December 15, 2020 • 48 mins
After more than a month of enduring police violence, Portland protesters finally leveled up enough to fight back. This is the story of the battle of July 4th.
Host: Robert Evans
Executive Producer: Sophie Lichterman
Writers: Bea Lake, Donovan Smith, Elaine Kinchen, Garrison Davis, Robert Evans
Narration: Bea Lake, Donovan Smith, Elaine Kinchen, Garrison Davis, Robert Evans
Editor: Chris Szczech
Music: Crooked Ways by Propaganda
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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get your podcasting fires stores that justice are in. Violence
(01:55):
has a curious way of rendering you both more resilient
to unless talk Laurant of more violence. By the start
of July, every regular protester and press member in the
city of Portland had seen dozens of flash bang grenades
detonate within feet of their heads. In June a lone
I was tear gas at least sixty times, and there
are literally thousands of other Portlanders who endured similar barrages.
(02:17):
We'd all run like hell from charging riot lines, which
isn't experience in and of itself. I've been to war
zones on two continents, have been shot at, and I've
been shelled once, and I can honestly say that being
bulrushed by dozens of armored policemen ranks as among the
most frightening things I've ever experienced. It's certainly less lethal
than coming under sniper fire, but there's something uncontrollably panic
(02:38):
inducing about being chased by a wall of angry men
who want to harm you. The lizard part of your
brain starts firing, panic rises up and the primal hinterlands
of your brain. If you aren't careful, it takes over completely.
And even if you do stay in control, the adrenaline
coursing through your system, it'll make your handshake, it'll blur
the parts of your mind to make coherent thought. Paul Possible.
(03:00):
Portland protesters learned a lot through the month of June,
but one thing they didn't quite figure out was how
to stand up against a charging riot line. They did
learn a lot of other valuable things, though. Tear gas
(03:22):
went from something that instantly dispersed crowds to more of
a moderate annoyance. Some of this was a product of
people acquiring gas masks and respirators, but more of it
had to do with people learning how to treat gas injuries,
how to put out or throw back smoking canisters, and
most importantly, how not to panic while choking on poison.
One major way this information spread in the early days
(03:42):
where live streams conundrum. A blind journalist who recorded soundscapes
for the Portland Riots recalls how she used live stream
audio to train herself up before going out. And I
had been, you know, since like the first week, helping
out in ways I can sort of from behind the
scenes constantly. It took until middle you know, because initially,
(04:04):
when all this started going down, you know here in Portland,
I was like, how can I be involved? You know,
logic brain is going, okay, Katie, you're blind. Not safe
for you to go out there. You know, all of
all of these reasons why blind person probably running through
clouds of tear gas not not the greatest idea you've
ever had. Um. And so it was like, okay, well,
(04:26):
what are the other ways I can I can support
the community at large and specific people who I know
that are out there. Well, for one, I got that
stimulus check and I didn't need it, so I'm like,
who needs gear? Um? So donating into different organizations that
was one way that I could help very easily. In
my position. I live by myself. I live like a
(04:47):
student because I am a student and I yeah, um.
Also supporting friends that I had who were out on
the ground, like sitting there watching all of the live
streams and like following you guys that were out there
on the ground since day one, Like I'm sitting there
up all night every night, eight nights a week, because
(05:07):
some number of my friends are out every night, right,
And so as stuff gets started, I start pulling up
every stream that I could find. So yeah, that was
a lot of what I would be doing, is having
multiple live streams playing at the same time, like listening
to the audio's. Obviously, I can't see what's happening in
the videos, So I mean I was not as effective
(05:28):
as somebody who could actually see the pictures, obviously, and
that tiny regard. I can't see the pictures people are
tweeting out or what's in them. But you know, me
and some of my friends had some groups set up
where I wasn't the only one doing this and we
would sort of share the information with each other first
before passing it on to the people who were, you know,
out and about, like, hey, guys, maybe stay away from
third and Mandason. There's reports of fascists in a truck
(05:50):
with U S flags, like don't go around. There's a
guy with a gun, you know, stuff like that. Once
people were actually out on the ground getting tear gas
and grenated and charged on a regular basis, they started
coalescing into groups based on what they were particularly interested
in doing to help out. For Chris and a number
of his colleagues, that meant learning to work as a
team of medics. It's this kid out of broken shoulder. Um,
(06:12):
and there's a bunch of people crowding around being like
I'm medic, but I've only got water and band aids
and stuff. Um. And I wandered up and I said, Hi,
my name's Chris. UM, I have triangle bandages? Would you
like one? And so I met a medic friend that way,
and then I met all of their medic friends and
it's like, well, we should keep in contact. You guys
have signaling and made like a small signal group. Um.
