Incident details
- Date of incident
- June 7, 2025
- Location
- Los Angeles, California
- Targets
- Lexis-Olivier Ray (L.A. Taco)
- Case number
- 2:25-cv-05563
- Case status
- Ongoing
- Type of case
- Civil
- Assailant
- Law enforcement
- Was the journalist targeted?
- Yes
Assault
Law enforcement officers stand on a freeway in downtown Los Angeles on June 8, 2025, following an immigration protest the previous night. L.A. Taco investigative journalist Lexis-Olivier Ray was struck with pepper balls while reporting on the protest.
LA journalist sues DHS over protest assault
Investigative reporter Lexis-Olivier Ray sued the Department of Homeland Security and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem on June 18, 2025, after he was shot with pepper balls while documenting a protest earlier that month. The protest was one of many in June against federal immigration raids in and around Los Angeles, California.
The suit was filed in federal court on behalf of Ray, several other reporters and press groups, and various legal observers and participants in the June protests, according to court documents reviewed by the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
“DHS’s excessive and indiscriminate use of force against journalists, observers, and protesters has prevented people, including Plaintiffs, from exercising their constitutional rights, is chilling the exercise of free speech, has caused significant injuries to Plaintiffs, and is continuing to cause irreparable injury to Plaintiffs and others who want to attend or report on protests,” the complaint said.
Ray was documenting a protest on June 7 in downtown LA for independent news platform L.A. Taco when federal law enforcement began dispersing the crowd using pepper balls. Ray told the Tracker he was struck multiple times.
On the day the plaintiffs filed the suit, they also requested a temporary restraining order forcing DHS to stop “indiscriminately and excessively using unnecessary force against reporters, legal observers and protesters at events within the Los Angeles area.”
The court denied the request on June 20, ruling that the plaintiffs had not proven that DHS agents’ alleged constitutional violations had continued after the events outlined in the complaint, and that the order they requested was too broad.
Lexis-Olivier Ray, an investigative reporter for L.A. Taco, was struck with multiple pepper balls while covering an immigration enforcement protest in downtown Los Angeles, California, on June 7, 2025.
The protests began June 6 in response to federal raids in and around Los Angeles of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gathered, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. After demonstrators clashed with Los Angeles law enforcement officers and federal agents, President Donald Trump called in the California National Guard over the objections of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass.
On the evening of June 7, protesters gathered outside the Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles, where immigrants were being held. The Los Angeles Police Department declared an unlawful assembly, ordering demonstrators to disperse. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department was also present, as well as officers from multiple federal agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security.
Ray told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he was outside the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building, where detainees were allegedly being held, when federal law enforcement began dispersing the crowd using pepper balls. He said he was unsure which agency the officers belonged to.
Ray then relocated to a nearby sidewalk on Alameda Street, where reporters had set up tripods and several TV news trucks were parked.
Eventually, the federal officers moved up their skirmish line toward Alameda Street, continuing to fire volleys of the projectiles in the direction of the press. Ray was struck multiple times, once in the middle finger and at least once on his back, he told the Tracker.
“It seemed so blatant, we weren’t around any protesters, we were clearly media,” Ray said. “They didn’t seem to care that we were media. They treated us like we were protesters and didn’t respect our First Amendment rights as journalists.”
The gaggle of press continued to back away as officers followed them, eventually establishing another skirmish at Alameda Street and Temple Street, according to Ray, who said his backpack, which was covered in pepper ball residue, served as a shield.
“I definitely am worried about the implications of covering other protests like that,” Ray said. “If the media wasn’t there, the public wouldn’t have an understanding of what happened that night.”
The Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to the Tracker’s request for comment.
In a June 7 post on X, ICE said: “Our officers and agents continued to enforce immigration law in LA, despite the violent protesters.”
On June 8, a sheriff’s deputy searched the bags of Ray and freelance journalist Joey Scott while they were reporting on another immigration enforcement protest in downtown Los Angeles.
The Tracker has documented other incidents in which Ray was shoved, detained, tackled and struck with a baton while covering protests in Los Angeles since 2020.
The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker catalogues press freedom violations in the United States. Email tips to [email protected].
