Media silence on Antifa violence against Seattle journalists

mynorthwest.com

Two independent journalists, Brandi Kruse and Cam Higby, were brutalized by Antifa at anti-Trump and anti-ICE rallies over the weekend. Where’s the Seattle media outrage? Where’s the Seattle media coverage?

Both Kruse and Higby were covering violent clashes, started by Antifa, with police in Tukwila and Seattle. But you wouldn’t even really know there was violence by Seattle media coverage. You certainly wouldn’t know Antifa was involved, with all but MyNorthwest and KTTH Radio accurately describing the radicals’ involvement.

The Seattle Times covered the violence in Tukwila, but framed it as instigated by Tukwila Police and federal law enforcement. Some local media covered the arson and vandalism in Seattle, but ignored the assaults. Why is that?

Brandi Kruse details the assault

Kruse was in Tukwila as armed Antifa swarmed a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) facility.

They assaulted cops with frozen water bottles and journalists, including Brandi Kruse, with bug spray.

“An individual whose face was completely covered took what I thought at the time, based on the smell, was bug repellent… and sprayed it directly into my eyes, and then started chasing us with it, spraying it for a pretty prolonged period of time,” Kruse explained on “The Jason Rantz Show” on KTTH.

Not long after the assault, Tukwila Police and an ICE Special Response Team were forced to use tear gas to disperse the violent mob. But The Seattle Times falsely framed the violence as caused by law enforcement.

Kruse slammed left-wing Seattle media outlets for “not even ignoring it, actively lying about it.”

“They’re actively rewriting the facts and history to provide cover for it, which are two very different things, and what they’re doing is far more nefarious than just ignoring it,” Kruse explained on “The Jason Rantz Show” on KTTH.

She points out that if it was Proud Boys doing half of what Antifa did, or even if they were actually peaceful, “just their presence would have been covered by the news.”

“Now imagine if the Proud Boys had assaulted a KING 5 reporter, or a Seattle Times reporter, or had assaulted federal agents. And now think of how that would have been covered. I mean, every media outlet in town would have covered it. The governor would have come out and said something about it, then the mayor. So, totally different. And I think just speaks to this, not only hypocrisy, but complicity,” she explained.

Cam Hugby was concussed by Antifa

Higby was in downtown Seattle when he was jumped by Antifa. They left him bloodied, bruised, and concussed. He was able to identify at least one of the alleged attackers.

“I hadn’t been recording for a while, and three dudes come running at me, ‘Hey, Cam, it’s time for you to leave.’ And then next thing I know, there’s more hands than I can count on the visor of my gas mask. I can’t see anything,” Higby explained on “The Jason Rantz Show” on KTTH. “They’re trying to unscrew the filter on my gas mask. At one point, they hold me down. I’m in a headlock. They’re choking me. And this guy comes up and he punches me in the head twice. He then kicks me in the face. I pull out pepper spray, deploy it in his face, and then he cries like a baby for the next 10 minutes.”

A visit to urgent care confirmed he was concussed. Higby said he’s lucky to be alive. He noted that the attacker was wearing SAP gloves, which can be filled with steel shot to make the punches more damaging.

Like Kruse, Higby was disappointed but not shocked by the lack of media coverage of the attack. He knows the coverage would have been different if the assailants were conservatives.

“You have an obligation as a journalist to cover what’s happening in this city, even if you don’t agree with the people who are being attacked,” Higby said in a message to Seattle media members.

Higby criticized The Seattle Times, in particular, because they completely ignored the downtown Seattle violence.

“It’s just it’s extremely alarming to me that nobody picks this up,” he said.

Where is Seattle media outrage or coverage?

When President Donald Trump offers even tepid criticism of media, there’s loud pushback about the threat to journalists. When journalists are physically assaulted, where’s the condemnation from The Seattle Times or KING 5?

Independent media or individual media personalities have spoken up, including KIRO Newsradio’s John Curley and KOMO TV’s Jeremy Harris. KTTH Radio, KIRO Newsradio, and MyNorthwest have also covered the violence. FOX 13, according to listeners, also offered some honest coverage. But why aren’t all mainstream outlets, television networks, or newspapers covering the violence?

The Seattle media doesn’t just have a bias—it has an agenda. When journalists are attacked by the Radical Left, they look the other way. When conservatives merely exist, they sound the alarm. The silence from Seattle’s mainstream outlets isn’t just cowardly—it’s complicity. And every time they refuse to report the truth, they prove they’re not journalists but activists with bylines.

Listen to The Jason Rantz Show on weekday afternoons from 3 p.m. – 7 p.m. on KTTH 770 AM (HD Radio 97.3 FM HD-Channel 3). Subscribe to the podcast here. Follow Jason Rantz on X, Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook.