A pardoned January 6 defendant says masked anti-ICE protesters recognized him, chased him, and doused him with gasoline or another chemical liquid outside a federal detention facility in Los Angeles.
The man is Jon Mellis, the conservative activist known online as Patriot Wild Man.
The reported attack happened Saturday outside the Los Angeles Metropolitan Detention Center, where local news also reported clashes, a dispersal order, and arrests during the broader protest.
Mellis says he came to the protest with a friend, started filming interviews, and was swarmed once people figured out who he was.
The Gateway Pundit summarized the attack and the aftermath this way:
Pardoned January 6er Jon Mellis, widely known online as “Patriot Wild Man,” was violently attacked by a masked mob of far-left anti-ICE protesters outside the Los Angeles Metropolitan Detention Center on Saturday.
Mellis previously served four years in federal prison over January 6, before being pardoned by the president.
The conservative activist told the New York Post that the mob chased him, doused him with gasoline or a chemical liquid, and punched him repeatedly in the head before he managed to escape.
Eoin Richard, who filmed the attack, told the paper, “We were there to film a protest being held for the one-year anniversary of the ICE raids.”
Richard said the mob was even trying to attack law enforcement. Mellis and Richard fled on foot as the mob pursued them.
They eventually reached safety and contacted the Los Angeles police. LAPD officers placed Mellis in the back of a patrol car for his protection and escorted him back to his vehicle.
A police dispersal order was issued, and some arrests were made during the broader protest, but authorities have not confirmed any arrests tied directly to the assault and dousing of Mellis.
No charges have been reported against the masked attackers as of Monday afternoon.
The Gateway Pundit also pushed the report on X as the story broke Monday afternoon:
J6er Doused with Gasoline, Violently Assaulted by Masked Antifa Mob at Los Angeles Anti-ICE Protest (VIDEO)
READ: https://t.co/ch35tWiqmi pic.twitter.com/dQJoB1bDCo
— The Gateway Pundit (@gatewaypundit) June 8, 2026
The video itself came from Eoin Richard, who filmed the scene and posted it to Instagram.
Watch the clip below:
The original account gives a sharper picture of what Richard says happened when the crowd closed in.
New York Post reported Richard’s version of the confrontation:
The Jan. 6 rioter who was turfed from Spencer Pratt’s election night party was swarmed by a group of anti-ICE protesters outside the Los Angeles Metropolitan Detention Center on Saturday in a disturbing incident caught on video.
ADVERTISEMENTFootage shows Jon Mellis, 39, known online as @PatriotWildMan, being repeatedly taunted as a “pedophile worshipper,” chased, and allegedly doused with gasoline by masked protesters as he attempted to escape the confrontation.
Cameraman Eoin Richard, who has covered protests in Washington, Chicago and Minneapolis, filmed the Saturday altercation in downtown LA.
“We were there to film a protest being held for the one-year anniversary of the ICE raids,” Richard said. “I’ve been covering it for over a year now. … Jon was getting some interviews with protesters, very nonpartisan, just simple stuff like, ‘Hey, why are you on the ground?’ After about two interviews, we were swarmed.”
The video captures the mob’s aggression, with masked individuals lunging at Mellis and Richard outside the ICE detention facility.
ADVERTISEMENT“It happened so quickly,” Richard said, “but basically we wrapped up one interview, and then a woman with a bullhorn came and started shouting in [Mellis’s] face a bunch of different things, and probably five seconds after that, masked Antifa approached him, one with a chemical of some sort, trying to dump it on him.
“He was doused and as he was trying to push the gallon of liquid away, a guy punches him in the face.”
Richard recounts how when things turned violent they both ran for their lives, “literally as a mob of people sprinted behind,” trying to attack and beat them.
That is the detail that turns this from another protest story into a straight law-and-order story.
A man was recognized, surrounded, allegedly soaked with a flammable liquid, and punched outside a federal facility.
The broader scene was already volatile enough that police moved in.
ABC7 Los Angeles reported on the surrounding protest scene outside the same detention center:
Police issued a dispersal order in downtown Los Angeles on Saturday after anti-ICE demonstrators clashed with officers outside the Metropolitan Detention Center, with several people arrested, authorities said.
ADVERTISEMENTThe protest, held on the one-year anniversary of mass federal immigration raids in Los Angeles, escalated as officers declared an unlawful assembly and ordered the crowd to leave the area.
Earlier in the day, scenes turned chaotic as Department of Homeland Security officers rushed to detain a protester in the street.
Video from the protest captured a person shouting, “Oh my eyes… I can’t see!” as chemical agents were deployed.
Video from witnesses also showed shouting, fighting and blood spattered on the curb as tensions intensified.
The anniversary marks one year since federal agents first carried out sweeping mass immigration raids through Los Angeles, including the detention of dozens of Ambiance Apparel employees. Families affected by those raids said the impact continues.
Advocates and community members gathered Saturday to call for continued support for those affected. Veronica Alvarado, the deputy director of the Warehouse Worker Resource Center, said the anniversary is a reminder of ongoing hardship.
Saturday’s arrests came hours after Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass spoke at an immigration forum commemorating the anniversary.
Police have not yet released the total number of people taken into custody during Saturday’s protest. An update is expected Sunday.
For years, President Trump supporters were told that political violence on the left was either exaggerated, isolated, or somehow understandable.
This video shows why ordinary Americans see a pattern the media keeps trying to soften.
Masked activists can call themselves whatever they want, but when a crowd chases a conservative activist and someone allegedly tries to dump a chemical on him, the word “protest” stops doing a lot of work.
The obvious question now is whether Los Angeles authorities will identify the attackers and bring charges.
Because if a masked conservative crowd had allegedly doused a left-wing reporter outside a federal building, America already knows how the media and the justice system would be treating it.
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