of the three agencies, the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office said it was aware that video had been taken of several incidents involving force, which would be reviewed to determine whether any officers violated law enforcement policies, according to The Oregonian.
A spokesperson for the PPB didn’t respond to a request for comment, but the bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the continuing ACLU litigation.
A journalist with Full Revolution Media said he was arrested by police while covering a protest on the night of Sept. 26, 2020, in downtown Portland, Oregon.
The protest was among the many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
Earlier in the day on Sept. 26, a rally organized by the Proud Boys far-right extremist group drew some 800 people to Portland, while at least 1,000 counterprotesters gathered nearby, The Oregonian reported. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown had declared a state of emergency ahead of the rally, putting officers from the Portland Police Bureau, Oregon State Police and the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office under a unified command.
After those protests ended, left-leaning demonstrators gathered downtown later that night, according to The Oregonian, and police declared an “unlawful assembly” around 11:40 p.m. At 10:23 p.m., the MSCO tweeted that "officers have made more than a dozen arrests."
John, the Full Revolution Media journalist, told the Tracker, "I moved south and decided to separate from the protesters by myself to look for a friend that had my charging cable, as my phone was about to die."
John, who asked that his last name not be used out of safety concerns, said an officer asked him to go with the crowd, but he said, "No, I'm going southwest."
"He told me again, and knowing it was not a legal order, I started to walk when he grabbed me and said, 'You are under arrest,'" he said.
John believes he was targeted, noting he had just interacted with that officer about 30 minutes earlier.
He had press markings on the front and rear of his helmet, he said, but was still transported in a "paddy wagon with people with no masks" to the Multnomah County jail, where he was booked for harassment and interfering with a peace officer. The charges were later dropped, John said.
The journalist said he was released on a Sunday and allowed to pick up his personal belongings on Monday when the property room opened, but his work-related belongings were kept in evidence until he filed for their release. On Thursday he was allowed to retrieve his helmet, GoPro camera, Canon camera, and backpack with a backup phone, charger, batteries and other items in it.
"One of my phones (brand new) had been damaged," he told the Tracker. "I was in booking for 14 hours, and if it weren't for help from people outside jail, I wouldn't have been able to pick up my daughter."
The MSCO didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Two independent photojournalists and a livestreamer were assaulted by an individual at a Sept. 26, 2020, rally in Portland, Oregon, according to interviews and multiple filmed accounts of the incident.
National leaders of the Proud Boys, which the Southern Poverty Law Center designates as a hate group, organized the rally, which drew between 200 and 300 people to Portland’s Delta Park, Oregon Public Broadcasting reports.
Journalists and others at the rally posted videos online showing a man shoving around independent journalists Zack Perry and Justin Katigbak.
The same assailant was also recorded throwing a livestreamer to the ground, kicking him in the face and throwing the journalist’s phone over a fence. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented the assault on the livestreamer, who goes by the name Jovanni, and damage to his equipment here.
Perry told the Tracker that prior to the assaults, a “huge chunk of the crowd” moved away from a stage erected in the park to chase after Jovanni. A Proud Boys member working security at the event managed to keep the crowd at bay to allow Jovanni to leave, Perry said.
Perry, Jovanni and other journalists walked away from the scene together. But the man followed after them, “stalking us and berating us” and blaming them for “burning down the city of Portland,” Perry said.
The assailant “pushed me very aggressively multiple times and punched me in the back of the head on two separate occasions but we just kept walking,” Perry said.
Katigbak told the Tracker that he began to follow the group after he noticed that the assailant was pursuing the two journalists, recording the altercation with a Nikon Z6.
“I noticed this guy was going after them and I followed to video,” Katigbak said.
Instagram user Gabby Albano posted a video of the assailant following Perry and Jovanni and giving Perry a shove from behind.
Soon after that exchange, the man shoved Jovanni into a nearby fence and kicked him in the face while he was down before tossing the livestreamer’s phone over the fence.
In Albano’s video, a man wearing a black polo shirt with yellow trim — colors associated with the Proud Boys — is seen trying to restrain the assailant.
The assailant paces for about one minute before turning his sights on Katigbak. The assailant then shoves the journalist into a tree, causing Katigbak to fall to one knee. The Tracker has documented that incident here.
In a video posted by Portland Tribune reporter Zane Sparling, Katigbak is seen getting to his feet when another rally attendee, wearing combat gear with a rifle strapped to his vest, shoves the journalist several times before others step between them.
Perry told the Tracker he did not file a complaint. Katigbak said he filed a report with the Portland Police Bureau regarding the assault but that he has not followed up with the department in the months since.
PPB spokesman Derek Carmon told the Tracker on Feb. 1, 2021, that no one has been arrested in relation to Katigbak’s alleged assault and no suspects have been identified.
Independent photojournalist Ariston Vallejos said he was shoved by local police officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 23, 2020.
Vallejos was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the deaths of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky, and others. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led the city to agree to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The Sept. 23 protest was called in response to a Kentucky grand jury’s decision that day to not prosecute Louisville police officers for shooting and killing Taylor.
Demonstrators gathered in downtown Portland outside the Multnomah County Justice Center, a focus of Portland protests because it houses a jail, courtrooms and a police station. According to a report in The Oregonian, sometime after 9 p.m., some protesters threw rocks at the windows to the Central Precinct station, located on the Second Avenue side of the Justice Center.
In response, Portland police declared the protest a riot and used crowd-control munitions on demonstrators. At around 10:30 p.m., a protester threw a Molotov cocktail at officers.
Throughout the night, Vallejos filmed and tweeted from the protests. In a Twitter message posted at 10:17 p.m., Vallejos wrote he was “repeatedly shoved and screamed at,” despite his being marked as press.
A video Vallejos posted about an hour later captures an officer arresting someone on the ground. After Vallejos gets closer, a police officer pushes him back, and tells him to “get the fuck out of here.”
Vallejos confirmed the videos to the Tracker and that he felt targeted.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Social media journalist Chris Khatami was hit with a law enforcement munition used for crowd control while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 23, 2020. Khatami told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he did not believe he was targeted.
Khatami, who hosts an entertainment show on the platform Twitch, has been documenting and livestreaming the city’s protests for racial justice and against police brutality on social media for several months.
On Sept. 23, protesters gathered outside the Multnomah County Justice Center in downtown Portland to demonstrate against the Kentucky Attorney General’s announcement that a grand jury had declined to charge any police officers in the March 2020 death of Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky.
According to Khatami, around midnight, officers began pushing protesters away from the building and through Chapman Square, which housed a large encampment of homeless people. It was a chaotic scene, Khatami told the Tracker, as he tried to film officers pushing and grabbing protesters in the dark, while not trampling the belongings of the encampment’s residents.
In the midst of this, Khatami said he was hit on the hand by a crowd-control munition, but that it did not leave a mark or cause injury. He said he was not sure what kind of munition it was, and he did not believe he was targeted.
At Wednesday’s protest I was hit by DHS munitions and all I got was this amazing shot.#PortlandProtests #portland #pdx #policeriot #copriot #PoliceBrutality pic.twitter.com/5VexF9wRug
— Ra's Al Gabaghul (@ChrisKhatami) September 25, 2020
Earlier that evening, around 11 p.m., Khatami said police officers threw a gas canister directly toward where he was standing with a group of journalists, all of whom were clearly labeled “press.” Khatami was wearing homemade signs that said “press” taped to his backpack, shirt and helmet, he told the Tracker.
The journalist said the canister bounced away and he was not hit with any chemical irritant.
In this video from last night's protests in Portland you can see a cop throw a CS gas canister at me, and you can hear me be an indignant baby about it! #pdx #PDXprotests #portland #PortlandProtests #PoliceBrutality #csgas #copriot #PoliceRiots pic.twitter.com/b6ktNW4lKb
— Ra's Al Gabaghul (@ChrisKhatami) September 24, 2020
Since July, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. Sergeant Kevin Allen, a Portland Police Bureau Public Information Officer, told the Tracker in an email that he was unable to provide comment on the incident because “there is active litigation involving the City of Portland on the topic you’re asking about.”
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
Independent videographer Melissa Lewis says she was shoved by local police officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 23, 2020.
Lewis was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the deaths of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky, and others. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led the city to agree to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The Sept. 23 protest was called in response to a Kentucky grand jury’s decision that day to not prosecute Louisville police officers for shooting and killing Taylor.
Demonstrators gathered in downtown Portland outside the Multnomah County Justice Center, a focus of Portland protests because it houses a jail, courtrooms and a police station. According to a report in The Oregonian, sometime after 9 p.m., some protesters threw rocks at the windows to the Central Precinct station, located on the Second Avenue side of the Justice Center.
In response, Portland police declared the protest a riot and used crowd-control munitions on demonstrators. At around 10:30 p.m., a protester threw a Molotov cocktail at officers.
Lewis told the Tracker she was filming a confrontation between an officer and a protester on Broadway in downtown Portland. After she walked on the crosswalk to film, a police officer began to yell at her.
Video published by independent journalist Laura Jedeed at 10:55 p.m. captures Lewis, with the words “press” on her helmet walking backwards while an officer follows. Then, the officer pushes her to the ground.
“I reached the sidewalk and he shoved me over. My ankle caught the curb. I felt it pop and snap,” Lewis told the Tracker. “Medics were concerned I broke my ankle because it swelled, so I got evacuated to the ER.”
At Providence Portland Medical Center, Lewis learned her ankle didn’t break. But medical staff told her the officer’s push resulted in torn soft tissue in her ankle.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Law enforcement at a September 2020 protest in Portland, Oregon, after a grand jury declined to prosecute Kentucky police for killing Breonna Taylor. Journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis was shoved by an officer at a Portland protest on Sept. 23.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:20-cv-01882,['DISMISSED'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, court verdict, protest",,, 2021-01-29 16:33:06.499447+00:00,2022-03-09 22:49:02.521130+00:00,"Freelance journalist says federal agents fired tear gas and smoke, then shoved her, during Portland protest",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/freelance-journalist-says-federal-agents-fired-tear-gas-and-smoke-then-shoved-her-during-portland-protest/,2022-03-09 22:49:02.464893+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Laura Jedeed (Freelance),,2020-09-18,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Freelance journalist Laura Jedeed said federal law enforcement officers fired tear gas and smoke towards her, and then shoved her, while she was covering a protest outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 18, 2020.
Jedeed, a contributor to Portland Monthly and Willamette Weekly, was covering one of the many Portland protests in response to law enforcement violence that first erupted after the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
The Sept. 18 demonstration began in the evening, as demonstrators marched several blocks south from Elizabeth Caruthers Park in the South Waterfront district to the ICE building, and stretched past midnight. The demonstration came after a whistleblower alleged that ICE was medically neglecting detainees at a private detention center in Georgia and overseeing hysterectomies on detained women. Demonstrators also chanted against the Trump administration’s policy of separating children from parents, in place from 2017 to 2018, and the lack of progress in reuniting all of the families.
Jedeed was documenting the scene as federal agents dispersed the crowd to the north after protesters started pushing at the gates of the ICE building. Then the Portland police joined in the enforcement effort and declared the protest an “unlawful assembly,” according to local news outlet KOIN. Eleven people were arrested by the police on a range of charges, and law enforcement officers fired crowd-control munitions at the crowd to drive them away from the ICE building.
A video published by Jedeed on Twitter at 10:37 p.m. shows tear gas enveloping a street where protesters were retreating. After her camera pans to capture law enforcement officers standing on a street, a munition bounces close to her, and green smoke comes out.
“It landed right near me, and it was a plume of green smoke. It made it impossible to film, and there was only press there,” Jedeed told the Tracker, adding that believes federal officers targeted her to stop her from filming.
Earlier in September, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler had banned the Portland Police Bureau from using tear gas for crowd control, and he tweeted the day after the protest that the police had abided by his order. Federal agents, however, have continued to deploy tear gas during Portland protests.
After pulling back to the ICE facility, law enforcement officers again rushed the crowd and made an aggressive arrest around midnight. Jedeed was pushed to the ground during the rush, she told the Tracker, adding that believes a federal law enforcement officer shoved her.
Footage published by Jedeed on Twitter shortly after shows a group of officers running down a street near the ICE facility. About nine seconds in, the camera points downward and then shuts off as she is pushed. “I get shoved and skid along the asphalt,” wrote Jedeed in a post accompanying the video.
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
Independent journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis was hit in the leg repeatedly with crowd-control munitions fired by law enforcement, then grabbed and thrown to the ground by a police officer while documenting a Black Lives Matter protest in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 18, 2020.
The protest was one of the many that broke out across the U.S. that year in response to police violence and in support of the BLM movement following the murder of George Floyd. As the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker has documented, an unprecedented number of journalists were assaulted and arrested at these protests, including in Oregon, where the ACLU later filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of journalists and legal observers who were targeted and attacked by police.
Lewis joined a separate civil suit on Nov. 1, 2020, charging that the City of Portland, Multnomah County, and various law enforcement officials violated the constitutional rights of people with disabilities during BLM protests that year.
Lewis and three other Oregonians with disabilities who either documented or participated in the protests accused law enforcement of assaulting them multiple times and of generally acting without regard for their disabilities. Lewis has photosensitive epilepsy and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that increases the risk of injury and makes it difficult for her to move quickly.
In the complaint, Lewis describes Department of Homeland Security agents firing tear gas, pepper balls and Stinger grenades (which contain rubber pellets and the same ingredient used in pepper spray) into the crowd of people assembled at the Sept. 18 protest near a Portland branch of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Lewis, who shielded herself with a door, says she was shot in the leg seven times during the barrage.
Later that night, according to the complaint, Lewis was perched on the tailgate of a truck to film the actions of law enforcement agents when a police officer grabbed her by her backpack and threw her off the truck and onto the curb, where she hit her back and hips. Lewis later went to the emergency room and was diagnosed with oxycodone for the severe pain caused by the impact.
In October 2021, the court approved a motion to dismiss the plaintiffs’ claims in the lawsuit, ruling that they had failed to prove that the city customarily violated the constitutional rights of people with disabilities when responding to protests. The plaintiffs then filed an amended complaint, which did not include Lewis.
Lewis told the Tracker that she ultimately withdrew from the suit because of issues with her legal representation.
Police officers at a Black Lives Matter protest in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 18, 2020, where journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis was shot with crowd-control munitions fired by federal agents and thrown to the ground by police.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:20-cv-01882,['DISMISSED'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,no,False,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, chemical irritant, protest, shot / shot at",,, 2021-01-29 16:37:36.725134+00:00,2021-01-29 16:37:36.725134+00:00,Independent journalist says she was pushed with baton by Portland police officer while filming an arrest,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-journalist-says-she-was-pushed-baton-portland-police-officer-while-filming-arrest/,2021-01-29 16:37:36.690534+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Alissa Azar (Freelance),,2020-09-08,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent journalist Alissa Azar was pushed by a police officer while she was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 8, 2020, according to the journalist and her social media posts.
Azar was documenting one of the many protests that have been held on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
The Sept. 8 demonstration began at Waterfront Park downtown after 9 p.m., according to KOIN, the local CBS affiliate. Demonstrators then marched to the nearby Transit Police Department Offices, where protesters threw eggs and water bottles at police officers, KOIN reported.
Sometime before 11 p.m., Azar was filming police officers arrest a protester when some of the officers yelled at her and other members of the press to move back. One of the officers then started pushing Azar with a baton.
“The cops also held back a group of press and stopped us from joining protesters twice. They pushed us pretty hard while already on the sidewalk,” Azar tweeted at 10:53 p.m.
About 20 minutes later, Azar posted a video on Twitter showing the incident. About 30 seconds into the video, while Azar’s camera is trained on the arrest, an officer can be seen pushing Azar backwards with a baton. Azar can be heard responding that she was “on the sidewalk.”
Also around that time, a police officer threatened to arrest Azar and other journalists if they stood in the street. In a video Azar posted on Twitter the next day, a police officer can be overheard saying, “If they’re press and they’re in the street, take them into custody.”
Azar confirmed the events to the Tracker.
The PPB, in a statement on that night’s protest, said several arrests were made of people who were blocking traffic or throwing projectiles at officers during the protest at the transit police offices.
PPB spokesman Derek Carmon declined to comment on the specific incident, but said the department is committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review.
Rach Wilde, an independent photojournalist working with Black Zebra Productions, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was shoved and arrested while covering protests against police violence in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 7, 2020.
Wilde was documenting protests that had been ongoing for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. The Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
In the early hours of Sept. 7, Wilde said demonstrators had moved from PPB’s North Precinct toward a nearby parking garage. According to a news report, officers blocked off certain streets from the march and created a closure area. Wilde said the crowd started to dwindle and there was not a lot going on.
“Then a rush came and a bunch of folks started getting arrested and just picked off,” Wilde told the Tracker. Along with several other journalists and legal observers, she said she followed the officers to document the arrests. Soon after, officers asked them to leave and ordered them onto the sidewalk.
“Out of nowhere, the [Portland Police] Rapid Response van arrived and they beelined [toward us],” she said. “One officer on the team had over and over again targeted me at different demonstrations. She knew exactly who I was. She would stand next to me at every demonstration and follow me specifically.”
Wilde said the officer pushed her off the sidewalk right as she was stepping onto it. Another Black Zebra journalist there repeatedly told the officer that Wilde was a member of the press; Wilde said she also had a press pass around her neck.
“I have the entire thing on camera. It was very clear that she was targeting me,” Wilde told the Tracker. Her reporting partner, whom Wilde had been “standing next to the entire time this demonstration,” was not arrested. The officer placed Wilde in temporary handcuffs, took her phone and brought her to where the demonstrators were being detained. She said she was then transported to and processed at Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office for interfering with a peace officer and disorderly conduct.
Wilde said she was released several hours later, around 6 a.m., and that when she received her phone back, the screen was destroyed. “That was the day my charges were dropped, but I didn’t find out until a month later,” she said. Wilde was contacted by a pro bono attorney, who confirmed this information. “They [Portland police] had spelt my name wrong,” she told the Tracker.
When reached for comment during ongoing protests in the fall of 2020, the PPB told the Tracker it wouldn’t be commenting on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesperson Derek Carmon said the department is committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review. When reached by email about this incident, Carmon said he had no additional comment.
Independent journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis was tackled twice in a row by a police officer in Portland, Oregon, while documenting a Black Lives Matter protest on Sept. 6, 2020.
The protest was one of the many that broke out across the U.S. that year in response to police violence and in support of the BLM movement following the murder of George Floyd. As the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker has documented, an unprecedented number of journalists were assaulted and arrested at these protests, including in Oregon, where the ACLU later filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of journalists and legal observers who were targeted and attacked by police.
Lewis joined a separate civil suit on Nov. 1, 2020, charging that the City of Portland, Multnomah County, and various law enforcement officials violated the constitutional rights of people with disabilities during BLM protests that year.
Lewis and three other Oregonians with disabilities who either documented or participated in the protests accused law enforcement of assaulting them multiple times and of generally acting without regard for their disabilities. Lewis has photosensitive epilepsy and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that increases the risk of injury and makes it difficult for her to move quickly.
In the complaint, Lewis describes federal and city law enforcement refusing for several hours to allow journalists and protesters to leave Portland’s Ventura Park, where the Sept. 6 protest began. At around 1 a.m., the complaint says, the Portland police announced that the park had closed three hours earlier and charged at full speed at protesters, medics and members of the press.
As Lewis began to leave the park, an officer tackled her to the ground, then tackled her again after she got up and started to move away from him. Lewis went to the emergency room and was diagnosed with whiplash and contusions on her shoulder blade, knees and thorax, the complaint says.
In October 2021, the court approved a motion to dismiss the plaintiffs’ claims in the lawsuit, ruling that they had failed to prove that the city customarily violated the constitutional rights of people with disabilities when responding to protests. The plaintiffs then filed an amended complaint, which did not include Lewis.
Lewis told the Tracker that she ultimately withdrew from the suit because of issues with her legal representation.
Police at a Black Lives Matter protest in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 6, 2020, where journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis was tackled twice to the ground by an officer while documenting the protest.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:20-cv-01882,['DISMISSED'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,no,False,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2021-01-20 16:31:42.371782+00:00,2021-11-09 21:33:29.226635+00:00,"Journalist pushed, threatened with arrest as Portland protest declared a riot",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalists-assaulted-portland-protest-declared-riot/,2021-11-09 21:33:29.181802+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Lesley McLam (KBOO-FM),,2020-09-05,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"KBOO podcast host Lesley McLam, who filmed demonstrations in the early morning hours of Sept. 5 in north Portland, reported on her Twitter account that police pushed her and threatened her with arrest.
Police were deployed to block protesters who had gathered at Ventura Park from marching on a police precinct building located several blocks away at Southeast 106th Avenue, the Oregonian reported.
Protesters had targeted law enforcement buildings and surrounding areas, sometimes breaking windows, setting fires and tagging structures with graffiti. Police used tear gas on Sept. 5 for the first time in a month and made 59 arrests at the protest near Ventura Park, according to a department news release.
At 12:43 a.m., McLam posted a video on Twitter of a police line near the police union headquarters, writing in the post that officers had driven protesters to the west from the police union headquarters on Lombard Street.
“Cops are moving,” McLam can be heard saying on the video as officers approach and surround a station wagon moving on the street in front of them.
“Then this happened. An officer pushed me back off the line,” wrote McLam, who didn’t respond to requests for comment.
In the video, McLam can then be heard interacting with an officer who apparently orders McLam to back away from the scene.
“We were told ‘sidewalk,’ we’re fine,” McLam said.
“The rules can change … Back up, thank you, ma’am. Back up. Thank you,” the officer said.
“You’re touching me. You were talking to someone else and you just physically touched me and shoved me backwards,” McLam said.
McLam can then be heard interacting with another officer.
“Ma’am you need to back up or you’re going to be under arrest,” the second officer says to McLam. “I’m not kidding.”
According to McLam’s statements on the video, the second officer also begins to push the journalist back onto a sidewalk, despite her insistence that she kept a six-foot distance from the group of officers.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Tuck Woodstock was struck in the neck with what the independent journalist believes was shrapnel from a flash-bang grenade while covering a protest against police violence in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 5, 2020.
Woodstock was reporting from one of many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over Floyd’s death began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a curfew that lasted three days. Even after the nightly curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon in June. Woodstock is a plaintiff in the suit, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city of Portland in July to not arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
Sept. 5 marked 100 straight days of protests in Portland. “It was wild for many reasons,” Woodstock told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, describing the events of the night.
A large group gathered in Southeast Portland’s Ventura Park, where organizers planned a march to Portland Police Bureau’s East Precinct according to the Portland Mercury.
By the time people were gathering to walk, police were announcing that the march was unpermitted. Woodstock said protesters marched anyway and were met by a “riot line” of officers. Next, Woodstock said, someone in the crowd threw two Molotov cocktails. “I remember thinking this was a huge escalation,” Woodstock said.
Woodstock, who was wearing press identification and working from among a group of other journalists, tweeted just after 9:15 p.m. they were hit in the neck.
Posted this out of thread but you’re going to want to watch it https://t.co/84F0LvJdaW
— Tuck Woodstock (@tuckwoodstock) September 6, 2020
While Woodstock couldn’t say exactly who or what hit them, a bunch of flash-bang grenades were exploding nearby. The shrapnel “felt consistent with flash bangs.” The injury caused minor bleeding, and left a mark on their throat for months, Woodstock said. Woodstock tweeted a picture of the injury several days later. They didn’t seek medical attention.
After the Molotov cocktails were thrown, a man caught fire from one of them and police declared a riot. There were also fireworks exploding in the street.
“Everything was exploding everywhere...that’s what stood out, I hadn’t seen anything like that before,” Woodstock told the Tracker.
When reached for comment during ongoing protests in the fall of 2020, the PPB told the Tracker it wouldn’t comment on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesman Derek Carmon said the department is committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review.
Freelance journalist Brian Conley said he was hit with shrapnel and knocked to the ground by law enforcement officers as he covered the police response to Sept. 5, 2020, demonstrations in Portland, Oregon.
Protests had been held In Portland almost nightly since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. Sept. 5 was the 101st consecutive day of civil unrest in the city.
Conley told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was covering demonstrations on the evening of Sept. 5 just west of Ventura Park in east Portland, near the intersection of Southeast Stark Street and 113th Avenue.
Police were deployed to block protesters who had gathered at Ventura Park from marching on a police precinct building located several blocks away at Southeast 106th Avenue, the Oregonian reported.
Protesters had targeted law enforcement buildings and surrounding areas, sometimes breaking windows, setting fires and tagging structures with graffiti. Police used tear gas on Sept. 5 for the first time in a month and made 59 arrests at the protest near Ventura Park, according to a department news release.
Conley, who has reported from conflict zones in Libya and Iraq, said that at about 9 p.m., he was struck on the back of his leg with munitions that he believed to be shrapnel from an exploding tear gas canister.
A short time later, Conley captured video of a Molotov cocktail exploding on the street, setting fire to a protester’s legs.
Other journalists and bystanders also filmed the scene, in which the protester is seen thrashing around the street before onlookers help to extinguish the flames crawling up his lower body. The footage went viral.
“When they started throwing Molotov cocktails, all hell broke loose,” Conley said.
At that point, police that had formed a line near the scene suddenly rushed toward protesters, Conley told the Tracker.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter Sergio Olmos posted video of the police “bull rush” that knocked Conley to the ground on Twitter.
“I tucked my shoulder and rolled,” Conley told the Tracker. “None of my equipment was damaged.”
Conley said fellow journalists on the scene helped him to his feet. He didn’t seek medical attention after the fall, nor did he file a complaint with the Portland Police Bureau regarding the incidents.
PPB said protesters threw Molotov cocktails at officers and that officers at the scene had declared the protest had turned into a riot, according to a department news release.
“This criminal activity presented an extreme danger to life safety for all community members, and prompted a declaration of a riot,” the release states. “The crowd was advised over loudspeaker that it was a riot and they were to leave the area to the east immediately. They were warned that failure to adhere to this order may subject them to arrest, citation, or crowd control agents, including, but not limited to, tear gas and/or impact weapons.”
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Photojournalist Nathan Howard said he was pushed to the ground by an officer while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon on Sept. 4, 2020.
Howard, whose work has been published by Reuters, Getty Images and The Associated Press, was documenting one of hundreds of demonstrations held across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists. Lewis-Rolland is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit.
On Sept. 4 protesters gathered outside of the headquarters of the Portland Police Association, the union that represents city police officers. Police declared an unlawful assembly at 11:45 p.m., KATU reported.
Howard told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that police came out and started to make targeted arrests of people in the street. He said he was taking photographs of an arrest when an officer came toward him.
Howard said he put his hands up and told the officer multiple times that he was a member of the press while he was backing up. While Howard continued to back up, he said the officer became more aggravated. Eventually the officer shoved him, he said, causing him to fall backwards. He said he landed against a metal street sign pole.
Howard said he was initially alright, and took advantage of his angle on the ground to try to photograph an arrest happening nearby.
Howard said he felt someone fall with him but couldn’t recall who landed on top of whom. He added that in the process, his head was pushed back, hitting the metal street sign pole. He said the impact was jarring, and needed to take a break for a few minutes.
Howard said he was wearing a vest that identified him as press.
The PPB declined to comment on the incidents. The police department has declined to comment to the Tracker on other cases in Portland due to ongoing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Photojournalist Mathieu Lewis-Rolland said a police officer shoved him, causing him to land on top of another journalist, while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Sept. 4, 2020.
Lewis-Rolland, whose work has been published by outlets including Reuters and Agence France-Presse, was documenting one of hundreds of demonstrations held across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists. Lewis-Rolland is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit.
On Sept. 4 protesters gathered outside of the headquarters of the Portland Police Association, the union that represents city police officers. Police declared an unlawful assembly at 11:45 p.m., KATU reported.
Lewis-Rolland told the Tracker he was photographing an arrest across the street from the Portland Police Association building. An officer came up from behind him, grabbed him by the backpack, and threw him to the ground, he said.
In a video Lewis-Rolland posted on Twitter, a police dispersal announcement can be heard while two police officers hold down an individual. The image suddenly becomes blurry and a voice can be heard saying “get back.” For a few seconds, the camera is pointed up toward a street sign, then the image refocuses facing toward the pavement.
Just got thrown to the ground by PPB while documenting an arrest. pic.twitter.com/j3ga3NsJVy
— Mathieu Lewis-Rolland (@MathieuLRolland) September 5, 2020
Lewis-Rolland said he wasn’t injured, but was rattled.
“There's something unique about having someone physically throw you to the ground,” he said. “It feels very violating.”
Lewis-Rolland said he was wearing a helmet and backpack that were both marked “PRESS.” He also wore a reflective yellow vest and carried two cameras.
The PPB declined to comment on the incidents. The police department has declined to comment to the Tracker on other cases in Portland due to ongoing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Scott Keeler, an independent journalist, said he was shoved and shot with pepper balls by law enforcement officers while covering a protest in northeast Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 30, 2020.
Keeler was documenting one of the many nightly protests held in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led the city to agree to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
Keeler was outside the Penumbra Kelly Building, which has been a repeated focus of demonstrators because it houses the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and some Portland Police Bureau units. The Aug. 30 protest was declared an “unlawful assembly” at 10:40 p.m. after protesters threw rocks and eggs at officers, according to the local KATU news station.
Keeler was covering a confrontation between protesters and law enforcement across the street at around 11 p.m. when the incidents occurred. Video posted on Twitter by Keeler shows officers from the PPB and MCSO taking several protesters to the ground and arresting them.
These protesters were just standing here before being targeted, attacked and kidnapped by unidentified men in black masks. Police would not let anyone leave the area before this happened. @R3volutionDaddy, @econbrkfst, an NLG observer and myself where shoved, and shot here. pic.twitter.com/KGWENDXRGY
— Soundtrack to the End (@_WhatRiot) August 31, 2020
In a separate tweet, Keeler said he and other members of the press “were shot in the feet with pepper balls from no more than a foot away to force us to back despite being forced to stay in the completely confined space by another cop on the opposite side of the scrum.”
The MCSCO didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Freelance journalist Alissa Azar was shoved and shot with pepper balls by law enforcement while documenting protesters getting arrested outside the Penumbra Kelly Building, in northeast Portland, Oregon on Aug. 30, 2020, according to social media posts.
Azar was documenting one of the many nightly protests held in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led the city to agree to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The Kelly building has been a repeated focus of demonstrators because it houses the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and some Portland Police Bureau units. The Aug. 30 protest was declared an “unlawful assembly” at 10:40 p.m. after protesters threw rocks and eggs at officers, according to the local KATU news station.
Azar tweeted that she “got shot with a pepper bullet for recording an arrest, pushed down to the ground aggressively.”
Griffin Malone, another independent journalist, captured the scene from across the street in a video he posted on Twitter.
The MCSCO didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent journalist Nicholas Lee said he was pushed by law enforcement officers while documenting protesters getting arrested outside the Penumbra Kelly Building, in northeast Portland, Oregon on Aug. 30, 2020.
Lee was documenting one of the many nightly protests held in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led the city to agree to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The Kelly building has been a repeated focus of demonstrators because it houses the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office and some Portland Police Bureau units. The Aug. 30 protest was declared an “unlawful assembly” at 10:40 p.m. after protesters threw rocks and eggs at officers, according to the local KATU news station. Law enforcement officers pushed people to the west of the building, Lee told the Tracker.
Lee was covering a confrontation between protesters and law enforcement across the street at around 11 p.m. when the incidents occurred.
In a video posted to Twitter, an officer from the sheriff’s department is seen pushing back Lee, who was wearing a helmet and backpack marked as “press,” while telling him to “back up.” Lee can be heard responding, “I’m on the sidewalk.”
These protesters were just standing here before being targeted, attacked and kidnapped by unidentified men in black masks. Police would not let anyone leave the area before this happened. @R3volutionDaddy, @econbrkfst, an NLG observer and myself where shoved, and shot here. pic.twitter.com/KGWENDXRGY
— Soundtrack to the End (@_WhatRiot) August 31, 2020
“[The officer] pushed me into a bush,” Lee said.
The MCSCO didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent reporter Garrison Davis was shoved by a police officer while filming a protester getting arrested near the police union building in north Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of Aug. 29, 2020.
Davis, a contributor to iHeartRadio, was covering one of the many nightly protests held in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
Sometime after midnight on Aug. 29, the door to the Portland Police Association building was set on fire. After a riot was declared, police chased protesters into the parking lot of a gas station across the street, tackling and arresting some of them, Davis told the Tracker.
In a video tweeted by Davis, an officer can be seen confronting him as he moves closer to film an arrest in front of the gas station. The officer can be heard yelling, “Move back! Move back!” Then the video goes dark as the officer shoves Davis.
Police approach me & begin to shove this reporter back as I’m walking in the open area around where arrests are happening. My phone is turned off in the process. #blacklivesmatter #protest #pdx #Portland #Oregon #BLM #PortlandProtest #pdxprotest #portlandpolice pic.twitter.com/WhKBnrgJqO
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) August 29, 2020
Robert Evans, a journalist for Bellingcat and iHeartRadio, captured the rest of the incident in a video he posted on Twitter. “Police officers very likely violate the TRO by shoving Garrison back to stop him from filming an arrest,” tweeted Evans.
Evans’ video shows the officer pushing Davis, who is holding his arms in the air. “Stay back over here where you were told to stay,” the officer can be heard telling Davis, who is clearly marked “press” on his helmet. Police can also be heard giving instructions over an LRAD warning protesters and press not to “interfere.”
Davis told the Tracker that he felt targeted as press by the PPB in this instance.
“He’s acting like I was repeatedly told to stay somewhere and I’m not, which isn’t what happened,” he said. “I wasn’t told to stay anywhere previously.”
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Mike Baker, Seattle bureau chief for The New York Times, said he was hit with less-lethal munitions, identified as paintballs, while covering a pro-Trump caravan that went through downtown Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 29, 2020.
Baker was covering the “Trump cruise rally,” which began at the Clackamas Town Center parking lot, about nine miles outside of Portland. Trump supporters were met with counterprotesters as they drove through the downtown, sparking confrontations, according to local news outlet KATU.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reported online videos showing the “flag-adorned trucks driving through groups of protesters, firing paintball guns at crowds and deploying what appears to be pepper spray,” leading to “dangerous, tense confrontations.”
Baker was filming the pro-Trump caravan at the intersection of Southwest Fourth Avenue and Southwest Washington Street downtown when a man riding in the bed of a black pickup truck flying a Trump flag opened fire with a paintball gun.
“The person in the back of the truck just started shooting their paintball gun into the crowd, just kind of shooting indiscriminately at anyone,” Baker told the Tracker. He was hit by a paintball in the back of the shoulder as he was turning away, he said, adding that it caused bruising but no serious injury. Baker was wearing body armor with press markings at the time he was hit, he told the Tracker
Baker captured footage of the incident, which he posted on Twitter at 8:15 p.m. As pickup trucks adorned with Trump and American flags drive through the intersection, a counterprotester can be seen trying to light a Trump flag on fire and another extends their middle finger at the caravan. A clear liquid of some kind can be seen being sprayed towards the caravan from the anti-Trump crowd, as a man in the back of a pickup fires a paintball at Baker and other people gathered on the sidewalk. Then a man in the next pickup deploys a yellow-tinted chemical irritant.
Clashes. Trump people unload paintballs and pepper spray. They shot me too. pic.twitter.com/PwU5pZMLnV
— Mike Baker (@ByMikeBaker) August 30, 2020
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests that have broken out across the country in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
Cory Elia, an editor at Village Portland and host of a KBOO podcast said he was hit with projectiles that he identified as paintballs while covering a pro-Trump caravan that went through downtown Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 29, 2020.
Elia was covering the “Trump cruise rally,” which began at the Clackamas Town Center parking lot, about nine miles outside of Portland. Trump supporters were met with counterprotesters as they drove through the downtown, sparking confrontations, according to local news outlet KATU.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reported online videos showing the “flag-adorned trucks driving through groups of protesters, firing paintball guns at crowds and deploying what appears to be pepper spray,” leading to “dangerous, tense confrontations.”
Elia tweeted a video of a Trump flag-adorned truck driving away. “This truck start shooting at counter-protesters and then came under attack. I got shot right in the corner of my mouth by a projectile.”
Elia told the Tracker that they had been firing projectiles before his video even started and had been for quite a while. “I was struck in the cheek with the paintball and it left a small welt,” he said.
This truck start shooting at counter-protesters and then came under attack. I got shot right in the corner of my mouth by a projectile. pic.twitter.com/iqcWgSgOFT
— Cory Elia (@TheRealCoryElia) August 30, 2020
He also tweeted a photo of an orange round, writing “This is the exact projectile that hit me. I’m good.” Elia said he had a large press marking on his bulletproof vest and several credentials around his neck.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests that have broken out across the country in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
A reporter for the Davis Vanguard, a California-based nonprofit news organization, was pushed several times by Portland Police Bureau officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 25, 2020.
Roman Mendoza was documenting one of the many nightly protests held in downtown Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
Mendoza told the Tracker protesters had gathered that night at a different park than usual, with plans to march to the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse, which had emerged as a nightly flashpoint between protesters and federal agents in July. The protesters instead marched toward City Hall.
“I ended up behind the protest march, and I noticed that there were some police officers on a riot van that were making their way down the street behind the protesters,” Mendoza said. “I was just recording them, so I positioned myself on the sidewalk facing the street and I was just recording the officers as they were going by.”
One of the officers noticed Mendoza, came up to him and told him to move. Mendoza said he repeatedly identified himself as a journalist.
“I tell him I’m press and I’m just reporting. And he starts pushing me,” Mendoza said. “I keep telling him, ‘I’m press, I’m reporting, do you need to see my credentials? I’ll pull them out for you, whatever you need to see.’”
Full video of me being accosted by an officer. I was marked pressed and offered my badge, under my sweater. He would not identify himself. #PortlandProtest pic.twitter.com/iX9EGwLfk6
— Rome_VanWA (@oh_rome) August 26, 2020
Mendoza said the officer pushed him half a block toward the end of the street before a group of protesters noticed what the officer was doing and started heckling him. When the officer turned his attention to the protesters, Mendoza said he made his way back to his original position, where the rest of the officers were staging.
Mendoza asked the other officers to identify the one who had pushed him, but the officers ignored him.
“As I was asking them to identify themselves, a sheriff who was with them pointed his pepper spray at me,” Mendoza said. “He didn’t deploy it, but it was clear that he was threatening me.”
Mendoza said he backed up a bit from the officers, and soon after they got back on the riot van and drove away.
Later that night, Mendoza said he was filming as officers arrested an individual. Police directed the members of the press who were present at the scene to move across the street and film from there. Mendoza said he didn’t comply with the officer’s direction, believing he was far enough away to not interfere with the officers’ actions.
“After a couple of minutes, they approached me and specifically moved me off the street, saying I couldn’t record there,” Mendoza said. “They grabbed me by my arm and just moved me across the street.”
Mendoza said he also asked that officer for his badge number but received no response.
The PPB declined to comment when emailed about this incident.
Independent journalist Teebs Auberdine said she was threatened by an individual while covering a protest in downtown Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 25, 2020.
The protest was one of many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Several hundred people marched to City Hall the evening of Aug. 25, and the police quickly declared an “unlawful assembly” after the property was damaged, according to The Oregonian.
While Auberdine was livestreaming, she likely recorded some minor property crime, she said. She was approached by someone dressed in mostly black bloc, a tactic used by some protesters to conceal their identities by wearing black and baggy clothing and face coverings, wearing a helmet and respirator, she told the Tracker. They threatened her, she said, saying, "What did you see? Didn't see shit.”
"I was in the process of moving backward and then they came after me,” she said. “They threatened me and slapped my camera, which destabilized the gimbal, but it didn’t fall out of the clip."
"It was very physically threatening in a non-specific way, but it was very unsettling," she said.
The individual told her that if she filmed in a way that they weren’t comfortable with, she would be "run out" or have her camera smashed, Auberdine told the Tracker.
She asked someone she knew to watch after her, but that person "ended up getting arrested by the Portland Police Bureau that night for standing beside me,” she said. “Initially I felt very responsible."
Auberdine was wearing a vest with large press markings on the front and back, she said, and also had a gimbal, microphone and reporting equipment.
“Whoever did it needs to direct their anger somewhere other than inflicting trauma on their allies. I've spent hundreds of hours, plenty of my own $, and sacrificed my health to stream,” she tweeted afterward.
In a follow-up tweet, she added, “Tonight was a mess. I’m a mess.”
Independent multimedia journalist Grace Morgan said she was tackled to the ground by several police officers while walking away from them during protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 23, 2020.
Morgan was documenting one of the nightly protests held in downtown Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In the early morning hours of Aug. 23, Morgan was covering a protest outside of the North Precinct. She told the Tracker that the police had given protesters orders to disperse, which don’t apply to members of the press, according to a preliminary injunction the city agreed to in July that bars police from harming or impeding journalists.
After forming a riot line, officers began pushing protesters to the west, Morgan said. She stood on the sidewalk filming, but the riot line extended to cover the sidewalk as well, which she described as unusual. Four officers approached Morgan, who was clearly labelled as press and filming while walking backwards, and told her to leave.
“I turned around to walk quicker and disperse essentially, and then I got pushed from behind, face forward,” Morgan explained. “I fell and caught myself on my knees and hands, and that’s when four officers held me down on the ground.”
Her phone fell out of her pocket onto the sidewalk, according to Morgan. The next thing she remembered was someone, who she later learned was a medic, lifting her up by her backpack and pulling her away from the officers. Morgan said the officers made no effort to chase or detain them.
“I realized pretty quickly that my phone was gone,” Morgan said. “Immediately I turned on the iPhone tracker and it was tracked to the North Precinct for the duration of the night, but turned off the next morning.”
The next day, Morgan said she went to the Portland Police Property Room on Northwest Industrial Street to try to claim her lost phone. She told the clerk about the incident and that the phone had been tracked to the North Precinct, but the clerk didn’t find anything relevant in the evidence log. The clerk then asked for Morgan’s contact information and said she could call again for updates.
“I kept calling the next couple of days and on the third day, the clerk said maybe an officer accidentally put it in their car or pocket and took it home,” Morgan reccounted. “I was like what? How is that a thing an officer can do?”
Morgan never got back her phone, which had cost $1,200. She said the clerk later suggested that a protester might have taken the phone, even though Morgan had tracked it to the police precinct.
The morning after the incident, Morgan went to the hospital and was diagnosed with a hairline fracture on her knee cap, she said. This was the first time she had visited a hospital for protest-related injuries despite previous incidents. Additionally, she was bruised in several areas and had to wear a soft knee brace for a month.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
Independent journalist Heather Van Wilde was documenting protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 23, 2020, when a police officer briefly seized her walker and the camera attached to it, resulting in a fall that caused injuries and exposure to tear gas.
Van Wilde, who publishes her journalism on Raindrop Works, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker she was documenting one of the many nightly protests held in the city following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25.
The Tracker documented assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led the city to agree to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
Van Wilde has fibromyalgia, vertigo and a form of traumatic arthritis, and as a result must use a walker to ensure her safety and mobility, according to a declaration in support of a separate lawsuit against the city and law enforcement officials.
She told the Tracker that she was covering demonstrations outside of the Portland Police Bureau’s North Precinct, and positioned herself at the steps of the Boys & Girls Club nearby in order to position herself and her walker off the sidewalk and out of the way of other press, protesters and police.
According to her declaration, Van Wilde continued to document from that position, with a DSLR camera around her neck and an action camera mounted on her walker using an eight-foot selfie stick until approximately 11:36 p.m., when a crowd of protesters and police ran past.
“I heard the tenor of the crowd change, and when I looked up everyone was running past and three cops were coming in my direction,” Van Wilde told the Tracker. “One of them yelled at me to move. I was wearing my distinctive press gear and I said I was press, which they should have known exempted me from the dispersal order.”
She confirmed to the Tracker that she was wearing a press pass around her neck as well as a bright pink hard hat with ‘PRESS’ printed on the left and right sides, and that she had no doubt the officer was aware that she was a member of the press.
“[The officer] was gesturing sort of a ‘go away’ gesture, which I took to mean that he didn’t care that I was press and still wanted me to go,” Van WIlde said. “Then he grabbed my walker, which was behind a handrail and wasn’t blocking his path or anything.”
As Van Wilde attempted to retrieve her walker so she could continue reporting, she told the Tracker she fell to the ground, breaking the seal on her gas mask and exposing her to the chemical irritants in the air. She found out later that the officer had moved the walker 10 to 15 feet away from her, also causing her camera to fall.
“Upon review of footage from other journalists on the ground that night, it appears that I was the only press member targeted for dispersal,” her declaration states. “Several press members were within arms-reach of police officers, and rarely were they asked to step back, much less told to leave or physically engaged with.”
Van Wilde told the Tracker she received basic aid from street medics at the scene after another journalist helped her stand and helped her retrieve her walker and camera. She went to a hospital three or four days after the incident for ongoing pain in her left shoulder and leg, as well as respiratory issues.
“I’ve definitely been a lot more anxious and fearful being around cops, to the point where, I think, since then I’ve only filmed one protest where there was any kind of law enforcement anticipated. And that one, I stayed so far back from the event that basically my footage was useless,” Van Wilde said. “So I ended up having to pivot everything I do to avoid protest coverage, which is still ongoing.”
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing ongoing litigation.
Footage from livestreamer Eric Greatwood shows reporter Heather Van Wilde, bottom left in pink helmet, having fallen after an officer pulled her walker away from her during a protest in Portland, Oregon, in August 2020.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,returned in full,False,law enforcement,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,no,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, chemical irritant, protest",,, 2020-11-05 21:51:38.036981+00:00,2022-09-21 20:25:27.744798+00:00,VICE freelancer hit with mace and projectiles during clash of rival rallies in Portland,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/vice-freelancer-hit-mace-and-projectiles-during-clash-rival-rallies-portland/,2022-09-21 20:25:27.686151+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Donovan Farley (VICE News),,2020-08-22,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"While covering rival protests in Portland for VICE News on Aug. 22, 2020, freelance journalist Donovan Farley posted a series of tweets reporting that he was maced and hit with projectiles. In his tweets, Farley identified his attackers as right-wing protesters.
