Human Impact Project

As protests continue outside the ICE facility in South Portland, Oregon, residents and local leaders are reporting health impacts from federal agents' use of tear gas and other chemical crowd control munitions. Area residents report symptoms including nausea, headaches, and respiratory issues. State lawmakers have expressed concerns about documented health effects including chemical burns and respiratory failure. Federal agents have deployed tear gas multiple times over recent weeks, with chemicals seeping into nearby apartments and affecting residents regardless of protest participation.

Ruperto Vicens Marquez, head chef at Emilio's Kitchen in Atlantic Highlands, was detained by ICE on October 19, 2025. According to ICE, Marquez is from Mexico and has a final removal order, though his lawyer disputes this claim and states he has a pending merits hearing scheduled for 2028. Marquez has valid work authorization through 2029 according to Atlantic Highlands Mayor Lori Hohenleitner, and his wife and three children remain in the U.S. A protest was held in support of Marquez, and a GoFundMe campaign has raised $85,000 to cover legal fees.

A Pennsylvania man exonerated after spending over 40 years in prison for a murder he didn't commit was immediately taken into ICE custody upon his release, with authorities seeking to deport him to India based on a 1988 deportation order. Subu Vedam, who moved to the US at nine months old, was cleared of the 1980 murder charge earlier this month, but ICE cited his old drug conviction and deportation order as grounds for detention. His family and lawyers are fighting the deportation, arguing that Vedam has virtually no ties to India, had applied for US citizenship before his arrest, and demonstrated decades of good behavior in prison where he earned three degrees and mentored fellow inmates.

ICE and Border Patrol agents threatened to arrest a Chicago cyclist who was following and recording them. The incident was captured on video and shared by a Chicago Tribune journalist. Community members intervened with whistles, which appeared to cause the agents to back away from the cyclist.

An 18-year-old girl in Hoffman Estates was forcibly removed from a vehicle and thrown to the ground by what appeared to be a federal agent during a weekend enforcement operation. She and two friends were detained for hours before being released. Her parents are demanding accountability and taking legal action, while there is confusion about which agency was responsible for the arrest.

A 15-year-old boy with autism and special needs, Emmanuel González Garcia, went missing on October 4, 2025, after wandering away from his mother Maria García's fruit stand in Houston. Houston Police Department located him the next day but did not connect him with the existing missing person report due to a name discrepancy (Manuel vs. Emmanuel). HPD contacted ICE and transferred the boy to federal immigration custody. García was without knowledge of her son's whereabouts for nearly a week until an immigration attorney intervened. The teen is now in Office of Refugee Resettlement custody and is facing emergency appendix surgery. An investigation into the Houston Police Department's procedures was initiated following the incident.

Mario Guevara, an Emmy-award-winning Salvadoran journalist who lived in Atlanta for nearly 22 years and held a valid work permit, was arrested by ICE on June 14, 2025, while live-streaming a 'No Kings' protest in Doraville. He spent more than three months in immigration detention, much of it in isolation, separated from his wife and children who remained in the US. A Georgia immigration judge ordered his release on bond in July, and the ACLU filed legal challenges on his behalf, but the Bureau of Immigration Appeals closed his case and ordered his removal on September 19. DHS denied targeting him for his journalism, stating he was arrested for obstruction and deported due to a decade-old removal order. He was deported to El Salvador on October 3, 2025, and continued working as a journalist afterward, reporting from Central America and speaking at international press freedom conferences.

Chicago Alderperson Jessie Fuentes was handcuffed and threatened with arrest by federal immigration agents at Humboldt Park Health on Friday after she asked whether they had a signed judicial warrant to detain a patient. Fuentes said the agents shoved her twice before restraining her, an exchange partly captured on video showing an agent demanding she leave and threatening arrest before forcibly turning her around and cuffing her. She said she was asserting the patient's constitutional rights and had not touched the agents or trespassed, and noted that federal agents have brought multiple injured people to local hospitals following arrests.

