(There was a lot more than this, but this is a collection of comments and sources (with URLs) about this important event.)
The rally of Patriot Prayer and counter-rally of Pop Mob/ANTIFA (Popular Mobilization) on August 4 in downtown Portland threatened to be a bloodbath. At least the mainstream media was hoping for a bloodbath that could be blamed on Patriot Prayer. Originally Patriot Prayer was to hold its rally on Terry Shrunk Plaza, which is federal property. The advantage of this is that the Federal Protective Service (police) enforce the law: Portland Police have long been ordered by Mayor Wheeler to side with ANTIFA, whether against legal rallies of the right or in refusing to respond to 9-1-1 calls by members of ICE being attacked by the ANTIFA gangs of OccupyICEPDX. (This latter instance is probably heading to the courts.)
After ANTIFA threatened to bring guns and use them to attack the Patriot Prayer rally, Joey Gibson, leader of Patriot Prayer, moved the planned rally to a city park and called on his supporters to also come armed. This was a terrifying prospect. Supporters of Patriot Prayer were afraid that one wrong move magnified by the hostile media could be a catastrophe. Supporters of ANTIFA were afraid of losing again, and began to see traitors and wreckers everywhere.
Pro-ANTIFA spokesman and the national media point at the case of Jeremy Christian: a homeless, mentally ill man (his Facebook page makes him out to be a support of Bernie Sanders and an anti-circumcision activist) who was not associated with Patriot Prayer. The mainstream media and ANTIDA insist he was associated with Patriot Prayer. He had appeared at the edge of a rally and had been asked to leave. The next day he was involved in a fight on the light rail. The media claims the attack was a racist attack on two women on the train, one a Muslimah, leaving two men dead and one stabbed. A little noticed story in a local Portland newspaper suggests that fight started because Christian encountered an ANTIFA activist who had beaten Christian up, and the fight escalated from there. That ANTIFA activist, who was stabbed) is the source for all the mass media accounts of what happened: He never says anything about their prior fight. Pop Mob even calls it Islamophobia. https://antifascistnews.net/2018/07/27/pop-mob-and-rose-city-antifa-are-organizing-a-mass-antifascist-resistance-to-patriot-prayer-on-august-4th/
On June 30, 2018 there had been a Patriot Prayer rally in Portland. The Portland Police carefully disarmed patriot Prayer and its supporters, and then allowed ANTIFA, armed with sticks and bats to attack Patriot Prayer. The result was a rout: Patriot Prayer and the Proud Boys took ANTIFA’s sticks away and beat then down, chasing them through the streets.
Distorted versions of these incidents, and many others, provide the basis for apocalyptic predictions of “racist” violence by Patriot Prayer. Every mass media account began with the claim that patriot Prayer was the first to call for arming (it was ANTIFA). A typical and very widely disseminated “analysis” and forecast by Huffington Post cites the (discredited) SPLC and the leader of the Pop Mob who rely on false accounts of the recent past to make hysterical and totally incorrect forecasts. The Huffington Post report goes on to cite unknown activists in Charlottesville (providing no URL in case you want to check up on them) predicting GENOCIDE in Portland. This Huffington Post article was posted everywhere, even bombarding people as an advertisement. I used the link at CAIR-Oregon, which fully supported ANTIFA: https://www.facebook.com/cairoregon/posts/267255873868585 A direct link is: https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/portland-patriot-prayer-proud-boys-rally_us_5b646217e4b0de86f4a0ba04
A long ANTIFA article predicting violence and denouncing Patriot Prayer (warning about traitors and infiltrators pretending to be journalists!): https://antifascistnews.net/2018/08/02/alloutpdx-against-patriot-prayer-on-august-4th-what-you-need-to-know/
ANTIFA warning about traitors and infiltrators (adds SPLC comment that the real problem is the existence of Whiteness): https://twitter.com/beckerachi/status/1025623810433662976
Daily Beast warns of massacre by Patriot Prayer (includes many threatening messages from Twitter and Facebook without URLs (that is, phony messages)): https://www.thedailybeast.com/right-wing-groups-with-guns-plan-to-impersonate-and-infiltrate-antifa
Then: Statement by Mayor Ted Wheeler released the following statement on demonstrations planned for Saturday in Portland. August 3: “There are many planning to attend demonstrations this weekend at Waterfront Park. I continue to strongly reject the idea that violence or hate speech are legitimate means to a political end Chief Outlaw and I have serious concerns about the potential for violence at this weekend’s demonstrations. It is particularly troubling to me that individuals are posting publicly their intent to act out violently. We don’t want this here. The Police Bureau has put forth significant effort into preparing for tomorrow’s demonstration and will do their best to provide a safe environment. Chief Outlaw will be in command of the Portland Police Bureau’s response for Saturday’s demonstrations. I have complete confidence in her leadership and the Police Bureau’s ability to appropriately manage this challenging situation. Background: The mission of law enforcement is to provide a safe environment for all participants, non-participants, and community members while ensuring the peaceful exercise of First Amendment rights. Federal law and First Amendment protections have consistently found that (1) a jurisdiction cannot deny permits based on free speech, and (2) a demonstration cannot be preemptively banned based on the occurrences at a prior demonstration. I have been an active participant in a national discussion about how to balance the right to free speech with the responsibilities that come with that right.
A4 Begins:
Local ANTIFA forces, led by the Portland Democratic Socialists of America, organized PopMob, the Popular Mobilization. (Not related to the Popular Mobilization Shiite militias in Iraq, to be sure.) PopMob specifically supported violence (“diversity of tactics” in a deniable way: The St. Paul principles): https://www.facebook.com/events/793756637681487/ PopMob claimed support from the diversity of Portland (it was all White, except for a few Filipina communists). Pop Mob notes that its current fight against Patriot Prayer is the same struggle as Rose City Antifa, the Pacific Northwest Antifascist Workers Collective, and Eugene Antifa in the recent past, and notes its roots in the recent, violent OccupyICEPDX: https://antifascistnews.net/2018/07/27/pop-mob-and-rose-city-antifa-are-organizing-a-mass-antifascist-resistance-to-patriot-prayer-on-august-4th/
PopMob participants: Portland Assembly [Rojavists]: https://twitter.com/pdxassembly/status/1022962884236562432
PopMob participants: International Socialist Organization: https://twitter.com/_grendan/status/1025811621308915712
Video livestream: multiple channels: (Patriot Prayer chants include: “Uhuru” and “Hey Tommy Tommy, Tommy Tommy Tommy Robinson”): https://twitter.com/N3m0QQ/status/1025854222305251328 — Much is by Luke Rudkowski of Soros-funded WeAreChange: he begins with a long discussion of his airline travel woes: https://twitter.com/N3m0QQ/status/1025854222305251328
Video: Portland Antifa VS Proudboys Round 2: Antifa holding a black lives matter sign and there is not one black in sight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhONU_yFeaw — short ANTIFA video showing Canadian Proud Boys to be multiracial: https://twitter.com/Kherman112/status/1025513182868041728
Video: Tim Pool: “anti-racist”: he notes he films from the Patriot Prayer side because ANTIFA is attacking journalists; he notes that Patriot Prayer is multiracial; adds that he is horrified by the flags with portraits of Stalin being flown by the ANTIFA side, noting the mass murder, including the Holodomor, perpetrated by Stalin: https://www.pscp.tv/w/1OyJAQOgVMoJb — He notes that Youtube will not allow him to livestream
Video and tweet stream: Shane Burley [publishes in Huffington Post, In These Times, Salon Magazine, Truth Out, AK Press, Alternet, Raw Story, Think Progress, Waging Nonviolence, Political Research Associates, Labor Notes]: long series of posts and videos: calls Patriot Prayer the Westboro Baptist Church of the Right; calls police pigs; Pop Mob (video of ILPS speech by Gabriela representative: https://twitter.com/shane_burley1/status/1025807999720456193 : calls for racial violence against White Americans); “Nazi scum off our streets” [Pop Mob main speaker at City Hall: extermination of the Whites: we want the nazis out of North America, out of Europe, out of the entire world; we are on stolen land of the Chinook Nation (people cheer at being on indigenous land?); we want a world free of White supremacists [i.e., White people], we want a world free of criminalized immigration, we want a world free of gay and lesbian and trans discrimination: https://twitter.com/shane_burley1/status/1025798365894848512]; photographs of illegible signs with large word “Pussy” on them. Notably, Burley did most of his reporting from the Patriot Prayer side, since it was not safe for journalists to be on the ANTIFA side.
Burley claims he saw no provocation of Police by ANTIFA, but that is surely because he spent the whole day on the Patriot Prayer side, because if he had gone to the ANTIFA side he would have been beaten up.