(06:34):
And then I started to meet other medics and like
get their signal information and met other medics that we're
doing the same thing. And so we all kind of
like everybody kind of met like five medics and all
five medics new another five medics and so it all
kind of um coalesced like that. UM. So there's a
lot of independent medics. But really there are these medic groups,
(06:56):
and within the internal communications that we have, we usually
like a few people, like one or two people from
each group. Like I'm with PAM, I know other medics
that are with PAM that are in like uh, you know,
in communication UM. And then you know there's the e
walks and we'll know some e walks and well, if
(07:17):
I can't get ahold of the walks, I know somebody
you can. If I can't get ahold of rose hips,
I know somebody you can. UM. And so we do
all try and talk to each other. UM. We try
and talk to each other on the day of to
make sure that you know, like we're all on the
same page, because different medics have different styles UM. And
then another reason that's so important is because especially in
(07:40):
emergency medicine UM, you're taught how to deal with like
bio hazards, situations, you know, things we need to triage
things where there's a lot of patients at once and
there's a lot of people coming from different places to
be medics, and you have to learn you know who's
above you, who's below you, so that you're not stepping
at each other's does and getting each other's way, and
so learning what everyone's scope of practices was very important.
(08:03):
And that's just kind of a standard question that we asked. Now,
if you meet somebody that you haven't met, they're like, oh,
medic would be like, oh hey, cool, my names Chris Um.
I was trained as an emt uh. If you don't
mind me asking what's your scope of practice? Because sometimes
there are people would be like, oh, yeah, I've been
taking care of my mom for like five years, but
I have no formal training and be like all right, cool.
I'm gonna keep that in mind. So when something happens,
you know, I don't ask someone like, hey, grab my
(08:25):
sand's plant and mold it for me. I can be like,
hey hold my flashlight, guy, um. Or sometimes you know,
we know a lot of people get tear gas. Those
people are really good because flushing eyes isn't hard, and
I can teach somebody how to flush eyes um. And
that way, if we've got those people flushing eyes and
then someone else has like a broken bone, I can
deal with that. There were small emergent groups who brought shields,
(08:51):
others who brought traffic cones and water jugs to douse
tear gas, and others who showed up with food and
protective gear to hand out to protesters. A number of
disabled activists who didn't field they could safely participate in
toe to toe confrontations with riot lines filled valuable logistic
roles making sure that front liners had ample water, respirator filters,
and food. Juniper was one of hundreds of people who
(09:12):
took it upon themselves to see that the Portland protests
were supplied with what they needed. I was able to
UM feel like I could go and drop off supplies
like I have. You know, I am a middle class,
upwardly mobile white person, UM, and I have some money,
and there are people out on the front lines putting
(09:34):
their bodies and lives on the line. And so I
was like, I'm gonna go give some snacks to people
and get some water and just some other other protective
equipment and things that I had that I knew could
be useful. Other small groups helped coordinate aid and raise
attention for actions online. One of these organizations was pop
mob or Popular Mobilization, who formed early on in the
(09:55):
Trump administration after a series of disastrous and bloody dueling
rallies between fascis. An anti fascist protesters in Portland's bob
Mob act as a sort of unifying bridge for different
local anti fascist groups, with a focus on getting the
word out to large groups of what they called everyday
anti fascists. These were people who weren't hardcore activists but
(10:15):
didn't want Nazis marching around their city. When Portland's BLM
movement took off, though, Effie Baum and their colleagues at
pop Mob decided they should take a less visible support role,
so mostly just retweeting things and then UM when people
would share events with us, boosting those events or boosting
UM different affinity groups that were involved in the nightly
protests and UM really just kind of providing a UM
(10:39):
uh basically a signal boost to the people that we're
doing organizing UM and specifically like focusing only on trying
to boost UM bipoc led efforts, especially given all of
the conversation around UM white anarchists and UM you know
co opting the movement or the you know media like
(11:02):
to blame everything on white anarchists, which then takes away
the autonomy and disempowers the people that were in fact
organizing those events and the very real anger, UM and
justified anger behind those events, and so we also did
not want to UM contribute to that narrative in any way,
shape or form. So we really made a very intest
(11:26):
intentional efforts to UM operate exclusively in a supportive role.
