Chicago protest updates: At least 1 injured in Loop downtown anti-ICE protest last night after car sped through protesters
Thousands marched downtown Chicago Tuesday, protesting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests nationwide. At least one person was injured, as a car sped through a crowd at one point.
There was also some vandalism reported, and several people were arrested.
The 66-year-old Chicago woman who was injured said she and her husband were toward the rear of the demonstration Tuesday night, when they saw the car speeding toward them.
In a matter of seconds, she says she was on the ground, dazed.
"I was feeling pain in my arm and just like 'what happened?'" Heather Blair said.
Blair has scrapes to her face, and her left arm is now in a sling, after she says she was injured during the frantic moments a car sped through a group of anti-ICE demonstrators in the Loop.
"If a car is upset with a crowd. They usually go slowly and honk, right? They don't accelerate," Blair said.
Blair says she and her husband were part of the thousands of people packing the Loop Tuesday night, voicing their anger and frustration with ICE raids locally and across the country.
She says the demonstration felt different than previous protests she says she joined.
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"It seemed high energy and maybe kind of tense," Blair said. "We kind of hung back at the back of the crowd."
Blair says she and her husband were walking in the street with other demonstrators around 6:20 p.m., when she said she saw a red car accelerating toward them.
She says in those frantic moments near Wabash Avenue and Monroe Street she doesn't remember if she was actually hit by the car or fell over in the pandemonium of the moment.
"The next thing I know, people are carrying me to the sidewalk and calling an ambulance," Blair said.
Blair said the Chicago Fire Department took her to nearby Northwestern Memorial Hospital in an ambulance for treatment.
"They put me in a collar because I struck my head; so, they wanted to make sure my spine and brain were OK," Blair said.
Blair says she fractured her left arm in the chaos.
She said she planned to demonstrate again this weekend, but doesn't know if she is going to be able to.
Chicago police did not immediately provide additional information about the driver in question.
