Immigration-related press freedom violations, 2017-present

As federal law enforcement expands its power to carry out increasingly restrictive immigration policies, it’s not just a political flashpoint and a human rights crisis — it’s also an ongoing struggle over press freedom.

Since its launch in 2017, the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker has cataloged numerous press freedom aggressions, both at immigration-related events and by Department of Homeland Security officials. While the majority can be described as attempts by law enforcement to prevent reporting on immigration policy or enforcement, the incidents range from assaults at protests to inclusion in federal investigations, from device searches at the border to intimidation of journalists and their sources.

The Tracker’s data so far covers President Donald Trump’s first term, President Joe Biden’s four years in office and Trump’s return to the White House.

Policy changes by successive U.S. presidents have been met by protests across the country, which in turn have seen waves of press freedom violations. Indeed, the majority of immigration-related incidents were the result of law enforcement attempting to prevent the press from documenting protests against immigration policy and enforcement, and were overwhelmingly assaults.

The Tracker’s start coincided with the 2017 inauguration of Trump, who began his campaign by whipping up anti-immigrant fervor. During his first week in office, Trump issued an executive order banning citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from traveling to the United States.

Journalists raced to cover protests against the ban, leading to the first immigration-related violation in the database: security and police officers at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport barring journalists from covering protests there.

After Trump’s 2017 travel ban was blocked in court, the administration tried again and ultimately won approval from the Supreme Court. The bans set the stage for a group of border stops the Tracker documented that year and the next.

More than two dozen journalists were stopped at the border, some sent to secondary screenings, and many were questioned about their work or had their phones seized.

Several journalists — including Isma’il Kushkush, Akram Shibly and Zainab Merchant — joined in a 2017 lawsuit against the DHS over the warrantless searches of their electronic devices. While an initial ruling held that border authorities must have reasonable suspicion before conducting a search, it was later overturned by a court of appeals.

In 2018, immigration authorities targeted journalists covering the arrival in Mexico of the asylum-seeking Central American migrant caravan, which Trump called an “invasion.” Journalists were stopped at the border, questioned about their work and had their equipment searched.

A San Diego, California, TV station later found that DHS officials had compiled a database as part of its surveillance of the caravan, including at least 10 journalists, who were then flagged for invasive treatment at the border.

Challenges to journalists crossing borders haven’t been confined to harassment at checkpoints; throughout the years, foreign journalists seeking asylum from persecution over reporting in their home countries have periodically been detained.

Mexican reporter Emilio Gutiérrez Soto was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in 2017 while appealing the denial of his asylum, and Honduran journalist Thirzia Galeas was detained in 2021 while requesting it. Egyptian former journalist Ayman Soliman had his asylum temporarily revoked in 2025 over purported ties to an Islamist political group, and Martín Méndez Pineda was denied parole in 2017 while seeking it.

Meanwhile, the majority of immigration-related incidents in 2020 and early 2021 took place at Portland, Oregon, protests against ICE practices, including medical neglect of detainees, and detention and caging of migrant children. As protesters gathered outside an ICE facility nearly night after night, federal officers responded with crowd-control munitions and chemical irritants, sometimes deliberately targeting the journalists covering the unrest.

Protests in Portland continued into Biden’s presidency, deliberately including Inauguration Day in 2021, when there were a handful of assaults against journalists. While slowing soon after, they were far from the only immigration-related press freedom abuses documented during his term, which was marked both by a loosening of immigration policies and a restriction of asylum claims.

Case in point: Biden’s Department of Justice issued a secret subpoena to gain information on a Guardian reporter’s phone records as part of a leak investigation initiated during the Trump administration. The DOJ investigation took place during the time investigations correspondent Stephanie Kirchgaessner was reporting on Trump’s “zero-tolerance” immigration policy in 2020.

In the wake of revelations of multiple secretive subpoenas in connection with leak investigations undertaken by Trump’s DOJ, then-Attorney General Merrick Garland announced in July 2021 that he was changing the department’s policies to prevent such seizures of journalists’ records. Those policies were rescinded when Trump returned to the White House.

Before Trump even returned to office, protesters began to voice their dissent with his planned anti-immigrant policies, and journalists undertook the risk to cover it.

Days before his January 2025 inauguration, Illinois protesters gathered to demonstrate against ICE at the Gary/Chicago International Airport, where regular protests have been held since 2017 to object to its long-standing use for deportation flights. Freelance photojournalist Matthew Kaplan was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, criminal trespass and resisting law enforcement while reporting there. The charges were dropped approximately two months later.

In his second term, Trump has given ICE an expansive mandate and billions of dollars to enlarge its detention system and deportation efforts. Trump encouraged agents to arrest anyone in the country illegally (not just those with criminal convictions), allowed them to make arrests in “sensitive locations” (including schools and hospitals) and expanded their ability to deport individuals without them first appearing before an immigration judge. He’s also accused journalists who have reported on the government’s immigration crackdown of inciting violence.

In the wake of those policy changes, a surge in protests began in June in Los Angeles, California, in response to federal raids of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gathered.

As news media covered the protests, personnel from the LA Police Department and LA County Sheriff’s Department, as well as federal agents deployed by Trump over the objections of state and city officials, unleashed crowd-control weapons indiscriminately. Journalists were shoved, tear-gassed, shot with projectiles, detained and blocked from reporting. In response, multiple journalists filed federal civil rights suits against the city, county and DHS, resulting in multiple orders restricting LAPD and federal agents’ use of force.

Federal raids have also spread throughout the country and, as in California, protests against them have been accompanied by a burst of press freedom violations. Journalists covering demonstrations outside the ICE facility in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, Illinois, faced a raft of assaults; a group of them won a preliminary injunction on Nov. 6, limiting federal agents’ use of force, riot-control weapons and chemical munitions. The judge in the suit said agents’ actions against the press “shock the conscience.”

Journalists in Portland, Oregon, have also been shot at and pepper-sprayed during ICE protests; journalists in New York, New York, attempting to cover immigration court proceedings have been shoved, even to the point of hospitalization.

Law enforcement agents at protests have acted to prevent documentation of their behavior and contributed to an atmosphere of fear and intimidation, journalists say. Multiple journalists have reported being pepper-sprayed and tear-gassed by federal officers while documenting protests at ICE facilities — including in New Jersey, New York, California and Illinois. Even without direct targeting, journalists have been caught in the crossfire of chemical irritants and crowd-control munitions, and told by officers that it “didn’t matter” that they were press.

In addition to violations occurring at immigration-related events, the Tracker has observed direct retaliation against journalists via immigration proceedings. Both Trump administrations initiated deportation proceedings against journalists in connection with their reporting: Manuel Duran in 2018 and Mario Guevara in 2025 for reporting on immigration-related protests. Duran was granted asylum in the U.S. in March 2022, but Guevara was deported in October 2025 to El Salvador.

To find all press freedom aggressions against journalists and news organizations at events or protests connected to immigration or the immigration system, or in relation to the journalist’s reporting on immigration, use the #immigration, #Department of Homeland Security and #ICE detention tags to search the database.

This special section was first published on Nov. 14, 2025.