Photojournalist shot with chemical irritants amid Illinois immigration protests

Freelance photojournalist Audrey Richardson was shot with crowd-control munitions and tear-gassed while covering protests outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Illinois, on Sept. 19, 2025.

The facility, where detainees are being held and processed ahead of deportation, has drawn escalating protests and federal response since early September, following the Department of Homeland Security’s launch of Operation Midway Blitz.

Richardson told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that she was on assignment for nonprofit newsroom Block Club Chicago that day, and arrived at the facility shortly before 5 p.m.

“It was calm at first,” she said. “Then, they would bring the detainees in and protesters would try to block the car, and that’s what would incite the pushback from ICE. It kept happening, and each time I feel like ICE got more aggressive.”

Increasing numbers of officers would advance out of the facility to push back protesters, Richardson said. During one such rush, as officers were shoving everyone, she said that she was pushed into a large rock near the road, causing her to fall over.

As evening arrived, Richardson said the federal officers deployed stun grenades and tear gas, while others stationed on the roof shot a barrage of pepper balls toward the crowd. That’s when she believes a munition hit her.

“I was shot in my left calf. It hurt really bad and there was a massive bruise for a few weeks,” Richardson told the Tracker.

She added that she doesn’t know whether she was deliberately targeted, noting that she was identifiable as press, or if she was caught in their indiscriminate spray of the crowd-control munitions.

“It seems to have gone from zero to 100 so quickly,” Richardson said. “That one time they decided to come out in full force was just really scary. They were just throwing explosives at protesters. Afterward, they didn’t do it again, because people were injured and throwing up.

“I think people were like, ‘OK, I don’t really want to go through that again,’” she added, noting that that was probably the officers’ goal.

An array of Chicago-area journalists and others — including Block Club — sued President Donald Trump and various U.S. agencies Oct. 6 over federal law enforcement’s violent response to ongoing anti-deportation protests outside the ICE facility.

In an article announcing the lawsuit, Block Club wrote that it decided to pursue the case after four of its journalists, including Richardson, were shot with pepper balls and tear-gassed.

“We intend to continue to report on the protests, but our ability to do so, to the standards that we hold ourselves to, continues to be impacted by our fears of violence and arrests of our employees and contractors,” said Stephanie Lulay, Block Club executive editor and co-founder. “We’re taking this step to protect our journalists and to assert our First Amendment right to report.”

The journalists won a temporary restraining order Oct. 9, forbidding federal agents from dispersing, arresting, threatening or using physical force against journalists without probable cause of a crime. It says agents can order journalists to change locations if they give them time to comply.

It also forbids the use of riot-control weapons and chemical munitions on those not posing an immediate threat to law enforcement; firing projectiles at the head, neck, groin, spine or female breast; or striking anyone with a vehicle. And it mandates that federal agents wear visible identification and body cameras.

Hayden Johnson, counsel at Protect Democracy, part of the legal team for the plaintiffs, said, “Over the last weeks and months, Chicagoans have bravely sought to express and protect these freedoms in the face of severe government abuse. Today’s ruling recognizes that those efforts—peacefully opposing a federal incursion into your city and reporting the events—require the utmost constitutional protection.”