A local CBS Los Angeles reporter was temporarily blinded after she was hit with tear gas while reporting on protests against ICE raids in the city Saturday night.
An increasingly distressed Lauren Pozen was on the air as the gas dispersed. Her colleagues in the studio asked her to find somewhere safe to report from after she told them, “We have tear gas, we have fireworks going off, tear gas is in the air, people are dispersing. I can’t see anything. I’m sorry, I can’t see anything.”
Pozen continued to cough until the network cut to footage being filmed from a helicopter. She returned to the air approximately three-and-a-half minutes later.
“Things happened so quickly out here,” Pozen said. “My back was turned to the camera and all of a sudden, we heard that big boom. And, of course, that was a massive amount of tear gas. I don’t want to make this all about me, but it’s all in my eyes, and my face, and my throat is burning. But that is the reaction with everybody here. And that was the purpose here, to get people to move, because what was going on was protestors — I’m going to call them agitators at this point.”
Protesters were “going up right to the doors there of the dock there and lighting off fireworks and basically antagonizing the police,” Pozen said. “And that is when they came out and they formed this skirmish line here. They’ve been, we’ve been out here since three o’clock. It was mostly peaceful, very nice demonstration.”
Things “took a turn” last night, she added. “You can see the presence of the law enforcement here. They were just getting way too close … Honestly, getting out of hand, and that is why we’re seeing what we’re seeing here with the police breaking this up and shutting this down.”
Donald Trump ordered more than 2,000 members of the National Guard to Los Angeles to shut down the protests Saturday night.
“The federal government is taking over the California National Guard and deploying 2,000 soldiers in Los Angeles — not because there is a shortage of law enforcement, but because they want a spectacle,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom tweeted. “Don’t give them one. Never use violence. Speak out peacefully.”
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