Photojournalist shoved with police batons at NYC pro-Palestinian protest

Independent photojournalist Alexa Wilkinson was repeatedly shoved with a baton by New York City police officers while documenting protests outside a fundraiser for Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign on Aug. 14, 2024.

State Democratic leaders — including Mayor Eric Adams and Gov. Kathy Hochul — and labor union members gathered in Harlem in a show of support for the Harris-Walz campaign ahead of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Politico reported. Pro-Palestinian protesters rallied outside the event, demonstrating against the Biden administration’s military support for Israel amid the ongoing Israel-Gaza war.

Wilkinson told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the protest outside the campaign event was uneventful, but tensions escalated after protesters marched the 10 blocks north to a restaurant where the Democratic officials were holding an after-party. She said she was near the front of the march when protesters arrived, and she was one of five or six journalists to make it into the restaurant alongside approximately 15 protesters.

After yelling back and forth between demonstrators and event attendees in the restaurant, Wilkinson said the manager ordered the protesters and press out of the restaurant. As they exited, she added, police had already begun making arrests and she was quickly trapped between planter boxes by officers from the department’s Special Response Group, a rapid response unit that the New York Civil Liberties Union calls notoriously violent.

“As I looked to my left, a door or two down there was one cop — who I now know to be one of the ones who had his baton out incorrectly and handle facing outward toward people — he was to the left sort of cornering press, an acquaintance of mine, and cracked him in the ribs,” Wilkinson said. “As press were trying to document that pocket of violence, SRG was then trying to push press and protesters out, very violently, down the sidewalk away from the restaurant and into the street.”

She told the Tracker that a group of journalists accidentally became trapped between a line of police and the protesters. At least four journalists, including Wilkinson, were struck or pushed by officers with batons that night. Wilkinson said she was repeatedly shoved and an officer grabbed her by the arm and threw her sideways during the chaos.

“That was the most brutal I’ve seen them be toward press,” she said. “And I was taken aback about how not quiet they were about their contempt for us.” Wilkinson added that she heard supervisory officers taunting the journalists and shouting things like “fuck your press pass” while pushing the journalists back.

The New York City Police Department did not respond to a request for comment.

Officers also repeatedly attempted to grab Wilkinson’s camera by the lens and the phone from her hand; her backpack was also ripped, which she said caused her to lose some of her personal belongings. She added that she was wearing a lanyard with her city-issued press credentials and was clearly identifiable as a member of the press.

After she left the protest at around 10 p.m., Wilkinson said she noticed bruises along the back of her arms and general soreness from the continuous shoving.