A lot of us were there UM many nights, and
UM continue to go out many nights, but UM the
organization as a whole did not have an organizational presence
as organizers. One of the you know, goals that we
(11:50):
would you know, have is pushing back against kind of
this like white supremacist culture that we have all that
we all participate in every day. And so that was
one of the main reasons we did not want to
take any kind of lead in the organizing is because
it's one thing when we are coming out and organizing
(12:15):
against je like Joey Gibson and Patriot Prayer, UM who
you know, the Proud Boys and those groups target a
lot of different marginalized and vulnerable populations from you know,
many different UM groups and so in a sense you
could look at it and say that that the work
(12:36):
is similar UM. But at the same time I think
that it's important for the people who are most affected
to be the voices that people are hearing, and especially
because we've seen how much that the media has latched
onto trying to discredit those voices by painting it as
(12:58):
angry white anarchists. Days and weeks war on Portland, protesters
grew hardened and increasingly effective at standing up to police violence.
Tear gas and grenades stopped working to disperse crowds. Pepper balls,
little paintball style projectiles filled with mace and fired from
a paintball gun, likewise lost their effectiveness. As shields became
more common, police bul rushes remained the most effective tactic
(13:20):
for dispersing crowds, especially since by late June most of
those crowds were quite small. Portland protesters started gathering on Telegram,
an anonymous messaging app, in order to coordinate and pass
on intelligence. During events, people would warn each other of
police charges in the presence of riot trucks. Before and
after events, they would dissect their performance and discuss ways
(13:41):
to improve. Near the end of June, they started talking
about how protesters might form their own shield wall, something
that could stand up against police charges. Now, in between
numerous nights of reporting on riots, my partner Elaine Kinchen
spent hours browsing through those conversations and watching as people
worked out how to defend themse elves from charging officers.
(14:01):
I'm gonna throw you over to a lane now, explaining
how that process came together. Well. Since the very beginning
of the protests, there had been various diagrams that were
circulating on the Internet. A lot of them came from
things that had been done in Hong Kong, so different
diagrams of roles that protesters could take two more effectively
(14:23):
protect each other. Some of those involved laser pointers and
some of them involved shields or helmets or supply line stuff.
And so those have been being circulated throughout all of June,
both on protester telegram channels and also on Twitter and
other communication channels. And as the charges than bullrushes and
(14:46):
stuff really heated up and more people were being injured
and the police brutality was becoming more intense, a lot
of those discussions and how to effectively implement them would
be happen they after protests had wound down or during
the day, and so I would follow and read through
(15:06):
all sorts of different threads where people were posting images
of how to do Roman style turtleshelf formations with overlapping shields,
or could make an effective vault to block the people
behind them from police munitions to more effectively protect all
the peaceful protesters who are in the back. All these
different emergent groups that form to handle different tasks within
(15:28):
the movement are what is called affinity groups. This is
a fairly old concept within anarchist organizing. Here are friends
at the Youth Liberation Front or why I left? Explain
the context again. Because President Trump and numerous right wing
media figures have repeatedly called for their imprisonment or execution,
we've hired voice actors to reread the things they said
to us rather than risk exposing their identities. So an
(15:51):
affinity group is usually like five to tend people who
share some affinity. And it's the preferred method for anarchist
organizing because it's small, it's informal, and usually non hierarchical,
and usually horizontally organized. Yeah, and um it's uh. I
think it's been preferable to like the large organization model
that we attempted and just failed because there was no
(16:12):
accountability and there's no way to ensure that like everyone
was cool with each other and when problems came up,
they just sucked us over. We spoke to one anonymous
activist who had no experience with anarchist organizing prior to
the summer of She started coming out to Portland protests
earlier in the summer with her friends. So the first
time I went out to one of the nightly protests,
I went with a couple of friends that I've known
(16:34):
since I was like eighteen or nineteen, because they had
been going out and I felt comfortable being with them. Um,
they don't come out anymore. Once her friends stopped going,
she floated around different crews of activists, experimenting with different
affinity groups, but eventually deciding that she preferred an even
more decentralized approach to protesting. As far as you know,
(16:55):
like my length of knowledge, an affinity group is just
you know, a decentralized group of people that you can
uh form ideas with and kind of go over maybe
like safety tactics and different things like that. UM. But
I kind of quickly realized that affinity groups weren't necessarily
for me. UM. I think that sometimes it can get
(17:19):
complicated fairly quickly, and so I still go down to
the protests by myself. Since I've been doing this for
as long as I have, it doesn't take me very
long to run into somebody that I know, And sometimes
I feel like having someone that's worried about my safety
can be a bit of a hindrance sometimes, I you know,
(17:41):
having to like be on a radio consistently and and
always be on my phone to make sure that I'm
you know, in communication with different people. I don't want
anybody to have to worry about if I'm going to
be fine, because I'm going to be fine. So yeah,
I mean, I just I usually go down by myself.
I think that the network of affinity groups has been
(18:04):
a positive thing. You know, the people that have been
around and experienced the most have that information that they
can share with one another. One major advantage of anarchist
organizing tactics is that it makes anarchist groups harder to
infiltrate and disrupt. Between nineteen fifty six and nineteen seventy one,
the FBI instituted a counter intelligence program nicknamed co Intel
(18:28):
Pro at the orders of Director J. Edgar Hoover. The
program was initially targeted at the US Communist Party, but
was quickly extended to all kinds of left wing activist organizations,
particularly the Black Panthers. Hoover's goal with co intel Pro
was to increase factionalism caused disruption and wind defections. He
wanted to spread such terror among left wing activists that
(18:49):
none of them would again walk into a meeting without
feeling like there must be FBI agents in the room.
Co intel Pro was incredibly successful, and while the program
officially ended in nineteen seventy one, the tactics the FBI
pioneered in this period have been used by a variety
of law enforcement agencies ever since. Even organizations like the
Portland Chapter of the Black Panthers, whose more radical programs
(19:10):
included free breakfast for neighborhood kids and dental care for all,
earned the ire of co intel Pro. In an interview
last year, chapter co founder Kent Ford recalled a journalist
sharing with him plots from the FBI to poison the
produce the Panthers would use to feed hundreds of kids
every morning. As a result, it is impossible to take
part in any kind of mass anti government action and
not feel like there are probably federal agents in your
(19:33):
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wherever you get your podcasts. Organizing by affinity groups helps
to negate some of the advantages the state has. It's
impossible to know that any mass group of hundreds of
people doesn't include undercover cops, but it is very possible
to know that you and your four or five close
buddies aren't cops. The only organizing that occurs in the
(22:11):
open at a large scale event is very basic and
not legally incriminating, i e. We're gathering at this park
at eight PM, hearing speeches, and then marching at nine.
On most occasions, either a specific organizer will pick the
direction for that week's march, or a vote will be
taken as to the destination. The decision to take part
in any illegal activity, acts of property destruction, in the
like is made by these small, independent affinity groups and
(22:34):
sometimes just individuals on their own. Often only two or
three groups out of a three person march will actually
engage in serious law breaking. The others are there to shout,
wave signs and stand up to confront the police when
they inevitably arrive. This method of organization does have a
number of weaknesses, which we will discuss in subsequent episodes,
but it has proven more resilient to state surveillance than
(22:55):
being part of an organization with a strict hierarchy. One
major aspect of this is that many more dedicated Portland
protesters take something called security culture. Very seriously, here's the
y I left again. Security culture? Uh, security culture, I
think is it's interesting the risks you're taking and what
precautions you need to take to be safe. Were like
(23:16):
because like not every risk is going to have the
same consequences, and so it's being able to judge those,
um and like if you do something that's questionable, possibly illegal,
don't talk about it, don't don't incriminate yourself, keep your
mouth shut, don't incriminate others. I mean, um, this is
a crime. Think article called what is security culture? I
believe and that's like a great introduction for people who
(23:38):
don't know. It's a very important part of like really
any movement because if you have bad security culture and
you're putting yourself at risk or or the organizers at risks,
you're going to disrupt a movement because you're going to
get people in trouble. So like that definitely plays like
don't let you know, don't talk about things you did,
don't photograph things you did. You can like you know,
(23:58):
don't don't bring your phone if that's the thing you're
able to do, because like they could track you, and
Feds in Portland literally clone phones and have like you know,
they can just pinpoint you. So that's another thing where
it's like, yeah, basically it's knowing the risk and knowing
how to safely protect yourself from those risks. That Zene.
What is security culture? We like to make sure to
send it to all everyone who wants to get involved
(24:20):
with us. That's like the first thing. Yeah, it's the
most basic thing that we send. None of these security
measures were enough to protect people from being arrested by
cops during actions. It doesn't matter how solid your digital
security is or how trustworthy your friends are if a
cop charges that you faster than you can run away.
But good security culture can prevent activists from being arrested
(24:40):
after actions. See the United States has filled to hell
and back with cameras when protesters damage your destroyed property.
While protesting, police will spend weeks trying to identify the
individuals responsible. This is a big part of why black
block has evolved as a tactic. If everyone is dressed
basically identically with their features covered and no logos or
hatto showing, it's much more difficult for police to identify
(25:03):
people after an action. Going in block has disadvantages too, though,
largely when it comes to optics. When you're properly blocked up,
it will be difficult or impossible to determine your race.
