A federal judge has issued a temporary restraining order blocking Trump administration officers from indiscriminately — and without warning — firing “chemical or projectile munitions” at protesters outside an ICE facility in Portland, Oregon.
U.S. District Judge Michael Simon opened his 22-page order by warning that the country is “at a crossroads,” casting the judiciary as a constitutional backstop against what he described as the drift toward an “authoritarian regime.”
The order delivers a sweeping defense of the right to protest President Donald Trump’s deportation agenda — and to report on government activity — without what Simon called “objectively chilling” conduct, including “physically harming protestors and journalists without prior dispersal warnings.”
“In a well-functioning constitutional democratic republic, free speech, courageous newsgathering, and nonviolent protest are all permitted, respected, and even celebrated. In an authoritarian regime, that is not the case. Our nation is now at a crossroads,” Simon wrote. “We have been here before and have previously returned to the right path, notwithstanding an occasional detour. In helping our nation find its constitutional compass, an impartial and independent judiciary operating under the rule of law has a responsibility that it may not shirk.”
Plaintiffs Describe Injuries During Protests and Reporting
The lawsuit — framed as a would-be class action — was brought by Laurie Eckman and Richard Eckman, a married couple in their eighties; Jack Dickinson, known as the “Portland Chicken”; and journalists Mason Lake and Hugo Rios. The plaintiffs sued Trump and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, alleging that DHS personnel used excessive force while the plaintiffs were legally protesting or conducting journalistic work outside the ICE facility.
Simon recounted the plaintiffs’ allegations in stark detail.
“Officers working for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security shot 84-year-old Laurie Eckman in the head with a chemical impact munition while she was peacefully holding a sign on a public street. She walked home soaked in blood,” the judge wrote. “Later that evening, she was treated in an emergency room, where she was diagnosed with a concussion. Earlier that day, DHS hit 83-year-old Richard Eckman’s walker with chemical munitions, after opening fire on a nonviolent crowd that included Mr. and Mrs. Eckman.”
Dickinson, the complaint says, was wearing a chicken suit when agents allegedly shoved him on a public sidewalk near the facility driveway and then “shot[…] in the back with munitions” from the roof.
The two journalists say they were also struck while covering the protests — Lake in the groin area, and Rios “with pepper balls approximately 20 times.”
Simon, a Barack Obama appointee, noted that the incidents described by plaintiffs “are not infrequent,” “are escalating,” and trace back to June 2025 — three months before Trump federalized the National Guard.
Earlier Ruling Questioned Whether Conditions Justified Federal Response
Simon’s order also points to prior findings from U.S. District Judge Karen Immergut, a Trump appointee, who remarked in November that unrest outside the Portland ICE facility hit a “high watermark of violence and unlawful activity” in June, but that protests later became “generally uneventful with occasional interference to federal personnel and property.”
Immergut then blocked Trump from deploying the National Guard, finding a mismatch between the president’s determinations and the factual record about the threat posed to federal property and officers.
“Applying ‘a great level of deference to the President’s determination that a predicate condition exists,’ this Court nonetheless concludes that the President’s invocation of Section 12406 was likely not made ‘in the face of the emergency and directly related to the quelling of the disorder or the prevention of its continuance,’” Immergut wrote.
Simon said the plaintiffs presented “strong evidence” that federal officers’ use of force was disproportionate to conditions on the ground.
Police Commander Says Federal Force Didn’t Match Protest Conditions
Simon also highlighted testimony from Portland Police Bureau Commander Franz Schoening, who said his officers were hit by “munitions” for no apparent reason — and that what he observed did not reflect best practices.
“Schoening testified that it was his impression that the amount of force used by federal officers at the Portland ICE Building is not a good indication of the level of violence or unrest caused by protests at that location,” Simon wrote. “Commander Schoening called the DHS force used on one specific occasion that he personally observed ‘startling’ and ‘certainly departed from what I would say was best practice or legal.’”
Simon added that Schoening described another instance in which Portland police were struck by rounds fired by federal officers despite him seeing no conduct that would have warranted it.
What the Order Restricts
Based on the record, Simon concluded that plaintiffs had standing to sue over what he described as a “complete loss of their First Amendment freedom to protest and report news at the Portland ICE Building,” a “legal injury” he said “recurs daily.”
The judge ordered that “Defendants and their agents, employees, and all persons acting under their direction or in active concert or participation with them […] are hereby prohibited and enjoined from engaging in or directing or encouraging others” to use various “chemical or projectile munitions” unless the “specific target of such a weapon or device poses an imminent threat of physical harm to a law enforcement officer or other person,” Simon wrote.
He also stated federal officers cannot fire “any munitions or use any weapons” at protesters’ heads or upper bodies unless officers are “legally justified in using deadly force against that person.”
DHS Response Cited as a Concern
DHS has reportedly defended its tactics as “appropriate and constitutional measures to uphold the rule of law and protect our officers and the public from dangerous rioters.” But Simon wrote that he was troubled by claims that DHS leaders have “publicly condoned” violence against protesters rather than condemning it.
