Tear gas causes health concerns for Twin Cities residents
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Clouds of smoke and gas billowed in south Minneapolis on Saturday, as federal and state law enforcement launched round after round of chemical irritants into a crowd of protesters and observers.
They had gathered on Nicollet Avenue after federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti. Most in the crowd were there to peacefully chant and stand watch, but all felt the effects of the irritants. The tear gas sent protesters running, many gasping for breath. Some collapsed and yelled for medics.
It also seeped into nearby homes and businesses — meaning those residents, workers and customers were exposed to it, even if they weren’t protesting.
It’s become a not-uncommon scene in the Twin Cities in recent weeks, as federal agents who are part of the federal immigration operation regularly deploy chemical irritants to deter observers and protesters. Medical experts say there’s a lot they still don’t know about the health impacts.
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“All we heard was, ‘Boom!’”
A week after a tear gas canister went off under her car, Destiny Jackson was still waking up at night coughing.
She was driving with her husband Shawn and their six kids on Jan. 14 in north Minneapolis, traveling home from their son’s basketball game. They got stuck in traffic on Lyndale Avenue North, amid a chaotic scene after a federal agent shot and injured a resident.
While stuck in traffic, Jackson saw an agent throw something towards them. It rolled underneath the car.
“I start screaming to go,” Jackson said. “And in a matter of seconds, all we heard was, ‘Boom!’ — and our car went up a little bit and it hit the ground.”
Neighbors helped pull her kids out of the car and brought them inside a nearby house, where they flushed out their eyes. Jackson said her six-month-old baby reacted the worst to the gas.
“He was kind of, like, lifeless,” Jackson said. “His eyes wouldn’t open, he had foam around his mouth.”
Jackson said she’s trained in CPR, and started it on her baby. Bystanders called 911. When fire department medics got to the scene, they found the infant breathing and stable, but in serious condition, a department spokesperson said.
Jackson said she and three of her kids were taken to a hospital. There, they went through a decontamination process. Medical staff donned protective suits and oxygen masks and doused them thoroughly with cold water, Jackson said.
Jackson and her infant were still on medication a week later, she said. Her kids are recovering.
Doctors at the hospital told her they’d been hit with “military-grade” gas.
Greg Bovino, who had been leading Border Patrol operations in the Twin Cities, said last week that agents are using chemical agents against “agitators,” who he says are impeding federal agents from carrying out operations.
But observers and peaceful protesters have also been tear-gassed, as have bystanders who found themselves caught in the middle of confrontations in residential areas — like the Jacksons.
A lot of unknowns
Asha Hassan is a researcher at the University of Minnesota. She has studied tear gas, particularly its impacts on reproductive health.
She said the most severe long-term impacts of tear gas could include asthma and blindness, but there are big gaps in that research — most of which, she said, comes from studies done in the mid-20th century on healthy men in the military.
“We don’t really have data on what this could potentially mean for women, for children, for people with chronic conditions or illnesses,” Hassan said.
In her research, she found a link between tear gas exposure and reproductive health impacts, such as disruptions to peoples’ menstrual cycles. People exposed to more tear gas were more likely to report those symptoms, she said.
And, she said, exposure to different kinds of tear gas might lead to different health outcomes, but there’s not a lot of research there, either.
“People aren’t always sure what they’ve been exposed to, and some of the information around what types of tear gas is being used is considered proprietary information by those manufacturers,” Hassan said.
That makes it hard to study, and hard for residents to figure out what they might have breathed in.
Agents have left used canisters on the ground after recent detentions and protests in the Twin Cities. Many are labeled as “CS” and “OC” — two common variants of tear gas. They contain different chemicals, but both cause watery eyes, burning sensations and trouble breathing. Agents have also set off smoke canisters in several different colors. Some are bright green or red.
Many of the canisters are manufactured by the company Defense Technology. In the company’s online product descriptions, many list warnings for exposure to chemicals — including lead salts and chromium.
The heavy use of chemical irritants has set off speculation on social media about the types of chemicals being deployed. Some activists have raised questions about the possible use of hexachloroethane, or HC — a carcinogenic type of crowd control gas, manufactured by the same company behind many of the canisters found on the ground at protest scenes. Law enforcement used HC canisters against protesters in Portland in 2020.
It’s not clear whether that type of irritant has been used in the Twin Cities operations. An ICE media spokesperson did not respond to questions about what kind of irritants agents use.
Poison control center fields calls for help
Jon Cole is the medical director at the Minnesota Regional Poison Center. He said the color of a smoke or gas, or a person’s symptoms after exposure, aren’t enough to identify one chemical from another. And he said federal law enforcement agencies have not told the center what they’re using.
“With incomplete information, we try to give the best advice we can to cover all the bases and plan for the worst-case scenario… based on all the available agents that are out there,” Cole said.
He said the poison control center has seen an uptick in calls asking for advice treating tear gas.
Cole’s advice is the same, regardless of exactly what type of chemical irritants someone is exposed to: flush out eyes with a lot of water or a saline solution, and wash skin with lots of water and a gentle soap.
He said chemical irritants pose the biggest risk to people with asthma and other pre-existing lung conditions. Anyone with those conditions should carry an inhaler, and use it if they have lingering coughing and wheezing after exposure to chemical irritants.
Symptoms should clear up with at-home treatment, Cole said. If they don’t, he recommended calling the state’s poison control line — especially if coughing and wheezing continues after 24 hours.
Those calls are confidential and protected under HIPAA.
For her part, Destiny Jackson said she’s trying to get some rest and recover, but the ongoing federal operation makes it hard to move on from the stress of getting tear-gassed with her kids.
On her way to the clinic for a recent check-up, she passed another confrontation between ICE agents and observers. She wondered if she’d be mistaken for a protester again, and targeted.
“This is stuff that is just happening in my neighborhood, like the other night,” Jackson said.
Ongoing lawsuits seeking to limit federal agents’ use of tear gas against protesters are making their way through federal courts. A federal judge issued a temporary injunction to bar agents from using tear gas against peaceful protesters and observers, but that was set aside by a federal appeals court.