As a result, police and local politicians important tended to
blame the activities have blocked up crowds on white anarchists
allegend that the city's Black Lives Matter movement had been
(25:23):
hijacked by white kids who just wanted to break things. Cosca,
an Indigenous Portlander who has been arrested by this point
at least ten times, pushed back against that characterization. Definitely
a narrative that works because people believe it, and people
keep repeating it, even some people of color. I hear
repeating it. But I know for a fact it's not true,
because because I've been doing this with you know, people
(25:47):
in Black Block for several years and have gotten to
know lots of people, and I have never ever seen
so many people of color in block before, and particularly
Native people, you know, like the just the Native people
in block is a huge amount compared you know, compared
to the population the general population of the area. So yeah,
(26:12):
I think it's I think you could even say it's
race that everyone in Black Block is white. In September,
after more than four months of nightly protests, the Justice
Department launched a criminal inquiry targeting the leaders of organizations
responsible for anti police brutality protests across the nation. Homeland
Security Secretary Chad Wolf told Fox News what we know
(26:33):
is that we have seen groups and individuals moved from
Portland to other parts of the country. I also found
a very poorly written USA Today article on the subject
and includes this paragraph asked why leaders of Antifa, a
loosely organized extreme far left ideology, and Black Lives Matter
formed in part to call attention to violence against black
communities had not been arrested. Wolf said, this is something
I talked to the a G personally about and I
(26:56):
know that they are working on it. So far, these
investigations had been markedly unsuccessful. Leaked reports later in the
year revealed that the Department of Homeland Security thought that
Antifa was an organized group with a structured leadership cast
that could be identified and arrested. No evidence of this
was ever turned up. Would suggest that this sort of
decentralized organizational tactic is at least harder for law enforcement
(27:17):
to penetrate. The vast majority of affinity groups don't exist
to organized window breaking, fire starting, or any of the
other things the media love to focus on in their
coverage of Portland protests. At their most basic level, affinity
groups are a safety tool. Cop rights can be incredibly dangerous,
and everyone considering going into such a situation should have
buddies who are there to watch your back and render
(27:38):
aid if you get hurt. Obviously, not everyone interested in
participating in protests had friends who are willing to go
out with them. Inter Comrade Collective an organization that formed
in the middle of the protests to help match loan
activists with buddies they could protest with for the night,
and so. UM the first time I had met up
with Commrad Collective, it was funny because, like, you know,
(28:00):
I had all this like anxiety and stuff, and uh.
I remember thinking like, oh my god, I'm so uncomfortable,
like I don't know these people. And then I was like,
I'm totally not going to meet up with them again
because I was like, I'll just stay by myself. Um,
here we are. But but it was like it was
when I when I left, and um, one of our
(28:23):
other comrades, uh like messaged me and was like are
you home? And like I wasn't expecting that, and I
was like what, And I was like, oh my god,
that's awesome. And then just like getting used to like
the checking in, you know, to make sure like they're
not arrested or didn't get attacked by you know, fascists
or whatever, and so just kind of like, um, I
(28:46):
think just getting exposed to like people, I'm like, oh
my god, these are like strangers that I don't know
that like give a ship about my well being and
so that kind of in turn makes you care more
about yourself, like and then also want to do the
same for others. And I also I'm one that likes
(29:06):
that tends to stray from the group. So like I'm
definitely like comfortable by myself in certain situations, but I
still I even if I'm separated, I just I like
to know that there is someone out there that like
I can hit up or whatever or check in with,
even if we're not like together at that moment. By
(29:28):
the start of July, all the ingredients were in place
for Portland's protest movement to display its first real meaningful
resistance to the violent might of a police riot line.
Protests had seriously waned in the days prior to the fourth,
with just a few dozen people showing up most nights,
but the holiday, and more to the point, the fact
that shiploads of fireworks were on sale for the holiday
brought a massive crowd of more than a thousand Portlander's
(29:51):
out to the city parks in front of the Justice
Center and the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse. In the
days that followed DHS Director Chad Wolf's announcement that rapid
deployment team were being sent to Portland's activists had been
on the lookout for Feds. They'd been visible inside the I. R.
S Building across the street from the Justice Center. Reporters
had taken several photographs of men in heavy military body
(30:11):
armor carrying rifles, but until the fourth none of those
men had actively engaged with a protest. My team, Beatrix, Selaine,
and Garrison and I all arrived in front of the
Justice Center at around nine pm. The energy in the
air was as apparent as the smell of gunpowder. People
were setting off fireworks, mostly mortars, at random in and
around the crowd. We hated it at first, after weeks
(30:40):
of being repeatedly flashbanged by cops. We were all just
ridiculously on edge. The first thing I saw upon a
rifle was a pile of American flags burning in a
concrete pit that had once held a massive Elk statue.