L. Vural Elibol, a photojournalist working for Turkish news agency Anadolu Ajansi, was violently shoved to the ground by federal officers outside an immigration court in lower Manhattan on October 1, 2025. The incident occurred as officers were detaining a person from Peru at the courthouse. Elibol was injured and hospitalized, spending 35 to 40 minutes semiconscious on the ground before being transported by ambulance to New York-Presbyterian Hospital, where he was treated and discharged the same day. Fellow photographers Dean Moses and Olga Fedorova were also pushed by federal agents during the incident.

L. Vural Elibol, a chief cameraman and videographer for Turkey's Anadolu Agency, was seriously injured when an ICE agent shoved him to the floor in a hallway outside immigration court at 26 Federal Plaza in Manhattan while he was documenting enforcement activity. Elibol hit his head on the floor near an elevator bank and remained unconscious for 35 to 40 minutes. Paramedics placed a neck brace on him and transported him by stretcher to a hospital, where he was treated for a possible concussion and kept for observation. Two other journalists—Dean Moses, a police bureau chief for amNewYork, and freelance photographer Olga Fedorova—were also grabbed and shoved by agents during the same incident but were not seriously injured. Eyewitnesses reported that ICE agents had been pursuing an immigrant into an elevator when Elibol was attacked while attempting to film the confrontation.

On September 30, 2025, at least three journalists were physically assaulted by masked ICE agents at 26 Federal Plaza while documenting an apparent arrest on the 12th floor. Dean Moses, police bureau chief for amNewYork, entered a public elevator to photograph ICE agents apprehending a woman when the agents grabbed him by his arms and shoved him out of the elevator. During the same incident, freelance journalist Olga Fedorova of the Associated Press was shoved to the floor by another ICE agent, and L. Vural Elibol of the Anadolu Agency was knocked down hard, striking his head and sustaining serious injuries that required hospitalization and a neck brace. Moses suffered minor pain in his underarms and shoulder but said he remains determined to continue covering proceedings at the courthouse.

Freelance photojournalist Dave Decker, on assignment for Zuma Press, was shot multiple times with pepper balls by federal officers and had his camera lens damaged while covering protests outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Broadview, Illinois, on September 27, 2025. Officers appeared to target Decker specifically, pointing him out before firing; he said he was also shot with pepper balls the previous day while covering protests at the same site. Broadview Mayor Katrina Thompson had sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security objecting to the use of chemical agents against residents and first responders, and the village said ICE agents warned of a more aggressive response in apparent retaliation before the September 27 protest.

Independent journalist Leigh Kunkel was shot in the face and back of the head with pepper balls by federal officers while reporting on protests outside an ICE facility in Broadview, Illinois on September 26, 2025. Kunkel was documenting demonstrations at the facility when ICE agents emerged from the gates and began firing crowd-control munitions at journalists and protesters gathered nearby.

Federal immigration agents conducted an operation on Chicago's Southeast Side near 105th Street and Avenue N, pursuing and deliberately ramming a vehicle that resulted in a crash. Two occupants were arrested on allegations of being in the U.S. without legal status, and when neighbors gathered to protest, agents deployed tear gas, pepper balls and smoke grenades, affecting residents, children and at least 13 Chicago police officers, with at least four protesters detained. In the following days, Southeast Side residents organized community defense efforts, including filming and reporting immigration activity, with local groups such as the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights and Centro de Trabajadores Unidos holding a press conference to rally support for rapid-response and deportation-defense work. Residents described the incident as part of the broader federal immigration crackdown known as Operation Midway Blitz, which began in the city the previous month.

Federal immigration agents intimidated two women who were documenting their activity on the west side this morning near Grand and Kostner. In a video posted to social media, they say agents boxed their car in a parking lot and surrounded it—but the women themselves never exited their vehicle. Agents threatened the women with arrest, and shined a flashlight into their vehicle.