According to Oregon Public Broadcasting, the protest began around noon as two groups faced off in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center. In a tweet, Farley characterized one group’s action as a “pro-police” rally. Countering that gathering was a group identified as anti-fascists, according to OPB.
At 1:07 p.m.Farley tweeted that he had been shot with paintballs “like five times” by a protester. About 10 minutes later he tweeted that he was hit by a water bottle in the “dome,” apparently referring to his head, as “right folks opened fire on protester and press alike” with various projectiles. Farley did not specify which group threw the water bottle and he did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
“Within an hour of meeting, protesters began to push each other and throw objects,” OPB said in its report. “Some demonstrators on the pro-police side fired paintball guns and deployed pepper spray on counterdemonstrators. Other protesters used baseball bats. Many people wore helmets and body armor as they punched, kicked and tore at each other.”
At 1:23 p.m. Farley posted what he identified as photos of paintball stains on his clothes. His tweet showed a bright yellow helmet labeled “MEDIA” as well as a photo of his chest area, above his press pass. “I took quite a lot of hits. Got my arms too,” Farley wrote.
A few minutes later, Farley tweeted that he was “shot directly in the phone” (he did not specify with what). “It’s a bunch of things being thrown by both sides at the moment but it sure seems #BlueLivesMatter is targeting press. Not everyone mind you—it’s mostly Proud Boys. A few of the other folks have been fine,” he tweeted.
He also tweeted that a group he said was mostly members of the far-right Proud Boys tried to push over a van with an unidentified member of the press on it. In a video tweeted by Farley at 1:41 p.m., the person standing on the van is clearly marked “PRESS” on their neon vest and appears to be holding a camera.
A few minutes later Farley tweeted, “I’m now realizing I got maced at some point as all my skin is on fire.” He speculated that it might have been “bear mace” in a later tweet. Bear spray is a defense against wildlife that contains capsaicin and related capsaicinoids. Capsaicin is the active ingredient that makes chili peppers hot.
According to OPB, most of the right-wing demonstrators left the downtown area by 2:30 that day, before the Portland Police Bureau declared an unlawful assembly at 2:50 p.m.
At 3:28 p.m. Farley tweeted that he was feeling the effects of the mace and was leaving the downtown area. “I am on absolute fire,” he said.
Mason Lake, an independent videographer, said he was shoved by police officers while covering a protest in the early morning of Aug. 22, 2020 in Portland, Oregon.
Lake was documenting one of the many protests that have been held on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
In the early hours of Aug. 22, Lake and a group of other journalists were covering a demonstration at the PPB’s North Precinct station. After the gathering was declared a riot around 1 a.m., police used smoke and physical force to disperse protesters, according to Al Jazeera.
In a video shared by Oregon Public Broadcasting journalist Sergio Olmos on Twitter at 12:58 a.m., a police LRAD can be heard warning that “all persons, including press and legal observers,” must move onto Northeast Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
In a video posted by Olmos at 1:37 a.m., an officer approaches and pushes Lake.
The PPB has said it wouldn’t comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
This article was updated to identify a previously “unidentified journalist” as videographer Mason Lake, who confirmed the incident to the Tracker.
Police officers detain a protester following a Black Lives Matter protest in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 24, 2020. Journalist Mason Lake was shoved by police while documenting protests there two days earlier.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:23-cv-01870,['ONGOING'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2021-01-15 18:04:15.763405+00:00,2023-07-13 20:10:32.388890+00:00,Portland Tribune reporter pushed by police officer while covering far-right rally,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/portland-tribune-reporter-pushed-police-officer-while-covering-far-right-rally/,2023-07-13 20:10:32.286914+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Zane Sparling (Portland Tribune),,2020-08-22,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Portland Tribune journalist Zane Sparling said a police officer shoved him as he covered a rally in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 22, 2020.
Protests in the city had been held on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. Sparling was covering a pro-Trump rally that attracted counterprotesters. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
At around 11 a.m. Sparling began covering the far-right rally at the Multnomah County Justice Center downtown. The rally attracted left-wing counterprotesters, and the two sides clashed throughout the day.
After several hours of coverage, Sparling was pushed by a police officer while he was filming Tusitala “Tiny” Toese, a well-known member of the Proud Boys, a far-right group. Sparling focused on Toese because there had been an active warrant out for his arrest over his alleged involvement in a beating in Seattle, he told the Tracker.
Footage taken and published by Sparling on Twitter shows Toese walking past PPB officers. About 10 seconds into the video, the camera goes askew as Sparling gets pushed. “Tiny Toese just walked past Portland police, they did not arrest him. Officer grabbed me by shirt and shoved,” Sparling tweeted.
Sparling said he was clearly identifiable as press because he was actively filming, though he doesn’t remember if his press identification was showing at the time.
“He grabbed on to my shirt and swung me in an orbit to move me to a different spot,” Sparling told the Tracker. “Lots of people were walking past these police officers, including someone with an active warrant. I don’t know why it was more interesting that I was walking past. I don’t know why I was the one that seemed to be the threat there. ”
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent videographer Melissa Lewis said she was doused with bear mace by individuals at a far-right protest while covering clashing demonstrations in Portland, Oregon on Aug. 22, 2020. Lewis, whose work has been published by Yahoo News, said she required medical treatment for injury from the chemical irritant.
Clashes erupted between members of far-right groups and counterprotesters on Aug. 22 outside the Justice Center in downtown Portland, the Washington Post reported. Members of the extremist group the Proud Boys and supporters of then-President Donald Trump gathered for a “Back the Blue” rally, and hundreds of counterprotesters, including Black Lives Matter activists, organized in opposition.
In video footage captured by Lewis, she appears to be filming clashes from behind a van parked on the edge of Chapman Square, a small park opposite the Multnomah County Justice Center. A man wearing a T-shirt that reads “TRUMP” approaches her and tells her to leave.
Seconds later, another man wearing a helmet and a gas mask appears and begins spraying an irritant, hitting Lewis. As that assailant retreats, a man in khaki shorts, taking cover from counterprotesters behind newspaper vending boxes, appears to spray an irritant toward Lewis. She takes a few steps backwards and a third individual appears from behind the van and sprays an irritant directly at Lewis.
As the Proud Boys and other “Patriots” pushed forward with shields, mace was used. One man asked @PhrenologyPhun to get behind him, where other men would have done her harm. Another man told her to LEAVE NOW. Finally Swinney and another man sprayed her multiple times. pic.twitter.com/JPjkcCe1k7
— Cascadianphotog Media (@Cascadianphotog) August 23, 2020
Lewis tweeted that when one individual sprayed her “head to toe,” she turned her head away and the chemical irritant went down her ear canal.
While filming for @Cascadianphotog, I was trapped against snack van and Alan Swinney took advantage of my vulnerable position. He sprayed me head to toe with bear mace. I instinctively turned my face away and the mace went down my ear canal.
— Melissa “Claudio” Lewis (@Claudio_Report) August 22, 2020
After retreating, Lewis said she began “furiously” removing her gear, but once she took off her gas mask, the irritant flowed into her face and all over her body.
“Because my hair was so soaked, it just ran down as soon as I took off my gas mask — that’s what was holding it back,” she said.
Lewis said the irritant caused her intense pain.
“It was like I had showered in it. I was absolutely bathed in bear mace,” she told the Tracker. “It was the most pain that I’ve ever been in.”
With ambulances unable to reach the area due to the unrest, Lewis said some other protesters carried her away from the area until she could get an ambulance to a hospital emergency room, where she said she was treated with pain medication.
Lewis and several counterprotesters filed a lawsuit on Sept. 25 against several far-right group members and supporters who were involved in the unrest on Aug. 22. As of March 2021, she said the suit was still pending.
Lewis was wearing a press badge while she was covering the protests, according to the lawsuit. She told the Tracker she does not know if her attackers identified her as a journalist.
“I was sprayed because I was recording and not right wing,” she told the Tracker in an email.
Protests in support of the Black Lives Matter movement had been held in Portland daily for months, sparked by the May 25 killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent photojournalist Cole Howard said he was hit with paintballs fired by a right-wing activist while he was covering confrontations between protesters in Portland, Oregon on Aug. 22, 2020.
Howard said he was also sprayed with mace by a second individual.
Clashes erupted after more than 100 far-right protesters, including members of the extremist group the Proud Boys and supporters of then-President Donald Trump, gathered outside the Justice Center for a “Back the Blue” rally on Aug. 22, the Washington Post reported.
Hundreds of counterprotesters amassed in opposition. Protests in support of the Black Lives Matter movement had been held in Portland daily for months, sparked by the May 25 killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
Howard, whose work has been published by Reuters, Newsweek and other outlets, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was documenting the confrontation between protesters and counterprotesters when a man on the right-wing side of the clash began firing paintballs at him.
Howard said the man made eye contact with him before firing three paintballs, which hit him across his torso and shoulder. “To have one paintball hit you is one thing,” Howard told the Tracker, adding that because he was hit multiple times, he believes he was deliberately targeted.
Howard said he was “very obviously marked as press” wearing both a flak jacket and helmet with press markings.
Less than an hour after he was struck by paintballs, Howard said another person from the Proud Boys side of the confrontation ran at him and sprayed a chemical irritant, which Howard said he believed was bear mace, in his face.
“From what I could see there wasn’t anybody right next to me — it was pretty obvious that he was targeting me,” he said.
In a photo Howard provided the Tracker, an assailant’s hand can be seen spraying a chemical irritant in the direction of the camera.
Howard said he was wearing goggles, which delayed the effects of the irritant, giving him a few seconds to move away. The irritant caused his eyes to swell shut for about 20 minutes, he said.
He said the irritant left him in pain that day and through the next day.
In September the Multnomah County District Attorney’s office filed multiple assault charges against a man, who was arrested for allegedly attacking people with paintballs and mace at two protests, including the one on Aug. 22. The indictment against Alan Swinney alleges that on Aug. 22 he used a paintball gun to cause physical injury, pointed a revolver at a person and unlawfully discharged “mace or a similar substance” toward another person. The charges do not name any of the alleged targets.
In October, a judge denied a motion for Swinney’s release, and as of March 2021, he was still being held in prison, according to the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Department. Swinney's lawyer, Eric Wolfe, did not respond to requests for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Photojournalist Cole Howard was documenting dueling protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 22, 2020, when he says he was targeted with paintballs and later a chemical irritant, which he captured in this image.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,private individual,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, Blue Lives Matter, chemical irritant, protest, shot / shot at",,, 2021-03-23 17:36:01.559522+00:00,2023-11-01 15:08:24.166000+00:00,Journalist’s hand broken by assailant at ‘Back the Blue’ rally,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalists-hand-broken-by-assailant-at-back-the-blue-rally/,2023-11-01 15:08:24.053798+00:00,,,,"Assault, Equipment Damage",,,cellphone: count of 1,Robert Evans (Bellingcat & iHeart Radio),,2020-08-22,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"An unidentified man attacked Bellingcat journalist Robert Evans with a baton, breaking bones in his hand, Evans said, as the journalist was covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 22, 2020.
Clashes erupted after more than 100 far-right protesters, including members of the extremist group the Proud Boys and supporters of then-President Donald Trump, gathered outside the Justice Center for a “Back the Blue” rally on Aug. 22, the Washington Post reported. Hundreds of counterprotesters, including Black Lives Matter activists, amassed in opposition.
Evans, a reporter for investigative news site Bellingcat and host of a podcast for iHeartMedia, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that shortly after 1 p.m. he saw a fight break out as he was reporting on the protests outside the Justice Center.
Video he posted on Twitter shows that as Evans nears the skirmish, a man in a gray baseball hat and orange-tinted sunglasses turns around and hits his baton downward at Evans’s hand, knocking his phone to the ground.
While I am filming a right wing activist charges out and assaults me, breaking my finger with an asp baton. Sergio has more footage of the confrontation that follows pic.twitter.com/gPdPsQ70b5
— Robert Evans (The Only Robert Evans) (@IwriteOK) August 22, 2020
Evans told the Tracker that he had an open fracture, meaning the blow broke the skin on his hand.
In a second video Evans posted, he approaches the man, who is now holding a blue sign that says “God Bless America.” Evans tells him, “you just assaulted a press guy.”
Journalist Garrison Davis posted another video of Evans, blood dripping from his finger, speaking to the man. Evans’s words are indistinct, but his assailant repeats “move back.” When Evans continues to speak, the man uses his sign to slam the journalist in the chest and head.
The person with the “God Bless America” shield assaulted journalist Robert Evans @IwriteOK and cut his hand. As Robert talks about the incident he continues to be assaulted. pic.twitter.com/3cOSQxrrXR
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) August 22, 2020
Evans, who was wearing a helmet and a protective vest that were both marked with the word PRESS, said he believes he was targeted because he was filming the clashes.
“I made very certain that he knew what he had done and that he knew who he had assaulted,” Evans said.
Evans said a medic who was helping protesters dressed his wound with a bandage and splint on site, and he continued to cover the protest for several hours. He later went to a hospital emergency room for treatment. He told the Tracker his hand was broken in two places.
Evans said his Samsung Galaxy phone screen was cracked and the charging port broken when he was attacked. He was able to continue using it to report for the rest of the day, but later needed to replace it.
Portland Police Bureau did not respond to emailed questions about the attack on Evans. A spokesperson for the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office said they had no record of a case related to the incident.
Evans told the Tracker in February 2021 that he planned to take legal action against his attacker but had not yet done so. He noted that police had not made any arrests related to the attack.
Protests in support of the Black Lives Matter movement had been held in Portland daily for months, sparked by the May 25 killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter Sergio Olmos wrote that he was hit with paintballs fired by a right-wing activist while they were covering confrontations between protesters in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 22, 2020.
Clashes erupted after more than 100 far-right protesters, including members of the extremist group the Proud Boys and supporters of then-President Donald Trump, gathered outside the Justice Center for a “Back the Blue” rally on Aug. 22, the Washington Post reported.
Hundreds of counterprotesters amassed in opposition. Protests in support of the Black Lives Matter movement had been held in Portland daily for months, sparked by the May 25 killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
Olmos posted on Twitter at 6:32 p.m. that while he was being shot with a paintball by a right-wing protester he pointed to his press pass, but the man continued to shoot paintballs.
In a video Olmos posted with his tweet, a man wearing a black helmet can be seen firing a paintball gun into the crowd amid clashes between far-right groups and opposing protesters. At one point in the video, several paintballs can be seen flying past Olmos’s camera as he films.
Olmos did not respond to requests for comment.
In September, the Multnomah County District Attorney’s office filed multiple assault charges against a man, who was arrested for allegedly attacking people with paintballs and mace at two protests, including the one on Aug. 22. The indictment against Alan Swinney alleges that on Aug. 22 he used a paintball gun to cause physical injury, pointed a revolver at a person and unlawfully discharged “mace or a similar substance” toward another person. The charges do not name any of the alleged targets.
In October, a judge denied a motion for Swinney’s release, and as of March 2021, he was still being held in prison, according to the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Department. Swinney's lawyer, Eric Wolfe, did not respond to requests for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Police officers shoved videographer Dustin Tolman who was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 22, 2020, according to social media posts.
Tolman was documenting one of the many protests that have been held on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
In the early hours of Aug. 22, Tolman and a group of other journalists were covering a demonstration at the PPB’s North Precinct station. After the gathering was declared a riot around 1 a.m., police used smoke and physical force to disperse protesters, according to Al Jazeera.
In a video shared by Oregon Public Broadcasting journalist Sergio Olmos on Twitter at 12:58 a.m., a police LRAD can be heard warning that “all persons, including press and legal observers,” must move onto Northeast Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
About a half hour later, as police were using force to disperse protesters, Tolman was among several journalists, clearly marked as “press,” who were pushed while trying to film an arrest. In a video posted by Olmos at 1:37 a.m., an officer is seen pushing Tolman.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
An officer shoved independent photojournalist Maranie Staab while she was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early mornings of Aug. 22, 2020.
Staab was documenting one of the many protests that have been held on almost a nightly basis since late May in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
In the early hours of Aug. 22, Staab and a group of other journalists were covering a demonstration at the PPB’s North Precinct station. After the gathering was declared a riot around 1 a.m., police used smoke and physical force to disperse protesters, according to Al Jazeera.
In a video shared by Oregon Public Broadcasting journalist Sergio Olmos on Twitter at 12:58 a.m., a police LRAD can be heard warning that “all persons, including press and legal observers,” must move onto Northeast Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
About a half hour later, as police were using force to disperse protesters, Staab was among several journalists, clearly marked as “press,” who were pushed while trying to film an arrest. In a video posted by Olmos at 1:37 a.m., Staab can be seen wearing a black baseball cap backwards, with a camera in her right hand and a phone on a gimbal in her left. An officer approaches and pushes Staab.
A few seconds later, the officer rushes at Staab again, pushing her hard into another photojournalist, and yelling, “Stay back!”
“I didn’t do anything to draw attention to myself,” Staab told the Tracker. “Some officers might respect the first amendment and the TRO that’s been in place, but the majority don’t.”
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent visual journalist Rodrigo Melgarejo was shoved by Portland police while covering protests in downtown Portland during the early morning hours of Aug. 21, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
The demonstration on Aug. 20 began peacefully in North Portland with little interaction between police and protesters, according to The Oregonian. However, several protesters were arrested in a later demonstration outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in South Portland, where Portland police declared an unlawful assembly.
“Tonight, PPB declared an unlawful assembly, saying anyone not press was going to be arrested if they don’t leave,” Melgarejo wrote in a tweet at 3:21 a.m. on Aug. 21. “Yet I was shoved, down the sidewalk and into the street.” He told the Tracker he was wearing a ballistic vest and black helmet, both marked with press labels.
In a video accompanying the tweet, Melgarejo is facing a row of officers in riot gear. At 0:11, one officer states, “If you are not press, you need to leave.” Another repeats the same statement a few seconds later, adding that protesters who refuse to leave will be arrested. The same officer then begins to physically pressure people to move and says at 0:20, “Get out of my way. If you’re in my way, I’m going to push you.”
At 0:34, the camera suddenly jostles and an officer’s face can briefly be seen very close to the lens. Melgarejo continues to film one particular officer who repeatedly demands, “Move!” and pushes people forward. This continues for another minute until demonstrators, press, and officers are all on the street. At 1:29, an officer can be seen pointing right at the camera, yelling, “Get out of the street!” and then shoving him.
When reached by email about this incident, the PPB declined to comment citing pending litigation.
Multimedia journalist Grace Morgan said she was hit with pepper balls shot by federal agents while covering protests against police violence in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 20, 2020.
Morgan was documenting protests that had continued for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
On the evening of Aug. 20, demonstrators marched from Kenton Park to the Portland Police Association headquarters, ending the protest by 10 p.m. Around that time, another group of protesters gathered at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement building, the site of what Portland Police declared a riot the previous night.
Morgan said many of the protesters had gotten pushed back to another park two blocks away, but she decided to stay by the building to monitor what the federal agents and Portland police would do next. After about 40 minutes, protesters marched back to the facility. Morgan filmed from the sidewalk as federal agents formed a line and began firing pepper balls and flash-bang grenades into the crowd. Unidentified officers also deployed tear gas, Morgan told the Tracker.
“Suddenly I got hit in the hand that I was filming with,” Morgan said. “It wasn’t until I later reviewed footage by another journalist that I realized I was hit in the head as well.”
In a video she tweeted at 11:38 p.m. on Aug. 20, Morgan drops her phone when she is hit with a pepper ball. She quickly picks the phone back up and walks away from the scene.
Here where they aimed, and hit me, directly at my camera / hand and I was able to pick it back up lol. I am clearly marked as press and on the sidewalk #PortlandProtest after this I distinctly smelled CS gas pic.twitter.com/9o1s6LOrvJ
— Peter (@gravemorgan) August 21, 2020
Griffin Malone, another independent journalist, captured Morgan’s incident around the 19-second mark in a video he shared. In it, what appears to be a flash-bang grenade bounces off of Morgan’s helmet. She said she clearly displayed her press badges and had markings on her helmet as well.
“I actually wasn’t even that close to the protesters, so it seems like I was specifically targeted,” Morgan told the Tracker. “They were firing 20 or 30 feet to my right and then one thing comes straight at me.”
Morgan said she didn’t know which agency fired the projectile that hit her. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence, didn’t respond to messages seeking comment.
At the time, a preliminary injunction a judge put in place in July barred federal agents from harming or impeding journalists. The ruling was upheld by an appeals court in October.
Justin Yau, an independent journalist, said he was pushed by a police officer in the early hours of Aug. 20, 2020, while attempting to film an arrest during a protest in southwest Portland, Oregon.
Yau, a student at the University of Portland whose work has been featured by the Daily Mail and The New York Times, was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. Yau provided a declaration in support of the ACLU suit, which led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
On the night of Aug. 19, Yau had been covering a demonstration at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building, After a riot was declared, protesters returned to Elizabeth Caruthers Park, a few blocks north. Federal agents had pushed protesters out of the park before the Portland Police Bureau took over enforcement.
Shortly after midnight on Aug. 20, Yau was filming an arrest near the northwest corner of the park when the pushing incident occurred, he told the Tracker. A PPB sergeant approached Yau, and other members of the press, who were standing back from the arrest, to expand the perimeter. Then another officer started pushing Yau and other journalists back before dropping a tear gas canister at their feet.
In a video of the incident filmed and tweeted by Yau, an officer can be heard saying, “back up, back up.” Then the camera goes askew and the video cuts out as Yau gets pushed.
By 12:04AM, Several arrests have been made during this dispersal operation. News media personnel have gathered to document the incident. https://t.co/h20gcSxXiU pic.twitter.com/9vCCoq5xEP
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) August 20, 2020
A different angle of the incident was captured and posted by Sergio Olmos of Oregon Public Broadcasting. Yau, wearing a black helmet marked “press,” can be seen getting shoved about 40 seconds into the video.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent journalist Alissa Azar said she was shot with munitions and had a stun grenade and tear gas thrown at her by law enforcement officers while covering a demonstration in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 20, 2020.
Azar was covering one of the many protests in Portland that have been held on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests. The injunction was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
On the night of Aug. 20, protesters gathered outside the building housing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in southwest Portland. Demonstrators sprayed graffiti on the building and tampered with the gate and windows, according to local news station KPTV, prompting officers from the Portland Police Bureau and Federal Protective Service, who emerged around 11:20 p.m., to confront the group.
Federal agents then began shooting pepper balls, stun grenades and tear gas at the crowd of protesters and press. The PPB was cited by KPTV as saying its officers didn’t fire crowd-control munitions or tear gas.
Azar posted a video on Twitter showing her getting hit several times, first with a stun grenade and then by some type of munitions. Soon after, she tweeted, “I had a stun grenade thrown at my ankle, tear gas canisters thrown at me got shot at. I’m ok just hurts.”
Here’s the cannister that you can see the feds rolled right at my feet before one of them shot me. I was bleeding above my foot from this and where I got shot is quite swollen. #BlackLivesMatter #AbolishICE #PortlandProtests #PortlandProtest #PDXprotests #pdx #DefendPdx #ACAB pic.twitter.com/jjni5nzqAU
— Alissa Azar (@R3volutionDaddy) August 21, 2020
Freelance journalist Griffin Malone captured the incident from another direction in a video he published on Twitter. About 30 seconds into the video, Azar, wearing a visible press badge, is seen running away and saying, “Ow!”
In a follow-up tweet, Malone published a photo of Azar with a welt on her body, writing that Azar “was hit in ankle with flash bang and then shot at.”
Azar said she believes the officers purposefully fired towards her. “I was standing close to them when it happened. The canister and getting shot [by munitions] were both intentionally aimed at me,” Azar told the Tracker. “I was standing with a group of media who were all visibly press as well.”
A spokesperson for ICE referred the Tracker to FPS, a Department of Homeland Security agency that deployed to Portland, for comment, but the agency didn’t respond. PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent journalist Scott Keeler said he was pushed by a police officer in the early hours of Aug. 20, 2020, while attempting to film an arrest during a protest in southwest Portland, Oregon.
Keeler, an independent videographer, was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon.
Shortly after midnight on Aug. 20, a Portland Police Bureau sergeant approached Keeler and other members of the press, who were standing back from the arrest, to expand the perimeter. Then another officer started pushing Keeler and some other journalists back before dropping a tear gas canister at their feet.
Keeler can be seen in a video posted by Sergio Olmos of Oregon Public Broadcasting kneeling in front of the press scrum in a black helmet and backpack clearly marked press. About 43 seconds into the video, the officer pulls Keeler to his feet and pushes him back, knocking his helmet off.
Keeler tweeted, “Cop just ripped my mask off and threw a tear gas canister under me as I was kneeled filming an arrest of another member of press. I had been in the same position filming for quite a while before this cop decided to target me.”
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Videographer Melissa Lewis said a tear gas canister fired by law enforcement struck her in the head while covering a demonstration in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 20, 2020.
Lewis was covering one of the many protests in Portland that have been held on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests. The injunction was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
On the night of Aug. 20, protesters gathered outside the building housing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in southwest Portland. Demonstrators sprayed graffiti on the building and tampered with the gate and windows, according to local news station KPTV, prompting officers from the Portland Police Bureau and Federal Protective Service, who emerged around 11:20 p.m., to confront the group.
Lewis said she was hit with the tear gas canister during that same round of law enforcement fire, though the incident wasn’t captured on video. “I was standing in an area that was exposed. They shot a tear gas canister, and it hit me right in the head,” Lewis told the Tracker. “Thankfully I was wearing a helmet and my gas mask.”
Lewis then went to a hospital emergency room for treatment, she said. She tweeted the next day that she likely had a “mild concussion.”
Lewis said that while she didn't feel personally targeted by the officers, she does believe they were targeting the press assembled there.
A spokesperson for ICE referred the Tracker to FPS, a Department of Homeland Security agency that deployed to Portland, for comment, but the agency didn’t respond. PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Police detain a woman at an August 2020 Black Lives Matter protest in Portland, Oregon. Journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis told the Tracker she was hit with a tear gas canister fired by law enforcement at a Portland protest on Aug. 20.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:20-cv-01882,['DISMISSED'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, chemical irritant, protest, shot / shot at",,, 2021-02-01 21:16:06.689812+00:00,2022-02-07 19:05:36.077281+00:00,"Independent videographer said Portland officer shoved him, causing his head to hit pavement",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-videographer-said-portland-officer-shoved-him-causing-his-head-hit-pavement/,2022-02-07 19:05:36.018421+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Nicholas Lee (Independent),,2020-08-19,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent videographer Nicholas Lee said a Portland police officer shoved him, causing his head to hit the pavement, while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of Aug. 19, 2020.
The protest was one of many that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The protest Lee was covering began in the evening of Aug. 18 and stretched past midnight. After gathering in Colonel Summers Park in southeast Portland at around 9 p.m. protesters marched nearly a mile to the Multnomah Building, the county seat of government, on Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard. Some protesters started fires in dumpsters and inside the building, according to The Oregonian, prompting the Portland Police Bureau to declare the gathering a riot around 10:30 p.m.
Lee, who had been shoved by a PPB officer earlier in the night, was pushed again by an officer just after midnight, he said.
“They gave me a shove, and my helmet fell off,” Lee told the Tracker. “Then the cops gave me a big shove when my head was unprotected. I fell right back and smacked my head on the pavement.”
A video published by independent journalist Justin Yau shortly after midnight shows the aftermath of the shove. Lee is seen on the ground, surrounded by a group of police officers. “Officers tackled a videographer @econbrkfst and knocked off his helmet, during enforcement actions earlier,” Yau wrote in the post.
Officers tackled a videographer @econbrkfst and knocked off his helmet, during enforcement actions earlier. #PortlandProtests #PDXprotests #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/SXc4KhRxqU
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) August 19, 2020
Lee said that after being pushed, he went to the doctor and got checked for a concussion, but he didn’t have one. “But I got bad whiplash to the extent that when I laid in bed I couldn’t lift my head up. It was excruciatingly painful,” he said.
When reached for comment during ongoing protests in the fall of 2020, the PPB told the Tracker it wouldn’t be commenting on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesman Derek Carmon said the department is committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review. The PPB wasn't available for comment on this incident.
Independent journalist Teebs Auberdine said she was shot at and shoved by law enforcement officers while covering protests in front of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland, Oregon, on the night of Aug. 19, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work. The injunction was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
Throughout the night of Aug. 19, federal officers and Portland police worked to push protesters away from the ICE facility and direct the crowd toward Elizabeth Caruthers Park, a few blocks north, according to The Oregonian. Police declared a riot at around 11 p.m. after demonstrators had thrown various objects at the officers and spray-painted across the building's windows.
Auberdine told the Tracker that within 15 minutes of arriving that night, she was shot in the arm with a beanbag-like metal round fired by Department of Homeland Security agents. "I was standing on the northwest corner [of the facility]," she said. "It was a direct line between the DHS who shot me. There was no one in front of or behind me."
Soon after, law enforcement officers began a push that continued for about six blocks to the north of the facility, she said. "I was forced to move along the sidewalk, so I didn't have a chance to really account for what had just gone on," she told the Tracker. "There was a hole in my sweater and red marking as well. It hurt a lot, but I didn't know immediately that I was bleeding."
She found street medics to help clean and bandage her arm, she said, and now has a scar.
Later that night, while Portland police officers were walking in a riot line to move protesters away from the ICE building, the officers "suddenly bull rushed and grabbed their batons," Auberdine said. She was the "first one in front of them," and got "shoved onto the hood of an SUV."
Auberdine was livestreaming at the time, and at around the 7:25 mark, officers can be seen suddenly running towards several individuals and pushing them toward a car. For a brief moment, her camera flips sideways, as she gets pushed. A loudspeaker can be heard urging protesters and journalists to head to the north.
She said she had a vest visibly labelled with press markings. "I think this type of violence has a much greater impact on me because this is a direct physical violation…of my body," she told the Tracker.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the continuing ACLU litigation. The DHS didn’t respond to an emailed request for comment.
Independent videographer Nicholas Lee said a police officer pushed him and smashed his phone on the street while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 18, 2020.
The protest was one of many that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
Around 8 p.m., protesters gathered in Colonel Summers Park, in southeast Portland, and about an hour later marched nearly a mile to the Multnomah Building, the county seat of government, on Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard. Some protesters started fires in dumpsters and inside the building, according to The Oregonian, prompting the Portland Police Bureau to declare the gathering a riot around 10:30 p.m.
Lee arrived at the protest around that time and witnessed police officers pushing demonstrators away from the Multnomah Building and making several arrests, he told the Tracker.
About an hour later, while Lee was covering some protesters several blocks away from the building, he said, Portland police officers told protesters and press to remain on the sidewalk.
“There were several cops there. I’m on the sidewalk with other members of the press. They’re like, ‘Move! Move!’ pushing us back,” said Lee.
At one point during the crush on the sidewalk, a police officer took his phone, he said.
”I was holding it, and it had a tether attached to it and it was around my wrist. [The officer] grabbed my phone and tried to wrench it away from me,” Lee told the Tracker. “He pulled on it so hard he got it out of my hand and then smashed it on the street.”
The police officer damaged his phone when he threw it on the street, said Lee. “It wasn’t broken, just cracked. There wasn’t significant damage, but I had to replace the screen protector,” he said.
Later in the night, after midnight, Lee was shoved again by an officer, he said. The Tracker documented the Aug. 19 incident here.
When reached for comment during ongoing protests in the fall of 2020, the PPB told the Tracker it wouldn’t be commenting on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesman Derek Carmon said the department is committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review. The PPB wasn't available for comment on this incident.
Independent photojournalist Teri Jacobs was shoved to the ground and hit several times by Portland police while covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 18, 2020, according to news reports and a legal filing.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was extended later that summer.
Demonstrators on that Tuesday the 18th marched to the Multnomah County Justice Center, where police declared the site of a riot around 10:30 p.m., according to news reports. Portland police officers in riot gear pushed protesters toward the north, where Jacobs was documenting along Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard, according to The Portland Mercury.
In a video shared by Twitter user @johnthelefty, an officer uses a baton to knock Jacobs’ head and shoves her to the ground, the newspaper reported. When she rolls over to sit up, he hits her on the forehead again with the baton.
Jacobs has filed a legal complaint with the United States District Court and is represented by attorneys from the Oregon Justice Resource Center, according to the Portland Mercury. “As Ms. Jacobs was knocked to the ground, she was terrified that the officer was going to continue to attack her and she feared that she might never get up again if he continued with his violent attack,” the complaint reads, according to the article. “An entire squad of Portland Police Officers witnessed this act, failed to intervene, and allowed this officer to walk away after committing a violent crime against Ms. Jacobs.”
In an interview with Fox 12, Jacobs’ attorney Juan Chavez said she was wearing a press credential and that prior to the documented shove, she was also hit “repeatedly on the head, neck and back with a truncheon” by the officer. Chavez added that her camera was broken “when she was knocked to the ground.” According to The Portland Mercury, Jacobs is “seeking punitive damages and attorneys fees from the city and PPB officers involved.”
Jacobs declined to comment to the Tracker. When reached by email about this incident, the PPB declined to comment citing pending litigation.
Journalist Melissa Lewis said she was pushed by law enforcement officers while she was covering demonstrations in downtown Portland on Aug. 16, 2020.
Lewis was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed on June 28 by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU lawsuit resulted in a temporary restraining order against the Portland Police Bureau and other law enforcement agencies working with the Portland police, and eventually led to a preliminary injunction in July barring the police from harming or impeding journalists and legal observers.
Lewis, an independent journalist who at the time was documenting Portland protests for Cascadianphotog Media, was also covering law enforcement officers stationed outside the Central Precinct. Lewis was filming on the corner of Southwest Second Avenue and Southwest Main Street, just north of the precinct.
Lewis’ livestream of the downtown Portland protest was published on Twitter at 10:36 p.m. At about 48 minutes into the video, the livestream captures more than a dozen officers advancing on Lewis and other journalists from multiple sides. Lewis can be seen in the video wearing a helmet with “press” on it. As officers from the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office walk aggressively toward Lewis, she can be heard asking “Where would you like me to go, the street or the sidewalk?” A voice is then heard saying, “Keep going, keep going, keep going.”
As Lewis says she’s “trying” to comply with the sheriffs’ directions, one officer appears to push her with a baton.
In an interview, Lewis said that Portland Police Bureau officers and Multnomah County Sheriff’s officers were giving her contradictory directions while advancing on her.
“The officers said get on the sidewalk and the sheriffs said get off the sidewalk. I was obeying PPB’s orders,” she said, referring to the Portland Police Bureau. “As a result I got pulled back from the backpack and batoned in the ribs by the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office.”
Lewis said she later went to a hospital. “As the adrenaline wore off, it really hurt. I wanted to go and get an X-ray on my ribs,” she said. “They were bruised, not broken, but it hurt to inhale.”
The Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office did not respond to a request for comment.
Independent photojournalist Maranie Staab said she was thrown to the ground by police in Portland, Oregon, while covering protests in the city’s downtown on Aug. 16, 2020.
Staab, whose photos of the 2020 protests in Portland were published by Reuters, The New Yorker and Agence France-Presse, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was documenting a protest in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis.
At approximately 1:30 a.m. that Sunday the 16th, Staab was documenting protests outside the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office when Portland police deployed tear gas. According to news reports, police declared the gathering a riot at midnight and eventually came in tactical gear to disperse the crowd.
In a video Staab posted on Twitter, a police officer can be seen pushing a protester into a wooden pole, ripping off their gas mask and throwing Staab to the ground. She said she was wearing a large vest marked “press.”
“When he saw that I was filming, he very casually threw me to the ground,” Staab told the Tracker. She continued filming even though she hit her head and scraped her elbows.
In an email, Portland police spokesman Derek Carmon said he reviewed the video and that, among other questions, it wasn’t clear whether the journalist was thrown down or tripped. He said the department was committed to upholding civil rights for all individuals. He detailed the PBB’s crowd-control policies and noted any use of force prompts a lengthy review.
“We have made a very intentional effort to share additional information with the public about the entire context of each nightly event,” Carmon wrote. “If you look at our press releases, you’ll find nightly summaries that discuss why the Incident Commanders gave the direction that they did, including the use of crowd control munitions.”
At the time, a preliminary injunction issued by a U.S. District Court judge barred Portland police officers from harming, arresting or impeding journalists. Carmon declined to comment on pending litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers hit Juniper Simonis with pepper spray and impact rounds as the independent journalist and scientist reported on protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 16, 2020, they told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
On the night of Aug. 15 and early into the morning of Aug. 16, Simonis was covering demonstrations against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. Simonis has been publishing information for several months about law enforcement’s use of chemical irritants at protests on Twitter and on the website chemicalweaponsresearch.com.
Law enforcement officers in Portland targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
Shortly after midnight on the 16th, Simonis was outside the Penumbra Kelly Building on East Burnside Street when a confrontation flared up between a line of police officers and protesters. Simonis told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker they saw a police officer pull a woman into a bush and arrest her. Another protester ran across the street toward them to intervene, but was met by a group of several officers who fired tear gas at him.
Simonis was filming the incident from the sidewalk when a group of officers approached and noticed the equipment Simonis said was for scientific documentation. In footage of the incident that Simonis filmed with a body cam and later posted on Twitter, the journalist can be heard yelling “I am press and that is scientific equipment!” as a police officer tells him, “well it’s a weapon right now.” Simonis said the equipment consisted of a metal bucket filled with sand and fireplace tongs used to extinguish and examine hot objects, such as gas canisters.
good morning!
— Dr. Juniper L Simonis; The Professor (@JuniperLSimonis) August 16, 2020
here's what happened last night while i was scientifically documenting the use of chemical weapons in Portland, as a member of the press
stuff really escalated (i got sprayed and shot) when an officer grabbed my clearly marked and stated equipment aka "my own shit" pic.twitter.com/uvgCTOsvJj
The journalist said they were wearing a helmet and hazard vest that had “press” written on them in black permanent marker.
As the officer grabbed the bucket and tongs from Simonis, the two struggled until an officer sprayed the journalist with pepper spray, Simonis told the Tracker. At that point, Simonis said, the equipment and cellphone went flying. With tear gas on their face and back, Simonis approached the officers and began yelling angrily. Simonis was then hit in the thigh and rear with two crowd-control rounds.
Simonis then walked to where their car was parked nearby and washed off the tear gas. The journalist was missing their phone and car keys, which had been attached to the bucket with a carabiner. Several hours later, Simonis said a friend returned to the scene and convinced the officers to return his bucket and fireplace tongs. Simonis also said an unidentified individual found and returned the cellphone but didn’t provide more information.
Simonis posted photos to Twitter showing bruises on their thigh and hip area from the impact rounds.
Portland Police Bureau spokesman Sgt. Kevin Allen declined to comment on the incident, citing continuing litigation involving the City of Portland.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter Sergio Olmos said on social media that a Portland police officer hit him with a baton while he covered protests in the city on Aug. 16, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
Protesters gathered outside the Penumbra Kelly building, where Portland police declared a riot at 11:57 p.m. on Aug. 15 and deployed crowd control munitions, according to news reports. Shortly after midnight, Olmos was documenting hundreds of demonstrators marching toward the Multnomah County’s Sheriff’s Office in southeast Portland. In a video posted to Twitter at 12:34 a.m., Olmos is hit with a baton and repeated calls to move can be heard. “Police bull rush, two officers run on the sidewalk and use butons [sic] to push press, including this reporter,” his tweet reads.
Olmos didn’t respond to requests for comment. When reached by email about this incident the PPB declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
Journalist Beth Nakamura said she was pushed by law enforcement officers while she was covering demonstrations in downtown Portland on Aug. 16, 2020.
Nakamura was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed on June 28 by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU lawsuit resulted in a temporary restraining order against the Portland Police Bureau and other law enforcement agencies working with the Portland police, and eventually led to a preliminary injunction in July barring the police from harming or impeding journalists and legal observers.
Nakamura, a photojournalist for The Oregonian newspaper, said she spent much of the night of Aug. 16 covering demonstrations outside the Multnomah County Justice Center, an epicenter of Portland protests because it houses a jail, courtrooms and a police precinct.
In an interview with the Tracker, Nakamura said that around 10 p.m. she went to the back of the Justice Center, which is also the entrance to the Portland Police Bureau’s Central Precinct, where some protesters had gathered. The entrance is on Southwest Second Avenue, between Southwest Main Street and Southwest Madison Street
Video published on Twitter at 10:20 p.m. by Portland-based independent journalist Catalina Gaitan shows Nakamura, wearing a vest with the word “press” on it, filming police near a garage door where a police vehicle from Gresham, Oregon, was trying to enter. Gresham is a suburb of Portland. The video shows an officer, who appears to be from the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office, pushing Nakamura away from the garage entrance. The same officer can be seen pushing away another person who is wearing a vest marked “press” and riding a bicycle. The Tracker was unable to verify the identity of that person.
Nakamura said she was not interfering with the garage entrance or the police car driving up to it. “That was a very aggressive officer and it was completely uncalled for. You end up feeling targeted,” she said.
The Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office did not respond to a request for comment on the shoving incidents.
Law enforcement damaged livestreaming equipment belonging to independent journalist Jon Ziegler while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 15, 2020.
On the night of Aug. 15 and early into the morning of Aug. 16, Ziegler was covering demonstrations in northeast Portland against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. Ziegler, who previously worked with the media collective Unicorn Riot, has been documenting protests for his independent livestreaming account, RebZ.tv.
Sometime after 9 p.m., law enforcement declared the gathering a riot and forced protesters to disperse, Ziegler told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. The journalist said he was walking behind a line of police officers and filming them as they chased protesters down the street, when he saw an officer shove a woman in front of him. In a recording of the incident posted to Twitter, the woman can be seen falling to the ground. Ziegler is then seen following the officer and asking for his badge number. The officer turns, yells “right up behind you” and lunges at Ziegler.
As cops chased and ran protesters down the street from the police precinct, some of the cops took out their aggression on the press trailing behind
— Jon Ziegler “Reb Z” (@Rebelutionary_Z) August 17, 2020
This one tried to rip my phone off my monopod but failed at the tug of war...and the livestream kept going! (but my clip is broken) pic.twitter.com/0vpzMAZjz4
The officer tried to grab Ziegler’s phone, but was unsuccessful, the journalist told the Tracker. The officer pushed Ziegler’s RetiCAM smartphone tripod mount so forcefully into this chest, however, that the clamp broke and the journalist was left with a minor scrape. Ziegler said he was wearing a bulletproof vest with a fluorescent press insignia. “It was obvious from two blocks away that I was press,” he told the Tracker.
Portland Police Bureau spokesman Sgt. Kevin Allen declined to comment on the incident, citing continuing litigation involving the City of Portland. Since July 2020, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
Independent journalist Alissa Azar said she was shoved multiple times by police officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 15, 2020.
Azar told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that Portland police officers were “being super aggressive with members of the press” that night. She posted a tweet, alongside a video of officers repeatedly calling “Move!” and pressuring people to walk in one direction; Azar called the confrontation “terrifying.”
“People almost fell off the railing from how hard the cops were pushing. We were not even next to the protesters,” she told the Tracker.
Azar said officers pushed her several times, including pushing her into a car at one point.
@PDocumentarians got maced and they wouldn’t let us get to him to help. I just got pushed into a car
— alissa azar (@AlissaAzar) August 15, 2020
“I’m still shaken. I honestly was afraid for everyone’s safety,” Azar said.
She said she had been wearing a vest and helmet, both labelled with press markings, as well as a credential from Pacific Northwest Press Corps, which describes itself as an association of independent journalists covering ongoing protests in Portland and other parts of the Pacific Northwest.
Portland Police Bureau spokesman Sgt. Kevin Allen declined to comment on the incident, citing continuing litigation involving the City of Portland. Since July, 2020, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Independent journalist Jacob Prescott said he was shoved to the ground by police officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 15, 2020.
Prescott, who livestreams on social media, was filming demonstrations in Portland against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement on the night of Aug. 14 and early into the morning of Aug. 15. At around 1 a.m, on the 15th, freelance journalist Justin Yau posted a video to Twitter with the caption “Portland Police executed a running charge across the bridge after a short standoff with protesters.”
In the video, a line of police officers is seen running across the bridge, instructing protesters to disperse and telling the press to stay off to the side. A man in a long sleeved gray shirt, later identified as Prescott, is running on the sidelines and then begins running backwards in the middle of the bridge while filming the officers.
Portland Police executed a running charge across the bridge after a short standoff with protesters. The crowd continues to splinter as the police continues it's pursuit. #PortlandProtests #PDXProtest #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/WM66T3BCwl
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) August 15, 2020
In a subsequent post, freelancer Yau wrote “One Portland Police officer shoved a livestreamer who dropped his equipment after the bullrush. I assumed from the audio it was because he didn't stay back far enough away from officers.” In the accompanying video, Prescott is seen picking up what appears to be a phone from the ground and then walking backward as he reattaches his phone to a tripod. Without any apparent warning, an officer approaches him from behind and pushes him to the ground.
One Portland Police officer shoved a livestreamer who dropped his equipment after the bullrush. I assumed from the audio it was because he didn't stay back far enough away from officers. #PortlandProtests #PDXprotests #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/SNxJ4mcmPx
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) August 15, 2020
In another video of the incident posted to Twitter by photojournalist Dave Blazer, Prescott is seen being pushed by one officer, after he picked up his phone from the ground, and then is shoved hard a few seconds later by a different officer whose action pushed Prescott to the ground.
Press person repeatedly attacked by the Portland Police, eventually thrown on the ground (if someone can identify him, it would be much appreciated). Then an officer squares up with a woman who is fearless.#FIGHTUntilLastBREATH #PDXprotests #Portland #PortlandProtesters pic.twitter.com/vtKaH0DqxV
— Dave Blazer Photography (@dave_blazer) August 16, 2020
Prescott later retweeted Blazer’s post and identified himself as the person in the video.
Prescott also retweeted footage of the incident taken by another journalist, with the caption “Portland Officer assaults me from behind.” In a subsequent message he posted a photo of a man he believed to be the officer who pushed him to the ground.