For several nights in a row, protesters had set fires
in and around the Elk statue, not out of anger,
but out of a desire to stay warm, and one
assumes for the joy of setting fires. Eventually, the city
(31:02):
removed the elk out of fears that it might collapse
and injure somebody. Protesters loved the Elk statue, though, and
began constructing a series of fasimilar Elk statues. On the
fourth it was a tiny model of a baby Elk
sandwiched in between billowing flames. While the flags burned, protesters
chanted Black Lives Matter. As more folks arrived, more fireworks
(31:26):
were set off. At first, people simply stood in the
street in front of the Justice Center, aiming fireworks straight
into the air to provide their incarcerated friends with the show.
This was not universally popular behavior, because again, at least
half the crowd was dealing with the opening salvos of
pretty serious PTSD. At this point, of course, The fireworks continued,
(31:57):
and once they hit a certain frequency, everyone's brains kind
of gotten numb to the effect. If I can be honest,
it started to be fun. Some individuals and affinity groups
within the crowd had brought lasers to shine into the
giant camera that had been installed out in front of
the Justice Center. By ten PM, the fireworks usage had
(32:18):
grown more militant and people were shooting dozens of commercial
grade fireworks straight into the Justice Center, breaking several windows.
At least one prisoner inside was seen waving excitedly out
to the crowd, which provoked rejoicing outside the fire where
sparrage continued, with protesters aiming occasional salvos at the Federal
(32:39):
courthouse too. At around ten PM, the police finally showed
up Judge or fireworks stores the Justice Center. These fireworks
are in the Academian Dolts in the building. Activities We
crooket conquer your New Year's resolution to be more productive
(33:07):
with the Before Breakfast podcast. In each bite sized daily episode,
time management and productivity expert Laura Vanderkam teaches you how
to make the most of your time both at work
and at home. These are the practical suggestions you need
to get more done with your day. Just as lifting
weights keeps our body strong as we age, learning new
skills is the mental equivalent of pumping iron. Listen to
(33:30):
before Breakfast, wherever you get your podcasts, give us the attention.
We need everything you've got fast Waiting on Reparations. We'd
be the podcast two in every Thursday politics and wordplay.
We fight for the people because they got us in
the worst way, from the Hill Cooper, the Bomb Bay,
from the left Enclave to what the neo kansee every
(33:51):
Thursday conversation and to break us off with some break
because we wait in the Listen to Waiting on Reparations
and I heart Radio, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get
your podcasts. After thirty years, it's time to return to
the halls of West Beverly High and hang out at
the peach pit. On the podcast nine O two one,
(34:12):
OMG joined Jenny Garth and Tori Spelling for a rewatch
of the hit series Beverly Hills nine O two one oh.
From the very beginning, we get to tell the fans
all of the behind the scenes stories to actually happen,
so they know what happened on camera. Obviously, but we
can tell them all the good stuff that happened off camera,
get all the juicy details of every episode that you've
(34:33):
been wondering about for decades. As nine O two one
oh super fan and radio host Sissany sits in with
Jenny and Tory, two reminisce, reflect and relive each moment,
from Brandon and Kelly's first kiss to shouting, Donna Martin graduates,
you have an amazing memory. You remember everything about the
entire ten years that we filmed that show, and you
(34:53):
remember absolutely nothing of the ten years that we filmed
that show. Listen to nine O two one oh G
on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts. Virtually all the people out on
the fourth work by this point hardened the police violence.
(35:15):
They've been trained by weeks in the streets to do
exactly the opposite of whatever the police l Red told
them to do, true to form. They surged forward at this,
moving in force into the intersection between the courthouse and
Justice Center. More and more fireworks were launched at both buildings.
As I moved forward, sensing imminent tear gas, I heard
one person behind me say they shouldn't have said anything.
Look what happens when they talk. At ten forty one
(35:38):
pm I started live streaming. Almost immediately after that, federal
agents inside the courthouse started dumping tear gas out of
holes in the walls of the courthouse. Yeah. Yeah, so
basically so far people were shooting it. Ship of fireworks off, uh,
(36:01):
and they gave a warning, and people kept firing fireworks
And now it looks like PUDs are out and shooting
tear gas there. The crowd backed up, but did not disperse. Instead,
they retreated to the parks, washed each other's eyes out,
and continued to shoot fireworks at both buildings. After a
(36:21):
few minutes, they marched forward again into the intersection. No
one knew it at the time, but with the first
federal tear gaest deployment and the decision of protesters to
continue advancing on the courthouse, a series of events had
been set into motion that would turn Portlands into one
of the biggest stories in the country, lead to hundreds
(36:42):
of arrests and several near fatal injuries. I don't believe
any of the people in the crowd that night particularly
wanted that to happen. I certainly saw no evidence of
a concerted plan. Instead, what I saw was a community
of battered people who had just spent weeks being gassed
and grenaded and beaten with truncheons and arrested for crymes.
