Trump's Battlefield America
"I'm gonna show you what I fucking look like right now," our cameraman Jon Farina says while struggling to breathe as ICE-fired tear gas covered his face. PAUSE YOUR DAY to watch and share this.
Status Coup is the ONLY INDEPENDENT OUTLET going beyond the studio, consistently ON THE GROUND covering what the corporate media COVERS UP. You will NOT SEE the following GRUESOME footage on CNN, MSNBC, Fox New, NY Times, or any corporate outlet. We need your support to continue ON-THE-GROUND. It is super important that we grow our paid membership in order to stay out there covering the growing fascism rampant across America.
WATCH BELOW the unreal footage Status Coup video journalist Jon Farina shot ON-THE-GROUND this weekend—while being tear gassed and shot at with pepper balls (chemical projectile).
In nearly a decade reporting ON-THE-GROUND, the only other instance I can remember feeling like I was in a war zone on American soil was in Cannon Ball, North Dakota. There, nine years ago, police dressed like storm troopers shot me in the calf with rubber bullets while unloading a storm of tear gas, mace, and other chemical weapons on Native Americans. The only weapons those water protectors carried were ceremonial drums, megaphones, and protest signs in opposition to the Dakota Access Pipeline.
Nine years later, the scenes at the ICE prison right outside of Chicago mentally brought me back to Standing Rock: the evil brutality, the gruesome assault on the unarmed and the vulnerable, and the twisted glee cops—in this case ICE and border patrol agents playing out their Call of Duty fever dreams—got in shooting at protesters who were simply standing up against the mass imprisonment of immigrants.
“I’m gonna show you what I fucking look like right now,” Jon Farina said while gasping for air after being tear gassed by border patrol agents. Thankfully, a fellow protester came to Jon’s aid, walking over to pour saline on his face so he could get some relief and continue reporting.
“Let’s get back out there, everybody’s suffering right now,” Farina said as he mustered up the strength to continue reporting.
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As border patrol and ICE agents attacked protesters, legal observers, and reporters outside the Broadview Detention Center—arresting independent journalist Steve Held and detaining him for several hours—they unleashed a staggering level of chemical weapons and brutality.
Loud screams from protesters captured the horrors as ICE and border patrol agents tackling unarmed protesters while simultaneously firing pepper balls, stun grenades, tear gas, sting balls, and more.
“Why you guys arresting U.S. citizens? Border Patrol gets to do this?” a protester can be heard shouting at border patrol agents as they tackle and arrest a protester—apparently for no actual reason.
“Being unjustly detained by federal police illegally deployed in our city,” the arrested protester said as he was cuffed and escorted away.
As this was occurring, protesters could be heard shouting at the border patrol agents as they carried out their illegal acts: “Cowards, fucking cowards!”
“We’re coming for you,” federal agents can be heard saying to protesters across the illegal fence ICE erected around the ICE prison right outside of Chicago in response to growing protests against Trump’s invasion of Chicago and crackdown of immigrants.
We’re going to remain ON-THE-GROUND in Chicago for the next few days to cover ongoing protests and speak with residents and activists about the carnage Trump has unleashed—all as a massive distraction to the fact that he is implicated in the Epstein files along with the worsening economy and rising grocery prices he promised to lower.
If you want to see the growing fascism spreading in America—up close and personal—we need your help. This reporting is important, but also expensive. Flights, hotels, rent-a-car, gas, food: reporting on the road costs money and we have no funding from the corrupt oligarchs destroying America. If you can, get off the sidelines and help build the justice journalism we desperately need. Become a Status Coup member today for as low as $5-10 bucks a month.
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Let’s keep waking up the masses,
Jordan
Things To Come. The savagery of ICE - a domestic militia that answers only to the Executive - foreshadows the emergent police state in the United States. Obama and Biden actually deported more immigrants than Trump to date. These grotesque displays of authoritarian brutality, and moronic and arbitrary targeting of American citizens betrays the actual purpose of these latter-day Brown Shirts. This is not really about 'illegal immigrants' - other than for demogogic and distraction purposes. It's about a fascist boot heel on the neck of the hoi poloi. The restive rabble, or excess humanity that transhumanist tech kingpins, like Curtis Yarvin, wish incarcerated or dead. There was an incident during the government's Covid totalitarian dress rehearsal, when a phalanx of armoured, combat ready police officers apparently shut down a street in Los Angeles. Among a smattering of people, a young woman casually approached one the Storm Troopers in the road to inquire whether she should exit the era. The officer promptly thrust his arms out with great force, hurling the woman towards the sidewalk, her head colliding with the curb. Copious amounts of blood began to pool round the impact point, as a couple hurriedly approached to help. Years later, I watched footage from the early 1930's of Sturmateilung (SA) marching through a German street. An appalled bystander ran into the road to confront them - and was violently pushed away by one of the power drunk thugs. History is echoing, but very loudly.