Prescott did not respond to Twitter and email messages from the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker seeking comment.
Portland Police Bureau spokesman Sgt. Kevin Allen declined to comment on the incident, citing continuing litigation involving the City of Portland. Since July, 2020, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Independent photojournalist Sean Bascom said he was hit by police during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on the night of Aug. 14, 2020.
Portland had experienced regular protests since the May 25 police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. On the evening of Aug. 14, protesters gathered in North Portland's Peninsula Park and began marching. According to The Oregonian, their intended destination was believed to be the Portland police union headquarters.
Just before 10:30 p.m., Bascom was filming at the intersection of Killingsworth Street and North Mississippi Avenue as Portland police officers charged a line of shield-bearing protesters and began pushing protesters and members of the media down the street.
Over a loudspeaker, police can be heard declaring an unlawful assembly, saying that “paint bombs and other projectiles” had been thrown at officers. They also can be heard addressing the press and legal-rights observers, saying that they would adhere to a temporary restraining order and allow them to do their jobs so long as they moved off the roadway and didn’t interfere with officers.
In July, a U.S. district judge issued a temporary restraining order barring police in Portland from using physical force against, dispersing, arresting or threatening to arrest journalists and legal-rights observers.
In a video Bascom shared with the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, the journalist can be seen complying with police orders, walking on the sidewalk while continuing to film while moving north on North Mississippi Avenue.
Meanwhile, police were making arrests in the street, “knocking people down and dragging them across the pavement” Bascom said. At one point, Bascom moved between parked cars to film a protester being thrown to the ground by police. An officer can be heard shouting: “Get out of the street now!”
In the video, Bascom tells the officer he is a member of the press and then the camera shakes.
“He came barreling in out of my view and just yelled “press out of the street” and then immediately hit me, it must have been with his baton, like right in my ribs,” said Bascom.
Bascom said he was wearing bright clothing and a helmet with press markings. He added he was also using a camera with a large lens and that he believed it was clear to the officer that he was a member of the press.
He told the Tracker he felt sore for about a month, experiencing pain when he breathed deeply. He didn’t get the injury checked out by a medical professional, but said it felt like he previously had bruised ribs while snowboarding and skateboarding.
While he technically wasn’t on the sidewalk, Bascom said he wasn’t in the way of police actions and that the officer was taking advantage of a technicality.
“I can’t be in their way because of the cars that are parked on either side of me,” he said. “The Portland police seem to have decided that when they’re clearing a street if press are on the sidewalk, then they’re fine, but as soon as they step one foot off of the sidewalk, they are totally free to use as much force as they want.”
In a press release regarding the Aug. 14 protest, the Portland Police Bureau wrote that “several people with ‘press’ affixed to them shined flashlights in officers eyes.” A spokesperson for the PPB told the Tracker they were unable to comment on the incidents due to ongoing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Garrison Davis, an independent journalist, said police attempted to grab his phone while he was filming a protest in Portland, Oregon, on the night of Aug. 14, 2020.
Portland had experienced regular protests since the May 25 police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. On the evening of Aug. 14, protesters gathered in North Portland's Peninsula Park and began marching. According to The Oregonian, their intended destination was believed to be the Portland police union headquarters.
Over a loudspeaker, police can be heard declaring an unlawful assembly, saying that “paint bombs and other projectiles” had been thrown at officers. They also can be heard addressing the press and legal-rights observers, saying that they would adhere to a temporary restraining order and allow them to do their jobs so long as they moved off the roadway and didn’t interfere with officers.
In July, a U.S. district judge issued a temporary restraining order barring police in Portland from using physical force against, dispersing, arresting or threatening to arrest journalists and legal-rights observers.
That night, an officer tried to grab Davis' phone away from him as he recorded, the freelance videographer said.
In a video filmed sometime before midnight, a Portland police officer can be seen approaching Davis, telling him to “back off away from our van” and then moving his hand toward the journalist’s phone in an action Davis said was an attempt to grab the device. Davis repeatedly told the officer he was on the sidewalk and not in their way. He had previously shouted at officers telling him to move that he was with the press.
“Portland Police continuing to blatantly ignore the federal restraining order. An officer comes off of the riot van, approaches me, and grabs my phone” Davis tweeted.
Portland Police continuing to blatantly ignore the federal restraining order. An officer comes off of the riot van, approaches me, and grabs my phone. #blacklivesmatter #protest #pdx #Portland #Oregon #BLM #acab #PortlandProtests #PDXprotests #PortlandStrong pic.twitter.com/7GWQojHlq0
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) August 15, 2020
Davis told the Tracker he felt that he and other journalists had been targeted that night.
“At this point I think they were mad at press because the reason why they keep getting in trouble is because the press is thoroughly documenting their crimes,” he said.
In a press release regarding the Aug. 14 protest, the Portland Police Bureau wrote that “several people with ‘press’ affixed to them shined flashlights in officers eyes.” A spokesperson for the PPB told the Tracker they were unable to comment on the incidents due to ongoing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Independent journalist Brian Conley said he was shoved by police during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on the night of Aug. 14, 2020.
Portland had experienced regular protests since the May 25 police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. On the evening of Aug. 14, protesters gathered in North Portland's Peninsula Park and began marching. According to The Oregonian, their intended destination was believed to be the Portland police union headquarters.
Over a loudspeaker, police can be heard declaring an unlawful assembly, saying that “paint bombs and other projectiles” had been thrown at officers. They also can be heard addressing the press and legal-rights observers, saying that they would adhere to a temporary restraining order and allow them to do their jobs so long as they moved off the roadway and didn’t interfere with officers.
In July, a U.S. district judge issued a temporary restraining order barring police in Portland from using physical force against, dispersing, arresting or threatening to arrest journalists and legal-rights observers.
Conley said that later that night he was pushed by a Portland police officer clearing a street in North Portland. On Twitter, he wrote that he and legal-rights observers had been pushed by a police officer at 11:45 p.m. for not walking fast enough. The officer “then struck me hard enough to knock the light from my camera. There was nowhere to go because too many people were in front of us,” he added.
In a video shot by freelance journalist Justin Yau, officers can be seen pushing people with batons, telling them to walk down the street faster. At one point, Conley can be seen turning around to film officers as he walks backwards using a camera with a light mounted on top of it. A voice can be heard saying “stop shining this light in my eyes” as one officer’s hand reaches out towards Conley’s camera.
“I was walking. I was not on the street. I was on the sidewalk,” Conley told the Tracker. “There was a mass of people in front of me. I really couldn’t go any faster” unless he stopped filming, he added.
Conley said the light mounted on his camera was knocked to the ground and retrieved by another journalist. It was undamaged.
At the time, he was wearing body armor marked “press” as well as a gas mask and a helmet. He said he had verbally identified himself as press as well, adding he believes the officer knew he was a member of the media.
“He was already kind of pushing me more than he should have been and there was nowhere for me to go,” he said. “I wasn’t a danger to him.”
In a press release regarding the Aug. 14 protest, the Portland Police Bureau wrote that “several people with ‘press’ affixed to them shined flashlights in officers' eyes.” A spokesperson for the PPB told the Tracker they were unable to comment on the incidents due to ongoing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Independent photojournalist Maranie Staab was pushed to the ground by Portland police while covering protests in downtown Portland on Aug. 11, 2020.
Staab, whose photos of the 2020 protests in Portland have been published by Reuters, The New Yorker and Agence France-Presse, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was documenting a protest in downtown Portland, where demonstrators had been gathering nightly in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis.
At 1:40 a.m. on Aug. 11, Staab said she was at the Portland Police Bureau’s North Precinct station, covering what she said was an arrest of a woman leaving the protest area. Shortly before midnight, Portland Police declared an unlawful assembly at the North Precinct area and tweeted that people should leave or be subject to arrest, citation or crowd control actions. In a video Staab shared on Twitter, officers can be seen running across the street, surrounding a car and yelling at individuals to “get out of the road.”
About 15 seconds in from a video shared by independent journalist Anissa Matlock, Staab turns to walk away from the scene and is pushed from behind by a police officer. With a camera in her right hand and a phone on a stabilizing device for recording in her left, she falls face forward onto a bush, then turns over to continue documenting the scene. In the video Staab can be heard saying, “I’m a member of the press and you just threw me to the ground.”
Last nite I was again assaultd by @PortlandPolice
— Maranie R. Staab (@MaranieRae) August 12, 2020
This is my perspective & the next video is by @matlockartist
I was identifid as Press & filmng as they slashd a protesters tires. I was in no way interfering.
This was2AM. The later it gets there's less Press & more impunity pic.twitter.com/0qhLkbSH0F
At the time, a preliminary injunction issued by a U.S. District Court judge barred Portland police officers from harming, arresting or impeding journalists.
Staab said the same officer who pushed her during the Aug. 11 protest had assaulted her more than five times. “I was wearing a big blue vest with white writing and there’s no mistaking me that I’m press,” Staab told the Tracker.
The Portland Police Bureau has said they wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
Independent videographer Nicholas Lee said police officers shoved him and shot him in the finger with a crowd control munition while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of Aug. 9, 2020.
The protest was one of many that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
Lee was covering a demonstration that began outside the Portland police union building in North Portland on the night of Aug. 8 and continued into the next morning. The police declared a riot shortly before midnight, after some demonstrators lit a fire inside the Portland Police Association headquarters.
Sometime around midnight, Lee was shoved to the ground by officers while he was on the sidewalk. “I'd been grabbed by the cops, shoved to the ground again because it seems they didn't want a brutal arrest filmed,” he wrote in a tweet that has since been deleted.
After a while, said Lee, law enforcement officers from the Portland Police Bureau and Oregon State Police fired sting-ball grenades that drove protesters in the direction of Kenton Park. Once the protesters had gathered in the park, police officers continued to fire crowd control munitions, he said.
At around 12:25 a.m., Lee noticed a tear gas canister on the ground in the park and approached it, he said. “I remember hearing, ‘If you touch that, you’re going to get shot,’” Lee told the Tracker. Soon he felt a rubber bullet, fired by a PPB officer, hit the tip of his middle finger.
“It hit my finger, and there was blood everywhere,” he said. “Another photographer took me to the emergency room.”
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent social media journalist Teebs Auberdine said she was hit with a projectile and pushed into a cactus by law enforcement officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of Aug. 9, 2020.
Demonstrations had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order in July barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists.
Late in the evening of Aug. 8, police declared a riot in North Portland after a small group of protesters broke into the Portland Police Association, the union that represents city police officers, and set a small fire on the floor of the office, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported. The Portland Police Bureau and Oregon State Police dispersed the demonstration from that area, though protests continued in the early hours of the morning in Kenton Park, about a half mile north.
Auberdine, who livestreams video of protests on her social media channels, said she was covering the protest in Kenton Park when she was hit with a metal projectile. While standing under a tree for shelter, she was struck in the arm with what she believes was a 40mm puck round fired by a PPB officer, she told the Tracker. The projectile ricocheted off of the tree and hit her from above, she said, adding that it didn’t cause her any injury.
Auberdine said other journalists were also standing near the tree at the time she was struck. She said she didn’t know whether the police had intended the projectile to hit anyone.
About 20 minutes later, she said, she was reporting near the front of a protest in the Kenton neighborhood, a few blocks from the park. Because of where she was standing, she said it was hard to move out of the way. Then a state trooper cross-checked her into a planter box in front of a restaurant or bar, she said. She broke her fall with her left arm by grabbing onto the side of the box. As she did, she said, the needles of a cactus stabbed through her sweater and into her arm.
Got shot in the arm by a canister tonight (clearly marked press) It ricocheted off a tree, so the impact didnt cause any significant injuries, but it ended a few day streak of me not getting shot :/
— Teebs (@TeebsGaming) August 9, 2020
Also got pushed into a cactus by a state trooper. That sentence exists now...
She said she pulled most of the needles out a short time later when the confrontation calmed down, but she wasn’t able to remove all of them until she went home.
Auberdine wore a black bullet resistant vest with the word “press” on the front and back in large white letters, she said, and also carried recording equipment, including a microphone.
“While I bet they would have shoved anyone in arms reach into that planter box, they 100 percent knew what they were doing,” Auberdine told the Tracker.
In response to an email inquiry, a spokesperson for the OSP didn’t specifically address the incident, but said that concerns about excessive use of force could be reported to the state police Office of Professional Standards.
When reached by email, PPB spokesperson Greg Pashley told the Tracker that he didn’t have any information to release about the incident.
Independent journalist Seth Dunlap said his arm was fractured after being struck with what he believed to be a flash-bang grenade tossed by a police officer while he was covering a demonstration in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of Aug. 9, 2020.
Dunlap, a contributor to the social media news outlet FrontLine Access, was covering one of the protests that had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon alleges in a class-action lawsuit. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists and other legal observers of the protests.
Late on Aug. 8, Seattle-based Dunlap was covering a demonstration outside the Portland police union headquarters in North Portland. The Portland Police Bureau declared a riot around 11:40 p.m., after a group of demonstrators lit a fire inside the Portland Police Association building. The PPB and Oregon State Police used crowd-control munitions and physical force to disperse the crowd.
Just after midnight, Dunlap was standing near ACLU legal observers when what he described as a flash-bang grenade was thrown in his direction by a PPB officer, injuring his arm, he told the Tracker.
“Luckily I had my left arm up recording at the time, and the flash-bang went off and hit my arm,” Dunlap said. “Otherwise it probably would have hit my face, and who knows what would have happened then.”
Independent journalist Suzette Smith tweeted a video of the chaotic scene, writing that Dunlap was struck with a “less-lethal munition.”
“He was on the ground and unresponsive for an agonizing number of seconds, during the chaos of the rush,” Smith wrote.
Medics at the scene tended to Dunlap and Smith posted a photo of his bruised arm.
Thank you to everybody for their incredible help during and after. Seriously, what heroes 🙏❤️🙏❤️. I’m OK. Hurting, but OK. Direct shot from a flashbang or something in the left arm. Don’t remember being out at all, so that’s extra scary. https://t.co/QFxkZ4Dg8m
— Seth Dunlap (@sethdunlap) August 9, 2020
Dunlap said that hours after he was struck, he “one-arm drove” home to Seattle. The next day, his arm “swelled up like a balloon.”
He went to an emergency room and learned that the orbital bone in his left arm was fractured, he said. “So that basically put me out of work for about a month.”
Dunlap, who was wearing a helmet and reflective clothing with markings that identified him as a journalist, said he felt targeted as a member of the press. "Considering I’m 6’7” and was wearing very visible and reflective press gear, and I was standing in a group of neon green-clad legal observers, I believe it’s pretty clear they threw that munition at us intentionally,” he said.
PPB spokesperson Kevin Allen declined to comment on the incident in an email to the Tracker, citing the ongoing ACLU litigation.
Independent journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis was shoved and struck in the ribs with a baton by sheriff’s deputies in Portland, Oregon, while documenting a Black Lives Matter protest on Aug. 9, 2020.
The protest was one of the many that broke out across the U.S. that year in response to police violence and in support of the BLM movement following the murder of George Floyd. As the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker has documented, an unprecedented number of journalists were assaulted and arrested at these protests, including in Oregon, where the ACLU later filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of journalists and legal observers who were targeted and attacked by police.
Lewis joined a separate civil suit on Nov. 1, 2020, charging that the City of Portland, Multnomah County, and various law enforcement officials violated the constitutional rights of people with disabilities during BLM protests that year.
Lewis and three other Oregonians with disabilities who either documented or participated in the protests accused law enforcement of assaulting them multiple times and of generally acting without regard for their disabilities. Lewis has photosensitive epilepsy and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that increases the risk of injury and makes it difficult for her to move quickly.
In the complaint, Lewis describes being forcibly removed by sheriff’s deputies from the area outside the Multnomah County Justice Center in downtown Portland at the Aug. 9 protest. The deputies screamed at members of the press and protesters to clear a path to the parking lot, according to the complaint, striking and pushing them with batons. Lewis says that despite complying with deputies’ directions, she was pulled by the backpack, shoved in the shoulders and struck in the ribs with a baton for not moving quickly enough, then told to stop filming.
In October 2021, the court approved a motion to dismiss the plaintiffs’ claims in the lawsuit, ruling that they had failed to prove that the city customarily violated the constitutional rights of people with disabilities when responding to protests. The plaintiffs then filed an amended complaint, which did not include Lewis.
Lewis told the Tracker that she ultimately withdrew from the suit because of issues with her legal representation.
Paint thrown at a police precinct sign during Black Lives Matter protests in Portland, Oregon, in August 2020. Journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis told the Tracker she was struck in the ribs with a baton by sheriff’s deputies at a protest on Aug. 9.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:20-cv-01882,['DISMISSED'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,no,False,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2020-12-13 11:22:23.695880+00:00,2023-01-30 21:15:21.474174+00:00,"Photographer slammed to the ground, arrested by Portland police",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/photographer-slammed-ground-arrested-portland-police/,2023-01-30 21:15:21.327505+00:00,"obstruction: disorderly conduct in the second degree (charges dropped as of 2020-08-31), obstruction: interfering with a police officer (charges dropped as of 2020-08-31)",,,"Arrest/Criminal Charge, Assault, Equipment Search or Seizure",,"camera: count of 2, cellphone: count of 1, equipment bag: count of 1, protective equipment: count of 1",,Joseph Rushmore (Freelance),,2020-08-08,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Joseph Rushmore, a freelance documentary photographer, was arrested by police officers and charged with two misdemeanors while covering a demonstration in the early hours of Aug. 8, 2020, in northeast Portland, Oregon.
The protest was one of many that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
Rushmore was covering a protest that began at around 9 p.m. in Laurelhurst Park. Protesters then marched about a half mile to the Penumbra Kelly building, a repeated focus of demonstrators because it houses the Multnomah County Sheriff's office and some Portland Police Bureau units.
Protesters blocked the road in front of the building while chanting, making speeches and yelling at officers, Rushmore told the Tracker. At one point, police officers rushed into the crowd, driving protesters into the surrounding residential neighborhood.
At some point after midnight, about 50 protesters regrouped to head back to the Kelly building, said Rushmore, who was following them. When the group was about a block from the building, officers blocked the way and started pushing protesters and journalists west along East Burnside Street.
Footage of Rushmore’s arrest, taken by an observer sometime after 1 a.m. and shared with the Tracker, shows officers rushing into the street and knocking down Rushmore and several protesters. Rushmore can be seen getting grabbed from behind and thrown to the ground. A group of officers then restrains Rushmore and arrests him.
“I have two very large cameras around my neck at all times so it is quite obvious I am press,” said Rushmore, though he wasn’t wearing any press credentials or clothing marked as press.
“During this rush, an officer with Portland Police Bureau grabbed me from behind, spun me around and threw me to the ground, slamming my head hard into the pavement,” said Rushmore, adding that his helmet protected him from injury. “At least one more officer got on top of me, and they held me down while zip-tying my hands behind my back. I yelled to the officer that I was press multiple times. He told me, `Now you're part of the riot.’ And when I told him again I was just press, he said, ‘Then you shouldn’t have been rioting.’”
The officers searched Rushmore and seized his helmet, cameras, backpack and phone before being taken to the Kelly building, he said. He was then sent to the jail at the Multnomah County Justice Center downtown, where he was detained in a general holding area. By noon, Rushmore was released, he said. He got all his equipment back two days after his arrest.
Rushmore was charged with two misdemeanors, interfering with an officer and disorderly conduct, but the charges were dropped sometime in the weeks after the arrest, he said.
Portland City Attorney Tracy Reeve didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Photojournalist Nathan Howard was hit in the ankle with a flash-bang grenade and shoved by a police officer into a bush while he was reporting on protests in Portland, Oregon early on the morning of Aug. 8, 2020.
Protests against racial injustice had been held nightly in Portland since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to a temporary restraining order, and later a preliminary injunction, barring the Portland Police Bureau from harming or impeding journalists.
Howard, who was covering the protest for The Associated Press, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was photographing a demonstration at the East Precinct of the PPB, which also houses the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Department office.
At around 1 or 2 a.m., police formed a riot formation and protesters started backing off, he said.
Howard said he was in a gap in the street between protesters and police as he photographed law enforcement advancing. He heard a metal clang and felt something bounce off his ankle, he said.
“I looked down and kind of had enough time to go, ‘Oh, this is gonna suck,’ and a half second later the flash-bang went off,” he said.
Howard told the Tracker the device was resting against his ankle when it exploded, cutting and burning him. The blast also melted pieces of metal into his shoes. He said that he kept following the protest, limping, as police drove the protesters away from the police building and onto side streets.
A short time later, Howard said he was standing with another journalist, photographing police arrest a protester in a yard. An officer came up behind them and told them that they had to leave. Howard said they couldn’t easily leave because they were in the space between protesters and police. He said they tried to explain that to the officer, but the officer said he did not care.
As Howard started backing up, he said, the officer shoved the other journalist into a bush. Howard told the Tracker he thinks he tried to take a photograph or said something to the officer to identify them as journalists, and the officer then shoved him into the bush.
The Tracker could not confirm the identity of the second journalist.
Howard said he was clearly marked as a journalist, wearing a vest marked “PRESS” and had credentials hanging around his neck.
Howard said he believed he was targeted because he was a journalist.
Howard told the Tracker he had a gash about 1 inch wide and 4 inches long from the flash-bang grenade. He said the heat from the explosion cauterized the cut, so it didn’t bleed much. A protest medic dressed the wound that night, and Howard said he continued to monitor it over the following days. More than six months later, he said he still had a scar on his ankle.
A spokesperson for PPB declined to comment on the incident. The police department has refused comment to the Tracker in other incidents citing ongoing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
Independent videographer Melissa Lewis said police officers hit her in the neck with a baton while she was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 7, 2020.
The protest was one of many that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
On the night of Aug. 7, Lewis was livestreaming a demonstration outside the Penumbra Kelly building in northeast Portland. The building, which houses the Multnomah County Sheriff's office and some Portland Police Bureau units, has been a repeated focus of demonstrators.
Shortly after protesters arrived around 10 p.m., police declared an “unlawful assembly,” according to KGW8. The local news outlet quoted the PPB as saying that after officers began making arrests, “members of the crowd started throwing rocks toward officers.” Oregon State Police officers were also involved in the enforcement effort, according to the story.
Lewis said that at around 11 p.m. police officers rushed towards a group of protesters, driving them south of the Penumbra Kelly building. While advancing on protesters, police officers swung batons at them, Lewis told the Tracker.
Lewis, who was wearing a helmet and backpack with the words “press” on them, said one officer swung a baton at her and hit her “on the base of my helmet, right where it ended, right on my [cervical] spine.”
The next day, Lewis went to the emergency room to get an X-ray. “Can’t rotate my head all the way back or side to side,” she tweeted. She also posted a picture of her diagnosis — a contusion to the neck.
Getting an X-ray for my neck, after getting hit with a baton. Can’t rotate my head all the way back or side to side. They hit right underneath my press sticker.
— Melissa “Claudio” Lewis (@Claudio_Report) August 8, 2020
“I was tender over the bones,” she told the Tracker.
The PPB has said it wouldn’t comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
Federal law enforcement in Portland, Oregon, in August 2020, during one of many Black Lives Matter protests that year. Journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker an officer hit her in the neck with a baton at an Aug. 7 protest.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:20-cv-01882,['DISMISSED'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,no,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2020-11-11 17:41:03.768850+00:00,2022-11-18 14:27:36.099258+00:00,Daily Mail photographer arrested while covering Portland protest,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/daily-mail-photographer-arrested-while-covering-portland-protest/,2022-11-18 14:27:36.016485+00:00,trespassing (charges dropped as of 2020-08-31),,(2022-10-20 09:35:00+00:00) No charges remain against Daily Mail journalist arrested in 2020,Arrest/Criminal Charge,,,,Michael Arellano (Daily Mail),,2020-08-07,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Daily Mail photographer Michael Arellano was arrested on Aug. 7, 2020, while covering a protest in northeast Portland, Oregon.
The protest was one of many that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations in late May, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The protesters began at Laurelhurst Park in southeast Portland and marched to the Penumbra Kelly Building on East Burnside Street and 47th Avenue, according to The Oregonian. The building, which houses the Multnomah County Sheriff's office and some Portland Police Bureau units, has been a repeated focus of demonstrators.
Within a few minutes of the crowd’s arrival, police declared an “unlawful assembly.” Officers moved toward a group of journalists standing near the Kelly building, The Oregonian reported. “The journalists, including an Oregonian/OregonLive photographer, were staying behind a line of orange cones that police had set up. Police moved in and detained one photographer working on behalf of The Daily Mail,” the paper reported, identifying him as Arellano.
In a statement about the night’s police actions, the PPB said it had announced that anyone remaining on the Kelly building property would be arrested for trespassing. “People who remained standing on the property after multiple public address announcements were arrested,” the PPB said. Arellano was booked for criminal trespassing in the second degree.
At 9:48 p.m., independent journalist Griffin Malone tweeted a video of Arellano’s arrest from across the street. In the video, Arellano doesn’t appear to be behind the cones with the other members of the press, but it’s also not apparent that he was on the Kelly building property. Officers can be seen pulling him backwards toward the building during the arrest.
Arrested press and retreated. pic.twitter.com/maH2Dd9NUG
— Griffin - Live Protest News (@GriffinMalone6) August 8, 2020
Photojournalist Nathan Howard retweeted the video and added, “Here's Michael Arellano photographer with the @DailyMail getting arrested for no apparent reason tonight. He has been covering this for weeks. No warnings, no dispersal order (which press are immune to anyway).”
The Oregonian reported that police “were keeping the loudspeakers farther away from the crowd than usual,” making it difficult for protesters to hear announcements.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Arellano didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Portland police assaulted and arrested Independent photojournalist Maranie Staab as she covered protests in downtown Portland on Aug. 6, 2020, according to Staab. Staab, whose photos of the 2020 protests in Portland have been published by Reuters, The New Yorker and Agence France-Presse, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was held overnight at the Multnomah County Detention Center and released the next morning. Her charges of harassment and interfering with a police officer have been dropped.
On the night of Aug. 6, Staab said she was near the Portland Police Bureau’s East Precinct station. Shortly before 10 p.m., police declared the gathering an unlawful assembly due to vandalism and property destruction. The night before, police had declared a protest there a riot. During the Aug. 6 protest, Staab said Portland police officers had formed a line and started to run towards the protesters. According to Staab, some journalists were caught up with the protesters as officers rushed toward them. Along with other members of the press, Staab said, she was being pushed along on the sidewalk.
Staab said that while walking backwards with a camera in each hand, she was pushed to the ground by a police officer. Staab said she had “press” written on her front and back in white text.
“I tried to get up, he pushed me down a second time,” Staab told the Tracker. When she tried to get up again, Staab said, “He pushed me down a third time and then pulled me off of the sidewalk into the street.” Staab said that the officer then handcuffed and arrested her.
In a video shared in a tweet by freelance journalist Justin Yau, police officers can be seen physically blocking the area and using flashlights to prevent other journalists and legal observers from clearly filming Staab’s arrest. According to Yau’s tweet, the arrest took place at 10:20 p.m.
At 2220 last night, photojournalist @MaranieRae was arrested by Portland Police while she was documenting the protest. They used flashlights & physically blocked other journalists and legal observers from filming the arrest. #PressFreedom #PortlandProtests #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/yc1lGjoy8p
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) August 8, 2020
Staab said police transported her in a van to the Multnomah County Detention Center where she was processed and charged with harassment and interfering with a police officer. According to the police report of the arrest, Staab resisted arrest and physically pushed the officer. Staab has denied the police account and said she had “cooperated in full.”
At the detention center, Staab said, the officers took her phone, camera, gas mask and hat when she was arrested, but returned her belongings the next day. Although she was able to keep her phone with her, Staab said the phone screen cracked when she was slammed to the ground. Staab said she was released at 4 a.m. on Aug. 7. She said the charges against her were later dropped.
In July, a U.S. District Court judge issued a preliminary injunction barring Portland police officers from dispersing, arresting or impeding journalists covering the city’s nightly protests, which began in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it would not comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
A journalist who is a member of an independent press collective known as the 45th Absurdist Brigade was shoved twice by police while reporting on protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 6, 2020.
The journalist, who asked not to be named, was covering one of the many protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
On the night of Aug. 6, the journalist was reporting on protests outside the Portland Police Bureau’s East Precinct when police began trying to clear the area, they told the Tracker.
Officers were moving people northeast, clearing an area toward Southeast Stark Street, the main thoroughfare, the journalist said. Walking backward alongside the police line, the journalist was filming the gap between the police and the protesters. While staying on the sidewalk, they saw officers start to “shove” members of the press, when they were suddenly pushed themselves.
“I was walking backwards and an officer was like, “Get back! Get back on the sidewalk!,’” they said, adding that the officer then “tried to slap my camera down.”
The journalist’s camera was tethered to their wrist, they said, so it just briefly fell out of their hands before they grabbed it again. But soon after, they were shoved again back toward the sidewalk, they said.
“Since I was already walking backwards when I got shoved, I just kind of went back on my back foot,” the journalist said. “And I just kind of stumbled back and got up, and continued walking, trying to make sure I didn't get trapped.”
A video the journalist posted on Twitter at 10:50 p.m. captures the shoving. The first push can be seen around 40 seconds in, and then the camera angle goes askew. Several seconds later, the journalist gets shoved again.
The push pic.twitter.com/RmL4t1A2in
— 45th parallel absurdist brigade (@45thabsurdist) August 7, 2020
The shoving was captured from another angle by independent videographer Garrison Davis. “An officer tried to slap @45thabsurdist’s phone out of their hand, then when that failed an officer just pushed them around,” Davis tweeted.
The journalist wasn’t physically harmed, they said, and their equipment wasn’t damaged.
The PPB didn’t respond to a request for comment on this incident.
Independent journalist Alissa Azar said she was pushed by a law enforcement officer while she was covering protests on Aug. 5, 2020, in Portland, Oregon.
The protest was one of many that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU suit led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
On Aug. 5, Azar was covering a demonstration that started at Floyd Light City Park in Southeast Portland at around 8 p.m. Protesters then marched to the Portland Police Bureau’s East Precinct station, about a five-minute walk from the park. When protesters arrived at the precinct, some of them vandalized surveillance cameras and set small fires outside the precinct, according to KGW8, the local NBC affiliate.
At around 10 p.m., after declaring the protest a riot, law enforcement officers responded with tear gas, driving the demonstrators away from the precinct station into the surrounding residential neighborhood.
At 10:36 p.m., Azar posted a video on Twitter showing a police officer directing protesters to move north as another group of officers arrests someone on the ground in the middle of a street. Azar continues to film as officers push observers from the progressive legal organization National Lawyers Guild away as they try to film the arrest. About 40 seconds in, an officer appears to approach Azar, and then her camera goes askew as she yells out.
“They pushed me and nlg for trying to film this,” Azar, who didn’t respond to interview requests from the Tracker, wrote on the post accompanying the video.
The incident was also captured by Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter Sergio Olmos from across the street. About 45 seconds into footage he posted, an officer can be seen pushing the NLG observer and Azar. There was a combination of Portland police and Oregon State Police involved in clearing the protesters, according to Olmos.
Portland Police Bureau spokesman Derek Carmon declined to comment on the video and Azar’s allegation, citing continuing litigation.
Freelance photographer John Rudoff said he was pushed by law enforcement while covering protests against racial injustice and police brutality in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 5, 2020.
That night and into the following morning of Aug. 6, demonstrations were held in North Portland outside the headquarters of the Portland Police Association, the union representing the Portland Police Bureau. Shortly before midnight, law enforcement declared the gathering an unlawful assembly after an unidentified individual tried to break into the building, according to statements by the police to local news media.
Police bull rushed the crowd, protestors were cleare from the area pic.twitter.com/qWZAzDS8Tq
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) August 5, 2020
Police officers then moved to disperse the crowd, pushing people off the street and onto the sidewalk, Rudoff told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
Rudoff, who wasn’t on assignment that night but whose photographs were used by wire services, said he was in the middle of the “scrum of… journalists, activists and everyone in-between” who were pushed by officers onto the sidewalk.
He told the Tracker he was clearly identifiable as a journalist as he was wearing press gear “literally head to toe,” including a fluorescent yellow press vest, a helmet that said press, a gas mask, body armor, and was carrying two large cameras. Rudoff told the Tracker he was uninjured and continued photographing.
In a video of the events that night shared on Twitter by freelance journalist Justin Yau, a police officer is seen telling a group of journalists trying to film an arrest that, “press needs to stop interfering,” and then pushing a female journalist wearing a white press helmet. Rudoff and Yau identified the journalist as freelance videographer and photographer Emily Molli.
Since July 2020, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn’t comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Photojournalist John Rudoff captured this image while documenting protests in Portland on Aug. 5, 2020. He told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was one of several journalists shoved by police officers that night.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,unknown,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2021-10-08 15:02:17.008867+00:00,2021-10-08 15:02:17.008867+00:00,Journalist pushed by police officers while covering protests in Portland,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-pushed-by-police-officers-while-covering-protests-in-portland/,2021-10-08 15:02:16.970032+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Emily Molli (Freelance),,2020-08-05,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Freelance journalist Emily Molli was pushed by law enforcement while covering protests against racial injustice and police brutality in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 5, 2020, according to first-hand accounts and social media posts.
That night and into the following morning of Aug. 6, demonstrations were held in North Portland outside the headquarters of the Portland Police Association, the union representing the Portland Police Bureau. Shortly before midnight, law enforcement declared the gathering an unlawful assembly after an unidentified individual tried to break into the building, according to statements by the police to local news media.
In a video of the events that night shared on Twitter by freelance journalist Justin Yau, a police officer is seen telling a group of journalists trying to film an arrest that, “press needs to stop interfering,” and then pushing a female journalist wearing a white press helmet. Yau identified the journalist as freelance videographer and photographer Emily Molli.
Molli shared Yau’s tweet and previously told the Tracker about getting pushed by police and getting hit with a crowd-control round during Portland protests, but hasn’t responded to text messages seeking comment on this incident.
Members of the press filming the injured arrestee were pushed away and accused if interfering. Several journalists including members of foreign news media were shoved away. #PortlandProtest #PDXProtest #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/goFiwQBfe0
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) August 5, 2020
Since July 2020, law enforcement officers from the PPB and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn’t comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Independent journalist Jake Johnson was shoved into a bush by a police officer clearing protesters from a street in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 1, 2020, despite being clearly marked as press. A second Portland Police Bureau officer then slammed him onto a car hood and maced him at close range.
The Portland-based journalist was covering one of the many protests that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
After more than two months of nightly protests in Portland, tensions had begun to ease in the wake of the federal government’s agreement in late July to end its crackdown on protests, leaving enforcement to local police. The PPB, meanwhile, had recently agreed not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers in response to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. Johnson, a recent graduate of Portland State University who had worked for the school’s magazine and newspaper, is involved in the ACLU suit.
Around 11 p.m. on Aug. 1, Johnson was using his phone to film police clearing a residential street after a protest that began at the Penumbra Kelly Building on East Burnside Street dispersed southward. Johnson told the Tracker that there were about 100 protesters left at this point. In a video Johnson later tweeted, the officers can be heard warning protesters that it was an unlawful assembly and they should disperse.
About 40 seconds into the video, a line of officers can be seen advancing down the residential street, yelling, “Move!” and “Get out of the street!” An officer can be heard saying, “On the sidewalk, get on the sidewalk,” as the camera angle swings upward. That’s when an officer pushed Johnson into a bush, he told the Tracker. Johnson said he had moved between parked cars when the officer used a baton to shove him, and that he injured his pinky toe when he tried to catch his fall.
Johnson was still filming as he attempted to follow the officer, asking for his badge number. Reading the number on the back of the officer’s helmet, he can be heard yelling that it was “officer No. 6” that shoved him.
Then the camera goes askew again, as another officer shoves him into a car, Johnson told the Tracker. His knees hyperextended when he hit the bumper, he said. Johnson said that when he looked up, he was immediately maced. In the video, a police officer driving by in a riot van can be heard saying, “Smart move.”
Johnson said that his phone flew out of his hand when he got hit, but that it continued to record. In the audio, someone can be heard giving Johnson back his helmet, which is labelled “press” on five sides (front, left, right, back and top).
“Did they mace you too?” a person can be heard asking. “Yeah,” Johnson replied. People continue to assist him, including helping him rinse his eyes.
The recording then gets cut off, but at 11:22 p.m. Johnson tweeted the rest of the audio. About 35 seconds into the recording, a person says, “That was pretty distinctly them shoving and macing press. I mean, you’ve got the fucking helmet and everything.” Johnson and the bystander can then be heard finding his phone, which was still recording, on the ground.
Johnson told the Tracker the pain in his right leg from hitting the bumper made it difficult to cover subsequent protests. “It’s very uncomfortable to go to sleep at night,” he said.
Garrison Davis, who was with fellow Portland-based journalist Robert Evans at the time, captured Johnson getting shoved on camera from another angle. At 11:16 p.m., Davis tweeted about the incident, referencing Johnson’s Twitter handle: “It’s pretty dark, but if you look closely you can see the police assault and thrown journalist @FancyJenkins (white helmet) onto the hood of the car. He got badly maced.” In the video, Johnson can be seen following the officer that pushed him while another officer runs up from behind and slams him into the car.
Members of the Portland Press Corps who go by @45thabsurdist on Twitter were also present at the incident. “Lost the march helping someone who was maced and shoved between two cars,” they tweeted at 10:34 p.m.
At 11 p.m., @45thabsurdist tweeted at Multnomah County district attorney Mike Schmidt: “For the record, @FancyJenkins is the reporter who just got maced while clearly marked, standing aside, filming.”
A PPB statement about the Aug. 1 protests said that “people with ‘press’ written on their outer garments repeatedly threw objects at officers.”
Sergeant Kevin Allen of the PPB told the Tracker that he didn’t have information about the incident involving Johnson, but said the PPB “requires that members use only the objectively reasonable force necessary to perform their duties and overcome the threat or resistance of the subject under the totality of the circumstances.”
Allen didn’t respond to a request to share records on people identifying as members of the press throwing objects.
Davis and Evans said they didn’t see any evidence of people marked “press” throwing things. “I saw no press throwing bottles,” Evans, a reporter for investigative news site Bellingcat and host of a podcast for iHeartMedia, told the Tracker.
The Department of Homeland Security has compiled intelligence reports about the reporting and tweets of two journalists covering protests in Portland, Oregon, according to a Washington Post article published on July 30, 2020.
The protests began at the end of May in response to footage of a Minneapolis police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, for more than eight minutes during an arrest. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a local hospital. The incident sparked protests across the country against police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement.
The Post reported that over the last week of July, the department’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis disseminated three reports that included information on New York Times reporter Mike Baker and Editor-in-Chief of the blog Lawfare, Benjamin Wittes, alleging that the journalists had published leaked, unclassified documents about DHS operations in Portland.
The reports included summaries of tweets written by Baker and Wittes, screenshots of the posts and information about the amount of engagement the posts received on the social media platform.
Neither Baker nor Wittes responded to the Tracker’s emailed requests for comment.
Following the Post’s article about the reports, Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf ordered the office to cease all collection of information on journalists and announced an investigation into the reports. The acting undersecretary for intelligence and analysis, Brian Murphy, has also since been reassigned, the Post reported.
A department spokesperson told the Post, “In no way does the Acting Secretary condone this practice and he has immediately ordered an inquiry into the matter. The Acting Secretary is committed to ensuring that all DHS personnel uphold the principles of professionalism, impartiality and respect for civil rights and civil liberties, particularly as it relates to the exercise of First Amendment rights.”
The production of these reports is consistent with the department’s aggressive tactics in Portland, sources told The Post, but such investigations are not intended to detail information about American citizens who have no connection to terrorist activity. Steve Bunnell, a former general counsel for the department, described the reports as “bizarre.”
Wittes posted a series of tweets detailing that it was not the sharing of his tweets and the department’s concern about leaks that troubled him.
“What is troubling about this story is that I&A shared my tweets *as intelligence reporting,* that is, an intelligence arm of the government filed a report on a citizen for activity at the heart of journalism: revealing newsworthy information about government to the public,” he wrote.
“I am not sure how my reporting of unclassified material constitutes any kind of homeland security threat that justifies the dissemination of intelligence reporting on a US person, particularly not one exercising core First Amendment rights and nothing more. I intend to find out.”
The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.
Tear gas engulfs demonstrators in Portland, Oregon, on July 28, 2020. That same week, the activities of two journalists covering the protests and the federal response to them were the subject of reports by the Department of Homeland Security.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2021-01-04 17:46:12.566882+00:00,2022-03-10 21:55:09.935755+00:00,Federal agents in Portland spray independent journalist with a chemical irritant,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/federal-agents-portland-spray-independent-journalist-chemical-irritant/,2022-03-10 21:55:09.871006+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Brian Conley (Independent),,2020-07-30,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent journalist Brian Conley was sprayed in the face with a chemical irritant by federal agents during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on the morning of July 30, 2020.
Conley was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Conley is a plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit, which was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon.
On the night of July 29, protesters gathered downtown at the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse, which had emerged as a nightly flashpoint between protesters and federal agents. The protest continued past midnight and into the next day.
Early on the morning of July 30, Conley was filming a confrontation between federal agents and protesters behind the courthouse on Southwest Second Avenue when officers began using crowd-control munitions and chemical irritants.
In a video of the incident Conley posted on Twitter, the scene appeared relatively calm despite a standoff with federal agents, as one protester can be heard playing ditties on a trumpet. After a loud bang, agents can be seen firing crowd-control munitions, with one officer spraying an irritant directly at Conley despite his shouts of “press!”
Here's another angle on #FPS and #DHS using #lesslethal weapons on #pdxprotest and myself, despite clear PRESS markings. #blacklivesmatter
— Brian Conley (@BaghdadBrian) July 30, 2020
if you appreciate my work, help me with the cost of gear: venmo baghdadbrian, cashapp $baghdadbrian pic.twitter.com/85het21LWH
Conley said he believed he was targeted. “He knew I was press, he knew the person next to me was press, there were no protesters nearby. So yeah, he had no reason to do that,” he told the Tracker.
About 20 seconds after he was sprayed, Conley’s video shows multiple agents spraying a protester who is on their knees in the street with their hands up.
Another video, uploaded by journalist Cory Elia at 12:33 a.m., also captured Conley getting sprayed. He is visible on the other side of the street, holding a camera with a bright light mounted on it.
They decided to clear the street and made an arrest. I found myself surrounded for a minute. pic.twitter.com/s1aIcxj8IW
— Cory Elia (@TheRealCoryElia) July 30, 2020
Conley, in a statement for the ACLU suit, said there were “maybe four or five protesters a few feet behind me” when he was hit.
“At point blank range, the federal agent nearest to me unleashed a deluge of pepper spray directly at me, dousing me in pepper spray,” he said in the statement. “The pepper spray covered my face, hands, clothing, camera, and gear.”
Conley’s body armor and helmet were both marked “press” at the time he was hit. He was also wearing a gas mask, which delayed the effects of the irritant. But once he started feeling the irritant, he was “severely uncomfortable, like burning on fire, for easily 12 hours after that, probably longer,” he told the Tracker.
“I’ve been pepper sprayed before and I’ve never had such a bad experience,” he added.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Roman Mendoza, a reporter for the Davis Vanguard, a California nonprofit news organization, was struck with shrapnel from a flash-bang grenade and pushed by a police officer while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on July 30, 2020.
The protest was held in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
On the night of July 30, protesters gathered downtown at the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse, which had emerged as a nightly flashpoint between protesters and federal agents. The protest continued past midnight and into the next day.
Mendoza told the Tracker he was standing near the line of fences that federal officers had erected around the courthouse when officers began to disperse the crowd.
“The officers threw a flash-bang near me and it kind of nicked my leg,” Mendoza said. “That one I probably should have gotten stitches for.”
Mendoza received some basic first aid from a volunteer medic at the protest, who cleaned out the wound and wrapped it in gauze. He said the shrapnel cut a relatively deep, 2-to-2.5 inch gash in his leg.
“It took two or three weeks for my leg to fully heal and get back to where it was before,” Mendoza said.
Mendoza said he continued reporting that night after receiving medical attention. As he walked, he came upon a group of Portland Police Bureau officers who were sitting in a vacant parking lot alongside several police vehicles and riot vans on the edge of the protest.
“As I approached them, once I got to a certain point they told me that was far enough and to not continue moving forward,” Mendoza said. “They had just issued the TRO, so I told them, ‘I’m not here to do anything. I’m press so I’m not going to disperse right now.’”
One officer quickly approached him and told him that he didn’t have to disperse, Mendoza said, but that he did have to comply with officers’ orders to move back the two paces he had taken into the parking lot and return to the sidewalk.
“The officer then pushed me so I was back on the sidewalk,” Mendoza said. “That was unnecessary, but yeah. I just stayed there to document what these police officers were doing, and they just started heckling me.”
Mendoza said they said things along the lines of, “You’re a loser,” “Why don’t you get a real job?” and “You must not have a life if you’re out here.” Mendoza said the officers also told him that he “wasn’t a real man” alongside other sexist comments. After about 20 minutes, the officers left the parking lot to what Mendoza believes was the protest area.
In February 2021, Mendoza told the Tracker that he had filed a complaint with PPB about the officers’ behavior and had received notice the bureau was investigating it, but no other updates.
The PPB declined to comment when emailed about this incident. The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Independent photojournalist Maranie Staab was hit in the knee with a rubber bullet fired by a federal officer while she was reporting on a protest in Portland, Oregon, early in the morning of July 30, 2020.
Racial justice protests in Portland had been held on a nightly basis since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
Thousands of people rallied around the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse and the nearby Multnomah County Justice Center earlier in the evening of July 29, according to the Oregonian. Confrontations between federal law enforcement officers and protesters continued late into the night, and federal officers declared an unlawful assembly at around 11:30 p.m.
Staab, whose work has been published by outlets including The Washington Post, The New York Times and VICE, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker the protests continued past midnight. Toward the end of the night, she said federal officers were going into a garage at the back of the justice building when some protesters followed them. Staab said she was near the garage door, standing to the side of it.
As the garage door was going down, Staab said, officers started shooting rubber bullets out at the protesters and press who remained.