A miner is standing in an intersection with a sign.
(37:03):
They had started coming out to protest police brutality and
wound up repeated victims of it, and now over the
course of June they'd gotten good at resisting it. Each
person there had learned tactics to mitigate police riot control agents.
They'd come to trust their fellow Portlanders, and now finally
there were enough of them out again to put up
serious resistance to the cops. And they had sacks full
(37:23):
of commercial grade fireworks to throw back at the thin
blue line shooting grenades at them. With all that psychic
weight behind them, there was simply no way this crowd
was going to back down to the demands of police
or federal agents. Instead, the massive Portlanders swarmed the front
steps of the federal courthouse that had just gassed them.
They began launching fireworks directly into its facade, shattering some
(37:44):
of the windows higher up. The street level windows were
all covered in plywood and those plywood walls had several
hinged slits on them that federal agents inside could flip
open to shoot from. I started calling them murder holes
after similar features built into medieval castles. The term stuck
minutes went by. Federal agents would occasionally fire pepper balls
into the crowd, but eleven PM came and went without
(38:05):
another major show of force. At around eleven o five,
the police started dumping gas or smoke out of the
side door of the Justice Center. The Feds dropped more
gas out too, but instead of dispersing, the crowd moved
back in an orderly fashion. Front liners with umbrellas and
shields moved to the front and deflected pepper balls, while
medics washed out eyes and people with gas masks and
respirators ran into the cloud to throw more fireworks at
(38:27):
the courthouse. Gas. Yeah, they're dropped the ropping it out
of the window. HOPEOU see how the fire we're going
off there. The whole situation evolved into something very much
like a siege. You can see here one of the
murders works a medieval time I think, so that's here
(38:50):
they're scooting, So we definitely have like an old fashioned
medieval seeds to sort of crowd getting their fears. Uh.
You see a crowd get into shields to the front.
You see the defenders firing had a murder hole. You
see fire. You know pilots big shot into the thing
(39:15):
is Jesus Christ. Yeah, Friday night, everybody, Friday night. I
hope can't tell what's smoked from fireworks and what's tear gas.
I think the FEDS and the police had expected the
gas and pepper balls would suffice to force the crowd away,
but the crowd kept advancing. Dedicated teams would run up
(39:35):
with traffic cones and put out gas grenades. Eventually, the
FEDS and the Portland Police were forced to bombard both
parks just to push the crowd away. Yeah wow, okay,
it's going wild. Somebody's riding a bicycle with a shield
to the crowd. Words are fire and death till there's
all behind us. Let's go through here, go through here. Eventually,
(39:59):
the FEDS and the police made a decision more gas.
It was the most gas deployed in Portland since tear
gas Tuesday. Despite being doused with gas, the crowd did
not scatter. When I washed my eyes out and was
able to look around, I saw hundreds of people still
arrayed for battle and ready to go. The police and
federal agents both came out and forced that night. They
marched forward, pumping out gas and pepper balls and smoke grenades.
(40:21):
The crowd was forced back foot by foot, but they
held together. I think DHS had expected that the presence
of federal agents and military gear would have rattled protesters more,
but activists just treated them like more cops. The sight
of fully armored soldiers in military gear was unsettling, especially
since no one at the time had any idea what
agency they were with. Look at these guys, we got
(40:41):
army guys. Look at guys here. The combined Feds and
police succeeded in splitting the crowd in two through a
combination of walls of gas and bulrushes, but both groups
held together and proceeded to lead law enforcement on a
two hour chase through the streets of Portland. There were
moments of shocking brutality where police would tackle protesters and
dragged them on their back across asphalt into clouds of
gas to arrest them. One protester we interviewed was arrested
(41:05):
that night. She'd shown up as a shield bearer and
had been one of the people protecting the crowd from
incoming fire. Yeah. Yeah, the fourth of July was wild.
You know. I think we everyone went into that night knowing, like,
you know, this is the fourth of July. It's going
to be a fairly big night. The protests for really,
they were going strong. And I showed up before the
sun went down and was just kind of doing the
(41:27):
thing that I had been doing the entire time leading
up to that point, which is, you know, I was
far enough away from the police that I could be
there if anyone got tear gas to help them with
sailing or something like that. Um and I had been
coming out each night with like extra gear to hand
out to people that didn't have anything. So I was
with one of my friends who ended up getting arrested
(41:51):
right next to me, UM and I was giving someone
sailing and he said, Emily, get up there about to
rush us. And and I had been given a shield
that night because the night before there was a woman
who was who had been tear gased really really badly,
and I gave her like my personal gear. I had
(42:12):
given away all of my extra stuff, so I gave
her my my stuff and someone came up to me
earlier in the evening and was like are you Emily
and as Ya, They're like, we made this for you,
like you helped my friend last night, um, and so
this is for you. And so I had a shield
with me. I used my shield to get up off
of the ground and I started to run and that's
(42:35):
when I got tackled and arrested. I had, you know,
after looking at the video, I remember feeling, um, at
least two knees on top of me and um, you know,
going back and thinking about it, like I had a
palm on top of my head. I ended up with
a black eye that had for like three weeks. Um.