Almost immediately, Portland Police disarmed protesters on both sides: notably, the centerpiece of every photo of the weapons seized by police was the one confederate flag shield carried by someone on the Patriot Prayer side:
[12:30] https://twitter.com/PortlandPolice
The turning point came when some ANTIFA threw stones and bottles at the Portland Police:
{2:20] This is the Portland Police Bureau. Officers have observed protesters throwing projectiles, including rocks and bottles. The projectiles were thrown at officers near SW Naito Pkwy and SW Columbia. All people in this area must immediately disperse. Failure to comply with ths order may subject you to arrest or citation, and may subject you to use of riot control agents or impact weapons. https://twitter.com/PortlandPolice/status/1025848204225441792
Here is a typical comment at that thread:
gay for housing & abolishing ICE @fatherqueerest 4m4 minutes ago: Replying to @PortlandPolice: cops and the klan go hand in hand so it’s no surprise that you’re all protecting nazis and terrorizing the antifascists. good job living up to your legacy as murderous thugs. #ACAB
Unicorn Riot (the ANTIFA media and intelligence group), celebrated the green-masked Demand Utopia Rojavist paramilitaries: https://twitter.com/CRASSOWSKI/status/1025838882192011264 — Unicorn Riot wearing Press badge, like Burley and others, they hide behind press credentials to pursue activism – Unicorn doxxes people routinely.
The Guillotine: The OccupyICEPDX guillotine used to behead a manikin of Pres. Trump (followed by the enactment of public acts of sexual necrophilia with the head, in front of children) was brought out as part of the PopMob rally: smol lil roll of paint @InternetEh: WE GOT THE GUILLOTINE. YOU BETTER RUN. — The Guillotine @GuillotinePod: A comrade in Portland rolling out The Guillotine today! We here at The Guillotine literally couldn’t approve more. — Kit O’Connell Retweeted: The Guillotine: @GuillotinePod: A comrade in Portland rolling out The Guillotine today! We here at The Guillotine literally couldn’t approve more. Shout out to this dude! We see you! (photograph of guillotine): https://twitter.com/InternetEh/status/1025839737829916672
Local media jumped in, to lie: KOIN TV-6 claimed Patriot Prayer had thrown the rocks and that the police were dispersing Patriot Prayer: the exact opposite of the truth: https://www.koin.com/news/local/multnomah-county/patriot-prayer-antifa-protest-portland-august-4-2018/1345541752
Periscope, Facebook and Youtube actively censoring Patriot live feeds; pro-ANTIFA live feeds unaffected.
Livestream comments: [One after the next Antifa are taking off their masks, shaking hands with nationalists, who cheer them and say they only desire debate. This is a miracle. Joey Gibson: “You thought we hate you cuz you’re gay? All of us are sinners. We love you.” Hotep Proud Boy: “I have experienced racism from white people, from blacks, from Muslims, from Jews. But we are ALL Americans! Black Lives MAGA!” Joints passed. Hotep says “One Love [Rastafarian term] – I heard a lot of communist, racist, but what timeline we in? We support the MAGA ideology. We have black, Asian, even homosexual. As long as you are pro-Western Civilization!” Recall the Proud Boy slogan is Uhuru, Swahili for Freedom and one of the Seven Principles of Kwanzaa. One single ANTIFA girl is left shrieking “fascist” — no one is being mean to her. One protester reads off his iPhone: Morris Dees of the SPLC molested his underage daughter. Since ANTIFA attacks people with cameras on sight, internet journalists, and mainstream journalists, have moved to Patriot side, where people are willing to discuss issues. The mainstream journalists know their stories are false since they are only personally safe with the Patriots.]: https://twitter.com/N3m0QQ/status/1025854222305251328
Aftermath
The only injuries were a few young, isolated Patriots, cornered by large mobs of ANTIFA: e.g., https://twitter.com/N3m0QQ/status/1025854222305251328
ANTIFA blames their dismal showing on a conspiracy of the Portland Police and Patriot Prayer, also traitors, and informers and wreckers, noting the ongoing mass killings of dissidents (?) in the United States: https://twitter.com/RoseCityAntifa/status/1025856851517140992
Council on American-Islamic Relations-Oregon and the Portland Democratic Socialists of America claims their rights were violated by a conspiracy of the Portland Police and “racist far-right groups, including white supremacists, white nationalists, and neo-Nazi gangs”…. “Throughout the rally, Portland Police primarily focused upon protecting the alt-right groups’ hate bias-motivated behavior”. CAIR invokes the spectre of hate crimes at the rally: there were none. http://cairoregon.org/index.php/2018/08/05/cair-oregon-and-portland-dsa-call-for-reforms-in-wake-of-portland-police-tactics-against-peaceful-counter-protesters/
No one seems to know where the guillotine went.
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