One rubber bullet struck her on the inside of her right knee, she said, causing her to collapse.
“I was just basically taken out,” she said. “My knee completely gave out and I just hit the ground.”
Staab said several journalists who were near her pulled her away from the area and helped her up. Within 30 minutes, her knee had swollen so much that the welt was visible through her jeans, she said.
A photograph Staab posted on Twitter later that day showed her knee very swollen and bruised.
My knee is fcked.
— Maranie R. Staab (@MaranieRae) July 30, 2020
How did this happen?
I was shot by Federal officers while working as a journalist in #Portland, Oregon. @ACLU @pressfreedom #PortlandProtest #PortlandProtests pic.twitter.com/ozkN85jAyI
Staab told the Tracker that she cared for the injury by elevating it, icing it and taking ibuprofen.
The next day, photojournalist Mathieu Lewis-Rolland posted on Twitter a photograph of Staab’s swollen knee, with white tape marked “PRESS” above and below it.
@MaranieRae was out last night and was hit while operating her camera. Her knee... 💔 @AthulKAcharya @ACLU_OR pic.twitter.com/b30vQPolTO
— Mathieu Lewis-Rolland (@MathieuLRolland) July 31, 2020
Staab said she continued to cover protests in the following days, wearing shorts because her knee was so swollen. The injury hobbled her for weeks, she said.
On the night she was hit, Staab said, she had used white masking tape with the word “PRESS” written in black marker to label herself on the front and back of her t-shirt and on her helmet. She said she was also carrying professional cameras.
Staab said that she does not have any way to know whether she was targeted. She noted that she was not standing near demonstrators, and said that federal officers did not “attempt to delineate between protesters and press.”
The Department of Homeland Security, whose officers were on duty that night, did not respond to a request for comment about the incident.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
On July 30, 2020, photojournalist Maranie Staab was hit with a rubber bullet fired by law enforcement in Portland, Oregon. The next day, another photojournalist documented her taped-up knee while she was reporting again.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,unknown,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest, shot / shot at",,, 2021-03-19 14:47:09.903666+00:00,2022-03-10 20:27:04.785673+00:00,Journalist hit in face with pepper ball fired by federal officers at Portland protest,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalists-hit-with-with-crowd-control-rounds-during-protest-in-portland/,2022-03-10 20:27:04.729541+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Teebs Auberdine (Freelance),,2020-07-29,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent journalist Teebs Auberdine said she was hit with crowd-control munitions by federal officers while covering protests in downtown Portland on July 29, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, which had been held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
According to news reports, demonstrators initially gathered for a vigil outside Portland City Hall. A KGW article said they moved toward Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse, where they met federal officers firing crowd-control munitions, including tear gas and flash bang grenades.
Auberdine told the Tracker she was live streaming at the intersection of Southwest Third Avenue and Southwest Salmon Street and clearly wore a vest labelled with press markings. "[Officers] would follow me with these lights as I moved," she said. "By the end of that night, it had gone from flashlights and strobes to also being shot with pepper balls while illuminated."
She said federal officers targeted members of the press "extensively" and that she was hit in the face by a pepper ball as well.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, hasn’t responded to a request for comment.
Village Portland managing editor and multimedia journalist Cory Elia said he was hit with crowd-control munitions by federal officers while covering protests in downtown Portland on July 29, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, which had been held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
According to news reports, demonstrators initially gathered for a vigil outside Portland City Hall. A KGW article said they moved toward Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse, where they met federal officers firing crowd-control munitions, including tear gas and flash bang grenades.
That night, Elia tweeted photographs of his jacket marked with CS powder and a paint-like substance, writing: “For those wondering those were marking rounds that hit me in the crotch and collarbone during my livestream. These guys actually aimed for the open spaces on my armor.”
For those wondering those were marking rounds that hit me in the crotch and collarbone during my livestream. These guys actually aimed for the open spaces on my armor. That's some impressive aim. pic.twitter.com/wakhCNlgIw
— Cory Elia (@TheRealCoryElia) July 30, 2020
In a different tweet at 1:17 a.m. on July 30, he specified that his “only significant injury” from the night before was to his right collarbone, which appears to be bruised. “The ‘rubber bullet’ still hit with enough force to bruise through my leather where it struck,” he wrote. “I was also shot in the press badge which was lower on my chest.”
His press badge casing appears to have scratches and a part chipped off, but it is unclear if those marks were directly caused by the munitions. Elia has declined to comment and his lawyer didn’t respond to requests for comment.
“After assessing everything it appears I was hit four times total,” he wrote in another tweet accompanied by a photograph of an impact round.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, hasn’t responded to a request for comment.
Independent journalist Brian Conley said he was hit with crowd-control munitions fired by federal agents while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of July 28, 2020.
Conley was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Conley is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit, which was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon.
On the evening of July 27, protesters gathered at the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, a nightly flashpoint for confrontations between protesters and federal agents, and demonstrated into the early hours of the morning of the next day.
Just before 1 a.m. on July 28, Conley was filming federal agents at the intersection of Southwest Third Avenue and Southwest Salmon Street as they attempted to clear protesters from the area around the courthouse.
In a video he later posted on Twitter, Conley can be heard yelling that he is press before an officer fires a tear gas canister in his direction. Another officer soon rolls a smoking canister toward Conley before puffs of pepper ball impacts can be seen in the street directly in front of him.
It was just before 1am, not even an hour into my 40s, the #FPS and possibly others decided to fire concussion grenades, tear gas, possibly stingers, and definitely rubber bullets and many pepperballs directly at me. AFTER I identifed as Press. #portlandprotest #PDXprotest protest pic.twitter.com/oVqejB9TJ8
— Brian Conley (@BaghdadBrian) July 28, 2020
“Do it again — I’m press!” Conley shouts after the pepperballs are fired at him and a flash-bang grenade appears to fly toward him.
A number of projectiles hit him, Conley told the Tracker. When he was shot, he was standing in the street but in front of and away from protesters. Conley said he believes the federal agents could tell he was press, given his shouts, his camera gear, and the fact that his body armor and helmet identified him as press.
“I don’t think you can say that’s not egregious or targeted,” he said, adding that he was doing his best to stay away from protesters. “Either they didn’t care or it was intentional.”
One of the projectiles hit Conley in the foot, he said, causing what he described as a “pretty serious contusion” and the worst injury he has sustained while covering protests. He believes his foot was hit by a baton round, a crowd-control munition frequently used by law enforcement agencies across the country. Other projectiles hit him in the chest as well, but he said his body armor prevented injury.
In a declaration for the ACLU suit, Conley said that while he wanted to continue covering protests, he could “barely walk” after the incident. He was increasingly concerned about the risks of reporting when federal agents were present, he said.
Soon after, as federal agents retreated back towards the courthouse, one of them threw a flash-bang grenade at Conley, he said in the declaration. “There was nobody behind me or anybody else they could have been aiming at,” he said.
Neither the Department of Homeland Security nor the U.S. Marshals Service, which both have had federal agents in Portland, responded to requests for comment.
Roman Mendoza, a reporter for the California-based nonprofit news organization the Davis Vanguard, was shot in the thigh and ankle with crowd control munitions while covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, on July 28, 2020.
The protest was held in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
On the night of July 28, protesters gathered downtown at the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse, which had emerged as a nightly flashpoint between protesters and federal agents. The protest continued past midnight and into the next day.
Mendoza told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he had been recording protests that night in front of the courthouse and in the park across the street. As he exited the park, Mendoza said officers were spraying people with crowd control munitions, and he was struck in the ankle and thigh. Mendoza said he believes a rubber bullet struck his thigh, but he couldn’t identify what had struck his ankle.
“I didn’t feel it very much in the moment because of the adrenaline,” Mendoza said. “I didn’t even recognize what had happened.”
In Mendoza’s footage of the incident, he appears to be walking through a cloud of tear gas near the edge of the park as more than a dozen protesters walk and run through the frame. The camera appears to suddenly shake and Mendoza can be heard exclaiming in pain. Immediately after, Mendoza continues filming as he walks towards a line of unidentified law enforcement officers.
Mendoza said both the helmet and backpack he was wearing that night were labeled “PRESS.”
The PPB declined to comment when emailed about this incident. The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, also didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Independent journalist Jasper Florence said they were hit with crowd-control munitions fired by federal agents while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of July 28, 2020.
Florence was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Conley is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit, which was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon.
On the evening of July 27, protesters gathered at the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, a nightly flashpoint for confrontations between protesters and federal agents, and demonstrated into the early hours of the morning of the next day.
Florence was struck in the early morning of July 28 while covering the demonstration in front of the federal courthouse. With protesters gathered at least 40 feet behind them, Florence was hit with a less-lethal munition while standing on the sidewalk in front of federal agents, they told the Tracker. Florence was hit near the hip, below their protective paintball vest, by what they believe was a baton round.
At 1:17 a.m., Florence tweeted, “I have just been shot.” About 10 minutes later, they tweeeted, “Feds got me in the side pretty bad dunno how bad but it fucking hurts yalls.”
I have just been shot
— Jasper Florence (They/Them) (@JFlorencePDX) July 28, 2020
Florence had trouble getting around “for days” after getting hit and that the pain made them stop covering protests that night, they said, but didn’t have the injury examined by a medical professional due to financial circumstances.
Florence was wearing a three-by-eight-inch “press” badge on their paintball vest as well as a helmet marked “press” in bright white letters, they said, adding that a press ID card was also visible.
“It was absolutely targeted both personally and as press,” Florence said. “I was very clearly marked with large lettering, so I feel like it’s kind of hard to miss.”
Florence was also struck with pepper balls, which caused irritation, but the vest provided some protection from the impact.
Neither the Department of Homeland Security nor the U.S. Marshals Service, which both have had federal agents in Portland, responded to requests for comment.
Independent multimedia journalist Grace Morgan was hit with pepper spray, thrown to the ground and detained for hours by federal agents while covering protests on July 27, 2020.
Morgan was documenting the nightly protests in downtown Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis on May 25.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In the early morning hours of July 27, Morgan was covering a protest in front of the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse. Demonstrators had gathered outside of the fence surrounding the building. In a video Morgan tweeted at 1:14 a.m., federal agents can be seen walking outside of the fenced area, after firing tear gas, pepper balls and flash bang grenades at protesters from inside.
“I was filming a pretty violent arrest of a protester, Noelle Mandolfo,” Morgan told the Tracker. “There were at least 20 other members of the press all surrounding her.”
Morgan said she and other journalists followed closely as Mandolfo and another protester were walked back to the courthouse.
“I remember thinking I was physically pretty close to the agents, but that wasn’t unusual for how the protests have been going,” Morgan explained.
As they walked, federal agents began firing more tear gas into the crowd and one canister landed next to Morgan’s feet, which she said she immediately kicked to her right.
“The next thing I know, I was being tackled to the ground, initially by one agent and then another,” she said. Elijah Schaffer, a reporter at Blaze Media, was walking behind Morgan at the time and recorded the incident, posted at 1:28 a.m. A federal agent can be seen spraying mace into Morgan’s eyes right before another slams her to the ground.
She said she told them that she was a member of the press. She also had two laminated press passes displayed as well as labels on her helmet and backpack. The agents gave no response as to why she was being detained, and walked her along with several protesters to a concealed parking lot at the back of the federal courthouse. When they arrived, agents cut Morgan’s backpack off of her, ruining the straps, and took her gas mask.
“We never got read our rights. The only way I found out why I was being detained was because they put masking tape on our backs and had written on it,” Morgan told the Tracker. “After we were put in our holding cells, we read each other’s backs to each other and that’s how I found out I was being detained for assault on an officer.”
Several times throughout the morning, Morgan said federal agents would tell them all to face the wall and an agent would forcefully push their heads into the wall.
“It wasn’t a full on slam, but it was enough that it was painful and super unnecessary,” she said. That happened at least three times.”
Morgan also asked for medical attention to address the mace in her eyes, which burned, but received no response. Eventually, she tried to wash off the residue with the toilet water in the cell, the only water available, which made her eyes burn even worse.
When she was released around 5 a.m., Morgan said she received her gas mask back, but the straps were cut off, even though agents had already removed the mask from her face.
She told the Tracker that on her release, she was told, “the evidence in your case has been reviewed, and the attorney general has decided to drop all charges.”
A preliminary injunction a judge put in place in July that bars federal agents from harming or impeding journalists was upheld by an appeals court in October. Morgan isn’t sure which federal agency detained her, but the Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
In a tweet sent at 10:45 a.m., Morgan wrote, “I went to urgent care this morning after release – just a light concussion, fractured knee cap and mild chemical burns on my arms from the mace. Which means! I can probably go back out again tonight if I rest up today!”’
Emily Molli, a reporter for SCNR, an independent video-based outlet previously known as Subverse News, said she was hit in the right arm with crowd-control munitions fired by federal officers while she was covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, during the early hours of July 27, 2020.
Molli was among dozens of reporters covering one of the many demonstrations that have broken out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
On the night of July 26, demonstrators gathered in the area around the Multnomah County Justice Center and the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, where clashes with the Portland police and federal officers escalated into the next morning, according to local news outlet KGW8. Federal officers declared an “unlawful assembly” at 12:16 a.m., according to a statement from the Department of Homeland Security.
Molli was hit with a marker round in the right arm, which she said caused bleeding and left a scar. “It hit my forearm muscle so hard that...I couldn’t grip with my right hand,” she told the Tracker. “It caused pretty nasty lacerations that took several weeks to finally heal.”
She had a press ID visibly displayed, she said, as well as press markings on her helmet.
DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement about the night’s enforcement actions that officers used crowd control tactics to respond to “attacks” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by demonstrators. The agency didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
Justin Yau, a freelance journalist whose work has appeared in the Daily Mail and The New York Times, said he was hit in the right leg with a marker round fired by federal officers while he was covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, during the early hours of July 27, 2020.
Yau was covering one of the many demonstrations that have broken out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
On the night of July 26, demonstrators gathered in the area around the Multnomah County Justice Center and the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, where clashes with the Portland police and federal officers escalated into the next morning, according to local news outlet KGW8. Federal officers declared an “unlawful assembly” at 12:16 a.m., according to a statement from the Department of Homeland Security.
Sometime after midnight, Yau was documenting the protests around the northwestern corner of Lownsdale Square, which is near the courthouse, when federal officers fired impact munitions through the smoke, he told the Tracker. A FN303 marker round bruised him in the right leg, he said, adding that it “bent some of my keys in my pocket at the time.”
Officers also fired a tear gas canister at a light fixture near him, said Yau, adding that it “shattered glass on top of us.” In a video posted to Youtube, the canister can be seen hitting at about 50 seconds in, causing Yau to duck. He was wearing a bright yellow vest with “press” labeled across the front and a black helmet with similar markings, he said.
DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement about the night’s enforcement actions that officers used crowd control tactics to respond to “attacks” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by demonstrators. The agency didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
Freelance journalist Laura Jedeed said she was hit by pepper balls fired by federal law enforcement while they were covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 26, 2020.
Jedeed was one of many covering protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
One of the main demonstrations taking place the night of July 25 — and stretching into the next morning — was held outside the Mark O. Hetfield federal courthouse, where federal law enforcement officers were stationed.
Jedeed, who contributes to Willamette Weekly and Portland Monthly, was also covering protesters outside the federal courthouse. Wearing a neon yellow vest with the words “press” on it, she was filming protesters at the front line, who tried to form a “shield wall” with umbrellas to block federal law enforcement officers from firing on the rest of the crowd.
A little after 1:10 a.m., Jedeed was hit by crowd control munitions in the leg and the wrist, she said. Jedeed had been holding her phone in that hand, and she later tweeted a photo of the swollen wrist.
It isn't broken but it isn't pretty pic.twitter.com/r8Tn7neRmU
— Laura Jedeed, Space Professional (@LauraJedeed) July 26, 2020
“I believe they targeted me,” Jedeed told the Tracker. “They hit me in the face with pepper balls. The pepper got through [my] goggles, and I was effectively blind. I stumbled back into the park [near the courthouse], and somebody had to help me. I was completely incapacitated.”
Jedeed then yelled for a medic, who flushed her eyes out with milk to mitigate the effects of the pepper balls.
“I looked at my wrist and realized something was very wrong [because it swelled up],” she said. “I tried to power through for another half hour, but the adrenaline wore off and I had to leave.”
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Lesley McLam, co-host of a KBOO podcast and contributor to Village Portland, said she was struck by a crowd-control munition fired by federal officers and covered in a “toxic white powder” while covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, on July 26, 2020.
McLam was documenting one of the many protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
One of the main demonstrations taking place the night of July 25 — and stretching into the next morning — was held outside the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse, where federal law enforcement officers were stationed. Several other journalists were targeted with crowd control munitions after midnight as well.
McLam said she was traversing the area between the courthouse and the parks across the street when she realized the protesters around her were crouched behind shields. “That crowd behind the shields is all hunched down, and that’s when I hear that `pop pop pop pop pop,’ and I felt it on both of my arms,” she told Tracker. “I just hunched down — I hadn’t even made it to the other side yet — hunched down and was like, `Wow, I just got fired at.’”
When she left the area, McLam noticed the white powder, which she believes was from an exploded pepper ball. In addition to getting hit in the bicep, a pepper ball that grazed her right arm left a small slice in her backpack strap, as well. Her phone was also hit by a pepper ball, she said
Later that morning, McLam tweeted: “While covering the protests at the federal courthouse, a toxic white powder got all over me and my equipment.” The accompanying pictures show powder on her backpack, which is labelled “media,” on her camera, on the leg of her pants, and around press passes issued by KBOO and Village Portland.
In a follow-up tweet, she posted two photos of her left bicep, where she was hit by what she believes was a pepper ball. “This is one of the places I was hit by a round shot by #FederalPolice. It broke the skin, through cloth, and a bruise is forming,” McLam wrote.
The injury caused bruising all the way down to the elbow and on the back side of her arm, McLam told the Tracker.
Neither her camera nor her phone were permanently damaged by the powder.
McLam couldn’t say with certainty whether she was targeted for being press, or whether she was hit because she was standing up while others were crouching. In addition to the identification on her backpack andher press passes, she was wearing a black baseball cap with “press” in white letters.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Journalist Tuan St. Patrick’s camera lens was broken after he was repeatedly shoved to the ground by Portland, Oregon police in the early morning hours of July 26, 2020, just hours after he and other journalists covering demonstrations say they were hit with crowd-control munitions.
St. Patrick is a national correspondent for Berlin, Germany-based video news service Ruptly, whose sole shareholder is funded by the Russian government. St. Patrick was covering one of the many protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Protests have been held nightly in Portland since late May and grew more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement in the city increased. Since July, police and federal agents in the Rose City have been under court orders not to harm or impede journalists.
St. Patrick was covering demonstrations that began the night of July 25 around the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse and continued on into the next morning.
St. Patrick and three other journalists told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that they were struck with crowd-control munitions just after midnight on July 26. Their account of that incident is here.
St. Patrick told the Tracker he was sprayed with a chemical irritant in that incident but continued covering the police response to the demonstrations.
He said that at about 5 a.m. on July 26, he was livestreaming while he was among protesters at the intersection of SW 4th Ave and SW Yamhill Street. Police announced an unlawful assembly for the area and dispatched officers to clear the intersection with crowd control munitions and physical force, he said.
“They start running towards us,” St. Patrick told the Tracker. “I turn around and I’m like ‘this is not so safe.’”
St. Patrick told the Tracker that he was pushed to the ground twice and shoved into a tree as officers rushed through the area. He got to his feet and found pepper-ball powder on his vest and his clothing. He was carrying a Sony A7 Mark III digital photo camera and, upon closer inspection of his gear, found that his lens had been broken.
“It was just a messy scene,” St. Patrick said.
Since July, law enforcement officers from the Portland Police Bureau and federal agencies have been barred by court rulings from arresting, harming or impeding journalists or legal observers of the protests. The orders were issued as part of a lawsuit that the American Civil LIberties Union filed on behalf of journalists who allege that law enforcement officials targeted them with arrests and physical violence.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent photojournalist Trip Jennings was struck in his eye with a pepper ball that pierced one of the plastic lenses on his gas mask on July 26, 2020 in Portland, Oregon, while he covered civil unrest in the city.
Jennings was covering one of the many protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Protests have been held nightly in Portland since late May, which grew more intense in July as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in the city. Since July, both police and federal agents in the city have been under court orders not to harm journalists or otherwise impede their work.
In a Twitter thread, Jennings said he was taking photos of the police response to demonstrations at the intersection of SW 4th Avenue and SW Salmon Street near the Multnomah County Justice Center, standing among demonstrators, when authorities gave an order to disperse.
As the crowd began to disperse, federal agents fired crowd-control munitions that included pepper balls, rubber bullets and tear gas, he wrote.
Jennings wrote that he was ducking for cover behind a tree when what he believes to be a pepper ball hit him in the face, broke through one of the plastic lenses on his gas mask and cut his eye and cheek.
The journalist found medics near the scene. “‘Oh my God, that’s bad!’” one of the street medics tending to his injuries remarked, according to Jennings.
Jennings told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that three medics escorted him to a vehicle to drive him to the emergency room at Legacy Good Samaritan Medical Center in northwest Portland. As the group drove away from the scene, federal agents fired impact munitions at the vehicle, he said.
“On the way to the hospital, we drove through clouds of teargas so windows stayed shut and the pepper spray on my clothing and bag choked us all,” Jennings tweeted.
The pepper spray still clung to Jennings after he arrived at Good Samaritan, causing the doctor who treated his injury to cough repeatedly behind a surgical mask, according to Jennings. The doctor put on a respirator mask prior to sewing eight stitches into Jennings’ eyelid and face, he told the Tracker.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
Independent journalist Teebs Auberdine said she was hit with impact munitions fired by federal officers while covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, on July 26, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
On the night of July 26, demonstrators gathered in the area around at the Multnomah County Justice Center and the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, where clashes with the Portland police and federal officers escalated later in the night, according to local news outlet KGW8.
Auberdine was livestreaming near the Justice Center, wearing a vest clearly labeled with press markings, when she was hit.
“Had to end stream early tonight after getting hit in the head with a pepperball. Still clearly marked Press,” she tweeted. “I'm well geared for this and was not injured, but it was fairly spicy and got all in under my helmet and around my neck.”
Had to end stream early tonight after getting hit in the head with a pepperball. Still clearly marked Press.
— Teebs (@TeebsGaming) July 27, 2020
I'm well geared for this and was not injured, but it was fairly spicy and got all in under my helmet and around my neck.
I'll be back tomorrow~
She didn’t sustain any acute injuries aside from the powder and gas exposure, she told the Tracker.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement about the night’s enforcement actions that officers used crowd control tactics to respond to “attacks” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by demonstrators. The agency didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incident.
Dave Killen, a staff photographer for The Oregonian, said he was struck with a rubber bullet fired by federal law enforcement officers while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 26, 2020.
Killen was one of the many covering protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
One of the main demonstrations taking place the night of July 25 — and stretching into the next morning — was held outside the Mark O. Hetfield federal courthouse, where federal law enforcement officers were stationed.
A little after 1 a.m. Portland police declared a riot after a section of the fence surrounding the federal courthouse was torn down.
Killen documented what he described to the Tracker as a “huge” response to the fence removal by federal agents, who began deploying “tons and tons” of tear gas. After retreating a block west for a few minutes, Killen returned to the area around the courthouse, where there appeared to be a “slight lull” since protesters had largely scattered.
When a fresh standoff soon appeared to be brewing, Killen started taking photos of federal agents as they moved down the street. That’s when he was struck on the side of the stomach by what he believes was a rubber bullet.
“I suddenly got hit by something big,” he said. “It just sort of dropped me. I realized right away what it must have been because I’m very familiar with all the munitions and I’ve been hit by pepper balls dozens and dozens of times over the years, so I knew it wasn’t a pepper ball.”
After the fence came (sort of) down, things got pretty wild. Lots of gas & munitions fired in the FC area. Eventually ppl fell back, officers in camo pushing west on Main. At 4th & main I got a rubber bullet to the love handle, which is probably best case scenario, but hurt a lot pic.twitter.com/MO48DowRR8
— Dave Killen (@killendave) July 26, 2020
Killen believes he was targeted, since he was well in front of most protesters, and the agents were just just 20 or 30 feet away when he was hit. While some protesters may have been in the area, he said he didn’t have to worry about bumping into anybody as he walked around taking photos without looking where he was going.
“I feel like at that distance, with that weapon, I don’t think there’s any way he wasn’t aiming for me,” Killen said.
His gear also made it obvious that he was press, said Killen, noting that he had press credentials around his neck and was shooting photos with one camera and while another camera was hanging at his side.
Killen said he was knocked off his feet by the impact, but was able to continue working. After he informed his newsroom of the incident, he was pulled back for the night.
This is it from me tonight. These pix are a mix from earlier. Can’t help but think that if it weren’t for this damn pandemic and the extra 10 pounds I’ve put on that rubber bullet would’ve missed me entirely 😬 pic.twitter.com/gNAO7wn7ey
— Dave Killen (@killendave) July 26, 2020
Killen said the munition left a huge bruise in the immediate aftermath, and that he still had a scar more than four months later.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Tuan St. Patrick, a national correspondent for Ruptly, said he was sprayed with a chemical irritant by federal agents while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 26, 2020.
St. Patrick was one of many covering the protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
One of the main demonstrations taking place the night of July 25 — and stretching into the next morning — was held outside the Mark O. Hetfield federal courthouse, where federal law enforcement officers were stationed.
St. Patrick was livestreaming near the courthouse as federal agents tried to disperse people after an unlawful assembly was declared just before 11:30 p.m. Sometime between midnight and 1 a.m., a federal agent pepper sprayed him in his eyes while he was crossing a street, St. Patrick told the Tracker.
At the time, St. Patrick had NYPD-issued press credentials around his neck and was wearing a bulletproof vest, mask and goggles. He also had his recording equipment strapped on, as seen in a photo he posted on Instagram.
Before he was sprayed with the irritant, St. Patrick saw officers targeting and pointing people out, he said. “I definitely felt targeted, there was no question that I was press when the officer came up to me point blank and sprayed me in the eyes,” he told the Tracker.
Despite wearing goggles, St. Patrick said he was completely blinded. A nearby ACLU legal observer helped get him clean. Soon after, he rejoined the group of media. “If we stop [reporting], that does more damage,” said St. Patrick
A little after 1 a.m. Portland police declared a riot after a section of the fence surrounding the federal courthouse was torn down.
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent journalist Garrison Davis said he was maced and shot with rubber bullets fired by federal agents, then later shoved by Portland police officers while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 26, 2020.
Davis was one of the many covering protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
One of the main demonstrations taking place the night of July 25 — and stretching into the next morning — was held outside the Mark O. Hetfield federal courthouse, where federal law enforcement officers were stationed.
Around 2 a.m., Davis was documenting a line of officers advancing down the street from the courthouse when he was hit with a chemical irritant, which he identified as mace, by a federal agent. Video published by Davis on Twitter shows officers walking down a street near the federal courthouse. Then one officer raises his hand and fires the irritant spray directly at Davis.
A federal officer sprays mace directly at me other press. #blacklivesmatter #Protests #pdx #portland #oregon #blm #acab #PortlandProtest #PDXprotest #PortlandStrong #WallOfVets #wallofmoms #MomsAreHere pic.twitter.com/GM3Y0UOwpV
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) July 26, 2020
A few minutes later, Davis was shot by a rubber bullet that he believes was fired by a federal agent. “I got shot with a rubber bullet, I’m standing in a crowd of just other press people,” he tweeted.
About a half an hour later, Davis was pushed to the ground by a PPB officer. Posting blurry footage of the incident on Twitter, he wrote, “Footage doesn’t look great cause my camera is still covered in mace at this point.”
“I’m on the sidewalk here. I’m not even on the street. And they still walk up and totally knock me over for no reason,” Davis told the Tracker. “Then when I try to get up, they continued to shove me.”
The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Journalist Jasper Florence was struck with pepper balls fired by law enforcement officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on the night of July 25, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
The Department of Homeland Security hasn’t responded to requests for comment on any incidents involving its officers. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which operates under DHS, referred the Tracker to the DHS for comment.
Florence was hit with pepper balls while they were documenting confrontations at the courthouse. In photos shared on Twitter, residue from pepper balls could be seen on an equipment bag on Florence’s hip and staining their pants. Their press identification is also visible.
Theese are from last night as I was heading out, you can clearly see I was shot in the chest hip and waist area, I had taken my press badge off my vest at that point but this occured pretty early into th night
— Jasper Florence (They/Them) (@JFlorencePDX) July 26, 2020
They (feds/ppb)seriously don't care
1/ pic.twitter.com/QLfQMNQWwd
Florence told the Tracker that law enforcement officers confronting protesters at the courthouse were firing “fairly indiscriminately” into protesters that night. Florence was wearing press markings, but said they didn’t feel targeted.
“They were trying to fire at the protesters, but they didn’t really think about how they were firing,” Florence said. “It was a caught-in-the-crossfire kind of thing.”
(explitive warning) This clip sucks but I had my camera on a canister that rolled and stopped near me when I looked up they were already firing pepper balls,
— Jasper Florence (They/Them) (@JFlorencePDX) July 26, 2020
Also sorry every time I get hit my immediate reaction is just swearing so bear with me here on that 2/ pic.twitter.com/i84ShdwFyU
Florence wasn’t sure how many times they got hit and described the injuries as minor, leaving bruises for several days. They were wearing a paintball vest, which helped protect their chest from pepper-ball impacts. Florence continued to work after being struck.
Videographer Johnny Lynch said federal agents struck and shoved him, knocking off his helmet while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 25, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
The Department of Homeland Security hasn’t responded to requests for comment on any incidents involving its officers. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which operates under the DHS, referred the Tracker to the DHS for comment.
Lynch, who was reporting near the intersection of Southwest Third Avenue and Southwest Salmon Street, at the park in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center for Black Zebra Productions, a community-based storytelling production crew, said officers were known to “beat people up” in the park, so he tried to stay close by to document what was happening. “They would always push [press] back if we were up there,” Lynch told the Tracker. “[This] night, they were extra mad. They pulled my gas mask and knocked my helmet onto the ground.”
In a video shared by Lynch and reviewed by the Tracker, officers can be seen aggressively walking toward him. One reaches out to grab what Lynch said was his gas mask and helmet strap. Another grabs the camera, which tilts downward where Lynch’s helmet can be seen rolling on the ground. Lynch said he had been wearing press identifications issued by The Sacramento Bee and Black Zebra Productions.
Officers then pushed him into the line of agents who were firing crowd-control rounds into the crowd, according to Lynch. “I was backing away and then they threw a concussion grenade directly at me that went off a few feet in front of my face,” he said. “Didn’t break anything luckily, but that was a really direct experience.”
Officers also threw a tear gas canister, which Lynch said hit him in the neck and left a chemical burn for a few days, but he said that the canister could have been directed toward the crowd in general.
When reached for comment in the fall of 2020, the PPB told the Tracker it wouldn’t comment on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesman Derek Carmon said the department was committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review.
Independent journalist Seth Dunlap was shot with pepper ball rounds by a federal agent while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, early on the morning of July 25, 2020.
Dunlap, a contributor to the social media news outlet FrontLine Access, was covering one of the protests that had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering Black Lives Matter protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
Demonstrations that began on the night of July 24 outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, a frequent flashpoint of confrontations between protesters and law enforcement, stretched into the early morning. Federal agents declared an “unlawful assembly” around 12:50 a.m., according to a U.S. Department of Homeland Security statement, which estimated that the crowd size was still around 2,000.
Dunlap was filming outside of the courthouse at around 2 a.m. when he was hit, he told the Tracker. Video that Dunlap livestreamed on Facebook showed tear gas blanketing the street outside of the fence that had been erected around the federal building.
About 52 minutes into the video, two agents can be seen through metal fencing, and one appears to gesture at Dunlap. The other agent walks to the fence and positions a gun to point it through a gap in the barricade. “They’re aiming this directly at me I think,” Dunlap can be heard saying.
Continuing to film, Dunlap turns the camera toward himself, showing his neon yellow vest with the word “press” spelled in large black letters on the front.
Then the agent can be seen firing a number of rounds. “He’s shooting me. He’s shooting me,” Dunlap says in the video. “That was pepper balls on me. I want you guys to know that — that was marked press, identified press.”
Dunlap later posted a clip of the encounter on Twitter. “The agent then proceeds to step forward and unload multiple pepper ball rounds directly into my chest and a few others rounds to my left,” he wrote in another tweet.
The press have a legal, and constitutionally protected, right to document and cover these #Portland protests. That right was recently affirmed by U.S. District Judge Michael Simon specifically to these protests. Then, this happens: pic.twitter.com/brZtoeUy8v
— Seth Dunlap (@sethdunlap) July 25, 2020
He told the Tracker that he felt he was targeted for being a journalist. Not only was he marked as “press,” but there were no protesters around him when he was hit, he said.
Dunlap continued reporting after the incident, but he was shocked. “That was the first instance when I had ever had anything like that happen to me so I think I was a little incredulous,” he told the Tracker.
The DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
Independent photojournalist Maranie Staab was shoved to the ground by a federal officer while she was reporting on protests in Portland, Oregon on July 25, 2020.
Racial justice protests in Portland had been held nightly since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. The protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
Thousands of people rallied near the Mark O. Hatfield District Court and the Multnomah County Justice Center on July 25, and numerous confrontations erupted between protesters and federal law enforcement agents through the night, The Oregonian reported.
Staab told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker she was walking in a park across the street from the Justice Center when a federal officer saw her and, without warning or explanation, shoved her, causing her to fall to the ground.
In a video Staab posted on Twitter, filmed by a social media journalist with Full Revolution Media, a tall person in a blue helmet can be seen pushing another person to the ground. Staab identified herself in her tweet as the person being shoved. “I was thrown to the ground by a #DHS officer while working as a photojournalist in #Portland.”
On Sun. I was thrown to the ground by a #DHS officer while working as a photojournalist in #Portland. (shown twice for clarification)
— Maranie R. Staab (@MaranieRae) July 29, 2020
A grwn man, outfittd for war, was compelld to put his hands on me, unprovoked, & push me to the cement.
I’m fine. But that’s not the point. pic.twitter.com/Pa0ZZJh65I
Staab told the Tracker she does not know why the officer shoved her. “I can't offer anything that makes sense.”
She said that she thought it might have been an effort to get people away from the Justice Center.
Staab said she was carrying her professional camera gear and had used white masking tape with the word “PRESS” written in black marker to label herself on the front and back of her T-shirt, and on her helmet. She said she wasn’t near any protesters at the time she was shoved.
She said she couldn’t be certain whether she was targeted because she was a journalist. None of her equipment was damaged and she wasn’t injured, but she said that the incident raises other concerns.
“To me the biggest issue is just, we're a democracy and our press has consistently been obstructed,” Staab said.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent journalist Griffin Malone said law enforcement officers targeted him with crowd-control munitions while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 25, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
The Department of Homeland Security hasn’t responded to requests for comment on any incidents involving its officers. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which operates under the DHS, referred the Tracker to the DHS for comment.
At 3:05 a.m. on July 25, Malone was shot in the leg with a projectile by a Portland Police Bureau officer. He said he was standing at the intersection of Main Street and Third Avenue at the time of the incident.
Malone tweeted a video of the incident, which shows a water bottle landing at the feet of the officer in the upper right frame. The office then turns and shoots directly at Malone at the eight-second mark.
Here is a water bottle get thrown from IN FRONT OF HIM and then he turns to me and other press and shoots me, clearly labeled press. pic.twitter.com/NcYjlKwCli
— Griffin - Live Protest News (@GriffinMalone6) July 25, 2020
Malone said he was advised in conversations with the ACLU that the incident happened so quickly it would be difficult to prove that it was targeted. However, Malone felt that it was personal. “I had run-ins with that officer earlier in the day and they already acknowledged me and the other press standing in the corner,” he told Tracker.
Malone believes the projectile was a pepper ball. It hit him on part of his leg where he had additional padding, and though it left a tiny bruise he told Tracker it didn’t hurt him badly.
When reached for comment in the fall of 2020, the PPB told the Tracker it wouldn’t comment on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesman Derek Carmon said the department was committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review.
Independent journalist Brian Conley said law enforcement officers targeted him with crowd-control munitions while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 25, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
The Department of Homeland Security hasn’t responded to requests for comment on any incidents involving its officers. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which operates under the DHS, referred the Tracker to the DHS for comment.
At about 2:25 a.m., Conley was filming as federal agents attempted to clear protesters from the intersection of Southwest Third Avenue and Southwest Salmon Street, in front of the courthouse. In a video later posted on Twitter by Conley, federal agents can be seen using tear gas to disperse the crowd and the sounds of other crowd-control munitions being fired can be heard. Conley stood close to federal agents as he filmed.
#pdxprotest but it looks like the gates of hell. I guess sleep deprivation made me forget just how scary the advance of #DHS officers felt after 2am Saturday morning. This video has not been edited, only trimmed for Twitter's length constraints. #portlandprotest pic.twitter.com/EQ3JzbKw6Z
— Brian Conley (@BaghdadBrian) July 26, 2020
At one point, a tear gas canister can be seen flying through the air directly at Conley from the left-hand side of his shot.
“That’s like the second tear gas I’ve been hit with,” he says in the video. “They threw that shit right at me.”
As a tear gas canister smoked on the ground in front of Conley and two other journalists who were wearing gas masks, federal agents can be heard firing more crowd-control rounds.
Conley told the Tracker he believed federal agents deployed the tear gas in his direction, even though he was standing next to federal agents. In the video, it isn’t clear whether the canister was deployed by federal agents. Conley said he was wearing a photographer’s vest and a helmet, both of which had press markings on them.
In a statement that is part of an American Civil Liberties Union suit Conley joined, he said agents began using tear gas for “no discernible reason” and that they gave no warnings or orders to disperse.
When reached for comment in the fall of 2020, the PPB told the Tracker it wouldn’t comment on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesman Derek Carmon said the department was committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review.
Independent journalist Seth Dunlap was shoved to the ground by an agent he believes was with ICE or another federal agency while filming protests in Portland, Oregon, on the night of July 25, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to include federal agents later that month.
The Department of Homeland Security hasn’t responded to requests for comment on any incidents involving its officers. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which operates under DHS, referred the Tracker to the DHS for comment.
Dunlap, a contributor to media company Frontline Access, said he was filming officers tearing up medic and water stations from approximately 30 feet away when an officer dressed in black quickly approached him and yelled, “Get the hell out of here.”
Dunlap repeated the language from the preliminary injunction ordering federal officers to not assault or arrest journalists, but the officer shoved him back.
“I calmly cited Judge Michael Simon’s reaffirming ruling to multiple federal officers that night and my interactions were generally fine,” Dunlap wrote to the Tracker. “Then one homeland security guard refused to let me stay and shoved me to the ground forcefully and threatened me with arrest. Only my loud pleas perhaps stopped that from happening, I’m not sure."
In a video Dunlap posted to Twitter that is no longer available, he can be heard saying that, as a member of the working press, he didn’t have to obey orders to disperse. “I’m going to respectfully allow you to do your jobs and you’re going to respectfully allow me to do [mine].”
After Dunlap took a knee, he said the officer turned around and walked away without saying anything else. He sustained several bruises, but didn’t know whether they all came from this incident.
“I felt completely violated not only as press but as a human,” Dunlap said.
Freelance photojournalist Lee Smith said he was hit with crowd-control munitions shot by federal agents while he covered protests against police violence in Portland, Oregon, on July 24, 2020.
Smith was documenting protests that continued for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests.
On the evening of July 23, demonstrators gathered outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse where law enforcement had constructed a fence around the perimeter. According to news reports, federal officers occasionally warned protesters when they shook or hit the fence. The officers later fired pepper balls at the protesters. At 12:30 a.m. on July 24, Portland Police declared an unlawful assembly after firework mortars and other objects had been launched over the fence, according to a report from the Department of Homeland Security.
Smith told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker federal agents had conducted numerous pushes throughout the night to disperse the protesters, but mostly stayed behind the fence, deploying tear gas, pepper balls and other crowd-control munitions. Officers also positioned themselves on top of the courthouse with long-range flashlights that would emit green lasers, which Smith said law enforcement was using to point out particular individuals.
“They kept singling me and a couple of people out, targeting specific press and activists,” he said. Smith said he had distinct “press” markings on his helmet and backpack and wore a press pass issued by Raindrop Works, a Portland-based site that has covered the protests there. “Eventually that person was either arrested or shot with munitions,” he said, of those picked out by the green lasers.
In a video Smith tweeted later that morning, there is a loud bang at 0:48 and the camera jerks. He can be heard saying, “They just hit me again.” Smith said his press pass had been hit by a canister that exploded and shattered the case.
Feds exploded a CS triple chaser on my chest. Shattering the case my press pass was in. #FedsOut #PortlandProtest pic.twitter.com/hysSDYqobp
— Lee “Threat level -7” Smith (@LeeSmithPDX) July 24, 2020
Smith said he was shot at least 12 times that night by a variety of crowd-control munitions, including pepper balls and foam rounds. He said the hits left bruises across his body, especially on his chest. He said he also suffered effects from tear gas and pepper spray, and he told the Tracker that at some point his iPhone 6S camera was broken.
Smith’s injuries came just hours after a judge’s July 23 preliminary injunction barred federal agents from harming or impeding journalists. The ruling was upheld by an appeals court in October.
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter Rebecca Ellis was one of at least eight journalists struck by crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon on July 24, 2020, despite a fresh court order barring federal agents in the city from harming members of the press covering protests.
Portland had been experiencing daily protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The presence of federal law enforcement in Portland in July intensified the city's regular protests and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in downtown Portland became a nightly flashpoint. A temporary restraining order from July 2 that barred Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Despite the expansion of the temporary restraining order, the following day numerous journalists were hit with crowd control munitions in the vicinity of the federal courthouse as protesters again gathered there. Some said they believed they were targeted.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. In its “Portland Riots Read-out” DHS said one federal officer was injured during the protest, which began the night of July 23 and went through the morning of July 24.
“No injuries to protestors or rioters have been reported” the statement added. It didn’t mention any injuries to journalists, despite reports some reporters were hurt.
Ellis was struck with a projectile fired by federal agents as she filmed them advancing at the intersection of Southwest Main Street and Southwest Third Avenue next to the federal courthouse.
A video posted to Twitter by Ellis at 1:27 a.m. shows federal agents firing several projectiles that appear to be tear-gas canisters as they advance down Southwest Main. The video shakes and Ellis can be heard exclaiming “ow!” as one of the projectiles strikes her in the hand.
“Feds approaching and just got shot in hand trying to film. Don’t think that TRO worked,” she wrote on Twitter alongside the video, referencing the temporary restraining order.
She told the Tracker she was wearing a lanyard with press credentials and was standing alongside other journalists in front of a huge crowd of protesters behind her. She believes police were attempting to fire at protesters.
She said the projectile left “a little mark for a few days, it wasn’t anything serious at all.”
Independent journalist Brian Conley was struck with crowd-control munitions fired by federal agents and said he also was targeted with a tear gas canister during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on July 24, 2020, despite a fresh court order barring federal agents in the city from harming members of the press covering protests.
Portland had been experiencing daily protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The presence of federal law enforcement in Portland in July intensified the city's regular protests and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in downtown Portland became a nightly flashpoint. A temporary restraining order from July 2 that barred Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Despite the expansion of the temporary restraining order, the following day numerous journalists were hit with crowd-control munitions in the vicinity of the federal courthouse as protesters again gathered there. Some said they believed they were targeted.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. In its “Portland Riots Read-out” DHS said one federal officer was injured during the protest, which began the night of July 23 and went through the morning of July 24.
“No injuries to protestors or rioters have been reported” the statement added. It didn’t mention any injuries to journalists, despite reports some reporters were hurt.
At about 4 a.m., Conley said he was filming a line of federal agents outside the federal courthouse at the corner of Southwest Third Avenue and Southwest Salmon Street. In a statement that is part of an ACLU suit Conley has joined, he wrote that the crowd was sparse and “mostly press.”
Video shot by Conley shows a protester approaching federal agents and dancing in front of them while holding flowers. After several minutes, federal agents can be seen grabbing the protester. As other protesters tried to intervene and wrest the detained protester from the agents, the officers began firing crowd-control munitions.
“Suddenly, without warning, the federal agent at the Courthouse shot me multiple times in my chest and my foot with incredibly painful impact munitions,” Conley wrote. “I was not in front of the few remaining protestors. There was nobody else nearby except press and a few medics. The pain was immense, but I continued to document what was happening.”
In the video, Conley can be heard yelling “Press! Press! Right here man, press!”
He said he was wearing a photographer’s vest and helmet with press markings and was filming with a large camera.
“I was very much there as a member of the press,” he told the Tracker. “I was doing my best to stay away from protesters.”
After several minutes, federal agents went inside the protective fence surrounding the courthouse.
In the video, Conley can be heard saying: “So let’s be clear, I was definitely just shot multiple times despite announcing that I was press, despite being a plaintiff in a federal complaint. I was not directly in front of the protesters, I was keeping my distance.”
Soon after, he said a tear gas canister was deployed directly at his head.
“There was no warning. It was shooting flames and exploded above me,” he wrote in a statement that is part of the ACLU suit.
Freelance journalist Sergio Olmos said he was struck by crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon,on July 24, 2020, despite a fresh court order barring federal agents in the city from harming members of the press covering protests.
Portland had been experiencing daily protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The presence of federal law enforcement in Portland in July intensified the city's regular protests and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in downtown Portland became a nightly flashpoint. A temporary restraining order from July 2 that barred Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Despite the expansion of the temporary restraining order, the following day numerous journalists were hit with crowd-control munitions in the vicinity of the federal courthouse as protesters again gathered there. Some said they believed they were targeted.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. In its “Portland Riots Read-out” DHS said one federal officer was injured during the protest, which began the night of July 23 and went through the morning of July 24.
“No injuries to protestors or rioters have been reported” the statement added. It didn’t mention any injuries to journalists, despite reports some reporters were hurt.
