FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Independent news outlet Status Coup reported yesterday that federal immigration agents threatened its reporter, Jon Farina, with arrest for following and filming them, despite well-established First Amendment protections for newsgathering and, specifically, for recording law enforcement.
Border Patrol officers cited a federal statute barring impeding or interference with law enforcement operations, which is entirely inapplicable to Farina filming from a distance. It’s the latest in a series of worrying incidents where politicians and federal agents claim that routine reporting on immigration enforcement is somehow illegal.
Freedom of the Press Foundation’s Director of Advocacy Seth Stern said:
“Americans have a constitutional right to record law enforcement doing their jobs in public and are fully entitled to follow police in order to exercise that right. That right is by no means exclusive to reporters, but it’s especially egregious for law enforcement officers not to recognize that journalists are allowed to document what they’re up to.
“Video of the incident makes clear that the reporters were not in any way obstructing or impeding officers in violation of federal law. They were recording from a distance. It looks like these officers believe transparency itself is obstructive to their operations, which is a pretty good indicator that their operations are in need of obstruction. We’ve repeatedly seen video footage expose misconduct and lies by federal agents. The First Amendment is intended to obstruct government abuses.
“Immigration officers are placing themselves at the center of a major national controversy. Their colleagues have killed and injured people, and held them in inhumane dungeons. If they’re too thin-skinned for the public scrutiny that comes with being a part of that, they can go find a job that doesn’t involve abducting people for an authoritarian regime.”
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