“He Grabbed Her By Her Hair and Hit Her”: Witnesses Describe Alleged Assault by Ex-KOMO Reporter Jonathan Choe

Three witnesses described the former reporter repeatedly punching the woman, who attempted to prevent him from entering a community center where migrants had set up tents.

Screenshot of police report describing the alleged assault

By Erica C. Barnett

Earlier this month, when a group of migrants from Venezuela and Angola briefly set up tents outside Garfield Community Center in the Central District, Discovery Institute staffer Jonathan Choe showed up and attempted to enter the area but was stopped by people who blocked his path with their bodies. (Choe started working for the Discovery Institute, which previously employed Chris Rufo, after KOMO News fired him for posting a video promoting a Proud Boys rally in Olympia.) In a choppy video he posted on X, Choe calls someone holding their hands in the air a "little soy boy" and repeatedly threatens to call the police if anyone touches him.

But Choe's heavily edited video didn't show what happened next: After leaving the parking lot, three witnesses say, Choe assaulted one of the people who had prevented him from getting closer to the migrants, punching her in the face repeatedly and sending her to the ground. One witness, a city of Seattle Parks Department employee who ran out of the community center when he heard shouting, told police he saw Choe punching the woman "two or three times."

PubliCola spoke with the woman Choe allegedly assaulted, who asked to be referred to by her middle name, Celeste, along with three witnesses to the confrontation. (One, the Parks Department employee, said he had nothing to add to the statement he gave police). The officer who spoke to Choe by phone said that based on his interviews, including his call with Choe, he did not find probable cause to file charges.

Celeste said she was volunteering as an interpreter for Spanish-speaking migrants when Choe showed up and took out what police later described as a "retractable baton," which she worried he planned to use against an Angolan migrant. "The worst-case scenario that was going through my head was that the migrant was going to defend himself, and because the migrant probably doesn’t have the same rights as I do as a citizen, I decided to physically get between Jonathan Choe and him," Celeste said. "I was trying to say shit to him to distract him."

Another witness named Riley, who was dropping off donations for the migrants, said she saw Celeste "putting her body in between [Choe] and the [community center] and using her words. He would rush her and retreat, trying to get her to touch him, and eventually, he ran out of steam."

At that point, according to Riley and Celeste, Choe went across the street to call 911 (telling the operator that people weren't allowing him to "get by" and enter the park, according to the police report), then returned and kept trying to enter the area where the migrants were. After exchanging more words with Celeste, she said, he told her, "'I’m going to turn my phone off so there’s no evidence,' and punched me," striking the left side of her face. "I kind of stumbled to the ground, and he grabbed my hair and ripped a chunk of my hair out."

Riley, who had been watching from across the street, said "it looked like they stopped to have a conversation—another verbal spat—and then he grabbed her by the hair and hit her in the face two or three times." When she ran over to intervene, according to Riley and another witness, Choe grabbed her phon and ran off with it. (Choe told police he returned Riley's phone "immediately" after taking it from her; Riley says she chased him and got it back.) In the confusion, Choe dropped the baton, which Celeste said she hurled as far away as she could.

A witness who was waiting at the bus stop across the street told PubliCola she watched as Choe "threw [Celeste] down and started punching and kicking her" before taking Riley's phone and running off "toward the dog park" near 23rd and Cherry.

The Seattle parks department employee told police he was inside the community center but ran out when he "heard a commotion," then "observed Choe punching [Celeste] on her face 2-3 times."

In his own account, summarized in the police report, Choe claimed Celeste was "bumping him and assaulting him" and that he "pushed her" in an effort to "defend himself." Choe's X feed is filled with videos in which he shows up at protests and other events and antagonizes left-wing activists and others, moving extremely close to them and then claiming they have "touched" or "assaulted" him. According to the report, Choe also told police he "believ[ed] that he would be assaulted by [Riley's] phone."

According to the police report,  Choe told the officer "he was dragging [Celeste] and threw her to the side. Later, I asked Choe to clarify what he meant by dragging and he explained that his hand became tangled on [her] which interfered with him letting go and leaving." None of the eyewitnesses described Choe being "tangled on" Celeste so that he had to drag her; instead, they all independently described him punching her in the face.

The SPD officer who showed up in response to Choe's 911 call wrote that he personally found Choe's claims about self-defense "plausible" and that he couldn't find probable cause to file charges against him for assault or theft. He also said that based on Choe's "heavily edited" video, Celeste appeared to be "berating" him.

According to Riley and Celeste, Choe seemed fixated on their gender identities—asking Celeste if she was "one of those trans people" and misgendering Riley.

PubliCola sent Choe a list of questions. He responded (full exchange here) by saying he was "still sifting through the mountain of evidence and trail of destruction you left behind after your alcohol fueled benders" adding that he was "[g]onna make a huge announcement real soon. I just signed up to report for a national cable channel." He did not answer our questions.