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 2022-02-04 14:44:19.163714+00:00,2022-09-21 20:51:35.498821+00:00,Portland-based journalist assaulted during ‘Million MAGA March’ in D.C.,https://pressfreedomtracker.us/all-incidents/portland-based-journalist-assaulted-during-million-maga-march-in-dc/,2022-09-21 20:51:35.442245+00:00,,,,Assault,,,,Laura Jedeed (Independent),,2020-11-14,False,Washington,District of Columbia (DC),38.89511,-77.03637,"
Portland-based independent journalist Laura Jedeed told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was assaulted while covering what organizers called the “Million MAGA March,” a gathering of various far-right groups, on Nov. 14, 2020, in Washington, D.C.
The rally was held in the aftermath of President Donald Trump’s failed reelection bid, a loss that the president and his supporters claimed — without evidence — was the result of widespread election fraud.
Things were mostly peaceful in the nation’s capital for much of Nov. 14, but fights broke between Trump supporters and counterprotesters as the day wore on, according to the Washington Post.
In a video that Jedeed posted two days after the march, two women can be seen calling Jedeed’s location to the attention of others in the crowd and accusing her of doxxing people at the rally.
“She loves to dox people. Right here, this bitch,” one of the women said while pointing in Jedeed’s direction.
A man with an American flag face covering approaches the scene, repeatedly calls Jedeed a “bitch” and moves just inches away from the journalist while she continues to record.
Jedeed tells the man that he is standing on her foot and repeatedly tells him to stop making physical contact with her. The journalist said that she recognized the two women and the man from rallies in Portland and that she had seen the man in the lobby of her hotel earlier that day.
“I can’t wait to see you in the fucking lobby again,” the man says to Jedeed.
A number of other members of the crowd, many of them not wearing masks, surrounded Jedeed and hurled taunts and insults at her while standing close to her, which she captured in videos she posted to YouTube and Twitter.
“They were just getting aggressively in my personal space,” Jedeed told the Tracker. “At no point did anyone hurt me. I was very lucky.”
Jedeed said the incident lasted about 20 minutes. In her video, she can be heard repeatedly telling members of the crowd to stop touching her.
Ultimately, the man with the American flag mask who’d stepped on her foot — and repeatedly called her a fascist while she was being harangued by the crowd — ended up escorting her from the crowd.
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.
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.
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.
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.