Photojournalist struck with baton, lens destroyed at New Jersey protest

Mostafa Bassim, a photojournalist for Turkey’s Anadolu Agency, was struck with a baton by a federal officer, damaging his camera lens, while covering protests outside a private immigration detention center in Newark, New Jersey, on May 28, 2026.

Protests outside the Delaney Hall facility began May 22, when many detainees went on a hunger strike. Members of Congress, state and local lawmakers and rights groups have alleged dire conditions at the facility.

Federal officers responded to the protests with chemical irritants, physical force and arrests, as did state police in the days that followed.

The Department of Homeland Security has denied allegations of detainee mistreatment.

Bassim told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that he arrived at the detention facility shortly before nightfall. He said that even before he was able to start documenting the scene, federal officers noticed his camera and began shining high-powered lights directly at him.

“The second they see you with a camera they just start doing that to you,” Bassim said.

The protests, he said, had a consistent pattern: a period of calm until vehicles tried to exit the facility. Protesters would attempt to block the cars from leaving and to see whether any detainees were being moved; Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers would advance to push back the demonstrators and make arrests.

“Then it’s calm again for an hour or so and then clashes again,” he told the Tracker. But that night, he added, officers were particularly aggressive.

“From the first time they started clashing with people — and they pepper-sprayed a lot of people — they would specifically pepper-spray the camera or the vent, if you’re wearing a gas mask,” Bassim said.

During the second clash, officers continued to spray chemical irritants at the crowd and strike people with batons. As things calmed, Bassim said, the ICE officers near him began to move back.

“I was looking at the other side to see if there’s still something going on on the other side of the line,” Bassim told the Tracker. “And then one of the agents just took a step toward me. He took one swing and it was at the camera. It hit the lens and it was cut in half.”

The photojournalist said he stood in shock for several seconds, having automatically held up his press credentials.

“I have this automatic response when I see them trying to attack us or talk to us: I just hold my press badge to make it clear that I’m press,” Bassim said. “So I did that for a second and then I was like, ‘He can see it, you know? Like, he clearly just took one swing at the camera, he meant to do that.’”

Bassim told the Tracker he asked the officer what he was doing, to which the officer simply responded with an order to move back and a gesture threatening to hit him again.

The damaged lens was a 24mm prime lens, which Bassim estimates will cost $1,500 to replace.

In a statement emailed to the Tracker on June 1, DHS said anyone who obstructs law enforcement or disrupts its operations would be prosecuted. It did not address its use of force against members of the press.

“We remind members of the media to exercise caution as they cover these violent riots and remind journalists that covering unlawful activities in the field does come with risks,” the statement read. “Our officers take every reasonable precaution to mitigate those dangers to those exercising protected First Amendment rights.”