Olmos said he was struck in the leg with what he described as “some kind of flash bang” while filming the protest at the federal courthouse.
In a video Olmos uploaded to Twitter at 1:13 a.m., sparks can be seen flying above the journalist before a canister tumbles in front of him and a bang is heard.
Some kind of flash bang goes off on my legs, it hurt enough that I had to walk off for a bit, but didn’t burn through my sambas. I’m good pic.twitter.com/5A0po4jDhO
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) July 24, 2020
“Some kind of flash bang goes off on my legs, it hurt enough that I had to walk off for a bit, but didn’t burn through my Sambas. I’m good,” he wrote on Twitter.
Later, after he left downtown Portland, Olmos shared a picture of small blood spots on the back of his leg writing: “must have burned through my pants.”
Olmos didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Independent social media journalist Teebs Auberdine was hit with projectiles on the legs and ankle fired by federal agents while covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon on July 24, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering Black Lives Matter protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23.
Early on July 24, Auberdine was standing on the sidewalk across Southwest Third Avenue from the courthouse when federal agents came out from behind the fencing to push protesters back, Auberdine told the Tracker.
Auberdine said federal agents were firing projectiles to drive protesters away, and a flash-bang grenade went off less than a foot away from her, slightly below their waist to the side. She said another projectile hit her in the ankle, causing bruising and swelling.
Auberdine later posted a photograph on Twitter of the black pants she was wearing that night, which were coated in residue and white powder she said was from the crowd control munitions federal agents used.
Got shot at & hit a lot tonight, I have a fresh bruise on my ankle.
— Teebs (@TeebsGaming) July 24, 2020
I was also hit in the back of the legs with (what I'm pretty confident was) an OC canister.
Are these pants salvageable, or am I gonna ruin my laundry machine? pic.twitter.com/IDVUEpLx4V
Auberdine said she was wearing a black bulletproof vest with the word “press” spelled in large white letters on the front and back. She also carried a microphone.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
KATU ABC 2 photojournalist Ric Peavyhouse was struck by crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on July 24, 2020, despite a fresh court order barring federal agents in the city from harming members of the press covering protests.
Portland had been experiencing daily protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The presence of federal law enforcement in Portland in July intensified the city's regular protests and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in downtown Portland became a nightly flashpoint. A temporary restraining order from July 2 that barred Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Despite the expansion of the temporary restraining order, the following day numerous journalists were hit with crowd-control munitions in the vicinity of the federal courthouse as protesters again gathered there. Some said they believed they were targeted.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. In its “Portland Riots Read-out” DHS said one federal officer was injured during the protest, which began the night of July 23 and went through the morning of July 24.
“No injuries to protestors or rioters have been reported” the statement added. It didn’t mention any injuries to journalists, despite reports some reporters were hurt.
Peavyhouse was filming federal agents though a protective fence around the federal courthouse when he was “hit by something that felt like buckshot,” he wrote on Twitter at 1 a.m. alongside a video he uploaded of the incident.
Feds came out. Tear gas. I got hit by something that felt like buck shot 44 seconds in. #PDXprotest #PortlandProtest pic.twitter.com/efdS9p6u2V
— Ric Peavyhouse (@RPeavyhouse) July 24, 2020
In Peavyhouse’s video, protesters can be heard taunting federal agents on the other side of the fence before the camera jerks sharply and Peavyhouse retreats.
At 2:15 a.m., Peavyhouse tweeted a photograph of a hospital wristband and wrote “not how you want a protest to end.” He replied to a comment saying he had something “stuck in his eye.”
In a tweet that afternoon Peaveyhouse wrote: “My best guess for what hit me in the eye last night was pepperball shrapnel shot at head level. Going frame-by-frame, it looks like officers shooting from the steps hit the officer in front of me and then I went down. I felt similar debris/shrapnel the other night. #pdxprotest”
Neither Peavyhouse nor a news director at KATU ABC 2 responded to requests for comment.
Independent journalist and livestreamer Rosa Watts said she was struck by crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on July 24, 2020, despite a fresh court order barring federal agents in the city from harming members of the press covering protests.
Portland had been experiencing daily protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25.
The presence of federal law enforcement in Portland in July intensified the city's regular protests and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in downtown Portland became a nightly flashpoint. A temporary restraining order from July 2 that barred Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Despite the expansion of the temporary restraining order, the following day numerous journalists were hit with crowd-control munitions in the vicinity of the federal courthouse as protesters again gathered there. Some said they believed they were targeted.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. In its “Portland Riots Read-out” DHS said one federal officer was injured during the protest, which began the night of July 23 and went through the morning of July 24.
“No injuries to protestors or rioters have been reported” the statement added. It didn’t mention any injuries to journalists, despite reports some reporters were hurt.
Watts said she was struck with a projectile fired by federal agents as she filmed through the federal courthouse’s protective fence in the early morning of July 24.
In a video captured by freelance journalist Matthieu Lewis-Rolland, Watts can be seen standing next to the fence wearing a helmet and jacket marked “press” in large letters. A projectile flies toward her from the left, appearing to hit her in the chest before she falls backward onto the ground.
Video of Feds shooting #press in the face in violation of #TRO @ACLU_OR @AthulKAcharya pic.twitter.com/fkGS2bHEcX
— Mathieu Lewis-Rolland (@MathieuLRolland) July 24, 2020
Watts replied to the video by saying it was her in the footage. She didn’t respond to requests for comment from the Tracker.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Jasper Florence was struck in the head with a projectile fired by federal agents while the independent journalist was documenting the protests in Portland, Oregon, on July 24, 2020, despite a fresh court order barring federal agents in the city from harming members of the press covering protests.
Portland had been experiencing daily protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The presence of federal law enforcement in Portland in July intensified the city's regular protests and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in downtown Portland became a nightly flashpoint. A temporary restraining order from July 2 that barred Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Despite the expansion of the temporary restraining order, the following day numerous journalists were hit with crowd-control munitions in the vicinity of the federal courthouse as protesters again gathered there. Some said they believed they were targeted.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. In its “Portland Riots Read-out” DHS said one federal officer was injured during the protest, which began the night of July 23 and went through the morning of July 24.
“No injuries to protestors or rioters have been reported” the statement added. It didn’t mention any injuries to journalists, despite reports some reporters were hurt.
“I have just been shot in the head,” Florence tweeted at 12:33 a.m.
Florence said they were on their phone writing a tweet when they were hit.
“It was just sort of like a blunt force impact and then just powder everywhere,” said Florence, who described the projectile as larger than a pepper ball, a munition frequently used by law enforcement across the country that Florence has been hit with before.
Florence was wearing a helmet, but said they believed they had suffered a concussion, experiencing brain fog, difficulty thinking and migraines in the following days. The helmet was marked as “press” as was a paintball vest they were wearing that night. Florence said they believed the press markings were visible to federal agents and that the incident was targeted.
Florence said later that night they were struck with what they believe was a tear gas canister in the knee, which destroyed a plastic motorcycle knee guard they were wearing. Florence said the knee remained sore for the following days but wasn’t seriously injured.
Los Angeles Times correspondent Melissa Etehad said she was targeted with crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on July 24, 2020, despite a fresh court order barring federal agents in the city from harming members of the press covering protests.
Portland had been experiencing daily protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The presence of federal law enforcement in Portland in July intensified the city's regular protests and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in downtown Portland became a nightly flashpoint. A temporary restraining order from July 2 that barred Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Despite the expansion of the temporary restraining order, the following day numerous journalists were hit with crowd-control munitions in the vicinity of the federal courthouse as protesters again gathered there. Some said they believed they were targeted.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. In its “Portland Riots Read-out” DHS said one federal officer was injured during the protest, which began the night of July 23 and went through the morning of July 24.
“No injuries to protestors or rioters have been reported” the statement added. It didn’t mention any injuries to journalists, despite reports some reporters were hurt.
Etehad told the Tracker she posted on Twitter that she was struck in the waist with a “rubber bullet” while covering the protest.
Also—I was hit by a rubber bullet on my waist even though I had clearly identified myself as a reporter and had just showed my credentials to agents just minutes before
— Melissa Etehad اتحاد (@melissaetehad) July 24, 2020
According to notes Etehad supplied the Tracker, federal agents outside the Multnomah County Justice Center deployed tear gas directly at her and a group of reporters at about 1:30 a.m. on July 24. She said the agents were about 10 feet away when they used the tear gas.
Following the deployment of tear gas, Etehad said she was holding up press identification to make it clear to federal agents that she was a journalist. She said she was staying away from protesters and was close enough to federal agents that they could see she was press.
According to her notes, at 1:45 a.m. she turned around to leave the area as federal agents began moving on protesters and again firing tear gas. “That’s when I got hit by the rubber bullet,” she told the Tracker.
She estimated she was at least 15 feet away from the nearest protester when she was hit in the waist while trying to retreat. Etehad was wearing a high-visibility vest, a gas mask and a helmet when she was hit. She also had press credentials hanging on a lanyard around her neck and was holding them up to show agents.
“I’m 99% sure I was targeted,” she said, noting again that she was close enough for agents to identify her and had remained in the same spot for a while before fleeing. “I was away from the protesters. It was aimed at me. They knew I was a journalist.”
Etehad said the projectile left a bruise that lasted several weeks and that it hurt to walk in the following days. “I got lucky,” she said.
Radio producer Wyatt Reed says he was targeted with crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on July 24, 2020, despite a fresh court order barring federal agents in the city from harming members of the press covering protests.
Portland had been experiencing daily protests over the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The presence of federal law enforcement in Portland in July intensified the city's regular protests and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse in downtown Portland became a nightly flashpoint. A temporary restraining order from July 2 that barred Portland police from harming or impeding journalists was expanded to include federal agents on July 23. Despite the expansion of the temporary restraining order, the following day numerous journalists were hit with crowd-control munitions in the vicinity of the federal courthouse as protesters again gathered there. Some said they believed they were targeted.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment. In its “Portland Riots Read-out” DHS said one federal officer was injured during the protest, which began the night of July 23 and went through the morning of July 24.
“No injuries to protestors or rioters have been reported” the statement added. It didn’t mention any injuries to journalists, despite reports some reporters were hurt.
Reed, an independent journalist and producer for radio show By Any Means Necessary on the Russian state-owned Radio Sputnik, was hit in the hand and knee by a tear gas canister fired by federal agents.
In a video Reed posted to Twitter at 3:05 a.m., he can be seen holding his bloodied right hand up and saying: “They shot me with some kind of canister, and fucked my hand up, I think my finger might have been broken.”
Feds just shot me directly with a tear gas cannister right before taking 4th & Main in Portland. I was sitting down on my phone and they hit me out of nowhere. At least one finger sprained & all my stuff covered in blood now pic.twitter.com/WQbkRWFAHk
— Wyatt Reed (@wyattreed13) July 24, 2020
Reed told the Tracker he was wearing a helmet that was labeled “press” and had duct tape that said “press” on his clothing. He said he believed he was targeted given that he had positioned himself away from protesters.
“I just personally wasn’t near anybody. I’m sure I was at least 20-some feet from everyone else,” he said.
Reed said his knee was “super inflamed” for a few days and that it was pretty hard to walk. Speaking to the Tracker in November, four months after the incident, he said he still felt pain in his knee he didn’t have before the incident.
“I can’t tell if I was lucky or unlucky, because I think it probably could have been a lot worse,” he said.
Reporter and photojournalist Shauna Sowersby said she was targeted with crowd-control munitions by federal agents while she was covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, early on July 23, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon filed a class-action lawsuit.
Sowersby, whose work has been published by the Daily Beast, KNKX Public Radio and the Pacific Northwest nonprofit news outlet Crosscut, was near the right side of the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse early that morning.
When federal agents approached the crowd and began shooting pepper balls, an officer aimed one directly at her, which hit her on her ribs, she posted on Twitter at 2:20 a.m.
Went off to the side to take photos (not on federal property) and got hit directly in the ribs by an officer shooting pepperballs. I’m clearly marked as “press.” The spot is welting and bruising already, holy shit it hurts. #PortlandProtest
— Shauna Sowersby (@Shauna_Sowersby) July 23, 2020
“At the moment, I kind of blacked out for a second because it's very painful,” she told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
Sowersby said she felt that police clearly aimed the pepper ball directly at her, and she was targeted as a member of the press. She said she was holding her camera and wearing a press badge, and was clearly marked as a member of the media.
After leaving the scene briefly, she said she went back to cover the protests, still affected by her injury.
“You're just kind of running on adrenaline at that point right so you get back in and I covered the rest of the night everything, but it was very painful,” she said.
A photograph she posted on Twitter later that morning showed a red welt on her torso where she was struck. A few days later, she went to the emergency room and was told by doctors she had sustained a small rib fracture and rib contusion, she said.
Sowersby said that she hasn’t pursued any action against the federal agencies to recover her medical costs, which totaled around a couple thousand dollars. She told the Tracker she thinks it is unlikely that filing a complaint or trying to recover the costs would have any effect.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
Freelance photojournalist Nathan Howard was hit twice with pepper balls fired by federal agents while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of July 23, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Howard testified about another incident to support the class action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, that led to the TRO.
Thousands were protesting in downtown Portland on the evening of July 22, when Mayor Ted Wheeler attended and was hit with tear gas alongside demonstrators, ABC News reported. Protesters continued to demonstrate outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse past midnight, with the Portland police declaring an “unlawful assembly” at around 12:30 a.m.
Howard was outside the courthouse sometime between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. when a protester who had breached a metal fence surrounding the federal building was injured, he told the Tracker. As two other protesters carried him out, Howard said, federal officers came out of the building to arrest a woman who was inside the fence.
Howard, who was on assignment for Getty Images, said he ran up to photograph the arrest. As he was taking pictures, he said, agents shot him with pepper balls through the fence. After briefly backing away from the fence, he approached again to continue taking photos and was hit with a second burst of pepper balls.
In a video posted on Twitter by photojournalist Justin Yau at 1:34 a.m., Howard, wearing jeans and a green shirt, can be seen approaching the fence and looking through his camera. About 12 seconds into the video, Howard steps back as a burst of white powder comes through the fence. When he approaches again, more powder bursts through.
Several have just been arrested. Federal agents rushed out of the building and grabbed several on the portico. This female protester can be heard screaming as she is dragged away. #PortlandProtest #PDXprotests #BLACKLIVESMATTER pic.twitter.com/upP2iYZQif
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) July 23, 2020
The impact of the pepper balls left him with welts and cuts on his forearms, which were exposed, and also caused him to cough.
“The way that it works when they’ve got the fence up is they fire through it and it shreds the pepper balls as it goes through, so they kind of like shrapnel into you,” he told the Tracker, adding that his equipment wasn’t damaged.
While Howard was wearing press identification at the time, he said he doesn’t think he was targeted as press.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
Photojournalist Mathieu Lewis-Rolland said he was hit in the chest with a tear gas canister deployed by federal agents while he was covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, early on July 23, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Lewis-Rolland is a plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon.
Lewis-Rolland, whose work has been published by the Portland Mercury, The New York Times and Reuters, said he was struck in the chest with a tear gas canister fired by federal agents early the morning of July 23.
Video shared by Lewis-Rolland with the Tracker shows canisters of tear gas being shot down the middle of an empty street, when sparks suddenly fly close to the frame. Lewis-Rolland abruptly jerks his camera, and as he moves away, a tear gas canister is visible on the sidewalk.
In an Aug. 10 document filed in the ACLU lawsuit, Lewis-Rolland said that the canister struck him.
According to the court papers, when he was covering protests in Portland at that time in July he had started wearing a fluorescent vest with a transparent pocket, where he displayed a press badge issued by the Portland Mercury. He also wore a helmet and backpack with the word “PRESS” written in several places.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
Federal officers struck Black Zebra videographer Johnny Lynch multiple times and dragged him to the ground as Lynch covered protests against police violence in Portland, Oregon, on July 22, 2020.
Black Zebra Productions, based in Sacramento, California, is a video production company that has drawn thousands of views for its livestreams at Black Lives Matter protests across Sacramento. Company videographer Lynch was in Portland covering one of the many protests that continued for months in that city following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25.
On the night of July 21, protesters gathered outside of the Multnomah County Justice Center in downtown Portland. A report issued by the Department of Homeland Security said that about 2,000 people had gathered by 10:30 p.m., when “rioters started to launch mortar-style fireworks over the fence at the federal courthouse and officers.” The DHS report also said protesters attacked a fence put up around the courthouse. In response, federal officers deployed tear gas, flash bang grenades and other crowd control munitions for several hours to break up the crowd, according to news reports.
In an interview with the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, Lynch said federal officers rushed protesters numerous times to disperse the group and deployed crowd control munitions, including tear gas and pepper balls.
"There was tear gas everywhere," Lynch told the Tracker. “I got my gas mask back on and went out to the Justice Center and that's when the rush happened."
In a live stream shared on Facebook by Black Zebra Productions, federal officers can be seen running towards a crowd of people at 1:24:03 into the video. Lynch said the rush began shortly after midnight July 22. Lynch, who is wearing an orange helmet, is caught in the commotion and pushed to the ground. A few seconds later he can be seen running away from the officers and smoke that is enveloping the crowd. Another video posted by Black Zebra shows, in split screen, the attack as seen from the livestream alongside footage from Lynch’s camera. In Lynch's perspective, which is in the top frame of the video, a federal officer's baton can be seen slamming down towards the camera.
"They said move, I turned around, and then they hit me," Lynch told the Tracker. "They hit me a couple of times [and] dragged me into a cloud of tear gas that had just started to go off." He said another officer hit him while he was being dragged on the ground.
"This was very obviously a group of camera people," Lynch said. "That officer was standing there next to me for at least long enough to have seen my camera.”
Lynch said he had been wearing press passes issued by The Sacramento Bee and Black Zebra Productions. He said he lost his lens hood, sustained several bruises across his body and suffered nausea from the tear gas. After he left the scene, he said he regrouped with his team and they continued documenting till 2 a.m. on July 22.
DHS didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country. The Tracker documented a previous incident involving Black Zebra here.
Rach Wilde, an independent photojournalist working for Black Zebra Productions, says she was shoved to the ground by a federal officer while covering protests against police violence in Portland, Oregon, on July 22, 2020.
Team members from Black Zebra Productions, a community-based storytelling production crew, were documenting protests that have been ongoing for months in downtown Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. In mid-July, federal agents were dispatched to the city, increasing tensions and drawing backlash.
On the night of July 21, protesters had gathered outside the Multnomah County Justice Center. By 10:30 p.m., the situation had escalated, according to a report from the Department of Homeland Security, the agency coordinating the federal presence in Portland. Around 12:30 a.m., Wilde told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was looking toward the side of the building, where officers were shooting impact munitions from a window.
“Out of nowhere, I heard a slight commotion. They [federal agents] just popped up and were right next to me,” she said. “Right as I turned around, one of the federal officers was beelining straight toward me.”
Wilde said the officer shoved her “as hard as he could” and kept running past her. In a livestream shared on Facebook by Black Zebra, federal officers can be seen running toward a crowd of people at 1:24:03.
Wilde, who was dressed in all black with a helmet and gas mask on, said she was pushed straight into a tree. “I hit my knee and my shoulder really bad,” she told the Tracker. She said her shoulder still hurts if she does certain movements and her knee will occasionally act up. The body of her camera was also damaged, as it hit the ground first, according to Wilde.
“It was clearly a pocket of press,” she said. “All of us had cameras. Majority had press presses.”
Wilde said she was wearing a press pass issued by Black Zebra Productions around her neck. After she left the scene, she regrouped with her team and they continued documenting until 2 a.m.
DHS did not respond to a request for comment on the incident.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Photojournalist John Rudoff was struck in the leg with a projectile fired by federal agents in Portland, Oregon, early on the morning of July 22, 2020, causing injuries that forced him to temporarily stop reporting on the demonstrations.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Rudoff is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, that led to the ban.
On the night of July 21, the “Wall of Moms” and thousands of other demonstrators converged on the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, where frequent confrontations between protesters and federal agents continued into the early hours of the next morning, according to the local KPTV news station.
Around 12:40 a.m. on the 22nd, Rudoff was documenting a protest at the intersection of Southwest Fourth Avenue and Southwest Salmon Street, a block from the courthouse, according to a declaration he provided in the ACLU case. While Rudoff was photographing a line of federal officers, he felt “a tremendous strike and extreme pain” on his leg, according to the document.
Rudoff, whose work has been published by Rolling Stone, the Nation and The New York Times, told the Tracker he was shot with a universal projectile ammunition, which is used in a riot gun.
He “hobbled” across the street, where friends assisted him with first aid, according to the declaration. Rudoff wasn’t able to continue his assignment, he wrote, since he was “in too much pain,” and the pain continued throughout the night after he went home. Photographs of the injury provided in the declaration, taken hours after the incident, show a raw, red abrasion.
Rudoff told the Tracker that he wasn’t near any protesters at the time he was struck, and believes that he was targeted. He was wearing a helmet and vest emblazoned with the word “press” in large letters, as well as a laminated press credential issued by the National Press Photographers Association, he wrote in the declaration.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
Photojournalist Mathieu Lewis-Rolland was hit with crowd-control munitions and tear gas fired by federal agents while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on July 22, 2020, causing damage to his camera.
Lewis-Rolland, an independent photographer whose work has been published by the Portland Mercury, The New York Times and Reuters, was covering one of the protests that had been held in Portland almost nightly since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering Black Lives Matter protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Lewis-Rolland is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, that led to the ban.
Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler, who had been criticized for his handling of law enforcement during the protests, attended the demonstrations the night of July 22. Protesters confronted the mayor for tactics the city police used to crack down on demonstrators, according to local news outlet KATU, while the mayor spoke out against the presence of federal law enforcement agencies in Portland.
Lewis-Rolland was standing about six feet from the mayor outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse, a focal point of the protests, when he was hit with munitions, according to a statement he provided for the ACLU case.
In a video Lewis-Rolland posted on Twitter, a crowd is seen up against the metal fence that had been set up around the courthouse. A round of shots can be heard, followed by Lewis-Rolland exclaiming, “I just got shot! I just got shot!” As he moves away from the fence, a white cloud of tear gas envelopes the crowd, including the mayor, who can be seen facing the fence and wearing a blue shirt and goggles.
“So if life could't get any stranger for me, last night I was shot with less lethal's by feds and then tear gassed all while standing next to @tedwheeler, the mayor of Portland, Oregon,” Lewis-Rolland wrote in the post.
So if life could't get any stranger for me, last night I was shot with less lethal's by feds and then tear gassed all while standing next to @tedwheeler, the mayor of Portland, Oregon. 2020 won't quit. pic.twitter.com/bclUiUBEFT
— Mathieu Lewis-Rolland (@MathieuLRolland) July 23, 2020
Wheeler was likely hit with tear gas at around 11:15 pm., according to KATU.
In the court statement, Lewis-Rolland said the munitions first hit the metal fencing, and the shrapnel damaged his camera and backpack. He didn’t respond to a request for comment about the damage to his equipment.
In the statement, Lewis-Rolland said that beginning on July 22, he started wearing a reflective yellow vest with a transparent pocket, where he displayed a press pass issued by the Portland Mercury. He also had “press” marked on his white bicycle helmet and on his backpack.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
Independent journalist Laura Jedeed said she was covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, when federal agents threw tear gas canisters toward her at least twice in the early hours of July 22, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
On the night of July 21, the “Wall of Moms” and thousands of other demonstrators converged on the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. courthouse downton for a number of confrontations with the federal agents that continued past midnight, according to the local KPTV news station.
Jedeed, a contributor to Portland Monthly and Willamette Weekly, live-tweeted protest scenes from outside the courthouse, where federal law enforcement officers were stationed. Using the Twitter handle @defendpdx, Jedeed reported throughout the night that federal agents repeatedly fired tear gas canisters at protesters, while demonstrators started fires and threw fireworks and tear gas canisters back toward the courthouse.
In a tweet that is no longer available online, Jedeed said “At least twice, the feds launched a tear gas cannister directly at me. I was not hurt, but others aren't so lucky.”
Jedeed confirmed the events to the Tracker.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
A member of a press collective known as the 45th Absurdist Brigade was shoved by a federal officer covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, on July 22, 2020.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
On the night of July 21, the “Wall of Moms” and thousands of other demonstrators converged on the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. courthouse downtown for a number of confrontations with the federal agents that continued past midnight, according to the local KPTV news station.
The journalist, who asked not to be named, was filming on the sidewalk across from the courthouse. A video the journalist posted to the collective’s Twitter at 1:57 a.m. shows officers advancing on a line of protesters with pepper balls and batons.
They come out of the courthouse hitting people with sticks pic.twitter.com/ikueMx3gy9
— 45th parallel absurdist brigade (@45thabsurdist) July 22, 2020
The journalist told the Tracker that while filming the scene with a phone, they witnessed a few people get shoved by police officers. The journalist attempted to stand back from the crowd by staying on the sidewalk, not huddled with other protesters or members of the press. An officer ran by and physically pushed several people back, including the journalist, who added that they may have been shoved with a baton.
“I was standing there filming and I got shoved,” the journalist said. “They just came out and shoved like four people in a row. And I was one of them.”
The journalist said they were clearly marked as “press” by large letters on their helmet, a sticker on their back and front, and press identification. However, they weren’t sure if they were targeted as press because officers were pushing a lot of people back.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
Rosie Riddle said she was targeted with projectiles by federal agents in Portland, Oregon, on July 22, 2020, causing injuries that forced her to temporarily stop reporting on the demonstrations.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Rudoff is a plaintiff in the class-action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, that led to the ban.
On the night of July 21, the “Wall of Moms” and thousands of other demonstrators converged on the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, where frequent confrontations between protesters and federal agents continued into the early hours of the next morning, according to the local KPTV news station.
A little after 2 a.m on the 22nd, Riddle was outside the courthouse, at the intersection of Southwest Third Avenue and Southwest Salmon Street, when she was hit with crowd-control munitions fired by federal agents, she said.
Riddle was struck after a protester threw a tear gas canister back at federal agents and ran behind her, she told the Tracker. The officers fired pepper balls, hitting Riddle twice in the stomach.
“I don’t know if the cop was trying to shoot through me or misfired or whatever,” she said.
After briefly retreating a few blocks to assess her injury, Riddle returned and continued taking pictures, she said. The situation was calm when she returned, she added, with protesters staying far behind her and away from the federal agents.
But soon after she returned, Riddle was hit again by crowd-control munitions in the leg, she said, adding that she believes the same agent hit her both times.
“I was pretty much alone up there,” she said, noting that no protesters were close to her. “It was just me up there trying to take pictures of the line while nothing was happening.”
Riddle, who was wearing a helmet marked “press” in large white letters and was displaying two red press passes, believes she was targeted the second time she was hit.
The projectile hit the left side of her right calf, causing her to bleed and making it difficult to walk, she told the Tracker, so she stopped reporting to find a medic. The wound was swollen and seeped for a week, she said, adding that she had trouble walking for several weeks and took a week off of reporting due to the injury. The injury left Riddle with a scar that she says still “throbs” when she walks uphill.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incidents.
Documentary photographer Rian Dundon was on assignment for the Economic Hardship Reporting Project on July 22, 2020, when he was repeatedly thrown to the ground and pinned down by a federal officer while covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, according to a lawsuit filed by the photographer in 2022.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May. The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
Dundon filed a lawsuit against the regional director of the Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, and more than 100 federal officers in April 2022. Dundon declined to comment on advice from counsel.
According to the suit, Dundon was photographing a fire started outside the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse in downtown Portland alongside other journalists in a group away from protesters, and was wearing a press badge.
“Federal officers dressed in military fatigues and wearing gas masks approached Plaintiff [Dundon] and the other journalists from behind,” the lawsuit states. “Plaintiff turned to run, but federal officers grabbed him and threw him to the ground.”
Dundon landed on a live, unexploded gas canister which then exploded.
“Plaintiff stood and again tried to flee, but federal officers again threw him to the ground. Federal officers then pinned Plaintiff on the ground,” the lawsuit says. In footage of the incident, Dundon can be seen pinned under an officer as a cloud of gas engulfs them.
Federal officers stormed towards the crowd from the North entrance arresting many along the way. There was a brief exchange of tear gas cannisters flying in different directions. #PortlandProtest #Portland #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/ggIS9vhLv9
— Justin Yau (@PDocumentarians) July 22, 2020
“One of the Marshals rips the press ID from around my neck,” Dundon wrote in a description of the incident for The Washington Post. “Another pinned me under the gas with his nightstick for 10 excruciating seconds before allowing me to leave the area.
“I walked home with third-degree burns that night, bedraggled but buzzing on residual adrenaline,” Dundon wrote.
The lawsuit alleges that the officers violated Dundon’s First and Fourth Amendment rights and restricted his ability to cover the protests. Neither Dundon’s attorneys nor DHS responded to requests for additional information.
“Targeting journalists was not a quirk of the federal enforcement efforts, it was one of its objectives,” the suit alleges. “DOJ and DHS agents could have completed the objectives of their response without causing harm to Plaintiff.”
The Tracker documented seven other journalists assaulted while covering the Portland protests that day.
Dundon is seeking noneconomic, economic and punitive damages in the lawsuit.
This screenshot, cited in Rian Dundon’s lawsuit, shows the photographer after he was thrown to the ground amid protests in Portland, Oregon, in July 2020. The 2022 suit alleges that federal officers deliberately targeted him.
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Jardula said he had arrived in Portland two days earlier with his colleague Fiorella Isabel Mayorca to cover the Portland protests that had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased.
Demonstrations against police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since late May. They were sparked by a video showing the death of George Floyd, a Black man, while in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25.
Jardula told the U.S Press Freedom Tracker he arrived at a demonstration at approximately 9:30 p.m. on July 20 outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, where federal law enforcement officers were stationed.
Jardula streamed live on YouTube for several hours, documenting the demonstration and interviewing protesters. He said he returned to a van parked nearby that they had been using as a media station and spot to rest and regroup a little after midnight. Dubbed the “Bernie Van,” it was owned by progressive activist David Crow and had been used as he independently campaigned for U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders during the recent Democratic primary. It was adorned with progressive slogans, including “Defund the Police.”
While inside the van at approximately 12:30 a.m., Jardula saw what he believed were federal law enforcement officers in riot gear come out of the courthouse and start to throw tear gas canisters on the ground to push protesters back, he said.
“We started choking from the smoke that came in,” Jardula said. “We were pouring water on our faces. We were almost panicking.”
The Tracker has documented Mayorca’s assault here.
Jardula continued to film the scene. An officer saw Jardula and Mayorca and alerted other agents to the van. Video posted on Twitter shows an officer pointing a gun at the van before a group of officers approach, shining flashlights on them and hitting the windows until they shatter.
Watch how the @theconvocouch team @yopasta & myself were inside the Berrnie Van, as feds descended upon us and began tear-gassing protestors. We couldn’t get out bc of the gas but we also couldn’t breathe. Feds then smashed the windows & pointed guns at us as the vid goes black. pic.twitter.com/jw0dOAeW22
— Fiorella Isabel🪓 ☭ ⚒🔥🕊 (@Fiorella_im) July 21, 2020
Jardula said that it appeared that the federal officers “wanted everybody out of that area, no matter who you are. They were setting a perimeter to push everyone back.”
While a number of federal agencies reportedly had officers in Portland in July, it wasn’t clear to Mayorca and Jardula which agency the officers they encountered were from. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, did not respond to requests for comment.
After the van’s windows were smashed, Jardula said he left the vehicle and shouted to the officers that he was a member of the press.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Independent journalist Mason Lake said an individual assaulted him while he was covering a demonstration in Portland, Oregon, on July 21, 2020.
The Portland-based videographer was covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense by late July as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in recent weeks.
Sometime before midnight the evening of July 21, Lake was filming around the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in downtown Portland, where protesters had been engaging in confrontations with federal law enforcement officers.
Then an individual at the demonstration came up to Lake and started accusing him of being a snitch and of filming protesters’ faces, Lake told the Tracker, adding that he responded by questioning why he was being singled out when there were many other cameras that were filming protesters’ faces.
“It escalated from there,” he said. In a video captured by Sergio Olmos, a journalist for Oregon Public Broadcasting — which Lake later retweeted — someone in a black hoodie can be seen punching Lake, who was wearing a gas mask and helmet, in the face several times.
“He took the first swing,” said Lake. “Once he hit me it got my mask out of the way, so I couldn’t see. The crowd rushed in and pulled him off me.”
Lake, who didn’t suffer serious injuries from the attack, told the Tracker he wasn’t sure who punched him. He said he wasn’t informing on protesters or filming their faces, and that his camera was aimed down at the time of the confrontation. Portland protesters have worried that footage of them at demonstrations could lead to arrests.
The assault on Lake came over a week after some Instagram and Twitter accounts accused Lake of being a “snitch,” or police informant, Lake said. The claims were posted after Lake had published videos of federal law enforcement arrests of protesters on his Twitter account.
The social media posts targeting Lake included screenshots of text messages purporting to be from Lake in which he admits to sending footage of protesters to the police. Lake, however, told the Tracker that he never sent those messages and that they were photoshopped.
“On Facebook, people started bombarding me and banning me in protest groups that I shared my photos in,” said Lake, adding that he started receiving death threats on social media and in texts. “I was in fear of leaving my house of people jumping me.”
The night after the initial assault, Lake was attacked again by protesters in an incident that sent him to the hospital. He wasn’t filming at the time.
Lake has also been repeatedly shot at with crowd-control munitions by federal and local law enforcement officers while documenting protests in Portland. After getting shot by a projectile that injured his arm on May 31, Lake filed a lawsuit against the city of Portland over the alleged battery by the police.
Mike Baker, Seattle bureau chief for The New York Times, was struck in the head by a federal officer while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of July 21, 2020.
Baker was covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
Demonstrations that began the night of July 20 stretched into the early hours of the next day, according to the Oregonian, as the “Wall of Moms” and other protesters confronted federal officers stationed at the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse downtown.
Not long after midnight, Baker was observing protesters try to pry protective plywood off of the federal courthouse when federal agents emerged from the building to confront the crowd. One agent came up from behind Baker and hit him in the back of the head, knocking him over.
At 12:31 a.m., Baker tweeted: “The feds came rushing out aggressively. Throwing people to the ground, tear gas, firing less-lethals. One ran at me and punched me in the head, knocked me to the ground. I’m ok.”
Baker also tweeted a video captured by livestreamer Eric Greatwood that shows a federal agent approaching Baker from behind before hitting him. Baker was wearing a gas mask and helmet and appeared to be standing away from the protesters when he was assaulted.
Things happened so fast last night, I wasn't quite sure the details of the federal officer hitting me. It looks like someone captured a bit at the end of this clip.
— Mike Baker (@ByMikeBaker) July 22, 2020
Out of personal curiosity, I'd welcome more footage if people have some.
To reiterate: I'm fine. Be back tonight. pic.twitter.com/0wE7YchZJr
Baker said he didn’t believe he was targeted as press. “I think they were just going towards the protest crowd and just kind of hit me along the way,” he told the Tracker.
Despite being struck in the head and knocked to the ground, Baker said he wasn’t injured.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers used pepper balls and tear gas to respond to an “assault” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by rioters. DHS didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incident involving Baker.
Channel One Russia cameraman Viacheslav Arkhipov was assaulted by federal agents while covering protests against police violence with colleague Yuliya Olkhovskaya in Portland, Oregon, on July 21, 2020.
Protests continued for months in downtown Portland in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. On the evening of July 21, demonstrators gathered outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. courthouse, where protesters held signs and sang songs, according to Olkhovskaya, the Washington, D.C. bureau chief for the outlet.
The gathering remained peaceful, she told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, until some new arrivals began to agitate the crowd. A Department of Homeland Security report about the evening describes several hours of violence, including attempts to set fire to the courthouse and break into its entrance.
Arkhipov and Olkhovskaya, had State Department-issued press badges visibly displayed and had a camera on a tripod nearby, Olkhovskaya said.
Olkhovskaya said that they were watching the courthouse scene at about 9 p.m. when officers came from the back door and kicked her. The Tracker documented her assault here.
Arkhipov said a federal agent hit his right wrist with a baton and a second federal agent grabbed his backpack from behind and pushed him to the ground.
"Two agents snatched the camera out of my hands and threw it on the ground,” he said. “Then one of the agents kicked the camera with his boot."
After the officers left the area, Arkhipov returned to the courthouse area, only to find the camera had been destroyed.
The camera’s memory card wasn’t damaged so the crew managed to file a story about the protest and the encounter with what the story described as “extremely aggressive” security forces.
According to an Izvestia news report, the Russian Federation sent official complaints to the United States about the Portland attack and another assault on Channel One journalists in Philadelphia in October. The Dec. 15, 2020, story said there had been no response from the U.S.
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a Tracker request for comment on the two Channel One incidents.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Mike Bivins was sprayed with a chemical irritant by federal law enforcement officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of July 21, 2020. Multiple other journalists also reported being targeted with crowd-control munitions that day.
The journalists were covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
Demonstrations that began the night of July 20 stretched into the early hours of the next day, according to the Oregonian, as the “Wall of Moms” and other protesters confronted federal officers stationed at the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse and the Multnomah County Justice Center downtown.
Around 12:30 a.m., as protesters tried to pry protective plywood off the courthouse, federal agents emerged from the building to confront the crowd. Around that time, Bivins was documenting federal agents yelling at protesters to disperse and pushing people back when he got pepper sprayed in the eyes, he told the Tracker.
In a video Bivins shared with the Tracker, a federal agent is seen rushing up to him and yelling, “Get out, now!” Then the video goes askew as the agent sprays Bivins.
“I could feel it all on the side of my head,” Bivins told the Tracker. “I thought my skin was going to fall off.” While Bivins was wearing protective glasses, he said that within a minute after getting sprayed, he could no longer see out of his left eye. Several protesters led him away and provided him with assistance.
Bivins had a press identification from the local news outlet Village Portland hanging around his neck and visible to the officers, he said.
Bivins said he plans to sue the Department of Homeland Security for $1 million over the incident. His attorney, Michael Fuller, sent the agency a notice of intent to sue on his behalf in November.
DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers used pepper balls and tear gas to respond to an “assault” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by rioters. The agency didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
The Portland police said in a statement that its officers weren’t present and didn’t engage with protesters that evening.
Sarah Jeong, an opinion writer for The New York Times and columnist for The Verge, said she was thrown down courthouse steps while reporting in Portland, Oregon, on July 21, 2021.
Jeong was covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
On the night of July 21, the “Wall of Moms” and thousands of other demonstrators converged on the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse downton for another night of confrontations with the federal agents, according to the local KPTV news station. When some individuals began pulling off the plywood blocking access to the courthouse shortly after 11 p.m., federal agents emerged from the building to clear the area.
Jeong was standing in front of the courthouse in an area that is elevated several steps above the sidewalk, she told the Tracker. Federal agents exited the courthouse and swept right to left, clearing the crowd of protesters in front of the building, she said.
Jeong, who was standing in the center of the crowd, began to slowly back up while holding up her press identification, she said. Her helmet was also clearly marked “press.” A federal agent then pushed her down the steps, she said, adding that she believes the agent shoved her while trying to arrest someone near her.
Jeong went fully airborne and landed on her back. Her backpack protected her from further injury, she said, but she had a bad bruise and suffered whiplash for a few days after the event.
Soon after she was pushed, at 11:19 p.m., Jeong tweeted, “Curious if anyone got video of feds throwing me down the steps of the courthouse?”
While Jeong doesn’t have direct footage of the push, she did find a video posted by another Twitter user showing the events leading up to the incident. About 19 seconds into the video, Jeong can be seen wearing a white helmet clearly marked “press.” She appears again briefly around 27 seconds into the video, on the elevated part of the courthouse, as an aggressive arrest is being made.
“It’s really hard for me to imagine that they didn’t know that they were pushing a journalist,” Jeong told the Tracker, but added that she isn’t sure if she was targeted as a member of the press.
“I was not that close to other people, I was clearly not a threat, I was holding up my badge, I was being very purposefully non-threatening,” said Jeong, who gave a declaration to the ACLU about the incident in support of a restraining order against federal agents. Since the restraining order was granted on July 23, her declaration wasn’t included in the suit.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers were “forced” to leave the courthouse to repel a “mob” of protesters. DHS didn’t respond to a request for comment on this incident.
Freelance journalist Griffin Malone said he was hit with crowd control munitions fired by federal agents while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of July 21, 2020.
Malone was covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
Demonstrations that began the night of July 20 stretched into the early hours of the next day, according to the Oregonian, as the “Wall of Moms” and other protesters confronted federal officers stationed at the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse and the Multnomah County Justice Center downtown.
After dispersing protesters shortly after midnight and then retreating, federal agents emerged again around 2:30 a.m. to use crowd control munitions to disperse the smaller crowd that remained at the courthouse, according to the Oregonian.
Malone was hit by a ricocheting munition or piece of shrapnel while documenting federal agents clear the area outside of the Justice Center from across the street.
In a video Malone posted at 3:10 a.m., the camera goes askew about 16 seconds into the footage as he gets hit. “Feds pushed. One arrested, then I was shot in the foot. You can see the camera jump,” he tweeted.
Malone doesn’t believe that he was targeted for being press, he said, because he was moving at the time he was hit. “I don’t think I was targeted, I was just running,” Malone, who wears press identification, a yellow vest and a helmet marked “press” to identify himself while reporting, told the Tracker.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers used pepper balls and tear gas to respond to an “assault” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by rioters. DHS didn’t respond to a request for comment on this incident.
The Portland police said in a statement that its officers weren’t present and didn’t engage with protesters that evening.
Freelance journalist Michael Elliott said he was struck with a foam-tipped crowd-control munition while he covered a protest outside the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse in Portland, Oregon, on July 21, 2020.
Elliott was covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
On the night of July 21, the “Wall of Moms” and thousands of other demonstrators converged on the courthouse downton for another night of confrontations with the federal agents. according to the local KPTV news station. When some protesters began pulling off the plywood blocking access to the courthouse shortly after 11 p.m., federal agents emerged from the building to clear the area.
Elliott, who says his work has been published by VICE, Oregon Public Broadcasting and Willamette Week among others, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was reporting from a sidewalk near independent journalist Eric Greatwood, who was livestreaming the protests with a camera attached to the top of a 20-foot pole.
The two journalists were standing on the corner of Third Avenue and Salmon Street, a block north of the federal courthouse.
“The federal agents were at the northwest corner of the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse and they were firing at anything and everything by Lownsdale Park,” Elliott said. “I’m not entirely sure what it was that required them to have such a heavy response. At that point, most of the dispersal that they were gunning for had happened.
“Nothing Eric or I were doing solicited the firing of the weapon other than just being there.”
Elliott told the Tracker he was struck in the right shin with a foam-tipped round; Greatwood was struck multiple times as well. Both of the journalists were wearing press badges around their necks and helmets marked “PRESS,” Elliot said.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers were “forced” to leave the courthouse to repel a “mob” of protesters. DHS didn’t respond to a request for comment on this incident.
The Portland Police Bureau said in a statement that its officers weren’t present and didn’t engage with protesters that evening.
Journalist Michael Elliott was struck with a foam-tipped projectile while covering a July 2020, protest in Portland. He said federal agents responding to the demonstration were "firing at anything and everything."
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest, shot / shot at",,, 2021-10-04 17:24:14.372748+00:00,2022-03-10 16:52:51.349153+00:00,Journalist livestreaming Portland protest hit with multiple projectiles,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/journalist-livestreaming-portland-protest-hit-with-multiple-projectiles/,2022-03-10 16:52:51.281953+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Eric Greatwood (Independent),,2020-07-21,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent journalist Eric Greatwood was among multiple journalists who said federal law enforcement officers targeted them with crowd-control weapons on July 21, 2020, while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon.
The journalists were covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
Demonstrations that began the night of July 20 stretched into the early hours of the next day, according to the Oregonian, as the “Wall of Moms” and other protesters confronted federal officers stationed at the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse and the Multnomah County Justice Center downtown.
Greatwood had been livestreaming the protests with a camera attached on top of a 20-foot pole when federal agents in camouflage advanced down Southwest Main Street, shooting munitions. He was hit twice with less-lethal munitions as he walked away from a line of federal agents.
Greatwood’s livestream shows munitions flying through the air, capturing the moment that he was hit the first time, around the 4:57:30 mark. “That one hurt,” he can be heard saying.
About 20 seconds later, the footage captures the moment Greatwood was struck again, this time in the buttocks. The pain was much worse this time, Greatwood told the Tracker, and can be heard moaning in the video. He left the protest shortly after due to the pain.
DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers used pepper balls and tear gas to respond to an “assault” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by rioters. The agency didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
The Portland police said in a statement that its officers weren’t present and didn’t engage with protesters that evening.
Jonathan House, a photo editor and photographer for Pamplin Media Group and the Portland Tribune, said he was shot with an impact munition while covering protests in Portland, Oregon on July 21, 2020. Multiple other journalists also reported being targeted with crowd-control munitions that day.
House was covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
Demonstrations that began the night of July 20 stretched into the early hours of the next day, according to the Oregonian, as the “Wall of Moms” and other protesters confronted federal officers stationed at the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse and the Multnomah County Justice Center downtown.
House was filming from across the street from the courthouse and Justice Center when he was shot in the arm. A video that House posted on Twitter at 12:34 a.m. shows a fire in the plaza on Southwest Main Street where an elk statue used to stand. About 29 seconds into the video, the frame wobbles as House is hit. “Federal agents moved in to clear the crowd. My arm got shot with an impact munition as I was taking this video (near the end),” House tweeted.
Federal agents moved in to clear the crowd. My arm got shot with an impact munition as I was taking this video (near the end). pic.twitter.com/fgCrYhymPO
— Jonathan House (@jonhouse_) July 21, 2020
House said he believes he was targeted. "This felt like the first time that I was specifically targeted," he told the Portland Tribune. "That rubber bullet was six inches from putting me into the hospital."
House told the Tracker that he was wearing a bright blue climbing helmet marked “press,” as well as identification on his backpack and a large press pass.
