Federal law enforcement officers, deployed under the new Trump administration executive order to protect federal monuments and buildings, confront protesters against racial inequality in Portland, Oregon, USA, July 18, 2020.
Nathan Howard | Reuters
Federal officials should not target journalists or legal observers at anti-racism protests taking place in Portland, Oregon, a judge ruled, extending a ban that had already been in place for local police and giving local activists a victory.
US District Judge Michael Simon issued a temporary restraining order against the Department of Homeland Security and the US Marshals Service in a case filed by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of people who observed and reported on the demonstrations, which have taken place every night for almost two months.
Simon said in the Thursday night order that the tactics of federal officials, including evidence that they had specifically targeted journalists and legal observers who were clearly identified and did not violate the law, raised serious questions about violations of the First Amendment.
The role of federal law enforcement officials in the Portland protests has come under scrutiny by civil rights advocates and elected officials. On Thursday, the Justice Department inspector general said he would examine the conduct of federal officials in the city.
Those filing the lawsuit claimed that federal officials shot them with tear gas canisters, rubber bullets, and pepper balls and beat them with batons, sometimes without warning, after identifying themselves as members of the press.
The order, which will remain in effect for 14 days, prohibits federal officials from “arresting, threatening to arrest, or using physical force directed against anyone they know or reasonably know” to be a journalist or legal observer unless there is probable cause. that the person committed a crime.
Journalists and legal observers “will not be required to disperse after the issuance of a dispersal order, and such persons will not be subject to arrest for failing to disperse after the issuance of a dispersal order,” Simon wrote, although he noted that “remain bound by all other laws”.
“This order is a victory for the rule of law,” Jann Carson, acting executive director of the Oregon ACLU, said in a statement. “Federal agents from the Trump Departments of Homeland Security and Justice are terrorizing the community, threatening lives and relentlessly attacking journalists and legal observers documenting protests. These are the actions of a tyrant and take place nowhere in U.S”.
Matthew Borden, a partner at BraunHagey & Borden who served as a pro bono adviser to the ACLU, said the order was “critical protection for journalists and legal observers who exercise their fundamental right to record and observe police activities in these major protests, and it is a victory for the nation’s right to receive a full account of these events. “
Representatives from DHS and the Marshals Service did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Local concerns and a mockery of Trump
Local officials have filed complaints about the conduct of federal officials. Those allegations escalated after Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler, who joined the protests Wednesday night, was hit with tear gas outside federal court.
“What I saw last night was powerful in many ways,” Wheeler wrote in a Twitter post on Thursday. “I listened, listened and supported the protesters. And I saw what it means when the federal government unleashes paramilitary forces against its own people.”
Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum is pursuing a separate lawsuit to prevent federal officials allegedly taking protesters off the sidewalks and dumping them in unmarked trucks without identifying themselves as law enforcement officers.
President Donald Trump taunted Wheeler in a Twitter post Thursday morning, calling him the “radical left-wing mayor of Portland,” whom Trump claimed was “booed and yelled at by agitators and anarchists. I love to see how the pathetic Never Trumpers writhe!
Trump criticized the actions of protesters in Oregon and across the country protesting against police brutality following the murder in May of George Floyd, a black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis. The federal government has said in court documents that it has deployed more than 100 officers to Portland, and Trump has threatened to send agents to other cities led by liberal mayors where it has claimed the protests have gotten out of control.
In court documents arguing against the temporary restraining order, Justice Department attorneys said the protests have sparked criminal activity and that officers were targeted with improvised explosives, “commercial grade mortars,” lasers and “filled balloons. of paint and other substances. ” like feces. “
They argued that an order would not be possible to implement and that it “would unduly compel law enforcement, including preventing them from taking appropriate action when people engage in criminal conduct.”
But Simon rejected that reasoning in his order, noting that the city of Portland itself had supported the ACLU in the matter.
“Although the Federal Defendants assert their right to disperse the ‘violent opportunists’, there is no evidence that any journalist or legal observer, let alone any of the named Plaintiffs, has damaged federal property or acted violently toward federal officials,” Simon wrote.
He added that the government during the oral arguments had already “admitted that they do not have such evidence.”
“In fact, evidence before the Court shows that journalists and legal observers attend protests as ‘guardians of the public interest’, not as hooligans,” wrote Simon.
Presumptive Democratic candidate Joe Biden, who will face Trump during the November presidential election, has criticized the presence of federal officials in Portland.
“Of course, the United States government has the right and the duty to protect federal property,” Biden said in a statement. “The Obama-Biden administration protected federal property across the country without resorting to these heinous tactics, and without trying to fan the fires of division in this country.”
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