Four Oregonians who took part in Black Lives Matter protests in downtown Portland last month sued Trump administration officials for injuries sustained as a result of Department of Homeland Security agents’ “unconstitutional” attacks on them during the demonstrations and want the federal government to pay for the hardships they say they suffered.
The class-action lawsuit — aimed at acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf; senior official performing the duties of deputy secretary, Ken Cuccinelli; and 200 unnamed DHS law enforcement agents — alleges the demonstrators were “peacefully protesting” downtown in late July when federal agents “operated beyond their authority, by using unconstitutional and unnecessary force against Black Lives Matter protesters.”
“These federal agents used chemical and impact munitions designed for war zones against American civilians,” lawyers representing the four plaintiffs wrote in an announcement of the lawsuit. “Their actions resulted in hundreds of injuries to peacefully protesting women and men of all races, ages and walks of life.”
The four people suing allege they were wounded at events where federal agents were present, though local police were also present at the incidents and are not being sued for any potential role in the injuries. The lawsuit asks for the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon to deem the actions of federal agents unconstitutional and award “unspecified compensatory and punitive damages to each peaceful protester subjected to chemical munitions.”
One of the demonstrators, Ellen Urbani Gass, described joining the Black Lives Matter protest with the Wall of Moms organization on July 24, when she said federal agents used tear gas on her group who were linked arm in arm. Urbani Gass, a 51-year-old mother from West Linn, Oregon, alleged that a federal agent shot a nonlethal munition at her and broke a bone in her foot.
“I could have been killed or maimed simply for exercising my right to protest peacefully in support of Black lives,” said Rowan Maher, a 25-year-old from Portland, whose bicycle helmet allegedly sustained a hole from a munition.
DHS’s Federal Protective Service agency is responsible for protecting federal courthouses and other federal buildings nationwide. Due to protests that included the tearing down of statues and vandalism of government buildings in June, DHS sent in a couple hundred federal police from its immigration and border agencies to assist FPS in Portland. Media and witness reports in downtown Portland have often shown largely peaceful protests occurring in the evening and concluding before midnight, while riots and criminal acts aimed at local and federal police and local property took place in the early morning hours.
Violence in Portland has gone on more than 80 days as the city’s mayor, Democrat Ted Wheeler, and governor, Democrat Kate Brown, have been unable to bring peace to the streets. Over the weekend, far-left and far-right groups clashed violently near the federal courthouse.