“I understand that you shoot tear gas out and it just takes up whole city blocks, especially if it’s windy,” he said. “But it seems particularly egregious if I’m kind of just standing there and I’ve got both my hands up while I’m filming something, and then one shot is literally coming right at me and hitting me.”
DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers used pepper balls and tear gas to respond to an “assault” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by rioters. The agency didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
The Portland police said in a statement that its officers weren’t present and didn’t engage with protesters that evening.
Mathieu Lewis-Rolland said he was shot with pepper balls and targeted with a tear gas grenade on the morning of July 21, 2020 in Oregon, Portland. Multiple other journalists also reported being targeted with crowd-control munitions that day.
The journalists were covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
Demonstrations that began the night of July 20 stretched into the early hours of the next day, according to the Oregonian, as the “Wall of Moms” and other protesters confronted federal officers stationed at the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse and the Multnomah County Justice Center downtown.
After retreating, federal agents emerged again after 2 a.m. to use crowd control munitions to disperse the smaller group of protesters that remained at the courthouse, according to the Oregonian. Around that time, agents shot pepper balls at Lewis-Rolland and threw a tear gas grenade in his direction, he said.
In footage of the incident that Lewis-Rolland provided the Tracker, he can be heard saying, “This is what makes me nervous, when there’s all this smoke and they don’t know who is who.”
Seconds later, federal officers begin to fire in his direction and he moves behind a tree.
“I have my hands in the air, I’m marked as press, I’m being fired upon,” Lewis-Rolland can be heard saying as he backs away. Then one officer advances towards him and tosses a tear gas grenade in his direction.
Lewis-Rolland’s helmet, T-shirt and backpack were all marked “press,” according to an interview he did with Buzzfeed. He also said he wrapped his Nikon camera in fluorescent tape so that officers don’t mistake it for a weapon.
Lewis-Rolland told Buzzfeed that officers were pointing their weapons at protesters and press alike that night. "I saw them pointing them at everybody and anyone, including me," he said, adding, “Last night was the most horrifying thing I have ever experienced in my life.”
Lewis-Rolland, a defendant in the ACLU class action suit, provided testimony about an incident earlier in July in which he was injured by munitions fired by federal agents.
DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers used pepper balls and tear gas to respond to an “assault” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by rioters. The agency didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
The Portland police said in a statement that its officers weren’t present and didn’t engage with protesters that evening.
Rach Wilde was one of multiple journalists who said federal law enforcement officers targeted them with crowd-control weapons while they were covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early hours of July 21, 2020.
The journalists were covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
Demonstrations that began the night of July 20 stretched into the early hours of the next day, according to the Oregonian, as the “Wall of Moms” and other protesters confronted federal officers stationed at the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse and the Multnomah County Justice Center downtown.
Around 12:30 a.m., as protesters tried to pry protective plywood off the courthouse, federal agents emerged from the building to confront the crowd.
Around the same time, Wilde was covering events across the street from the Justice Center when federal officers rushed the crowd and targeted her with baton rounds and pepper balls, she told the Tracker.
“We were filming this rush, and they were shooting whoever and whenever they wanted,” she said. Wilde had been filming officers who were “aggressively either detaining or arresting” a protester when “one of them looked straight at me, pointed his weapon at my body and hit my ankle with a baton round.” She wore press identification issued by Black Zebra Production, an independent media organization, around her neck.
“They continued to shoot at me [with pepper balls] as I was literally hopping away,” Wilde told the Tracker. “I had little marks on my backpack from when they shot at me.”
Wilde, who had previous experience as a street medic, said she regrouped behind a car and continued to document throughout the night.
Afterwards, Wilde went to the hospital for an X-ray and learned that she had a “very deep bone bruise and possible hairline fracture.” She said she is unable to walk for prolonged periods of time and feels like she is “spraining it all over again” if her ankle is hit a certain way. She said she plans to return to the hospital for another X-ray soon.
DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers used pepper balls and tear gas to respond to an “assault” against the courthouse and law enforcement officers by rioters. The agency didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incidents.
The Portland police said in a statement that its officers weren’t present and didn’t engage with protesters that evening.
Independent journalist Garrison Davis was hit by a crowd-control munition fired by federal law enforcement officials while covering a protest outside the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse in Portland, Oregon, on July 21, 2020.
Davis was covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
On the night of July 21, the “Wall of Moms” and thousands of other demonstrators converged on the courthouse downton for another night of confrontations with the federal agents, according to the local KPTV news station. When some individuals began pulling off the plywood blocking access to the courthouse shortly after 11 p.m., federal agents emerged from the building to clear the area.
Shortly before midnight, Davis was hit in the thigh by a projectile as federal agents were moving back into the courthouse.
“As the Feds retreat into the courthouse they shoot tons of impact additions, like rubber bullets, towards anyone they see. I was hit pretty hard in the thigh,” he tweeted.
As the Feds retreat into the courthouse they shoot tons of impact additions, like rubber bullets, towards anyone they see. I was hit pretty hard in the thigh. #PortlandMoms #blacklivesmatter #protest #pdx #portland #oregon #blm #acab #PortlandProtest #PDXprotest #Feds #MOMTIFA pic.twitter.com/DsWHmdHV1z
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) July 22, 2020
The accompanying video, taken while Davis was standing behind a concrete pillar, shows the retreating federal agents shooting through tear gas.
Davis posted photos of his injury, which he said was sustained through “heavy duty” pants, in a follow-up tweet.
“I had to limp for a few days, it wasn’t pleasant,” Davis told the Tracker.
He does not believe that he was targeted. “I think I put myself in a position to get a good shot, and they were firing rubber bullets wildly in that direction and I got hit,” he said.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, said in a statement that officers were “forced” to leave the courthouse to repel a “mob” of protesters. DHS didn’t respond to a request for comment on this incident.
Journalist Fiorella Isabel Mayorca said she was caught in a cloud of tear gas and had guns pointed at her by law enforcement officers as she covered protests with her colleague in Portland, Oregon, on July 21, 2020. She also said officers smashed the windows of a van they were using.
Mayorca, the co-owner of The Convo Couch, a Los Angeles-based video news outlet, said she arrived in Portland two days earlier to cover protests that had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased.
Demonstrations against police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the U.S. since late May. They were sparked by a video showing the death of George Floyd, a Black man, while in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25.
Mayorca told the U.S Press Freedom Tracker she arrived at a demonstration at around 9:30 p.m. on July 20 outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, where federal law enforcement officers were stationed.
Mayorca and Craig Jardula, another co-owner of The Convo Couch, streamed live on YouTube for several hours, documenting the demonstration and interviewing protesters. They said that a little after midnight, they returned to a van parked nearby that they had been using as a media station and spot to rest and regroup. Dubbed the “Bernie Van,” it was owned by progressive activist David Crow and had been used as he independently campaigned for U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders during the recent Democratic primary. It was adorned with progressive slogans, including “Defund the Police.”
While inside the van at approximately 12:30 a.m., they saw what they believed were federal law enforcement officers in riot gear come out of the courthouse and start to throw tear gas canisters on the ground to push protesters back, Mayorca said.
Mayorca continued to film the scene when she said an officer saw them and alerted other agents to the van. Video shows an officer pointing a gun at the van before a group of officers approach, shine flashlights on them and hit the windows until they shatter.
Watch how the @theconvocouch team @yopasta & myself were inside the Berrnie Van, as feds descended upon us and began tear-gassing protestors. We couldn’t get out bc of the gas but we also couldn’t breathe. Feds then smashed the windows & pointed guns at us as the vid goes black. pic.twitter.com/jw0dOAeW22
— Fiorella Isabel🪓 ☭ ⚒🔥🕊 (@Fiorella_im) July 21, 2020
Mayorca said the officers told them to “Get the fuck out."
“They pointed guns at us,” she said. “It made me feel like they were the enemy, when they’re supposed to be putting in order, so to speak.”
The Tracker documented Jardula’s assault here.
While a number of federal agencies reportedly had officers in Portland in July, it wasn’t clear to Mayorca which agency the officers they encountered were from. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, did not respond to requests for comment.
After the van’s windows were smashed, Mayorca said they left the vehicle and shouted to the officers that they were members of the press.
“They did let us walk out, and we were able to get safely out of there,” Mayorca said.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Yuliya Olkhovskaya, the Washington, D.C., bureau chief for Russia’s Channel One, said that she and cameraman Viacheslav Arkhipov were assaulted by federal agents while covering protests against police violence in Portland, Oregon, on July 21, 2020.
Protests continued for months in downtown Portland in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. On the evening of July 21, demonstrators gathered outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. courthouse, where protesters held signs and sang songs, according to Olkhovskaya.
The gathering remained peaceful, she told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, until some new arrivals began to agitate the crowd. A Department of Homeland Security report about the evening describes several hours of violence, including attempts to set fire to the courthouse and break into its entrance.
Olkhovskaya said that as she observed the courthouse scene about 9 p.m., she felt a kick from behind. "It was completely unexpected because there had been no officers around. They came from the back doors," she told the Tracker. "One of them pushed me to the ground and I dropped my phone.”
Olkhovskaya said she and Arkhipov both had State Department-issued press badges visibly displayed and had a camera on a tripod nearby. “It was obvious we were a professional crew,” she said.
Arkhipov, who was hit with a baton and pushed to the ground, said federal agents snatched the camera from his hands and threw it to the ground. The Tracker documented his assault here.
Olkhovskaya said that she repeatedly yelled that she was press, but the officers never acknowledged that. She said one officer grabbed her helmet, threw it to the ground and pushed her away. After the officers left the area, she returned to the courthouse area, only to find a few remnants of the camera and no helmet.
"They destroyed it completely and intentionally," Olkhovskaya said. "I still don't understand why they broke our camera."
Olkhovskaya said she got scratches on her hands but they were able to file a story about the protest and their encounter with what the story described as “extremely aggressive” security forces.
According to an Izvestia news report, the Russian Federation sent official complaints to the United States about the Portland attack and another assault on Channel One journalists in Philadelphia in October. The Dec. 15, 2020, story said there had been no response from the U.S.
The Department of Homeland Security didn’t respond to a Tracker request for comment on the two Channel One incidents.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Cory Elia said he was hit with crowd-control munitions by federal law enforcement officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, during the early morning hours of July 20, 2020.
Cory Elia, co-host of a KBOO podcast and managing editor of the news site Village Portland, said federal agents threw tear gas canisters toward him despite being clearly identifiable as a member of the press.
The Portland-based journalist was covering one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man, while in police custody.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July.
At around 4:40 a.m., Elia was filming protesters near Southwest Salmon Street and Southwest Third Avenue downtown when he and his co-host, Lesley McLam, were hit by tear gas. Elia told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that several canisters landed near them.
Federal agents also fired munitions that “flew past our heads,” Elia said. “We were stuck on the corner and munitions were flying all around us, preventing our exiting the area.”
Elia, who wore press badges and clothing marked with the word “press,” said he was targeted despite yelling out at the officers that he was a journalist. The Tracker has documented McLam's assault here.
While a number of federal agencies had officers in Portland in July, it wasn’t clear which agency the officers were from. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Photojournalist Nathan Howard was hit by projectiles fired by federal law enforcement officials in the early hours of July 20, 2020, while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon.
Howard was hit by pepper balls while covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Howard gave declarations in support of the class action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, that led to the TRO.
In the early morning of July 20, Howard was covering federal officers clear protesters from the area outside the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, according to the ACLU declaration. One group of officers exited the courthouse and pushed protesters across Chapman Square to Southwest Fourth Avenue. Howard remained in the square to document a second group of federal agents, which then emerged from another federal building two blocks away. At the time, the only other people in Howard’s proximity were journalists, as the protesters had already dispersed.
When the second line of agents advanced north through the park, some of them turned their attention to Howard, he said in the filing. He held up his National Press Photographers Association press pass and shouted, “I’m press!” Then the agents told him to stay where he was.
After the two groups of officers merged, some agents once again noticed Howard, according to the filing. When he held up his press pass again and repeated that he was press, one of the agents told him to stay where he was. However, another agent fired at least two pepper balls at Howard at close range, he said. Howard then hid behind a tree until he felt safe to continue working.
Howard tweeted about the incident at 12:12 a.m., though he said in the declaration that it may have occurred just before midnight.
Myself and a few other photogs yelled press. Feds said "Okay just stay there," then shot me with pepper balls. Gee thanks guys.
— Nathan Howard (@SmileItsNathan) July 20, 2020
He told the Tracker that he had been wearing a puffy jacket, so the initial effect of the pepper ball was a mild sting. But he also experienced the full chemical effects of the projectiles.
Howard, who had been on assignment for ZUMA Press that day, said that he has no doubt that he was targeted. “During the 2020 Portland protests, I have been hit by pepper balls three times. The first two times, they were not obviously targeted at me, so I gave the police the benefit of the doubt. This time was radically different,” he wrote in his declaration.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Portland-based journalist Lesley McLam said she was hit with crowd-control munitions by federal law enforcement officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, during the early morning hours of July 20, 2020.
Lesley McLam, co-host of a KBOO podcast who also works with news site Village Portland, said federal agents threw tear gas canisters toward her and her co-host, Cory Elia. McLam said she was clearly identifiable as a member of the press.
The Portland-based journalists were filming one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man. A viral video showed a white police officer kneeling on Floyd’s neck during an arrest in Minneapolis. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a local hospital.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July.
At around 4:40 a.m., Elia and McLam were filming protesters near Southwest Salmon Street and Southwest Third Avenue downtown when several canisters landed near them, McLam told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. A livestream McLam posted on Twitter shows a standoff between protesters and federal agents.
McLam can be heard yelling out in the livestream that she is a member of the press who is exercising her constitutional rights in documenting the protest.
McLam, who wore press badges and marked herself as “press” on her clothing, said she was targeted despite yelling out at the officers that she was a journalist. Elia’s assault is documented by the Tracker here.
While a number of federal agencies had officers in Portland in July, McLam said she believes Border Patrol agents were present at the demonstration she covered because of the uniform patches she photographed. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Independent videographer Mason Lake said he was hit with crowd-control munitions by federal law enforcement officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, during the early morning hours of July 20, 2020.
Lake said federal officers hit him nine times with pepper balls, including three times in the head. He said he was clearly identifiable as a member of the press.
The Portland-based journalist was filming one of the many protests that broke out in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man, while in police custody.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July.
Around 2 a.m. or 3 a.m. on July 20, Lake was filming from the front lines of a protest near Southwest Salmon Street and Southwest Third Avenue downtown, where the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse is located, he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
Video posted by Lake on Twitter shows federal agents stationed in front of the courthouse advancing on the protesters and shooting munitions. As flash-bang grenades and tear gas canisters go off, a smoking canister can be seen flying back toward the officers.
Lake said that federal officers hit him nine times with pepper balls, which are projectiles roughly the size of paintballs that discharge an irritant when they hit a person. He was wearing a gas mask to protect himself from the pepper and tear gas, with the word “press” clearly displayed on his helmet and vest, he said.
“I felt three at my legs, and then three in my chest, and three in my face and visor,” Lake told the Tracker. “They targeted right for my face.”
Lake said the pepper balls interfered with his ability to document the protest. “That pepper stuff fades in and becomes a chemical burn, so I ended up leaving,” he said. “They’re paintballs filled with pepper. When they hit you, it’s like cutting onions times 10.”
While a number of federal agencies had officers in Portland in July, it wasn’t clear to Lake which agency the officers were from. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
A freelance photojournalist was hit by projectiles fired by federal law enforcement officials in the early hours of July 20, 2020, while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon.
Jungho Kim was hit by a pink paint projectile while covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Kim declared his support of the class action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, that led to the TRO.
At 12:05 a.m., Kim was standing between Chapman and Lownsdale squares after federal agents had cleared the area and formed a police line, he told the Tracker. He estimates that there were about 50 federal officers in the area, with the closest ones about 20 feet away from him.
“All of a sudden I felt this impact on my chest,” said Kim. “I looked down, and I was covered in pink paint.” He didn’t suffer any bodily harm from the impact, which he attributes his ballistic vest. The last photograph Kim took before he was hit shows a line of dozens of officers ahead of him, too far away to make out any identification.
At 12:20 a.m., Kim tweeted, “Portland Police are targeting journalists, including me (I'm okay, I'm wearing a ballistic vest). Do I look easy to mistake for anything other than press?” He clarified in a later tweet that he thought it was actually federal agents that shot him.
Portland Police are targeting journalists, including me (I'm okay, I'm wearing a ballistic vest). Do I look easy to mistake for anything other than press? @NPPA pic.twitter.com/vSk6e1YdRV
— Jungho Kim / 김정호 (@jkimphoto) July 20, 2020
The accompanying photo shows pink paint splattered on the reflective part of Kim’s neon yellow vest, where the word “press” is written in large letters. A press pass is hanging from a lanyard around his neck.
Kim isn’t sure who fired the rounds, but he believes he was targeted for being press. “The fact that I was shot in the chest, basically where it says press, I think that that’s pretty blatant,” he told the Tracker, noting that he was in a well-lit area with no protesters around.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Independent journalist Donovan Farley wrote that he was hit with projectiles fired by federal law enforcement officers while he was covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on July 19, 2020.
Farley was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Farley is involved in the class action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, which led to the TRO.
Farley wrote on Twitter that he took a projectile in the ribs.
“No one there was aggressive and I was just filming and holding up my press pass, fed essentially shot my pass,” he tweeted at 11:58 p.m.
My press pass was on my right hand this is where the munition hit me on the right side. He obviously shot directly at my press pass. pic.twitter.com/ppyS04w3Iy
— Donovan Farley (@DonovanFarley) July 20, 2020
“My press pass was on my right hand this is where the munition hit me on the right side. He obviously shot directly at my press pass,” Farley wrote in a followup tweet with a picture of the wound on his rib.
He had to cut his reporting short because he was having trouble breathing, according to a later tweet. Farley didn’t respond to a request for further comment.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, also didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Eddy Binford-Ross, a 17-year-old student journalist, said federal agents threw a stun grenade and tear gas canister at her on July 19, 2020, while she was covering protests in Portland, Oregon.
Binford-Ross, editor in chief at her high school student newspaper in Salem, Oregon, was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
July 19 marked the 53rd day of protests in Portland, Binford-Ross reported in her school paper, The Clypian. The protests had grown more intense with the arrival of federal law enforcement in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Binford-Ross is a plaintiff in the class action suit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon.
The mood at the demonstrations had felt positive at the start of the night, Binford-Ross told the Tracker. She was covering the second night of protests by the “Wall of Moms” outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, a nightly flashpoint for confrontations between protesters and federal agents.
Just before 10 p.m., law enforcement issued a warning to protesters who had been attempting to dismantle the fence around the courthouse, which the federal government considered crucial to its presence, according to a document obtained by Oregon Public Broadcasting. When the moms formed a barrier between protesters and the fence to de-escalate tensions, federal officers rushed out of the courthouse and pointed guns at protesters from the other side of the fence.
It was just before midnight when the stun grenade was thrown towards Binford-Ross, she said. After some protesters had taken down parts of the fence, agents deployed stun grenades and tear gas to push protesters back into the street. Binford-Ross had already begun to retreat into Chapman Square and was away from most protesters when the multi-port stun grenade landed near her. When she tried to move away, an agent threw a tear gas canister in her path.
“It was really inhumane,” Binford-Ross said. “It would be one thing if I was running towards officers, but I was running away from them, I was trying to get away from that situation.”
Her mother, Warren Binford, accompanied her and tweeted a video of the moment the stun grenade exploded. “The US #BorderPatrol threw this stun grenade at me & my minor daughter, both US citizens, while she was covering this local story,” her mother wrote.
The US #BorderPatrol threw this stun grenade at me & my minor daughter, both US citizens, while she was covering this local story again last night about the #Feds in #Portland for her high school newspaper @Clypian. This was the 2nd time in 3 days the Feds have thrown.... pic.twitter.com/IBh0n73tzJ
— Warren Binford (@childrightsprof) July 20, 2020
Another tweet shows the stun grenade marked “BORTAC,” which is an acronym for the U.S. Border Patrol Tactical Unit.
In addition to having press identification, Binford-Ross had added additional press markings since being targeted with crowd-control munitions the day before, including a helmet marked “press” on all four sides and pants with “press” written with reflective tape spelling down the leg
While she’d felt more prepared to cover that night’s demonstrations since beginning her protest coverage in Portland two nights before, she still has moments when the odors of tear gas come to her at random times. “It definitely takes a mental and emotional toll,” said Binford-Ross, who covered more than 30 BLM protests in Portland and Salem for the school paper over the summer. Her tweets about the protests were used by ABC, Reuters, Yahoo News and other outlets.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Independent photojournalist John Rudoff said he was hit with crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on July 19, 2020.
Rudoff was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Rudoff gave declarations in support of the class action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, that led to the TRO.
Rudoff was hit in the shoulder with a projectile while documenting federal agents emerging from the courthouse and shooting tear gas and munitions, he said in his declaration for the ACLU.
“Suddenly, and for no reason, a federal agent shot me in my right shoulder, inches from my head,” Rudoff wrote, adding that he believes he was hit with a 40mm rubber bullet. “The pain was so bad that I had to retreat into the park and stop documenting for around 15 minutes while I recovered.”
Rudoff said he felt targeted as press. “I have body armor that has ‘press’ on it in several-inch-high letters front and back, and a helmet that has ‘press’ on it in inch-high letters front and back,” he told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. “I intentionally stand away from crowds as best I can, and intentionally I’m dressed in light-colored clothing as much as possible.”
In the declaration, he also noted that he had two large professional cameras with him and was wearing a National Press Photographers Association press pass.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Photojournalist Alex Milan Tracy said he was hit with crowd-control munitions fired by federal law enforcement officers during a protest in Portland, Oregon, on July 19, 2020.
Tracy was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Tracy gave declarations in support of the class action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, that led to the TRO.
Shortly before midnight on July 19, Tracy was documenting federal officers as they launched a “barrage of tear gas” at protesters outside the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, according to his ACLU declaration.
“As I was taking video and photographing the chaos, a federal agent shot me in my left ankle joint with an impact munition round,” wrote Tracy, adding that he had been standing away from the protesters. “At the same time, I was consumed with tear gas and hit with pepper-balls on my right elbow.”
Tracy posted a video on Twitter capturing the moment he was hit. “I take a hit on my left ankle joint. Thanks to @SmileItsNathan and street medics for helping me out,” he tweeted, referencing fellow freelance photojournalist Nathan Howard.
I take a hit on my left ankle joint. Thanks to @SmileItsNathan and street medics for helping me out. pic.twitter.com/pTeW3rZNK3
— Alex Milan Tracy (@AlexMilanTracy) July 20, 2020
Howard, who was also shot by pepper balls after midnight, posted a video of Tracy being treated by medics. “Journalist @AlexMilanTracy is hurt. Less lethal to leg. Medics with him now. He says he's ok,” he tweeted. Howard’s assault was documented by the Tracker here.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Independent journalist Jake Johnson was hit with projectiles fired by federal law enforcement officers while they were covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on July 19, 2020.
Johnson was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Johnson is involved in the class action lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, which led to the TRO.
On the night of July 19, Johnson was hit in the stomach by a projectile fired by a federal officer. He was standing in Chapman Square, near the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, when he was hit by an agent retreating toward the courthouse. At that point, most of the protesters were on Southwest Main Street or in Lownsdale Square, a park area next to Chapman Square and across from the courthouse.
Toward the end of a video taken by journalist Robert Evans and retweeted by Johnson at 10:38 p.m., Johnson can be seen standing on a diagonal path that runs through Chapman Square.
You can watch me get shot here in addition to two hours and 38 minutes or so of other high quality content and commentary from @IwriteOK. You can see me get shot if you start watching at 2:33:00 I get shot around halfway through that minute. 1/2 https://t.co/KmdFV935jl
— Jake “wear a mask” Johnson (@FancyJenkins) July 20, 2020
“I’m walking down the diagonal path very slowly because I’m not trying to startle any officers by rushing at them. I’m giving them plenty of time to see I’m approaching slowly, they can see that I’m press, the park is lit up,” Johnson told the Tracker, noting that his helmet says “press” on five sides.
Around 2:33:30 into Evans’s video, Johnson can be heard groaning as he gets hit in the stomach. He then kneels down to try and retrieve the projectile. “Based on the injury and the bruising pattern, my best guess is that it was a rubber bullet,” he said.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, also didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Freelance journalist Laura Jedeed said she was hit in the leg by a projectile fired by federal law enforcement while she covered a protest in downtown Portland, Oregon, on July 18, 2020.
Jedeed, a contributor to Portland Monthly and Willamette Weekly, was covering one of many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July.
In the early morning hours of July 18, Jedeed was covering a demonstration near the Mark O. Hetfield federal courthouse, where federal officers were stationed. Throughout the night, she told the Tracker, demonstrators “would hang out in front of the courthouse. And then without warning, the feds emerge, [tear] gas the hell out of people and then go back in.”
In one instance around 12:30 a.m., federal officers fired tear gas and rubber bullets, driving protesters north of the courthouse. “They were firing everything and the kitchen sink at protesters retreating down the street,” Jedeed said.
While Jedeed was on Southwest Second Avenue, north of the courthouse, a projectile hit her in the leg. “This was while they were peppering the people who were fleeing with rubber bullets. [But] I don’t know what I was struck with,” she said. “I felt it hit me. And I kept running. After they were done chasing us, I looked down and saw I was bleeding quite a lot.”
A picture of the wound Jedeed posted on Twitter later that morning, shows her bloody leg with a small hole in it.
I want to clarify that although I'm not sure what I was shot with, it wasn't live ammo. Maybe a rubber bullet?
— Laura Jedeed (Misanthrophile) (@1misanthrophile) July 18, 2020
Whatever it was, I'm definitely gonna have a cool scar to remind me of how Trump's private army conducts itself https://t.co/IuZgdbbD0Y
Jedeed said she was clearly marked as press, wearing a press badge and a neon yellow vest with the words “press” on it. However, she said she didn’t think she was specifically targeted, calling the law enforcement response “indiscriminate.”
Jedeed wasn’t sure what federal agency fired the projectile that struck her. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Blair Stenvick, a reporter for the Portland Mercury, said they were assaulted by police on July 18, 2020, while covering protests in the Oregon city against police brutality and racial inequality.
Stenvick suffered abrasions and an ankle injury after getting pushed by police during a bull-rush of a crowd of protesters, despite a recent court order that had specifically prohibited Portland police from harming or impeding journalists.
The night of July 18 marked a string of continuous demonstrations in Portland for at least the previous 50 days following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
As one group of protesters returned to the main focus of ongoing demonstrations, the Multnomah County Justice Center and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, Stenvick went to cover another protest outside the Portland Police Association office in North Portland.
As soon as Stenvick arrived, the situation escalated. Individuals had set a fire inside the PPA office, prompting the Portland police to declare a riot just before 11 p.m.
In an interview with the Tracker, Stenvick describes seeing police use rubber bullets and smoke canisters. “I was always having to walk the line of trying to look out for my own safety but still being able to document things as well as I could,” Stenvick said.
At that point, Stenvick backed away and followed directions by police. While taking pictures from the outskirts of the gathering, Stenvick noticed that protesters had suddenly started running. Stenvick looked back and saw police in riot gear bull-rushing protesters.
“I could tell in that moment that I was already in danger, and so I started running also, following police orders,” Stenvick told the Tracker. “Also putting my hands up in the air just to show that I wanted to comply with orders and not be a threat to them.”
Stenvick said they yelled to the police, “I’m press! I’m press!” before being shoved to the ground.
“[It was] unnecessary [for them] to hit me because I was already running away, and wasn’t there as a protester,” said Stenvick, who had also been wearing a press pass. “Very clearly I wasn’t a threat to them, so [there] was a mix of ... anger, shock and disbelief.”
At around 11 p.m., Stenvick tweeted a picture of their abrasions on the knee and hand.
Police just cleared the crowd. I was running full speed easy and got pushed from behind by a PPB officer. Fortunately I just got scraped. pic.twitter.com/zoKmIEUIvS
— Blair Stenvick (@BlairStenvick) July 19, 2020
While Stenvick didn’t report this specific incident to police, they are involved in a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon in June. The Portland Mercury is one of several plaintiffs in the case, which led to the city agreeing to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work. Stenvick provided testimony about a separate incident as part of the preliminary injunction.
Derek Carmon, a spokesman for the Portland Police Bureau, was unable to comment on this incident due to the ongoing litigation.
After the incident, Stenvick resolved to use the experience as a lesson about empathy. “Journalists ... use their own life experiences to relate to other people, so just seeing for myself — even just in that one instance — what it’s like to be unjustly treated by a police officer, I think that’s helpful for me to have some tiny little piece of understanding when covering these issues,” Stenvick told the Tracker.
Eddy Binford-Ross, a 17-year-old student journalist, said federal agents threw a flash-bang grenade toward her on July 18, 2020, while she was covering protests in Portland, Oregon.
Binford-Ross, editor in chief at her high school student newspaper in Salem, Oregon, said flash-bang grenades landed near her on two separate occasions that night — one before midnight on July 17 and one after — but only the second one seemed targeted at her. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, which documents assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd, considers a targeted crowd-control incident an assault.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Binford-Ross is a plaintiff in the class action suit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon.
July 17 was the first night Binford-Ross had covered the Portland protests since federal agents had been deployed to the city. The first flash-bang grenade incident occurred shortly after 10 p.m., she said.
Demonstrators had gathered around 7 p.m. at the Multnomah County Justice Center for a candlelight vigil. Binford-Ross was outside the Justice Center when federal agents started ordering people to move. “Anyone who stepped into the street [got] shot with their crowd-control munitions,” she told the Tracker.
Binford-Ross moved down a block, where she met two acquaintances from Salem who were livestreaming the events. They were half a block away from protesters when a federal agent threw the flash-bang grenade over the wall near her. “There wasn’t any warning or anything...it was like 10 feet away from us...it was a blinding shock,” Binford-Ross said, adding she was temporarily deafened.
The second flash-bang grenade was thrown sometime after 1:30 a.m., as federal agents were advancing on protesters in Chapman Square. Binford-Ross was standing off to the side away from the protesters, she said, wearing press identification around her neck and carrying a large camera.
As federal agents advanced on the crowd with guns drawn, one of them threw a flash-bang grenade towards her that exploded near her feet, stunning and deafening her again. “They shot right towards me...it came within 10 feet of me again,” Binford-Ross said.
She was recording at the time, and her mother, Warren Binford, posted the video on Twitter. “These are concussive devices & they targeted a child,” her mother wrote.
Our young daughter (a #studentjournalist) had this #flashbang shot at her by the #Feds & #portland police last night even though she was staying on the perimeter, wearing her press credentials & completely law abiding. These are concussive devices & they targeted a child. Shame! pic.twitter.com/DWUk2ef86H
— Warren Binford (@childrightsprof) July 18, 2020
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
“It doesn't seem like something that would happen in the U.S.,” Binford-Ross said. “It felt like something you would experience in a war zone, especially when the people who are shooting the munitions towards you are unidentifiable federal agents, from undisclosed federal agencies and they’re in camo, like soldiers.”
Binford-Ross, who covered more than 30 BLM protests in Portland and Salem for her school paper, The Clypian, over the summer, said she never planned on a career in journalism until she saw the value of reporting during this time. “It was a real lesson in perseverance and dedication and also personal safety,” said Binford-Ross, who said her tweets about the protests were used by ABC, Reuters, Yahoo News and other outlets.
Freelance journalist Andrew Jankowski was arrested by police officers while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on July 17, 2020, a day after a judge issued a preliminary injunction to block the Portland Police Bureau from arresting or targeting journalists.
Jankowski was covering the protests that broke out in Portland in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. For more than six weeks, nightly protests had taken hold in downtown Portland, escalating tensions and violence between protesters, Portland police and federal officers. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In the early morning hours of July 17, Jankowski was covering a protest at Southeast 47th Avenue and East Burnside Street, outside of the Penumbra Kelly Building, which houses the PPB’s crime-prevention and neighborhood-involvement units as well as space for the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office. Jankowski told the Tracker he recalled two dispersal orders from Portland police officers ordering protesters to move west.
“I guess they [officers] decided that we weren’t moving fast enough and did what’s come to be known as a bull rush,” Jankowski. “Out of nowhere, they run at people and start shoving.”
As protesters and officers scattered in different directions, Jankowski felt someone push him. He believed it was an officer.
“I yelled ‘Media!’ while I ran, and even screamed the word as they twisted my wrist behind my back to take away my phone,” Jankowski wrote in an article for the Portland Mercury. “People from across the street saw I was wearing a press pass. I tried making it easier for the officer to zip tie me, and was told to stop resisting.”
He said he had thought ahead to wear a protective vest, which absorbed most of the impact, but he still sustained cuts and scrapes on his hands. Officers also grabbed his backpack, which was later destroyed.
A video documented and tweeted by Nicholas Lee, an independent photographer and videographer, shows Jankowski being held by officers at around 12:50 a.m. A few seconds into the video, officers can be seen shining a bright light into Lee’s lens, hampering him from capturing the footage.
As Lee continues to film, he shouts, “Are you press?” Jankowski responds with a “Yes” and his name. A bystander can be heard asking, “Have they told you why they are arresting you?” to which Jankowski replies “No.”
Jankowski said he believed the officers answered the question about his charges only because protesters were demanding it. But at that moment, he was still in shock and couldn’t fully understand what the officers were saying. The PPB announced later that morning that Jankowski was booked for disorderly conduct and interfering with a peace officer.
“I don’t know if I was targeted, but once they knew who I was, they still weren’t letting me go,” Jankowski said, noting that he had a large press pass taped to his chest. In a photograph Jankowski shared with the Portland Mercury, he can be seen with a sign taped on his chest that had “freelance journalist” written across the top along with logos of the Portland Mercury and other news outlets.
The officers brought Jankowski to the Penumbra Kelly building, where they removed the press pass from his chest, cutting through the line that read “Freelance journalist,” he said. He was finally processed at 3:44 a.m. at the Multnomah County Justice Center and released about six hours later, with the two charges pending.
“Through their questions, I came to realize that the officers questioning me didn’t understand, or didn’t want to understand, how freelance journalism works,” he wrote. “I felt they were trying to provoke, intimidate, and belittle me when they asked why an arts writer was reporting on protests.”
PPB spokesman Derek Carmon declined to comment on Jankowski’s arrest, citing continuing litigation.
When Jankowski went to court in September, he learned that the district attorney had declined to prosecute him, but that the case could still be reopened in the future. He also received a notice from the PPB regarding a complaint that he had allegedly filed. He said that while he hasn’t filed a dispute, he is currently working with a lawyer to potentially file a civil case.
Since the incident, Jankowski has gone to physical therapy for his wrist and wore a brace for several months, he said. In the Portland Mercury, he wrote about experiencing “bizarre trauma responses,” claustrophobia and paranoia.
Independent journalist Garrison Davis said federal law enforcement officers shot crowd-control munitions at him on two different occasions on July 17, 2020, while he was covering protests outside a federal building in downtown Portland, Oregon.
The Portland-based journalist was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
In the early hours of July 17, Davis was filming federal agents returning to the building, which houses the local offices of the Internal Revenue Service and other federal departments. “They just started shooting at the press with mainly pepper bullets because we could see them breaking on the fence,” Davis told the Tracker, referring to the fence that was in place to prevent protesters from entering the closed city parks.
At 1:07 a.m., Davis tweeted a video showing officers shooting pepper balls towards him and other journalists from across the intersection of Southwest Madison Street and Southwest Third Avenue. “DHS shooting at press. There were no protesters behind me. I have press on my helmet and am holding out my press pass,” he wrote in the post. Davis told the Tracker that none of the pepper balls made direct contact with him, but landed around him.
DHS shooting at press. There were no protesters behind me. I have press on my helmet and am holding out my press pass. #Teargas #blacklivesmatter #protest #pdx #portland #oregon #blm #acab #PortlandProtest #justicecenter #riotribs pic.twitter.com/gVnp0NPsmv
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) July 17, 2020
Later, when Davis returned to the same area to cover that evening’s protests, federal agents staged at the federal building fired on the crowd. A pepper grenade hit his hand and the iPhone he was using as a camera, he told the Tracker. One of his fingers was bloodied, and he was coated in pepper dust, as Davis documented in a video he tweeted at 10:17 p.m.
I am alright, just covered in some type of dust and my hand is sore. #blacklivesmatter #protest #pdx #portland #oregon #blm #acab #PortlandProtest #PDXprotest #justicecenter #Feds pic.twitter.com/dMA5NjxD2w
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) July 18, 2020
Davis said his phone was covered in pepper dust, which became activated when his hands got sweaty. “So that was awful and I had to get medical care because it was really bad,” he said. “It took multiple days to wash off all the pepper dust.”
Given the size of the crowd, Davis doesn’t believe he was targeted as press in that instance. A member of the Portland Press Corps that uses the group’s Twitter handle @45thabsurdist was also affected by the grenade and posted footage of when it hit.
“It was an explosion that covered @hungrybowtie and me with a powder that is fine until it contacted sweat or water which is when it started burning. Stay away from those,” wrote @45thabsurdist in a follow-up tweet, referring to Davis’ Twitter handle.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Documentary photographer Rian Dundon was on assignment for the Economic Hardship Reporting Project on July 17, 2020, when a federal officer targeted him with crowd-control munitions while he was covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, according to a lawsuit the photographer filed in 2022.
Protests had been held in Portland on almost a nightly basis since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May. The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documented assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering BLM protests across the country.
Dundon filed a lawsuit against the regional director of the Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, and more than 100 federal officers in April 2022. Dundon declined to comment on advice from counsel.
According to the suit, Dundon was standing alone on the sidewalk of SW Madison Street between 3rd and 4th avenues, while the nearest group of protesters was half a block away outside the Edith Green-Wendell Wyatt Federal Building.
Dundon noticed several federal officers positioned among the shrubbery around a nearby plaza so he approached to take a picture through the chain-link fence separating the sidewalk from the park.
“When he raised his camera to photograph the scene, a DHS agent trained his weapon on Plaintiff and fired several rounds of pepper balls, striking the fence and sidewalk near his feet,” the lawsuit states. “The pepper balls exploded on contact and released a powder into the air. They came in direct contact with Plaintiff, causing him injury.”
The lawsuit alleges that the officers violated Dundon’s First and Fourth Amendment rights and restricted his ability to cover the protests. Neither Dundon’s attorneys nor DHS responded to requests for additional information.
“Targeting journalists was not a quirk of the federal enforcement efforts, it was one of its objectives,” the suit alleges. “DOJ and DHS agents could have completed the objectives of their response without causing harm to Plaintiff.”
Dundon is seeking noneconomic, economic and punitive damages in the lawsuit.
A portion of the lawsuit documentary photographer Rian Dundon filed against a regional director of the Department of Homeland Security, others alleging he was assaulted twice while covering protests in Portland in July 2020.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:22-cv-00594,['ONGOING'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2021-03-23 16:13:58.680903+00:00,2022-02-08 21:33:49.002523+00:00,Independent journalist assaulted by police while covering Portland protests in July,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-journalists-say-they-were-assaulted-by-police-as-they-covered-portland-protests-in-july/,2022-02-08 21:33:48.944357+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Alissa Azar (Freelance),,2020-07-16,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent journalist Alissa Azar said she was assaulted by Portland police while covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, on July 16, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out across the country in response to police violence following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to apply the ban to federal agents later that month.
Journalist Griffin Malone — whose work has appeared on PBS, ABC and The Associated Press — told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was reporting outside the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Department Office with Azar and two National Lawyers Guild observers when the deputies rushed out of the sheriff’s office. Amid the rush, officers pushed Azar and kicked her ankle, according to Malone
Azar told the Tracker that she was also hit on the ankle by a flash-bang grenade, which drew blood. She also said she had bruises across her legs from being hit with crowd-control munitions.
Azar told the Tracker she was wearing a vest and helmet, both labeled with press markings, as well as a credential from Pacific Northwest Press Corps, which describes itself as an association of independent journalists covering ongoing protests in Portland and other parts of the Pacific Northwest.
When reached for comment in the fall of 2020, the Portland Police Bureau told the Tracker it wouldn’t comment on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesman Derek Carmon said the department was committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review. The PPB did not respond to a request for comment about these specific incidents as of press time.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Independent journalist Griffin Malone says he was assaulted by Portland police while covering protests in downtown Portland, Oregon, on July 16, 2020.
The protests were among many demonstrations that broke out across the country in response to police violence following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis.
Law enforcement officers in Portland had targeted journalists since the outbreak of the demonstrations, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The case resulted in a temporary restraining order on July 2 barring the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists, which was expanded to apply the ban to federal agents later that month.
Journalist Griffin Malone — whose work has appeared on PBS, ABC and The Associated Press — told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was reporting outside the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Department Office when deputies rushed out of the building to disperse the crowd.
Twenty minutes after the initial rush and a handful of arrests, Malone said he was standing with independent journalist Alissa Azar and two National Lawyers Guild observers when the deputies rushed out of the sheriff’s office again. Amid the rush, officers pushed Azar and kicked her ankle, according to Malone. Azar’s assault is documented here.
Malone told the Tracker he routinely wears press identification, a yellow vest and a helmet marked “PRESS” to identify himself while covering protests.
Malone said he attempted to help Azar walk as deputies continued pushing the crowd back, when an officer deliberately shoved him. Moments later, he felt a pain in his leg.
“I’m not sure what the pain was from,” Malone said. “Someone next to me said they saw it was [a deputy’s] baton, but in the videos that I’ve seen you can’t really see clearly what happened so I’m not sure.”
Malone said a deputy continued shoving Malone, Azar and the lawyers guild observers until he was replaced by a second officer, who Malone said was “a bit more respectful of the press.”
When reached for comment in the fall of 2020, the Portland Police Bureau told the Tracker it wouldn’t comment on specific incidents, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case. Then in early 2021, PPB spokesman Derek Carmon said the department was committed to upholding civil rights for all citizens, including by requiring officers to report any use of force for review. The PPB did not respond to a request for comment about these specific incidents as of press time.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
A federal law enforcement officer fired a tear gas canister toward freelance journalist Justin Yau on July 15, 2020 in Portland, Oregon, striking him with two burning fragments.
Yau, a student at the University of Portland whose work has been featured by the Daily Mail and The New York Times, was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement after the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Yau provided a declaration in support of the suit and deferred additional comment to that declaration.
In the early hours of July 15, Yau was covering a protest outside the Multnomah County Justice Center and the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse downtown, according to his declaration. He was taking photographs with a Nikon camera and filming on his cellphone and gimbal. He was also clearly marked as press, with a neon reflective vest and helmet reading “press” in block letters as well as a press pass around his neck.
A few minutes before 4 a.m., Yau was filming and photographing protesters at the intersection of Southwest Third Avenue and Southwest Main Street as they were pushed north by federal agents, according to the court filing. He was standing about 40 feet from the protesters as federal agents fired on the crowd with flash-bang grenades, pepper balls and tear gas. Although Yau was covering the protest from a distance, a federal agent fired a tear gas canister directly at him, he said, striking him with burning fragments.
Independent journalist Garrison Davis captured part of the shooting in a video he posted on Twitter around 5 a.m.
Shortly after, Yau replied to Davis’ tweet with his own post, saying, “It was 2 pieces of burning fragments from the Teargas grenades that landed briefly on my arm and jeans. The burning pieces can be seen briefly on the ground.”
“I have covered protests in Hong Kong, where a totalitarian regime is suppressing protesters with brutal violence,” Yau said in the court filing. “Even Hong Kong police, however, were generally conscientious about differentiating between press and protesters.”
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Photojournalist Mathieu Lewis-Rolland was hit with multiple rounds of non-lethal projectiles fired by federal agents while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 12, 2020.
Protests have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
At 1:58 a.m. on July 12, Lewis-Rolland began filming live on Facebook, documenting as federal agents emerged from the U.S. Courthouse and started moving the crowd toward the west. About one minute into the video, a federal officer can be seen raising his gun at Lewis-Rolland, but not firing. When Lewis-Rolland reached the intersection of Southwest Fourth Avenue and Southwest Main Street, about a block from the Courthouse, he turned to take a photograph of a teargas canister rolling into the intersection when he was shot multiple times. The impact of the non-lethal plastic munitions ripped his T-shirt in at least two places.
In a declaration in support of the ACLU lawsuit that led to the TRO, Lewis-Rolland said that one or more federal agents shot him 10 times with impact munitions. He shared photographs of his injuries with the ACLU, including one large laceration and two smaller contusions on his right side, a laceration on his right elbow, two large lacerations on his back and four smaller contusions on his left side. Munitions recovered from the intersection are also pictured.
These are some of the #munitions I recovered from the intersection at sw 4th and Main in #PortlandOregon where I was targeted and shot 10 times. pic.twitter.com/OUkOAEXR35
— Mathieu Lewis-Rolland (@MathieuLRolland) July 16, 2020
“I was not posing any type of threat to Agent Doe or anyone else. I was not even facing him,” Lewis-Rolland said in the declaration.
While a number of federal agencies had officers in Portland in July, it wasn’t clear which agency the officers were from. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
A journalist with Full Revolution Media said he was hit with a crowd-control munition by federal officers while covering a protest in the early morning hours of July 12, 2020, in downtown Portland, Oregon.
The demonstration was among the many that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The protest, which began on the night of July 11 and stretched past midnight, took place near the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse, a frequent focus of demonstrators, according to local news outlet KATU. Protesters faced off with federal officers, who deployed crowd control munitions and CS gas, an aerosol and type of tear gas.
John, the Full Revolution Media journalist, told the Tracker that at approximately 1:49 a.m., he was hit in the shoulder and armpit with an impact munition fired by federal officers. He was about a half block away from the corner of Southwest Third Avenue and Southwest Salmon Street, near the district courthouse.
"When coming out of [the] courthouse they would deploy gas and shoot pepper balls...often shooting through clouds of tear gas," said John, who asked that his last name not be used out of safety concerns.
John, whose helmet has large “press” markings on the front and back, said he felt targeted, since he was standing alone. “Nothing was really happening in my area by park bathrooms, and I was uphill from [the] federal courthouse," he said.
John sustained bruising and minor abrasions on his shoulder, he said.