A 73-year old East Bay grandmother, Harjit Kaur, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials during a routine check-in this week. Today, her family and an expected 200 community members will stage a protest demanding her release.The protest will be held at 5 p.m. today (Friday, Sept. 12) at the intersection of Appian Way and San Pablo Dam Road in El Sobrante (below the El Sobrante Gurdwara).Kaur has lived in the East Bay for more than 30 years. She currently lives in Hercules but worked for two decades at a small business, Sari Palace, in Berkeley and regularly attended the El Sobrante Sikh Gurdwara. She was detained on Monday after ICE asked her to come to the San Francisco office to turn in additional paperwork. On Tuesday she was taken to a detention center in Bakersfield.“It’s just been a total nightmare. I don’t feel like this is real,” Manji Kaur, Harjit Kaur’s daughter-in-law, told Richmondside. Kaur has two -grandsons and three granddaughters.

ICE agents detained two American citizens near an El Super grocery store in City Heights, San Diego, after they began recording a federal enforcement operation. Brooke Benner said she was handcuffed within 14 seconds of starting to film, while a second woman was tackled to the ground and handcuffed after witnesses said she kicked a federal vehicle. Both women were taken to a federal building downtown, held for about seven hours, and released without charges. DHS said the two were 'agitators attempting to impede operations,' while Benner said agents targeted her for criticizing them.

Brooke Benner, an American citizen with a young daughter, was detained by ICE agents in the parking lot of an El Super grocery store in San Diego's City Heights neighborhood after she began filming agents who had just detained another man. Within seconds of recording, agents grabbed and handcuffed Benner, telling her she was being arrested for "impeding" their operations. Shortly after, agents detained a second American citizen steps away in the same parking lot, after witnesses said she kicked a federal vehicle; community patrollers recording the encounter said two agents pinned her against a car before one tackled her to the ground, while another agent pointed a taser at bystanders. Both women were taken to a federal building downtown and held for about seven hours before being released without charges. Benner said the experience frightened her and that she plans to continue monitoring ICE activity in her community.

Seven people were arrested during a U.S. Border Patrol immigration enforcement operation at Bixby Knolls Car Wash in Long Beach on Saturday. The individuals arrested were from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Mexico. About 10 unmarked cars blocked the car wash exit during the raid, which resulted in the arrest of several employees. The chief of the Glassport Borough Police Department reported that Immigration and Customs Enforcement made 17 arrests in the borough over a two-week period. Seven workers at Bixby Knoll's Car Wash in Long Beach, California were detained by federal immigration agents on September 13, 2025. During the raid, a woman being placed into a federal vehicle appeared to faint and collapse while in custody. The incident occurred as masked federal agents in tactical vests arrived in dark-colored SUVs and blocked the car wash's entrance and exits, with some workers attempting to flee. Witnesses documented the operation on their cellphones, with one observer describing the scene as impactful.

Two 17-year-old U.S. citizens, including Luis Ochoa, were detained by ICE agents in Alamo, Texas, after stopping to record an immigration enforcement operation on their way to a Marine Corps recruitment office. Video showed an agent repeatedly hitting one teen and agents using pepper spray while pulling him from his car and handcuffing him; Ochoa said his wrist was broken and that an agent told him, after he identified himself as a citizen, "I don't give a damn. Your parents can't help you now." The teens were held for eight hours before being released, and DHS described them as "anti-ICE agitators" who obstructed and assaulted officers. Ten days later, Luis's mother, Teresa de Jesus Ochoa Briseño, was arrested outside the Alamo restaurant where she worked as a cook, denied the chance to sign voluntary departure papers, issued a final removal order, and sent to Reynosa, Mexico the same day without Luis or her attorney being allowed to see her beforehand; Luis said agents told the family the arrest was connected to their Facebook posts and pending lawsuits over his detention.