The Department of Homeland Security, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Independent journalist Garrison Davis was struck by a tear gas canister fired by federal agents while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of July 12, 2020.
Protests have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests, held nightly since late May, had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23.
Around 12:40 a.m., Davis was filming in Lownsdale Square across from the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse when he was shot in the back with a teargas canister, he told the Tracker. The canister fell into his messenger bag, soaking Davis and his bag with gas and nearly catching the bag on fire.
Davis, who described both of these incidents in a declaration for the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon in support of expanding the TRO to cover federal agents, said he believes that he was targeted by federal troops: “There wasn’t really anyone by me,” said Davis, whose helmet is marked “press.” In a video tweeted by Davis that captures the moment he was hit, he can be heard cursing and fumbling as bystanders help to remove the canister from his bag.
Protesters using Hong Kong tactics to put out a canister, then officers deploy a canister, hitting me with it and it falling into my bag. I have PRESS marked on my helmet. #teargas #blacklivesmatter #pdx #portlandoregon #oregon #blm #acab #portland #justicecenter #teargas pic.twitter.com/bMSrtQyNGr
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) July 12, 2020
About 15 minutes later, Davis tweeted another video showing a line of federal agents deploying munitions towards the park from across the street. “More teargas being deployed in the street and park. Officers trying to shoot me as I record. There were no protesters behind me as they shot in my direction,” Davis wrote in the post.
He felt targeted once again. “I had my camera up and I’m walking around with my camera up, both hands are on my camera the whole time,” Davis told the Tracker. “It’s very clear what I’m doing, but I was continuing to get shot at when no one was around me.”
While a number of federal agencies had officers in Portland in July, it wasn’t clear which agency the officers were from. The Department of Homeland Security, which coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Independent journalist Ari Taylor told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was assaulted and detained by federal officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on July 2, 2020.
Taylor, who was livestreaming for Halospace Community Media and filming for the Grassroots Activist International Association, was documenting one of the many protests that have been ongoing for months in Portland and across the U.S. in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25. The Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
The Portland protests had grown more intense as the presence of federal law enforcement increased in early July. A temporary restraining order on July 2 that barred the Portland police from harming or impeding journalists wasn’t expanded to include federal agents until July 23. Taylor said she is participating in a separate class-action suit against federal officers and Chad Wolf, former acting secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, for using excessive force against protesters.
On the night of July 2, several hundred protesters gathered outside of the Multnomah County Justice Center, according to local news station KGW. After several demonstrators broke into the building, federal agents emerged to clear the area around 11:42, according to a Portland Police Bureau report. The Portland police declared a riot about 10 minutes later.
Taylor told the Tracker that right before the riot was declared, she was filming a glass door that had been shattered during an altercation between federal officers and a shirtless individual. According to Taylor, the officers were pushing down on the door and broke it, but the individual was arrested for the incident.
"They [officers] had shoved another member of the press with their shield, and I had gone to help him up," Taylor said. "Then they went after the shirtless individual, and I turned around to get his arrest. I had my back to the officers and was filming the crowd, and that's when they attacked me."
In a video taken by independent journalist Eric Greatwood and posted on YouTube, at about the one-minute mark, several officers can be seen pulling Taylor across the courthouse entrance and into the building amidst clouds of purple smoke and yelling from the crowd. At the 1:45 mark in another video, it is clear that Taylor is being dragged by her arm and leg. Another video shows Taylor's camera footage intercut with another individual's footage, and she can be seen being dragged up the stairs around the 0:50 mark.
Taylor said the officers pulled her across a pile of broken glass, damaging her DSLR camera and lens in the process.
Once inside the building, Taylor identified a mix of officers from the Portland police, DHS, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, based on their uniforms and badges, she told the Tracker. They brought her to a holding facility on the third floor, she said, but wouldn’t tell her what she was being charged with.
"A male officer patted me down and searched me," said Taylor. "Every hour, they'd come in and I'd ask to talk to a lawyer and they wouldn't let me."
Around 5:30 a.m., the officers released her without any paperwork or rationale as to why she was detained, said Taylor, adding that they only stated, "We may be talking later."
"They still have my gimbal," she said, referring to a mechanical stabilizer for her camera. She said the officers had confiscated all her belongings, including her backpack, gas mask and camera equipment when they searched her. "There's nothing to be held accountable. I have no paperwork to prove that I was ever in their facilities."
At the time, Taylor had press credentials stating the organizations she was affiliated with, she said. She tweeted photos of numerous bruises, cuts and scrapes sustained from the incident, and said she ended up going to the hospital for treatment of injuries to her hip, back and foot.
This just my view and one other persons view there are many other views of my federal kidnapping that you can watch. I was given no paper work and still don’t have all my stuff. I had many injuries but I will post pictures of a few. https://t.co/9hWBP4LCEe pic.twitter.com/oiAfVAkyec
— Pdx Peoples News (@PdxPeoples) July 17, 2020
The DHS, which has coordinated the federal presence in Portland, didn’t respond to a request for comment about the incident.
Freelance journalist Justin Yau was arrested on July 1, 2020, while filming the arrest of a protester in northeast Portland, Oregon.
Yau, a student at the University of Portland whose work has been featured by the Daily Mail and The New York Times, was covering one of the many protests that had broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Law enforcement officers in Portland have targeted journalists since the start of nightly demonstrations in late May, according to a class-action lawsuit filed in June by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. Yau is a plaintiff in the suit, which led to a U.S. District Court judge issuing a temporary restraining order the day after his arrest that barred police from arresting or harming journalists. The city later agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not arrest, harm or impede the work of journalists or legal observers of the protests.
In the early hours of July 1, Yau was following a group of protesters moving toward the North Precinct of the Portland Police Bureau. The police had earlier declared a riot and dispersed the protesters shortly after 10 p.m., and the group had reassembled.
Yau told the Tracker that the crowd he was following made visual contact with a police riot line at around 12:45 a.m. at the intersection of Northeast Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Northeast Killingsworth Street. Police pushed the crowd westward. “I was about like 30 feet away from the police line and I was walking away following instructions and I was on the sidewalk matching their pace,” said Yau.
As they moved down Killingsworth toward Northeast Mallory Avenue, Yau observed a protester walking slowly with their hands up. Then he heard police warn the protester to get out of the street faster, followed by an order to arrest them. He began to film the arrest on his cellphone. But when the police charged forward, Yau didn’t initially realize they were taking him into custody as well.
Yau was tackled from his right side and fell on his left side on top of his camera and the gimbal he used to stabilize it. His phone flew out of his hands and was permanently damaged, though still working. “I just went limp and didn’t say anything,” he told the Tracker.
Freelance photojournalist Alex Milan Tracy captured video of Yau’s arrest. The video shows Yau being cuffed on the ground. “The person that you are arresting clearly is identified as press from his helmet,” Tracy could be heard telling the officers, who didn’t respond. “Why are you arresting a member of the press?”
I question officers actions as police arrest an identifiable member of the press @PDocumentarians near NE Killingsworth and Mallory. pic.twitter.com/AqMQ5kvm3q
— Alex Milan Tracy (@AlexMilanTracy) July 1, 2020
In addition to wearing a helmet marked as “press,” Yau said he had a glow vest attached to a backpack labeled “press.” He was also wearing neutral colors to distinguish him from protesters, who are often in all black.
Tracy also captured footage of one of the arresting officers putting his backpack in a bag and escorting him into a police van. The restraining order required the police “to return any seized equipment or press passes immediately upon release of a person from custody,” but Yau’s equipment was not returned until July 6, according to the ACLU claim.
Yau appears to be limping in the second video from the impact of landing on his knee during the arrest. “My left knee was kind of in a lot of pain throughout booking, I couldn’t sleep,” he told the Tracker.
The reason given for Yau’s arrest was felony riot and interfering with a peace officer — this resulted in a no-complaint charge after the district attorney decided not to press charges.
Yau believes he was targeted for being press, a view shared by Tracy, who referenced Yau’s arrest in a declaration for the ACLU suit. “It seemed to me that the police were specifically targeting and retaliating against reporters for seeking to enforce out First Amendment protections,” said Tracy.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Portland photojournalist Alex Milan Tracy said the Portland Police Bureau seized his GoPro camera “as evidence” when he was covering a protest outside the police union office in the Oregon city’s North Portland neighborhood on June 30, 2020.
The protest was one of the many that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
Tracy was documenting a protest near the Portland Police Association on North Lombard Street “when the police declared an unlawful assembly and charged at the crowd,” he said in a declaration on behalf of a class action suit the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon filed against the PBB in June. Tracy is a plaintiff in the suit, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city in July not to arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
While Tracy was running, his GoPro Hero 8 fell out of a pouch on his waist, he said in the claim. “One officer told me that it would be seized ‘as evidence’ because it was behind the police line at this point,” he said, adding that the police prevented him from looking for the camera. Tracy wasn’t available to comment.
In a video Tracy tweeted after the incident, he says to the camera: “Moments ago, during a police charge, a GoPro camera that I use for newsgathering purposes, fell out of my pocket attached to my waist and has been taken by the police as evidence. I do not condone this act, and I would appreciate if I could get my camera back without having to go through the evidence office downtown.”
He got his camera back from the PPB Property Warehouse on July 2.
Independent journalist Tuck Woodstock said they were pushed several times and hit by crowd-control munitions while covering protests in Portland, Oregon on June 30, 2020.
The Portland-based journalist was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over Floyd’s death began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a curfew that lasted three days. Even after the nightly curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. Woodstock is a plaintiff in the suit, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city in July not to arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
The June 30 demonstration took place the day before a planned vote to extend the city’s contract with the police union. Protesters marched over a mile from Peninsula Park to the Portland Police Association headquarters in North Portland.
Soon after protesters arrived at PPA offices around 9 p.m., the police declared an “unlawful assembly” and ordered them to disperse. When Woodstock arrived just after 9:30 p.m., the scene involved police pushing protesters and the press and shooting impact munitions at the crowd, they said.
“I got to the PPA just in time to watch PPB shoving protesters, NLG, and press while insisting that they walk faster,” Woodstock tweeted at 9:26 p.m. In the accompanying video, the camera goes askew as police push people around Woodstock.
About a half hour later, Woodstock was pushed several times when police bull-rushed a crowd of protesters. While trying to film the arrest of some protesters, Woodstock “felt a baton pressed into their back as an officer yelled ‘move, move, move, move,’ directly in their ear,” according to court documents in the ACLU case. Despite informing an officer that they were press, Woodstock was pushed at least four times, the filing said.
Then, a little after 10 p.m., Woodstock was hit by shrapnel from a canister police threw that appeared to explode on the curb in front of them. Woodstock tweeted a video of the incident, writing, “Yup just got hit in the leg with shrapnel. Seems very superficial.”
Yup just got hit in the leg with shrapnel. Seems very superficial. pic.twitter.com/2KqSIgwRDI
— Tuck Woodstock (@tuckwoodstock) July 1, 2020
Woodstock declined to comment further about the incidents.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Independent journalist Eric Greatwood was hit in the groin by a crowd-control projectile while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on June 30, 2020.
The Portland-based journalist was documenting one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over Floyd’s death began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a curfew that lasted three days. Even after the nightly curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The suit resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city in July not to arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
The June 30 demonstration took place the day before a planned vote to extend the city’s contract with the police union. Protesters marched over a mile from Peninsula Park to the Portland Police Association (PPA) headquarters in North Portland.
Soon after protesters arrived at PPA offices around 9 p.m., the police declared an “unlawful assembly” and ordered them to disperse. Police used batons and less-lethal munitions to move protesters east, according to testimony by Greatwood and other plaintiffs in a motion filed by Don’t Shoot Portland, a police accountability group, to hold the city in contempt over a federal court ruling a few days earlier that restricted law enforcement’s use of less-lethal weapons in the Portland protests.
Greatwood, a U.S. Air Force veteran, had been filming protests in Portland almost daily since June 5 with a video camera mounted on a 20-foot pole. That night, a police officer called Greatwood by name, a detail he described as hair-raising.
Around 10:15 p.m., Greatwood was hit with a munition from an FN303 launcher while he was bending down to examine an unexploded smoke canister, according to court documents. The launchers are considered less-lethal, but have proven to be fatal in the past.
Portland Police Bureau Officer Brent Taylor, who fired the round, testified that he was concerned Greatwood would throw the canister back at the police line, but that he didn’t mean to aim at Gretwood’s groin.
But Greatwood, who had been wearing a helmet marked “press,” testified that he felt targeted, saying, “I believe that the police personally targeted me and intentionally aimed to shoot me in the groin.”
While U.S. District Judge Marco Hernandez ruled on Nov. 27 that several of the shooting incidents by police on June 30 violated the temporary restraining order restricting the use of less-lethal munitions, the judge found that the use of force against Greatwood was appropriate because he posed a threat when he examined the grenade.
The ruling came as a surprise to Greatwood, “I just want justice to be served,” he told the Tracker. “It’s hard for me to feel like any of it is fair, I feel like I was the most neutral, most labeled person there.”
Greatwood, who was livestreaming when he was hit, tried to hide his groaning from people who were tuned into his feed. “It was easily the most excruciating injury I’ve had happen to me,” he told the Tracker. Greatwood ended up going to the emergency room, where he was given basic first aid. The injury took more than a month to heal, he said.
Freelance journalist Lesley McLam was arrested on June 30, 2020, while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon. McLam — together with Cory Elia, a colleague at Village Portland and KBOO radio station who was arrested with her — has since filed a lawsuit against the city of Portland, the state, and law enforcement for their arrest and treatment afterwards.
McLam was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over Floyd’s death began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a curfew that lasted three days. Even after the nightly curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. McLam is part of that suit, as well, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city in July not to arrest, harm, or impede any journalists or legal observers.
The June 30 demonstration took place the day before a planned vote to extend the city’s contract with the police union. Protesters marched over a mile from Peninsula Park to the Portland Police Association headquarters in the neighborhood of North Portland. Soon after protesters arrived at PPA offices around 9 p.m., the police declared an “unlawful assembly” and ordered them to disperse.
McLam was livestreaming when the police declared a riot around 11 p.m. and followed as they moved protesters east on North Lombard Street, further away from the PPA offices. About 22 minutes into the footage, she captures Elia’s arrest. She can be heard demanding that they release Elia and turn over his phone and other personal items to her. The tracker has documented Elia's arrest here.
About 11 minutes later, the video shuts off at the moment McLam gets arrested. After an officer tells her to “Get off the street,” she can be heard responding, “I’m a member of the press. I’m on the crosswalk.” Then an officer can be seen approaching her, and the camera goes askew and filming ends.
On July 8, Elia and McLam filed a civil lawsuit against the city, the state, and multiple law enforcement officers for allegedly violating their constitutional rights and for battery, assault, negligence and false arrest. They are also seeking compensation for their injuries and punitive damages.
According to the complaint, as McLam attempted to film the officers present at Elia’s arrest, she was rushed by approximately six officers. “McLam’s glasses flew off as she was tackled,” it said, adding that officers “hit and/or punched McLam in the legs and knees, causing contusions and muscle pain and spraining her ankle.” She also had swelling, bruising and tenderness from her handcuffs, according to the complaint.
In addition, due to the stress of her arrest, McLam experienced vomiting and urinary incontinence, according to the complaint. In a video posted on Twitter by a bystander, a handcuffed McLam can be seen vomiting as officers empty her pockets.
McLam was taken to Multnomah County Detention Center, where she was placed in an isolation cell “covered in what appeared to be dried, sticky vomit and smeared feces,” according to the complaint. When she started to feel cramping, McLam worried that the stress had started her menstrual cycle early. She called out for a menstrual pad which wasn’t brought to her until more than 30 minutes later, the complaint said.
While the police referred criminal charges to the Multnomah County district attorney’s office, attorneys in that office declined to file charges, resulting in a “no-complaint,” according to McLam’s defense attorney. But the police continued to hold her for several more hours before releasing her around 6:30 p.m. on July 1, the complaint said.
KBOO, where McLam and Elia voluntarily co-host a podcast, released a statement strongly condemning their arrest. “The nationwide trend of suppressing the freedom of speech or freedom of press by attack or arrest by police is disturbing and must be addressed,” the station said.
Asked by the Tracker about the civil suit in March 2021, McLam said there were no publicly available updates.
“I think it’s really important that people have a better understanding of the dynamics that are actually happening on the ground,” she said.
When reached by email about the incident, the Portland Police Bureau declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
Freelance journalist Cory Elia was arrested on June 30, 2020, while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon. Elia — together with Lesley McLam, a colleague at Village Portland and KBOO radio station who was arrested with him — has since filed a lawsuit against the city of Portland, the state, and law enforcement for their arrest and treatment afterwards.
Elia was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over Floyd’s death began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a curfew that lasted three days. Even after the nightly curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. Elia is part of that suit, as well, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city in July not to arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
The June 30 demonstration took place the day before a planned vote to extend the city’s contract with the police union. Protesters marched over a mile from Peninsula Park to the Portland Police Association headquarters in the neighborhood of North Portland. Soon after demonstrators arrived at PPA offices around 9 p.m., the police declared an “unlawful assembly” and ordered them to disperse.
Elia was livestreaming when the police declared a riot around 11 p.m. and followed as they moved protesters east on North Lombard Street, further away from the PPA offices. A little more than 17 minutes into the footage, Elia can be heard telling an officer that he recognizes him. Then the camera goes askew as the officer knocks it out of his hand.
Another livestream tweeted by Elia shortly after shows the police line pushing him back. “One of your officers just tried to break my phone,” he can be heard saying.
After the police stop at an intersection, Elia walks to the other side of a car to create more distance from the police. He can be heard getting into a verbal back and forth with an officer about whether the press is exempt from police orders, and the officer responds that the protest was a riot. Elia then returns to the police line and asks an officer for his name and badge number. “Are you Bartlett? I think I recognize you from the other night,” he says. A little after six minutes into the video, Elia is placed under arrest.
He was charged with two counts of assaulting a police officer, two counts of interfering with a peace officer, one count of resisting arrest, and one count of disorderly conduct. Elia’s phone was seized as part of the arrest, he tweeted after his release the next day. Elia tweeted on July 9 that most of his gear had been returned to him.
On July 8, Elia and McLam filed a civil lawsuit against the city, the state, and multiple law enforcement officers for allegedly violating their constitutional rights and for battery, assault, negligence and false arrest. They are also seeking compensation for their injuries and punitive damages.
The suit alleges that after Elia recognized PPB Officer John Bartlett, who is named as a defendant, the officer “turned to his fellow officer and said something.” Then Bartlett, along with other PPB officers and an Oregon State Police trooper, grabbed Elia and forced him to the ground, “dog-piling” him, according to the complaint. The suit also alleges that in the course of the arrest, an officer kicked him in the groin.
After Elia was taken to the Multnomah County Detention Center, his protective mask was taken from him, which the complaint alleges was a concern since “no officers were wearing masks,” despite the state’s COVID-19 mask mandate, according to the complaint.
Elia was placed in isolation twice, the suit alleges. The second time he “began suffering a panic attack, experiencing severe claustrophobia, heart racing, vomiting and mental anguish,” the complaint said. He was released after 10 hours in jail.
KBOO, where Elia and McLam voluntarily co-host a podcast, released a statement on July 1 strongly condemning their arrest. “The nationwide trend of suppressing the freedom of speech or freedom of press by attack or arrest by police is disturbing and must be addressed,” the station said.
While the police referred criminal charges to the Multnomah County district attorney’s office, attorneys in that office declined to file charges, resulting in a “no-complaint,” according to Elia’s defense attorney.
Because of Elia’s ongoing civil suit stemming from this incident, he declined to comment further to the Tracker. As of press time, McLam said there were no publicly available updates about the lawsuit.
When reached by email about the incident, the Portland Police Bureau declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
Robert Evans, a journalist and iHeartRadio podcast host, was repeatedly shoved by police officers in Portland, Oregon, while reporting on protests on June 30, 2020, according to a lawsuit filed against the city.
Protests broke out in Portland and across the United States in response to police violence and the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white officer in Minneapolis.
On Aug. 27, Evans, with colleague Bea Lake, who was arrested while documenting protests on June 7, and another plaintiff filed a civil lawsuit against the city of Portland. The complaint said that on June 30, Evans was covering a group of protesters as they marched to the Portland Police Association building where officers in riot gear were already stationed. About a half hour later, the demonstration was declared an unlawful assembly. Police officers ordered the crowd to disperse and started removing individuals from the street and sidewalk before firing riot control agents.
Evans, who did not respond to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker’s request for comment, was wearing a helmet labeled “PRESS” and press credentials and was repeatedly shoved by police officers as he tried to follow their orders. He stated in the complaint that he was “unable to fully document clashes and police conduct because he was forced off to the side and unable to find a reliably safe place for him to film.”
On June 28, the Americans Civil Liberties Union of Oregon filed a class-action lawsuit against the city of Portland and its law enforcement. The city later agreed to a preliminary injunction to not arrest, harm, or impede working journalists or legal observers at protests.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn’t comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protest, citing ongoing litigation.
Independent video journalist Mason Lake is pressing charges after he said he was shoved, then pepper-sprayed, by a Portland, Oregon, police officer on June 27, 2020.
According to court documents, Lake alleges that while filming a protest, he stopped to help an unnamed individual who had fallen. A police officer directing crowds “physically grabbed and pushed” Lake and pepper-sprayed him in the face, the documents claim.
The incident caused “physical injuries including pain, burning sensations, as well as fear and embarrassment,” claimed Lake’s complaint. Lake posted video from the protest on social media.
Lake filed a lawsuit in June 2022 against the City of Portland and two police officers, identified as John Doe 1 and 2. In the complaint, Lake alleges that while covering protests in 2020 and 2021, Portland police in seven separate incidents shoved, pepper-sprayed, threatened, pinned, grabbed and punched him, and damaged his equipment.
He is seeking $200,000 in compensatory damages. For jurisdictional reasons, an amended complaint was moved from state to federal court on Dec. 12, 2023. Neither Lake nor his attorney responded to requests for comment.
The alleged assault took place against a backdrop of social justice protests around the country in the summer of 2020 following the police murder of George Floyd that May. In Portland, protests brought thousands to the streets continuously throughout that period.
When reached for comment, the Portland Police Bureau said they could not comment on ongoing litigation but referred the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker to the city attorney, Robert L. Taylor. Taylor did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
A portion of the complaint filed by journalist Mason Lake in June 2022 in which he alleges the Portland, Oregon, police infringed on his press freedom rights seven separate times. The case was moved to federal court in December 2023.
",None,None,None,None,False,3:23-cv-01870,['ONGOING'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"chemical irritant, protest",,, 2021-01-22 19:47:05.110245+00:00,2022-03-10 20:48:09.017069+00:00,Portland photojournalist struck with pepper balls while covering Portland protest,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/portland-photojournalist-struck-pepper-balls-while-covering-portland-protest/,2022-03-10 20:48:08.956859+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,John Rudoff (Independent),,2020-06-19,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent photojournalist John Rudoff said he was hit with pepper balls by police on June 19, 2020, while documenting a protest in downtown Portland, Oregon.
Portland-based Rudoff, whose work has appeared in The New York Times, CBS and ABC, was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over Floyd’s death began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a curfew that lasted three days. Even after the nightly curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by the Portland Police Bureau, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon in June. Rudoff is a plaintiff in the suit, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city of Portland in July not to arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
On the night of June 19, as Rudoff was documenting a protest near the Multnomah County Justice Center, police began to disperse protesters and press from the area. When Rudoff showed the police his press identification and camera equipment, and one officer responded, “Move, move, move, we don’t care if you’re media,” Rudoff wrote in his declaration for the ACLU suit.
Later that night, Rudoff was taking photographs at the Justice Center when someone from the crowd of protesters went onto the steps of the building. “Shortly afterward, the police stormed out and began firing without warning, and I was hit” by pepper balls, he said in the filing.
Rudoff, who was wearing a helmet marked “press” when he got hit, told the Tracker he believed he was targeted by PPB because he was clearly marked as press and wasn’t near the protesters.
“I intentionally stand away from crowds as best I can, and intentionally I’m dressed in light colored clothing as much as possible,” he said.
PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the continuing ACLU litigation.
Independent journalist Tuck Woodstock said police shoved them while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on June 15, 2020.
Woodstock was covering one of the many protests that have broken out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over Floyd’s death began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a curfew that lasted three days. Even after the nightly curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon in June. Woodstock is a plaintiff in the suit, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city of Portland in July not to arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
Around 8:30 p.m. on June 15, Woodstock started covering a rally, organized by Rose City Justice, demanding funding cuts for the Portland Police Bureau ahead of an upcoming Portland City Council budget vote, according to The Oregonian newspaper.
The protesters marched from southeast Portland to Pioneer Courthouse Square downtown. After the rally concluded, Woodstock followed protesters to the Multnomah County Justice Center, a regular meeting point for protesters.
Just after 11 p.m., police declared a civil disturbance and warned the crowd to leave the area or be subjected to force or arrest. Around the same time, Woodstock tweeted that shots rang out as police used crowd-control munitions to disperse the protesters. About 20 minutes later, Woodstock tweeted that a protester had been shot in the head by some type of munitions in an area outside the dispersal zone.
Soon after, Woodstock tweeted about getting shoved. A video Woodstock posted later on Twitter appears to show the incident. “Police were aiming guns at a protester next to me, and I got caught in the protester’s umbrella and then slammed into by police and then dropped my phone and then picked it up to see the protester get jumped on by many police,” Woodstock says in the tweet.
And this, my friends, is when police were aiming guns at a protester next to me, and I got caught in the protester’s umbrella and then slammed into by police and then dropped my phone and then picked it up to see the protester get jumped on by many police. So. Content warning. pic.twitter.com/Phx5UnqXGg
— Tuck Woodstock (@tuckwoodstock) June 16, 2020
Woodstock declined to comment further about the incident. Derek Carmon, a spokesman for the PPB, said he was unable to comment on this incident due to the ongoing ACLU litigation.
Beth Nakamura, a photojournalist for the Oregonian, said she was pushed by officers then struck with a baton while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on June 13, 2020.
Protests in the city that day were in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the United States since the end of May.
In Portland, nightly protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. But even after the curfew was lifted, Portland law enforcement continued to target journalists, according to a class-action lawsuit filed on June 28 by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU lawsuit resulted in a temporary restraining order against the Portland Police Bureau, and eventually led to a preliminary injunction in July barring the police from harming or impeding journalists and legal observers.
In the early morning hours of June 13, Nakamura was covering protests in downtown Portland around the Multnomah County Justice Center, which houses a jail, courtrooms and a police precinct. Most protesters were congregating in Chapman Square, across the street from the Justice Center.
At around 12:30 a.m., Portland police declared the demonstration an “unlawful assembly.” Officers fired tear gas and flash-bang grenades, then rushed into the park to clear the area of demonstrators.
“It’s a chaotic scene that unfolds quickly,” Nakamura told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker. “I was photographing and held up — which I always do — my I.D. and my camera. I was at the time saying, ‘Press, press.’”
When the police instructed her to move north, Nakamura obeyed.
“I turned around and I was walking, and I got pushed by a police officer,” she said. “Then I got batoned, slammed on the back as I’m walking.” When she tried to explain that she was with The Oregonian, the officer said, ‘I don’t give a fuck who you are,’” according to Nakamura.
“Physical assault is not normal,” said Nakamura. “It’s not something anyone should tolerate well. It’s not right.”
After Nakamura tweeted about the incident a couple of days later, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler, who also holds the title of police commissioner, responded in a tweet: “This is extremely concerning. Journalists need to be able to cover the protests safely. I know @portlandpolice works hard to protect the rights of our press, but there are alarming incidents that need to be addressed.”
While covering protests I was slammed by a baton from behind by police. Just before that I was shoved hard. I'd made it clear I was press (both hands up, ID in left hand, camera in right). This happened sometime between 12-1 Friday night.
— Beth Nakamura (@bethnakamura) June 15, 2020
The Oregonian, Nakamura’s employer, and the Portland Tribune, Sparling’s employer, have both filed complaints about the incidents with the Portland Independent Police Review, an independent agency that investigates allegations of police misconduct.
“Both of those investigations are underway,” Ross Caldwell, the director of the Independent Police Review, told the Tracker. “We have a huge volume of cases, as you can imagine, so everything is taking longer than it normally does.”
In response to questions about the incidents involving Nakamura and Sparling, marched Carmon, a spokesman for the Portland Police Bureau, told the Tracker, “We will not be commenting in regard to these two incidents at this time” because “there is a TRO in place and because the preliminary injunction is still an open litigation case.”
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Police disperse protesters in Portland, Oregon on June 13, 2020.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,unknown,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, protest",,, 2021-10-19 16:29:44.171889+00:00,2022-11-08 20:45:01.877552+00:00,"Portland Tribune reporter struck with munition, pushed by police amid protests",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/portland-tribune-reporter-struck-with-munition-pushed-by-police-amid-protests/,2022-11-08 20:45:01.774707+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Zane Sparling (Portland Tribune),,2020-06-13,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Zane Sparling, a journalist for the Portland Tribune, said he was shoved by an officer and then hit in the foot with a crowd-control munition while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on June 13, 2020.
Protests in the city that day were in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the United States since the end of May.
In Portland, nightly protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. But even after the curfew was lifted, Portland law enforcement continued to target journalists, according to a class-action lawsuit filed on June 28 by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The ACLU lawsuit resulted in a temporary restraining order against the Portland Police Bureau, and eventually led to a preliminary injunction in July barring the police from harming or impeding journalists and legal observers.
On the evening of June 13, Sparling told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker he was covering demonstrators who were yet again gathering in Chapman Square downtown. A little after 10:30 p.m., the Portland police declared the protest an “unlawful assembly” and began to fire crowd-control munitions and tear gas to clear the square. Sparling followed a group of about 50 protesters who fled the area and then formed a line on Southwest Main Street, next to the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall.
As the police were warning protesters that the downtown area was closed and they needed to leave, Sparling — who was filming the scene with his cellphone and had a camera strapped around his neck — moved to the sidewalk so he could document the scene away from the crowd.
“As a journalist, I was staying out because that’s when people want observers on the ground: when munitions are going and orders are being enforced with force,” he told the Tracker.
When the police started to charge toward the demonstrators, Sparling turned the corner onto Southwest Park Avenue. “But the officer appeared around the corner as well,” he said.
Footage that Starling posted on Twitter at around 11:50 p.m. shows an officer running around the corner and — right after Sparling calls out that he was “media” — shoving him into a wall. The officer could be heard saying, “I don’t give a shit.” and ordering him to leave the area.
Portland Police charge protesters tonight.
— Zane Sparling (@PDXzane) June 14, 2020
Officer: Move!
Me: MEDIA!
Officer: I don’t give a shit! Go!
I was shoved into the wall, then hit in the heel by some sort of crowd control munition. I’m fine pic.twitter.com/daPElkEb6J
“I didn’t break any bones. But it was a scary moment,” Sparling told the Tracker. “I was on the sidewalk not doing anything other than my job, other than being there and trying to observe.”
Sparling wasn’t unsure if the police targeted him because he was a journalist, noting that although his camera was hanging from around his neck, his press badge may have been hard to see.
After getting shoved, Sparling walked down the rest of the block to leave the area. As he was walking away, a crowd-control munition hit his foot, leaving a red welt, he said.
The Portland Tribune, Sparling’s employer, and The Oregonian, Nakamura’s employer, have both filed complaints about the incidents with the Portland Independent Police Review, an independent agency that investigates allegations of police misconduct.
“Both of those investigations are underway,” Ross Caldwell, the director of the Independent Police Review, told the Tracker. “We have a huge volume of cases, as you can imagine, so everything is taking longer than it normally does.”
In response to questions about the incidents involving Nakamura and Sparling, marched Carmon, a spokesman for the Portland Police Bureau, told the Tracker, “We will not be commenting in regard to these two incidents at this time” because “there is a TRO in place and because the preliminary injunction is still an open litigation case.”
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
A freelance photojournalist said police shot him in the back with a rubber bullet while he was covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on June 12, 2020. The photojournalist asked to remain anonymous out of concerns for his safety and privacy.
Many protests broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over Floyd’s death began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a curfew that lasted three days. Even after the nightly curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. The photojournalist provided a declaration in support of the suit, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the Portland Police Bureau in July not to arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
On June 12, the journalist said he was taking photographs of the protests near the Multnomah County Justice Center — which houses a jail, courtrooms and a Portland police precinct — when he was shot from behind.
“I was taking photos near the Justice Center when police shot me in the back with a rubber bullet,” he said in the court declaration, noting that he had a press pass and he is clearly identified as a journalist. “Fortunately, I was wearing a backpack, or I may have been seriously injured. Shortly after this, the police swarmed the crowd from behind, physically assaulting and beating people at random.”
The shooting made him fearful of covering the demonstrations after that. “After this incident, I stopped reporting on the protests because the actions and attitude of the police made me feel unsafe,” said the journalist, who declined to comment further for the Tracker.
In response to questions about the journalist’s account, Portland Police Bureau spokesman Derek Carmon told the Tracker, “We will not be commenting” because “there is a TRO in place and because the preliminary injunction is still an open litigation case.”
Portland City Attorney Tracy Reeve similarly said, “We are not able to comment on pending litigation.”
Independent journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis was shot by police officers in Portland, Oregon, with a foam baton round — a crowd-control munition similar to a rubber bullet — while documenting a Black Lives Matter protest on June 12, 2020.
The protest was one of the many that broke out across the U.S. that year in response to police violence and in support of the BLM movement following the murder of George Floyd. As the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker has documented, an unprecedented number of journalists were assaulted and arrested at these protests, including in Oregon, where the ACLU later filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of journalists and legal observers who were targeted and attacked by police.
Lewis joined a separate civil suit on Nov. 1, 2020, charging that the City of Portland, Multnomah County, and various law enforcement officials violated the constitutional rights of people with disabilities during BLM protests that year.
Lewis and three other Oregonians with disabilities who either documented or participated in the protests accused law enforcement of assaulting them multiple times and of generally acting without regard for their disabilities. Lewis has photosensitive epilepsy and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that increases the risk of injury and makes it difficult for her to move quickly.
In the complaint, Lewis describes standing in a crowd near the Multnomah County Justice Center in downtown Portland at the June 12 protest. As protesters shook the fence around the building, the complaint says Portland Police Bureau officers shot Lewis in the leg with the foam baton from less than three feet away, although she had her hands raised and was not touching the fence.
Lewis said she felt severe pain after the blow, a reaction linked to her Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. She went to the emergency room and was diagnosed with an injury to a leg muscle, the complaint says. She continued to experience pain afterward, could not put weight on her leg and was forced to use crutches for two weeks, and, later, a cane.
In October 2021, the court approved a motion to dismiss the plaintiffs’ claims in the lawsuit, ruling that they had failed to prove that the city customarily violated the constitutional rights of people with disabilities when responding to protests. The plaintiffs then filed an amended complaint, which did not include Lewis.
Lewis told the Tracker that she ultimately withdrew from the suit because of issues with her legal representation.
Police at a June 2020 protest in Portland, Oregon, after the murder of George Floyd; journalist Melissa “Claudio” Lewis says police shot her with a foam baton at a protest there that month.
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The protest was one of many that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. Even after the curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class action suit the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon filed against the Portland Police Bureau in June. Tracy is a plaintiff in the suit, which resulted in a temporary restraining order and an agreement by the city in July not to arrest, harm or impede any journalists or legal observers.
Tracy was covering one of three protests in the city on the night of June 7. The protest originated at the Multnomah County Justice Center with a speech by faith leaders. The protest remained peaceful until 11 p.m., when protesters began to shake the fence around the Justice Center and police countered with pepper balls. Around 11:45 p.m., an unlawful assembly was declared and the use of crowd control munitions escalated.
As officers cleared the area in front of the Justice Center, Tracy was hit in the lower leg by the police paint marker round, according to the ACLU declaration. Tracy wasn’t available for further comment.
In a video Tracy tweeted of when he got hit, green paint can be seen on the ground where he had been standing. He also tweeted a picture of his pants covered in green paint below the knee.
Just before midnight, Tracy fell while running from a police charge. “I fell backwards on a curb, got up and turned around and was seconds away from getting grabbed by riot police who were tackling people to the ground as they made arrests,” he said in the declaration. In a video Tracy tweeted, he appears to fall about 20 seconds in, and then a protester can be seen getting tackled as Tracy gets up to run.
— Alex Milan Tracy (@AlexMilanTracy) June 8, 2020
The PPB has said they wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
Bea Lake, who works as a staffer for podcasts hosted by journalist Robert Evans on iHeartMedia radio network, was arrested in Portland, Oregon, while covering protests on June 7, 2020. A video of the incident shows an officer telling Lake to leave, Lake asking for the officer’s name, then Lake being arrested. Police and other records show Lake was charged with “interfering with a Peace Officer” and released several hours later.
Protesters gathered outside the Multnomah County Justice Center in downtown Portland the night of June 7 as part of ongoing protests against police brutality and racial injustice. Shortly before midnight, law enforcement declared the gathering an unlawful assembly after protesters threw water bottles, cans and other objects over a fence and in the direction of police officers, according to the Portland Police Bureau and live streams from the scene. The officers ordered anyone in the area to leave and fired flash grenades to clear the area.
Lake was filming officers dispersing the crowd when an officer approached and said to leave. At 17:45 into a video recording of the incident posted to Twitter, the officer is heard saying “press passes don’t matter.”
Lake then asks the officer for his name, to which he replies by pointing to a number written on his shirt. He then says “keep moving.” After Lake asks again for his name, the officer says “You want to go to jail? You’re under arrest.” As the officer grabs and arrests Lake, she can be heard shouting repeatedly “I am press, I am not resisting.”
One of my crew members, clearly labeled as press, was just arrested for asking an officer their name. https://t.co/E1zPepX4Ev
— Robert Evans (The Only Robert Evans) (@IwriteOK) June 8, 2020
iHeart Radio’s Evans posted the video on Twitter June 8, followed by the message “She is free with a citation, which we will fight.” The arrest of Lake is described, without giving Lake’s name, on page 21 of a complaint filed by the ACLU against the city of Portland; Portland police records note the arrest of Bea Lake, 31, charged with “interfering with a Peace Officer.”
The Tracker was unable to reach Lake and Evans for comment, and it is unclear if the charge is still pending against Lake. The Portland Police Bureau did not respond to an email seeking comment on the incident.
In July 2020, Lake and Evans joined a class action lawsuit against the city of Portland. In the complaint, the journalists alleged that police officers used unnecessary force and interfered with their abilities to do their jobs as members of the press during the protests, according to news reports. No information on the status of the lawsuit was available from any of the involved parties as of March 2021.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
Cory Elia, an editor at Village Portland and host of a KBOO podcast, was deliberately sprayed with tear gas while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, during the late hours of June 6, 2020, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by ACLU of Oregon.
Protests in the city that day were in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the United States since the end of May.
In Portland, nightly protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. Even after the curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to the ACLU suit. The suit led to an agreement by the Portland Police Bureau in July not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests. Wheeler later banned the police from using tear gas as a form of crowd control on Sept. 10.
Just before midnight on June 6, Elia was attacked while filming police clearing out protesters in Chapman Square downtown. In a live video that Elia posted on Twitter, an officer can be seen turning toward him and spraying him in the face and on the camera. “They just sprayed me!” Elia can be heard yelling. “I’m down, I can’t see,” he said, adding that he had been holding up his press pass.
“Police knew he was press when they attacked him,” the ACLU complaint says. Elia ended up going to the hospital to be treated.
The ACLU filed the complaint on June 28 on behalf of multiple journalists. On July 8, Elia and Lesley McLam, a colleague at Village Portland and KBOO radio station, filed a civil lawsuit against the city, the state, and multiple law enforcement officers for allegedly violating their constitutional rights and for battery, assault, negligence and false arrest. They are also seeking compensation for their injuries and punitive damages.
Asked in an interview about his decision to participate in the suit, Elia told the Tracker, “If these instances are not seen, not heard about, not reported, they can continue. It results in a very dangerous situation. Any reporter out there can be subjected to this treatment without any kind of consequence or accountability for those actions.”
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Editor's Note: This article has been updated to reflect that Cory Elia is not a plaintiff in the ACLU of Oregon's lawsuit, but has filed an independent civil rights suit with journalist Lesley McLam.
Independent journalist Donovan Farley was struck with a wooden truncheon and pepper sprayed while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, during the late hours of June 6, 2020, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by ACLU of Oregon.
The Portland-based journalist was covering one of the many protests that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. Even after the curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to the ACLU suit. The suit led to an agreement by the Portland Police Bureau in July not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests. Wheeler later banned the police from using tear gas as a form of crowd control on Sept. 10.
Just before midnight on June 6, Farley began filming police officers arresting a man in Chapman Square downtown, as one officer put his knee on the man’s neck. Farley “had identified himself as press and was filming several police officers kneeling on a protester’s neck, George Floyd-style,” according to the ACLU filing.
Then, in an attack that was captured on a KATU newsfeed and posted on Twitter by Theo Van Alst, an associate professor at Portland State University, one of the officers pushes Farley back with his hand before hitting him with a truncheon. The officer can then be seen macing Farley as he turns to walk away, then hitting him and macing him again.
From the @KATUNews feed about 15 minutes ago. This guy gets maced and beaten for filming at the Justice Center #PortlandProtests #PortlandProtest #pdx #portland pic.twitter.com/hGSosEES0m
— TVAyyyy, Don’t Go in the Basement 👻 ✶ ✶ ✶ ✶ (@TVAyyyy) June 7, 2020
“I was chased and assaulted because I was a journalist who caught law enforcement behaving in the exact illegal fashion that started this nationwide uproar,” Farley said in a statement posted on Twitter. While acknowledging that he was vocal in telling the officers to remove their knee from the man’s neck, Farley said he was staying out of the way of the arrest.
The first hit with the truncheon injured his lower thigh, Farley said, and the officer also hit him between the shoulders as he was retreating. The shock of that blow is what caused him to turn around, he said, which is when the officer maced him again at close range.
“The burst was so intense that for the first second I thought he had taken out the big canister and punched me with it,” said Farley in the statement, adding that he was incapacitated for the remainder of the night.
Farley wasn’t available for further comment.
The ACLU filed the complaint on June 28 on behalf of multiple journalists.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation in the ACLU case.
Editor's note: This piece has been updated to reflect that Donovan Farley is not among the plaintiffs in the ACLU of Oregon's class-action lawsuit.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter Sergio Olmos was shoved by a police officer while covering a protest in downtown Portland, Oregon, in the early morning hours of June 6, 2020.
Olmos was covering one of the many protests that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. Even after the curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class action suit the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon filed against the Portland Police Bureau in June. The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work. Olmos is a plaintiff and provided a declaration in support of the suit.
Olmos was covering a protest at the Multnomah County Justice Center that began the evening of June 5 and stretched into the next morning. Shortly after 11 p.m., he tweeted that the PPB had declared an “unlawful assembly.”
Tear gas pushed the protesters further into the downtown, according to a tweet Olmos posted at 11:41 p.m. Ten minutes later, Olmos posted an image of an email from a police spokesperson urging the media to “leave the area please for your safety.” In the tweet accompanying the image, Olmos wrote, “This reporter is staying.”
After midnight, the crowd returned to the Justice Center and was soon dispersed by police yet again. Olmos gets shoved by an officer using a baton while leaving the area. “This reporter is shoved by police, I try to vocalize my moments and tell police officer I’m behind him and blocked,” he tweeted at 1:27 a.m,
The accompanying video shows Olmos filming two police vans from across the street. “I’m going this way,” Olmos can be heard saying to an officer. “Hey, I’m behind you.” Another officer approaches and shoves Olmos with his baton, then points a can of tear gas at him. The officer gestures for him to follow the path of the sidewalk, which appears to have been rerouted for construction. “I didn’t see that, I’m going,” Olmos can be heard saying.
At 4:15 a.m., Olmos posted footage of the incident from another angle. “I vocalize my movements, telling two police officers I’m behind them. I think the sidewalk is closed and I’m stuck. I call out to police to let them know. Police officer shoves as I explain,” he wrote in the post.
Olmos also tweeted a photo of himself marked as “press” and wearing a press pass around his neck.
“He had his press pass clearly visible,” the ACLU court filing said. “Nevertheless, the police attacked him with a baton.”
Olmos didn’t respond to a request for comment. The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the continuing ACLU litigation.
Robert Evans, a reporter for investigative news site Bellingcat and host of a podcast for iHeartMedia, was hit by a crowd-control munition while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, during the early hours of June 6, 2020, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by ACLU of Oregon.
Protests in the city that day were in response to a video showing a white police officer kneeling on the neck of George Floyd, a Black man, during an arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25. Protests against police brutality and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have been held across the United States since the end of May.
In Portland, nightly protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. Even after the curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to the ACLU suit. The suit led to an agreement by the Portland Police Bureau in July not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests. Wheeler later banned the police from using tear gas as a form of crowd control on Sept. 10.
Evans, who was livestreaming the protest, was filming the police clearing Chapman Square when he was hit in the fingers by an impact munition. At about 48 minutes and 40 seconds into the video, Evans can be heard exclaiming after being hit.
“They got me real good in the fucking fingers,” Evans can be heard saying, speculating that the munition might be made of glass. “They were shooting at my chest though, because my hand was on my chest.”
“I think maybe even aiming at my press pass, because my hand was right next to it,” he added. The ACLU complaint notes that Evans was hit in the hand that was holding his press pass, and that his helmet also said “press.”
Evans told the Tracker that his fingers were bruised and hurt for a few days. “That one wasn’t serious,” he says, but it was memorable for how targeted he felt.
The ACLU filed the complaint on June 28 on behalf of multiple journalists. Evans and his colleague Bea Lake filed their own civil lawsuit against the City of Portland on July 14.
The PPB has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing the ongoing litigation.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents journalists assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas or who had their equipment damaged in the course of reporting. Find all incidents related to Black Lives Matter and anti-police brutality protests here.
Editor's Note: This piece has been updated to reflect that Robert Evans is not a plaintiff in the ACLU of Oregon suit, but has independently sued the City of Portland.
Lesley McLam, host of a KBOO podcast, was violently grabbed and shoved by police while covering demonstrations in Portland, Oregon, on June 4, 2020, according to her ongoing lawsuit against the city and Mayor Ted Wheeler, and other law enforcement officers.
McLam, who did not respond to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker’s request for comment, was covering the protests that broke out in Portland and across the country in response to the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white police officer in Minneapolis.
McLam filed a civil lawsuit, along with her colleague Cory Elia, against the city and multiple law enforcement officers on July 8. The lawsuit cites multiple press freedom violations against both journalists.
According to the complaint, McLam was covering the protesters that had gathered in front of the Multnomah County Justice Center when she saw a group of individuals near a dumpster fire about a half block away. At the time, McLam was wearing a black baseball cap with white lettering that identified her as “PRESS.” Her backpack was also labeled “MEDIA” and she had prominently displayed press credentials.
McLam started filming the fire with her cellphone and narrating the events when police officers in riot gear arrived and announced the street was closed. According to the complaint, McLam continued filming but moved to the sidewalk, allowing space for people and officers to pass.
The complaint said McLam was filming when an officer approached her. She identified herself as a member of the press while displaying her credentials when the officer violently grabbed McLam by the throat. She was then shoved backward by that officer and two others.
On June 28, the Americans Civil Liberties Union of Oregon filed a class-action lawsuit against the city of Portland and its law enforcement. The city later agreed to a preliminary injunction to not arrest, harm, or impede working journalists or legal observers at protests.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn’t comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protest, citing ongoing litigation.
Cory Elia, an editor at Village Portland and host of a KBOO podcast, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was assaulted by police on June 2, 2020, in Portland, Oregon, despite clearly identifying himself as press.
The protest was one of many that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, nightly protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. Even after the curfew was lifted, journalists continued to be targeted by police, according to a class action suit the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon filed against the Portland Police Bureau in June.The city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
“The police physically assaulted KBOO reporter Cory Elia because he was recording them,” the complaint said.
On June 2 at 11:34 p.m., Elia posted a video of protesters running from the police, who can be heard declaring the protest an unlawful assembly. Projectiles can be seen landing between the protesters as they run through tear gas, while flash bangs can also be heard.
About 10 minutes later, Elia tweeted, “I just got manhandled by police after filming this one even while identifying myself as a journalist and showing my press pass. They slammed me into a wall as I was choking on teargas. An independent journo pulled me away from officers and got me out.”
Elia told the Tracker that an officer struck him in the back with a baton, and then he was slammed into the wall head first. He fell over his bicycle and hit his ribs on the handlebars, then officers kicked him as he choked on tear gas, he said.
A video recorded by reddit user testsubject011 shows part of the assault. The person recording the video approaches Elia, who is straddling his bicycle and holding up his press pass. “I’m a journalist, I’m a journalist. If they start messing with me just keep chasing them,” says Elia, before warning, “They’re coming behind you.”
The person continues to record while retreating from police. When Elia comes back into view about 24 seconds into the video, he appears to get pinned against the wall by police.
“If these instances are not seen, not heard about, not reported, they can continue. It results in a very dangerous situation. Any reporter out there can be subjected to this treatment without any kind of consequence or accountability for those actions,” Elia told the Tracker.
On July 8, Elia and Lesley McLam, a colleague at Village Portland and KBOO radio station, filed a civil lawsuit against the city, the state, and multiple law enforcement officers for allegedly violating their constitutional rights and for battery, assault, negligence and false arrest. They are also seeking compensation for their injuries and punitive damages.
The PPB has said they wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation.
Editor's Note: This article has been updated to reflect that Cory Elia is not a plaintiff in the ACLU of Oregon's lawsuit, but filed an independent civil rights suit with journalist Lesley McLam.
George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020, ignited a sweeping assembly of protesters across the United States — and the globe — a staggering, monthslong outcry for police reform and racial justice. In many moments peaceful, in many others bracingly violent, journalists of all stripes took to documenting these demonstrations. At times, to do the job meant to expose oneself to the effects of riot-control agents, to face harassment from individuals or law enforcement officials, to fear for your safety or have your reporting interrupted.
In Portland, Oregon, the protests have been particularly acute, not only in their duration, but also their intensity. Not coincidentally, the journalists who’ve documented the unfolding events have seemingly faced a heightened level of risk, most notably in their interactions with local and federal law enforcement. In response, the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon filed a class-action lawsuit in June “on behalf of journalists and legal observers who were targeted and attacked by the police while documenting protests.” The suit led to an agreement by the Portland Police Bureau in July not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work. A judge later expanded the ban to federal officers, who were a heavy presence in the city until Oregon Governor Kate Brown negotiated a phased withdrawal with the Trump administration in late July. While an appeals court later issued a temporary stay on that order, the federal ban was reinstated in early October.
Below is a roundup of incidents involving journalists in Portland getting tear-gassed, threatened or somehow impeded in their work in the city beginning summer of 2020.
A full accounting of incidents in which members of the press have been assaulted, arrested or had their equipment damaged while covering protests across the nation can be found here. To learn more about how the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker documents and categorizes violations of press freedom, visit pressfreedomtracker.us.
June 2, 2020
Tear gassed. pic.twitter.com/vAkqCR8lvb
— Alex Zielinski (@alex_zee) June 3, 2020
Tear gas hurts a lot but fades quickly pic.twitter.com/h1YlKEPaFf
— Blair Stenvick (@BlairStenvick) June 3, 2020
June 5, 2020
Last night a member of my crew was almost rammed by a red truck (newish, likely Ford) with an American flag flying from each end of the back. The police aimed their guns at her when she tried to get its plate #.
— Robert Evans (The Only Robert Evans) (@IwriteOK) June 6, 2020
If any member of the crowd filmed this, please let me know.
June 7, 2020
An officer shouts "You were standing taking photos..." as two people hiding behind a car are arrested. Another officer threatens me with arrest as I clearly state I am press as I move back and comply with orders. pic.twitter.com/fwTStAsceO
— Alex Milan Tracy (@AlexMilanTracy) June 7, 2020
June 16, 2020
Portland police officer “your asked to disperse, wearing the press does not give you the right to be here”
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) June 16, 2020
Reporter @_jlevinson: “we’re moving”
Police: “you’ve been given warnings, so if you don’t move faster your gonna go to jail”
“So you want us to run?”
“yes I do” pic.twitter.com/I9zrFRnwhf
A few officers sprint forward to make an arrest and as I document I am threatened with arrest. pic.twitter.com/nVRcwvEmXi
— Alex Milan Tracy (@AlexMilanTracy) June 16, 2020
July 18, 2020
I got LIT UP last night! New riot gear paid for itself already. The feds were ABSOLUTELY targeting media & press.
— Mason Lake Media (@MasonLakePhoto) July 19, 2020
I was not the only one. Let me tell you something, nothing turns your blue pants brown like militarized police pointing at you!!!
😳😳😳 pic.twitter.com/PEYLIMdDOd
A PBB officer told me to “go home” another said “get the fuck out”, I pointed to my credentials and said “press”, the officer said “I don’t care.” But they drove off without saying anything else.
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) July 18, 2020
Officers shove protestor who's trying to leave. Then threatened @TheRealCoryElia, me, and 10+ other legal observers / press for filming pic.twitter.com/ME3vKMcyp2
— Griffin - Live from Portland (@GriffinMalone6) July 18, 2020
Got lost from the rest of press group officer ran up to me, I yelled press and he yelled "nope" and started running at me. Pretty sure this isn't legal.
— Griffin - Live from Portland (@GriffinMalone6) July 18, 2020
July 22, 2020
Tonight I was coated in mace by the feds three times to the point I had to leave cause everything about me was sticky. I *just* did laundry today too...
— Teebs (@TeebsGaming) July 23, 2020
Any tips on things I can do or buy to increase the number of macings before I need to leave and shower??
July 26, 2020
Federal officer drags protester to the floor, pushes journalist, and says “get the the fuck out of here” to press pic.twitter.com/P6m9SCjERs
— Sergio Olmos (@MrOlmos) July 26, 2020
July 30, 2020
Feds ambush and assault press; Mace and arrest protester who is on their knees w hands in the air. @AthulKAcharya @ACLU_OR @DontShootPdx pic.twitter.com/5d9eem84q9
— Mathieu Lewis-Rolland (@MathieuLRolland) July 30, 2020
Aug. 1, 2020
The police form a riot line, they tell press to leave the area, we were on the sidewalk. #blacklivesmatter #protest #pdx #Portland #Oregon #BLM #acab #PortlandProtests #PDXprotests #PortlandStrong pic.twitter.com/ixMA27i7k1
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) August 2, 2020
A cop walks up close to me and @IwriteOK and threatens us with pepper spray. #blacklivesmatter #protest #pdx #Portland #Oregon #BLM #acab #PortlandProtests #PDXprotests #PortlandStrong pic.twitter.com/gFabrZ9bAL
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) August 2, 2020
Aug. 5, 2020
Here we see, from a bit earlier, how the police tried to justify their illegal dispersal. They claim it is NOT a dispersal, but a road closure. So they can legally force journalists off.
— Robert Evans (The Only Robert Evans) (@IwriteOK) August 6, 2020
I do not think this would hold up in court. Which is probably why they left. pic.twitter.com/7kLa5BnhUY
Aug. 6, 2020
A cop tells us we're all under arrest
— Laura Jedeed (Misanthrophile) (@1misanthrophile) August 6, 2020
Then the line loads up on their riot van and leaves
I live in a Tom and Jerry cartoon
Aug. 7, 2020
Anyone who doesn't leave the area is subject to arrest "to reiterate this order applies to the press"
— Griffin - Live from Portland (@GriffinMalone6) August 7, 2020
Is this legal? @AthulKAcharya? pic.twitter.com/BZ7rwjN5fT
Aug. 9, 2020
Aug. 12, 2020
Aug. 14, 2020
Just tried to walk up to the group of protesters and a police officer blocked me from covering, saying “M’am, I’m not having this conversation. For the last eight weeks I’ve had press throwing things at me and calling me names. So you will have to go around the block.”
— Suzette Smith (@suzettesmith) August 15, 2020
Aug. 15, 2020
Portland police tell press that talking to officers is illegally engaging them. They shove press for not being on the sidewalk even though they were, they then tell them to "be press" on a different sidewalk. They assaulted legal observers and press following orders all night. pic.twitter.com/lDHNxvVMIw
— Daniel V. Media (@danielvmedia) August 16, 2020
Aug. 18, 2020
“If you’re in the street again, you’re going to jail. Period,” one officer says as a chase ends and I get back onto the sidewalk.
— Cata Gaitán (@catalinagaitan_) August 19, 2020
A different officer pulls on my left arm as I walk forward, then says: “Stay on the sidewalk.” pic.twitter.com/xoxOmx1nKG
Aug. 19, 2020
The Portland Police have declared a riot. They are warning "media and press" that they are ordered to disperse. This is a violation of the Federal Restraining Order. pic.twitter.com/BYVLPjrMtu
— Robert Evans (The Only Robert Evans) (@IwriteOK) August 20, 2020
Aug. 22, 2020 - Aug. 23, 2020
Police make another arrest, then run up on press trying to film #PortlandProtests #Portland #PortlandRiots pic.twitter.com/bFMiX6L3cK
— Brendan Gutenschwager (@BGOnTheScene) August 23, 2020
Aug. 25, 2020
Sept. 5, 2020
Back by the park more teargas being used, smoke grenade lands right in a group of press. #blacklivesmatter #protest #pdx #Portland #Oregon #BLM #PortlandProtest #pdxprotest #portlandpolice pic.twitter.com/wmkecM5f8g
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) September 6, 2020
Sept. 6, 2020
Here I am getting menaced by the cops for doing what they told me to do. pic.twitter.com/Vpwm04hCyz
— Jake “wear a mask” Johnson (@FancyJenkins) September 6, 2020
Sept. 23, 2020
Cops tell multiple people marked press to move back “30 feet.”
— Garrison Davis (@hungrybowtie) September 24, 2020
We are on the sidewalk against a building. Also police cannot disperse press due to the federal TRO that is still in effect for PPB. #PortlandProtests #BLM #PDX #BlackLivesMatter #portland pic.twitter.com/TrTR3ZAS6U
Oct. 11, 2020
It looks like the far-right portion of today is over, at least
— Laura Jedeed, Professional Stocker (@LauraJedeed) October 11, 2020
I'm not a big selfie person: not my style. But I'm posting this one so you can see exactly what I looked like when I was threatened
I am not in bloc. I am wearing a press pass pic.twitter.com/ub2em1TSVH
Information in this roundup was gathered from published social media and news reports as well as interviews where noted. To read similar incidents from other days of national protests also in this category, go here.
While documenting July 18, 2020, protests in Portland, Oregon, videographer Mason Lake said federal law enforcement officers were aiming for the press. “They threw tear gas canisters and flash bangs right at us,” he said.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],Media,"Black Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter 1 year, Black Lives Matter 2020, chemical irritant, protest",,, 2020-09-01 16:05:33.417642+00:00,2023-07-17 20:18:59.702644+00:00,Videographer hit by police projectile during Portland protest on May 31,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/videographer-hit-police-projectile-during-portland-protest-may-31/,2023-07-17 20:18:59.587267+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Mason Lake (Independent),,2020-05-31,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent journalist Mason Lake said he was shot by law enforcement officers with a projectile that injured his arm while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on May 31, 2020.
Lake, a videographer based in Portland, was filming one of the many protests that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man. A viral video showed a white police officer kneeling on Floyd’s neck during an arrest in Minneapolis. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a local hospital.
In Portland, protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. Lake, who wasn’t wearing anything to identify himself as press, told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was documenting protesters at Southwest Main Street and Southwest Third Avenue around the time the curfew was going into effect on May 31.
Lake said law enforcement officers began using force against protesters.
“The police gave no announcement. They were shooting tear gas with no warning,” he said.
Derek Carmon, a Portland Police Bureau spokesman, disputed Lake’s version of events. He told the Tracker that it is “not our practice to use any crowd-control device without warning. Multiple announcements were given in the area during that time frame.”
Video taken by Lake at around 8:05 p.m. shows protesters in a haze of tear gas. One of the law enforcement officers stationed at the Multnomah County Justice Center can be seen throwing a flash bang grenade at protesters, and an announcement can be heard warning that the officers will use force if the demonstrators don’t leave.
In another video Lake sent to the Tracker, at around 8:10 p.m., he filmed demonstrators kneeling and chanting across from the Justice Center building. Somebody near Lake yells, “incoming!” Then the video goes askew as Lake yells in pain.
When Lake recovers, he films his injured arm and says, “I just got shot by the Portland police.”
“It shoved my hand and left me with welts,” Lake told the Tracker. “I stayed for a little bit to keep recording, but the tear gas came on, and I had to leave and recover.”
Lake said he believes he was hit by a “foam baton,” a projectile used by law enforcement officers for crowd control, due to the sound it made. The Tracker couldn’t independently verify what kind of munition was used.
He said both the Portland Police Bureau and Multnomah County Sheriff's Office policed protests that day. It isn’t clear which agency the officer who fired the shot works for.
On June 6, Lake filed a lawsuit against the City of Portland over the alleged battery by the police that occurred on May 31, seeking up to $450,000 in damages. “Mr. Lake believes he was specifically targeted by City of Portland police officers because he was a photographer documenting police brutality,” the lawsuit states.
Portland City Attorney Tracy Reeve told the Tracker she couldn’t comment on pending litigation.
In an emailed response to questions about Lake’s allegations, Carmon of the Portland Police said: “If it is Portland officers in the video who use force, they know that all uses of force are required to be documented in a police report and administratively reviewed per our policy to determine if they meet our standards. If there is a determination that something was out of policy, it would follow the process for investigation with [Independent Police Review]/[Internal Affairs] to determine if discipline is warranted.”
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
Editor's note: This article has been updated to reflect information gained from a copy of Lake's lawsuit against the City of Portland.
Independent photographer Mathieu Lewis-Rolland said he was fired on by police and targeted with tear gas at close range while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on May 31, 2020.
Lewis-Rolland, based in Portland, was covering one of the many protests that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man. A viral video showed a white police officer kneeling on Floyd’s neck during an arrest in Minneapolis. Floyd was later pronounced dead at a local hospital.
In Portland, protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days. Around 10:40 p.m. on May 31, Lewis-Rolland went to investigate a loud bang at the intersection of Southwest Salmon Street and Southwest Third Avenue, on the same corner as the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse, according to a class-action lawsuit filed by American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon. Lewis-Rolland is a plaintiff in the case, which led to an agreement by the Portland Police Bureau in July not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests.
The intersection by the U.S. Courthouse was mostly clear of protesters when Lewis-Rolland arrived, according to his case filing. As he began photographing, an officer aimed a gun directly at him. Shortly after, the officer fired several projectiles toward him without warning, according to the filing.
The police also threw tear gas, according to the suit. “Mr. Lewis-Rolland was overcome by the effects of tear gas and was unable to continue documenting protests or police action at that location, but he attempted to continue operating his camera to the best of his ability while recovering from the effects of the tear gas,” says the complaint. “He was able to capture a visual cloud of gas hovering over the intersection he had just retreated from.”
Lewis-Rolland later posted a photo on Facebook showing the officer just before he fired. “He could see I was holding a camera as well as I could see he was holding a gun,” Lewis-Rolland said in the post. He added that while he wasn’t injured, he felt shrapnel hit his body.
About an hour later, he was photographing a protest around the corner from the first incident, at Southwest Fourth Avenue and Southwest Taylor Street, when a different officer threw a canister of tear gas designed for crowd control at his feet, according to the suit. The photographer was again momentarily incapacitated by the effects of the tear gas.
When he started covering the protests on May 30, Lewis-Rolland wore a shirt and jeans and carried a Nikon camera with a telephoto lens, he told the Committee to Protect Journalists, a founding partner of the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, in a recent interview. “Before this I covered local music, festivals, local business editorials, landscapes, and weddings,” he said.
Lewis-Rolland told CPJ that he later had a T-shirt printed with the word “press” on the front and back and received a press pass from the Portland Mercury. He couldn't be reached for further comment about the incident.
The ACLU class-action complaint said that during the May 31 incident, Lewis-Rolland was “unmistakably present in a journalistic capacity” since he was carrying a “large Nikon D850 camera with a 70-200mm lens and a flash.”
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting several hundred incidents of journalists being assaulted, arrested, struck by crowd-control ammunition or tear gas, or having their equipment damaged while covering protests across the country. Find these incidents here.
A journalist with Full Revolution Media said he was hit with rubber bullets and pepper balls by Portland police officers while he was covering a protest on May 31, 2020, in downtown Portland, Oregon.
The demonstration was among the many that broke out in response to police violence and in support of Black Lives Matter following the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker is documenting assaults, arrests and other incidents involving journalists covering protests across the country.
In Portland, protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Mayor Ted Wheeler to declare a daily 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days.
On the night of May 31, protesters gathered near the Multnomah County Justice Center and marched toward Pioneer Courthouse despite the curfew, according to the Oregonian. Shortly after the 8 p.m. curfew took effect, the Portland police declared the protest an unlawful assembly and used tear gas and other crowd-control munitions to disperse the crowd.
John, the Full Revolution Media journalist, told the Tracker that around midnight he was near Southwest Fourth Avenue and Southwest Alder Street, when a "few young males came sprinting around the corner." They were being chased by a police riot van, said John, who asked that his last name not be used out of safety concerns.
"Police dismounted and shot many rounds at [them]," he told the Tracker. "I took one step to the right to make sure the police knew I was there because I was behind a tree, and they shot me multiple times with pepper balls and rubber bullets."
John yelled at the officers, he said, asking why they shot him and asking for a supervisor, but they ignored him and drove away. He told the Tracker that pepper balls were shot right next to his camera. He didn’t have press markings and doesn’t remember if he mentioned being a member of the press, but believes he was targeted.
The rubber bullets split his elbow open and created swelling for several weeks, he said, adding that the pepper balls left small abrasions.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing continuing litigation. After the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon filed a class-action lawsuit, the city agreed to a preliminary injunction in July to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
Cory Elia, an editor at Village Portland and host of a KBOO podcast, was repeatedly shoved by police while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on May 31, 2020, according to his lawsuit against the city and Mayor Ted Wheeler, among others.
Elia was covering one of the many protests that broke out across the U.S. in response to police violence and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement following the May 25 death of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white police officer in Minneapolis.
In Portland, protests over the death of Floyd began on May 29, prompting Wheeler to declare an 8 p.m. curfew that lasted three days.
On the night of May 31, protesters gathered near the Multnomah County Justice Center and marched toward Pioneer Courthouse despite the curfew, according to the Oregonian. Shortly after the 8 p.m. curfew took effect, the Portland police declared the protest an unlawful assembly and used tear gas and other crowd-control munitions to disperse the crowd.
Elia and his colleague Lesley McLam filed a civil lawsuit against the city, the state, and multiple law enforcement officers on July 8, citing multiple press freedom violations against the journalists. Elia declined to comment, citing an upcoming deposition.
According to the complaint, Elia and a journalist with weekly alternative newspaper Street Roots were reporting together downtown and were attempting to leave the area when a demonstrator ran past them. Immediately after, a flash-bang grenade exploded within feet of where the pair of journalists were standing and, while temporarily blinded and disoriented, five officers surrounded them.
“[The officers] threatened to arrest them if they did not move ‘NOW!’” the complaint said. “They held out their press passes and yelled ‘PRESS! PRESS!’ and reminded the police officers that press were exempt from the curfew order.”
According to the complaint, the officers deliberately pushed both journalists after they identified themselves, and caused Elia to stumble into his bike, injuring his ankle.
After the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon filed a class-action lawsuit at the end of June, the city agreed to a preliminary injunction to not to arrest or harm any journalists or legal observers of the protests or impede their work.
The Portland Police Bureau has said it wouldn't comment on incidents involving journalists covering the protests, citing ongoing litigation.
Andy Ngo, an independent photojournalist and editor for Quillette, was attacked and had his equipment stolen while documenting an antifa counterprotest in Portland, Oregon, on June 29, 2019.
Ngo is an out-spoken critic of antifa and has covered antifa demonstrations and protests since 2016, primarily publishing the videos taken on his GoPro to Twitter and YouTube. Ngo told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he does not wear press identification or badges while covering protests, but openly films and identifies himself as media to those who ask. He also said that he has become well-known to the antifa community in Portland and has “come to expect” their hostility against him.
The far-right group The Proud Boys originally announced the Portland rally for June 29, almost exactly one year after the “Battle of Portland.” That event was marked with street fights and dueling protesters, and was ultimately classified as a riot by the Portland Police Department.
In planning an opposition rally, local antifa demonstrators called the Proud Boy rally an “attack,” and published a ”call to defend” the city. The post mentioned Ngo in a section labeled “Violent and Racist Proud Boy Propaganda,” and described him as a “local far-right Islamophobic journalist.”
The day before the rally, Ngo tweeted out screenshots from the post, writing, “I am nervous about tomorrow’s Portland antifa rally. They’re promising ‘physical confrontation’ & have singled me out to be assaulted.”
Ngo and the public relations firm he has contracted to handle his media requests following the incident did not respond to requests for comment.
The Guardian reported that early on the day of the protest and counterprotests, Ngo was filming when protesters dumped a milkshake on him. Later video taken by Oregonian journalist Jim Ryan showed Ngo being hit and sprayed with silly string by masked individuals who appeared to be antifa demonstrators at around 1:30 p.m.
First skirmish I’ve seen. Didn’t see how this started, but @MrAndyNgo got roughed up. pic.twitter.com/hDkfQchRhG
— Jim Ryan (@Jimryan015) June 29, 2019
Ngo tweeted that he “was beat on face and head multiple times in downtown in middle of street with fists and weapons” and that he was taken to an emergency room. Ngo also posted photos of his facial abrasions.
In a Wall Street Journal opinion piece, Ngo said that he was diagnosed with a brain hemorrhage.
A Vox explainer article outlines the history between Ngo, The Proud Boys and antifa, and how Ngo is considered by some to be more of a provocateur than journalist. Some have pointed out that Ngo was the only journalist targeted.
For the purposes of the Tracker, Ngo identifies as a journalist, has a track record of publication and was in the process of documenting when he was attacked. For more about how the Tracker counts incidents, see our frequently asked questions page.
Portland protests have become a dangerous beat over the past year: the Tracker has documented multiple journalists covering the demonstrations and riots being injured by far-right and antifa protesters, as well as by Portland police.
In a video opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal, Andy Ngo shows images and describes being beaten at a protest rally in Portland that involved both right-wing and antifa groups.
",None,None,None,None,False,20CV19618,['DISMISSED'],Civil,None,False,private individual,None,None,False,False,None,None,private individual,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"anti-fascism, protest, robbery, white nationalism",,, 2019-05-30 16:14:56.969947+00:00,2023-08-31 20:57:13.952538+00:00,Independent journalist files assault charges following May Day protests,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/independent-journalist-files-assault-charges-following-may-day-protests/,2023-08-31 20:57:13.833276+00:00,,,"(2020-06-04 13:21:00+00:00) Conservative writer sues for damages claiming targeted assault, intimidation campaign, (2023-08-21 16:56:00+00:00) Writer awarded $300,000 in lawsuit alleging assault, intimidation campaign",Assault,,,,Andy Ngo (Independent),,2019-05-01,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Andy Ngo, who identifies as an independent journalist and photographer, says he was sprayed with bear repellent and assaulted while recording during a May Day protest and its aftermath in Portland, Oregon.
Ngo, who primarily publishes his videos on Twitter and YouTube, says he was documenting rising tensions between members of antifa, who had scheduled a gathering at local bar Cider Riot, and members of far-right groups, including Patriot Prayer, who arrived at the bar seemingly to confront antifa members.
When he arrived in front of the bar at approximately 7:30 p.m., Ngo told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that members of antifa who had covered their faces with bandanas and masks started shouting, “Camera! Camera!” Ngo said that the antifa protesters were familiar with him and his work, as he has been covering antifa critically since November 2016.
While standing outside, Ngo said he was approached by a woman from the antifa side who said that she had applied for a job at his mother’s flower shop and a man who recited the shop’s address, which Ngo said felt like a pointed threat.
Patriot Prayer members arrived at the bar shortly after.
“[The two groups] were standing at the bar and across the street yelling at each other and eventually it did become physical,” Ngo said. “There was a brawl that involved what looked like pepper spray, mace and bear mace being sprayed, back-and-forth objects being thrown—glasses, bottles—and things were hitting cars and breaking on the ground.”
About 10 minutes after he arrived, Ngo said he noticed that the interaction was becoming very hostile and decided to move a bit further back.
“I stood behind a van that was on the street and peaked around the corner with my camera,” Ngo told the Tracker. “And then a masked individual ran from the property of the bar and sprayed the chemical directly in my face.”
In his video of the incident, a woman wearing sunglasses and a bandana covering her face can be seen coming from the opposite side of the van spraying what appears to be bear spray at members of Patriot Prayer before turning and spraying Ngo directly.
Ngo told the Tracker that the chemical burned his skin and eyes, and he had to be led across the street by a woman nearby to sit down. “I could still hear the fight and it sounded like it was getting closer and closer to me,” Ngo said. “The people around me said, ‘You’ve got to go, you’ve got to go now.’” Struggling to open his eyes, Ngo said he went to the nearest establishment, a wine bar, to use their restroom to wash what was left of the spray.
At approximately 8:20 p.m., he called the police non-emergency line to report the incident. Ngo said the operator informed him that all available officers were currently engaged in policing the riot, and that no one would be available to take his statement for several hours. Ngo returned home, and just after 11 p.m. an officer came by to take his statement.
This was not the only incident Ngo reported to the police that day: He told the Tracker that he was punched while he was covering a protest earlier on that day, which he reported to officers at the scene. Ngo told the Tracker that protesters had recognized him when he arrived at a publicly announced protest just after noon.
“Immediately, they were hostile to me, although I’ve come to expect that,” Ngo said. “The ones that knew me flipped me off and cursed at me. The ones who didn’t know me went up to me and said, ‘I don’t give you permission to record me.’ I didn’t respond to that: it was in a public park.”
At approximately 2:20 p.m. a man with his face covered and wearing sunglasses approached Ngo and sprayed his camera with silly string. An Oregonian reporter stepped between them, admonishing the man and prevented him from spraying Ngo or his gear further.
It was shortly after, as the protesters’ march stopped in front of Portland’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement offices at around 2:45 p.m., that Ngo says an antifa protester punched him in the stomach.
In an email, a Portland Police Bureau public information officer said that the investigations into the two assaults reported by Ngo are ongoing and therefore the bureau cannot provide comment or details.
In a screenshot from his video, Andy Ngo is sprayed with a chemical while filming May Day protests in Portland, Oregon.
",None,None,None,None,False,20CV19618,['DISMISSED'],Civil,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,private individual,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,None,,"anti-fascism, chemical irritant, protest",,, 2019-02-05 20:58:22.490987+00:00,2020-03-20 18:58:13.905897+00:00,"Portland man arrested for stalking, harassing Oregon editor",https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/portland-man-arrested-stalking-harassing-oregon-editor/,2020-03-20 18:58:13.825224+00:00,,,,Other Incident,,,,,,2019-01-29,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Therese Bottomly, editor of The Oregonian/OregonLive, was stalked, harassed, and threatened by a Portland man who repeatedly stated Bottomly had published false information.
Kevin Michael Purfield was arrested and indicted on charges that he stalked and harassed Bottomly on Jan. 29, 2019, according to OregonLive.
Purfield reportedly sent numerous emails and phone calls to the newsroom alleging that Bottomly had published false information — including about the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary mass shooting.
Purfield, who repeatedly called the newsroom to say that various mass shootings had never occurred, sent Bottomly “her home address and ‘symbols of death’” after the editor told him to stop calling, OregonLive reported.
Purfield had previously pleaded guilty in 2013 to making hoax bomb threats to the Multnomah County Probation Office and the downtown jail building. He is being held at the Multnomah County Detention Center and bail has been set at $2 million, according to OregonLive.
A representative for Portland, Oregon, Mayor Ted Wheeler invited reporters from three news organizations to sign a non-disclosure agreement as a condition for access to the Portland Police Bureau's Incident Command Post during a protest by the right-wing group Patriot Prayer on Nov. 17, 2018, according to Willamette Week
The agreement prohibits the publication of “confidential” information which it broadly defines to include direct quotes.
“Direct quotes of the assigned employee or any other member interviewed or conversed with are Confidential unless the assigned employee otherwise consents to and authorizes publication of their direct quote,” the agreement states.
“The Receiving Party acknowledges that access to PPB facilities and Confidential Information during an observation and tour is a privilege and not a right. Thus, the Receiving Party agrees to waive any claims and hold City and PPB harmless for any perceived failure of the Disclosing Party to grant the Receiving Party access to Confidential Information, or for any restriction on the Receiving Party’s ability to use, reproduce, or publish Confidential Information.”
Willamette Week, which published a copy of the non-disclosure agreement, reported that journalists from KGW-TV, The Oregonian and the Portland Tribune were offered the deal by the mayor’s communications director Eileen Park.
"It's an effort to provide more access, transparency, and to show the public what goes into the decision making and planning process prior to and during these protests," Park stated in an email to a KGW reporter obtained by Willamette Week. "Lt Craig Dobson will be your liason [sic], and can guide when and what you will be able to tweet and share.”
The Portland Mercury wrote that Park worked with the Portland Police Bureau to select journalists based on their history of “fair and balanced” reporting.
"In hindsight, I can see how this does not look good," Park said. “Ideally, we should open this option up to every media outlet."
“We hear the concerns and hope media sees from our office it was about increasing access,” a spokesperson for the mayor told Willamette Week. "We'll continue to do that no matter what."
According to the Willamette Week, no news organization accepted the offer which was ultimately rescinded. Six people were arrested during the protest.
Eder Campuzano, a reporter at The Oregonian, was hit in the head by a plastic water bottle while covering protests in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 4, 2018.
“Moments after I began live-streaming the police response to yet another face-off between right-wing and anti-fascist demonstrators, blood was dripping from my head onto one of my favorite shirts and I was being escorted to The Oregonian newsroom,” Campuzano wrote in a first-person piece about the incident.
Tyler Dumont, a journalist at Fox 12 Oregon, captured a photo of Campuzano's bleeding head and posted it on Twitter, where it spread quickly.
Was just standing next to @Oregonian reporter @edercampuzano, he got hit with something and is bleeding. Medics helping him. Things are getting extremely intense, even for those of us standing back from the center of these groups pic.twitter.com/F4ID7Dj2Zp
— Tyler Dumont FOX 12 (@TylerDumontNews) August 4, 2018
Campuzano wrote that after he was hit, reporters, protesters, and onlookers quickly descended on him to make sure he was okay, and a street medic stemmed the bleeding with a gauze pad. Although he had to stop his livestream, he added, his focus remained on his reporting.
He reported that he was taken to urgent care, had his vitals taken by nurses, and had his wound stapled.
After being released from urgent care, Campuzano tweeted that he was OK.
Hey-a Twitter! Thanks for all your kind words and I appreciate you being concerned after seeing that photo of me clutching my head. Here’s a short update. 1/* pic.twitter.com/bAANd5f7bb
— eder campuzano 🇲🇽🇺🇸🎮🎶📽 (@edercampuzano) August 5, 2018
He noted that this incident broke his 91-week streak of covering protests without getting hurt. He said that he generally takes precautions when documenting demonstrations, following police orders to the best of his ability and staying on the perimeter of the action.
“The pain subsided an hour after I arrived home," he later wrote in The Oregonian. "I just hoped that photo of my bloodied face wouldn't make it far."
By then, Dumont's photo of Campuzano's bleeding head had gone viral, and Campuzano reported that he was “flooded with concerned tweets, texts and emails from all over the country hoping I was okay," from people concerned that protesters had targeted Campuzano for violence because of his reporting.
Campuzano does not feel that he was attacked or targeted for violence at the protest. Instead, he believes that he was merely in the wrong place at the wrong time.
“I'm not the first reporter to sustain an injury in the field covering these things,” he wrote.
Ric Peavyhouse, a photojournalist with local TV station KATU, was filming a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 4, 2018, when a police officer shot him in the leg with a “less-lethal” foam-tipped round.
Mike Bivins, a freelance reporter who covers the city, was standing a short distance away from Peavyhouse and captured video of the sponge round striking him. He later posted the video on Twitter.
Here’s video of @KATUNews photojournalist @RPeavyhouse taking a police less-lethal weapon like a champ during the Aug 4 Patriot Prayer rally and counterprotest pic.twitter.com/m1w8DPndGL
— PDX Mike Bivins (@itsmikebivins) August 8, 2018
The video shows a small number of protesters in front of a line of Portland police officers. Peavyhouse is standing on the side of the street, holding a big TV camera on his shoulders and filming the line of police and the protesters.
In the video, police officer issues a dispersal order over a loudspeaker.
“All people in this area must immediately disperse,” the officer says. “Failure to comply with this order may subject you to arrest or citation and may subject you to the use of riot control agents or impact weapons.”
Suddenly, a small blue projectile — likely a 40mm plastic round with a blue foam tip — strikes Peavyhouse in his right thigh. He clutches his leg, turns around, and stumbles out of frame.
In an interview with KATU, Peavyhouse described being struck by the less-lethal round.
“Then I hear a tat-tat-tat-tat,” he said. “A split second later, I feel like a crack on my leg, feels like a baseball bat hitting your thigh.”
Peavyhouse tweeted that the 40mm sponge round left a large bruise on his thigh and made it painful for him to walk.
Last protest injury update: got checked out by a doctor. Bruise gets nastier by the hour. Hurts to walk a little, but doctor says to just take it easy.
— Ric Peavyhouse (@RPeavyhouse) August 5, 2018
Hit by one of the larger “less lethal impact rounds” used by @PortlandPolice yesterday #LiveOnK2 pic.twitter.com/tLd9GbjPyx
Ric Peavyhouse, a photojournalist for Portland TV station KATU, was struck by a blue foam-tipped round fired by police officers on August 4, 2018.
",None,None,None,None,False,None,[],None,None,False,None,None,None,False,False,None,None,law enforcement,yes,False,None,[],None,None,None,None,None,None,False,[],,"protest, shot / shot at",,, 2018-08-15 02:12:58.414047+00:00,2023-11-27 21:31:50.053081+00:00,Portland police shove independent journalist Donovan Farley with batons,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/portland-police-shove-independent-journalist-donovan-farley-with-batons/,2023-11-27 21:31:49.948352+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Donovan Farley (Paste),,2018-08-04,False,Portland,Oregon (OR),45.52345,-122.67621,"Independent journalist Donovan Farley and photographer Doug Brown were shoved by Portland police officers while covering a protest in Portland, Oregon, on Aug. 4, 2018.
The journalists were in downtown Portland that day to cover the far-right "Patriot Prayer" protest and counterprotests for Paste magazine.
A video that Brown posted on Vimeo shows journalists and protesters slowly retreating before an advancing line of Portland police officers, as the officers fire non-lethal projectiles at them. At one point, the officers stop at the edge of a street and wait. Without warning, the officers begin running down the street toward Brown, Farley, and others. Once they reach them, they violently shove them backwards with their batons.
"Move!" the officers yell as they force Brown backwards.
"What's your name?" Brown asks one of the officers pushing him. "What's your name, sir? What's your name?"
The officer does not reply.
“Their response when we were pinned against a wall was to hit and push us repeatedly with their batons,” Farley wrote in an account for Paste. “We all either had press passes clearly displayed or were holding several obviously professional cameras when we were attacked, and there was a TV crew trailing the line of police, so we figured we’d be allowed to slide out of the way and do our jobs. We were wrong.”
A screengrab from a video recorded by Doug Brown shows Portland police officers shoving Brown backwards with batons on Aug. 8, 2018.
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The journalists were in downtown Portland that day to cover the far-right "Patriot Prayer" protest and counterprotests for Paste magazine. Brown was taking photographs of protesters and Portland police officers, who were clad in riot gear and armed with batons and non-lethal weapons.
A video that Brown posted on Vimeo shows journalists and protesters slowly retreating before an advancing line of Portland police officers, as the officers fire non-lethal projectiles at them. At one point, the officers stop at the edge of a street and wait. Without warning, the officers begin running down the street toward towards Brown, Farley, and others. Once they reach them, they violently shove them backwards with their batons.
"Move!" the officers yell as they force Brown backwards.
"What's your name?" Brown asks one of the officers pushing him. "What's your name, sir? What's your name?"
The officer does not reply.
Brown later tweeted a video showing the police charge.
Here's riot cops in Portland rushing and hitting me, @DonovanFarley, and others on the sidewalk. I don't know why they did this. #AllOutPDX #DefendPDX pic.twitter.com/mra0fanen0
— doug brown (@dougbrown8) August 4, 2018
“Here’s riot cops in Portland rushing and hitting me, @DonovanFarley, and others on the sidewalk,” Brown wrote. “I don’t know why they did this.”
Freelance photojournalist Liam Cohen was tear-gassed and pepper-sprayed by police officers while covering a far-right rally in Portland, Oregon, on June 30, 2018.
Cohen was documenting the rally for the Willamette Week, a Portland alt-weekly, when he got caught in between members of the far-right Patriot Prayer group and counterprotesters.
“Tear gas got shot in the middle to try to break the groups up,” Cohen told Freedom of the Press Foundation.
Just got seriously tear gassed and severely battered. Can’t post photos at the moment but will as soon as I can. #patriotprayer #Portland #protest #riot #antifa
— PDX Photojournalist (@pdxjourno) July 1, 2018
Cohen said he then was pushed around the corner heading north on 2nd St, where police officers in riot gear shot streams of pepper spray into the crowd.
“They shot right at me,” he said. “It seemed like they were going for a broad ‘let’s hit everybody.’ I think they were targeting anyone who was near that skirmish.”
He resumed documenting the protest shortly after being tear-gassed and pepper-sprayed.
“I’ve been pepper sprayed before, so in a weird way, I’m used to it,” Cohen said. “Everything was burning at first, but this passed after a few minutes. I waited until I got my bearings, threw water into my eyes from my water bottle, and just continued following the protest.”
Cohen said that at the time he was pepper-sprayed, he was carrying a large camera and wore both press credentials and a press patch.
“The way that Portland police handle this...they don’t discriminate against hitting journalists," he said. "If they saw me and knew that I was press, they didn’t care. That’s the way it goes out there, they don’t care if you’re press or not.”
KATU cameraman Carter Maynard was harassed and assaulted while covering a protest on June 28, 2018, outside the offices of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Portland, Oregon.
Prosecutors pursued charges against a 33-year-old woman for the attack, alleging that she slammed a wooden gate into Maynard’s head, and that her motivation was due to hostility toward the press. She was acquitted by a Multnomah County jury in May 2019.
The Oregonian reported that the medical professionals who examined Maynard diagnosed him with a concussion. A doctor hired by the defense, who did not personally examine him, disputed this.
According to The Oregonian, the woman accused of attacking Maynard testified that she had her hand on the wooden gate but did not slam it into the reporter; rather she let it go and it closed on him. She also testified that she thought the KATU reporter broadcasting images of protesters in attendance would endanger their lives.
Maynard, who no longer works for KATU, could not be reached for comment.
Portland Mercury reporter Kelly Kenoyer was shoved while covering a far-right rally in Portland, Oregon, on June 3, 2018.
“It was a scary experience—the first violent protest I've covered, and I had a bit of that violence directed at me,” she wrote in a piece for Portland Mercury.
Kenoyer told Freedom of the Press Foundation that she began covering the Patriot Prayer rally around 4 p.m., at which point there were around 20 people aligned with the far-right Patriot Prayer group and over 100 anti-fascist protesters present.
While filming a verbal confrontation between a Patriot Prayer demonstrator and a counterprotester, she said, a Patriot Prayer protester tried to grab her phone and shoved her backwards.
Kenoyer was able to film part of the altercation and later posted the video on Twitter.
This observer came to my defense when a guy pushed me in the face with a middle finger. pic.twitter.com/TTn1O9s9Zu
— 🌤Kelly Kenoyer☀️ (@Kelly_Kenoyer) June 4, 2018
“As [I filmed], the man (a masked up guy on the Patriot Prayer side), flipped me off, directing that hand towards the phone,” Kenoyer said. “Then he pushed his hand into my phone, shoving it into the side of my head/face, and pushed me over.”
After being pushed, Kenoyer identified herself as a reporter, and a bystander approached to try to defuse the situation. Kenoyer said that the man who shoved her and another Patriot Prayer demonstrator then then began yelling at the bystander.
“Things escalated from there and I ended up getting shoved backwards — I think they shoved the bystander into me,” she said. “I stumbled backwards and a random counterprotester caught me. He apologized for touching me and said he wanted to make sure I didn’t fall.”
Kenoyer said she felt frazzled after the altercation and took a moment to gather herself back together before getting back to work.
She said that she does not think that anyone was specifically targeting reporters for harassment, but protesters on both sides objected to being filmed.
"Neither side particularly wanted to be filmed," she said. "Antifa activists also told me not to film, though they didn’t physically assault me over it.”
Kenoyer also noted that a different Patriot Prayer member filmed her and said, “You like that, bitch?!” She clarified later that day to the woman that she was a reporter.
Last year, Kenoyer was also signaled out and threatened by right wingers on social media after writing for Eugene Weekly about the impacts of doxxing by the right on anti-fascist activists.
Arun Gupta, a freelance journalist whose work has been published in The Nation and The Guardian, was subpoenaed on Feb. 14, 2018, to testify at a deposition about a Nation article he wrote. Gupta did not contest the subpoena but refused to answer any questions related to his journalism and reporting process.
In August 2016, The Nation published “The Financial Firm That Cornered the Market on Jails,” an article by Gupta about Stored Value Cards — a financial firm, also known as Numi, that provides prepaid debit cards to local jails — and a class-action lawsuit that a former jail inmate filed against the firm.
In February 2018, as part of its defense in that class-action lawsuit, Numi subpoenaed Gupta to testify about his reporting.
“Recently, Numi and the bank subpoenaed and deposed me in order to gain access to all my potential notes, sources, documentation, recordings, and so on,” Gupta told the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
Gupta said that Numi originally tried to depose him in New York, but that his attorney was able to get the subpoena moved to Oregon, a state with a very strong press shield law.
Gupta oped to comply with the subpoena and was deposed on Feb. 28 at the Portland offices of Davis Wright Tremaine, the media law firm representing him. At the deposition, he refused to answer any questions related to his reporting, citing reporter’s privilege.
“Because Oregon has such strong media shield laws, my lawyer was able to bat down virtually every question the [company’s] lawyer threw at me,” he said. “They got some information about my educational and work history, but nothing else.”
Radio journalist John Sepulvado was subpoenaed on Feb. 16, 2017, to testify at trial about an interview he conducted with Ryan Bundy, one of the leaders of the group that forcibly occupied the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in 2016. Sepulvado conducted that interview while still a journalist at Oregon Public Broadcasting; he later moved to California and now works for San Francisco radio station KQED.
Federal prosecutors first asked Sepulvado in 2016 to voluntarily testify about the interview. He refused, and the Obama administration's Department of Justice declined to issue a subpoena that would force him to testify.
But that changed under the Trump administration. Shortly after being sworn in as attorney general, Jeff Sessions personally approved the subpoena, which was then served on Sepulvado.
Although the prosecution did not explicitly ask Sepulvado to testify about his confidential sources, but Sepulvado later said that defense attorneys looking to discredit his testimony began asking him about his confidential sources.
In a first-person piece for The Portland Mercury, Sepulvado wrote that he believed it was his responsibility to fight the subpoena and protect his sources.
"To violate the trust of my named source, and the audience, by testifying for or against anyone in a criminal trial would erode both my credibility and OPB’s, impeding our ability to report freely under the First Amendment," he wrote. "My unnamed sources are people who have entrusted me to protect their identity no matter what, in exchange for information of importance to the public."
On Feb. 24, a federal judge in Portland ruled in Sepulvado's favor and quashed the subpoena.
Leader of a group of armed protesters Ammon Bundy talks to the media at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge near Burns, Oregon, January 8, 2016.
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