(42:56):
But someone was palming my face into the pavement. Uh.
And so you know, I get up. I had a
backpack on. They cut my backpack off of me. The person,
the officer that arrested me, told me that I had
tried to hit a police officer with my shield. And
I just like very calmly and and politely said, you know,
(43:19):
like you know, look proving that because I would never
do anything like that. Because I wouldn't. I was down
there to help the people that needed to be helped.
I'm not a medic. I never wore met a gear.
I never claimed to be a medic. You know. I
was just there to to assist in any way that
I could. Both crowds engaged in something of a fighting
retreat for the better part of two hours. When police
(43:40):
would mass up for a bulrush, protesters would launch fireworks
into their riot line. This disrupted them every time and
seemed to even panic some. Eventually, the police grew so
weary of being blasted that they pulled back and both
crowds were able to escape pursuit. At around forty am,
both crowds met up again, just a couple of blocks
away from the courthouse and Justice Center. After two hours
(44:00):
of constant fighting, hundreds and hundreds of people were still together,
organized and dangerous. Despite everyone's weariness, there was tremendous excitement
in the air as the crowd of Portlanders reoccupied the
parks and set off celebratory fireworks in the center of
the Elk statue. He sutting off fireworks again celebart for
(44:20):
the first time since the demonstrations had begun on May
twenty nine, Portland protesters had what felt like a real
victory the police and the federal agents had thrown everything
in their arsenal at a crowd that refused to disperse.
People had held their own against multiple riot lines and
forced them to back away. For the first time ever,
a crowd kicked out of the parks in front of
(44:40):
the Justice Center had succeeded in reoccupying those parks. For
a long time, people just celebrated whoa boy. In my
own experience, July four was the first night that did
feel a little like a revolution, And of course, the
coming days weeks would make it very clear that the
(45:01):
fight was far from over and that July four had
been at best a very temporary victory. But in the
early hours of July five, it still felt like one
uh where the grandpops who couldn't fathom the obamasist and
(45:22):
I don't hate America just to me, and she keeps
the promises twenty teens looking like the sixties. It's crazy,
a nationwide deja wo? What my people post to do?
Go to schools named after the clan founder we're around
town is I don't see why we're frowning Native American
students forced to learn about when o'pellah Sarah. How is
that fair? Bro? Some euros unsung in some months. That's
(45:44):
get monuments built for them. But it ain't be all
a little bit of monster. We crook it. Give us
ever attention. We need everything you've got Fast Waiting on
Reparations we be the podcast tune in every Thursday politics
(46:06):
and wordplay. We fight for the people because they got
us in the worst way, from the Hill Cooper, the
Bombay to Kanya, from the left enclave to what the
neo kanse every Thursday, the heavy conversation and to break
us off with some break because we're waiting. Listen to
Waiting on Reparations on the I Heart Radio app, Apple
podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Robert
(46:30):
sex Reese, host of The Doctor sex Rees Show, and
every episode I listened to people talk about their sex
and intimacy issues, and yes, I despise every minute of it.
And she she made mistakes too? Did she kill everyone
at her wedding? But hell is real. We're all trapped
here and there's nothing any of us can do about it.
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So join me, won't you? Listen to The Doctor sex
re Show every Tuesday on the I Heart Radio app,
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have a Shop Aloud and I am Troy Millions and
we are the host of the Earnier Leisure podcast, where
we break down business models and examine the latest trends
and finance. We hold court and have exclusive interviews with
some of the biggest names of business, sport, and entertainment,
(47:12):
from DJ Khaled to Mark Cuban, Rick Ross and Shaquille O'Neil.
I mean our alumnilist's expansive Listen to as our guests
reveal their business models, hardships and triumphs and their respective fields.
The knowledge is in death and the questions are always
delivered from your standpoint. We want to know what you
want to know. We talked to the legends of business,
sports and entertainment about how they got their start and
most importantly, how they make their money. Earn your Leisia
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to Earnier Leisure on the Black Effect podcast Network, I
Heart Radio, app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hi, I'm Robert sex Reese, host of The Doctor sex
Rees Show, and every episode I listened to people talk
about their sex and intimacy issues, and yes, I despise
every minute of it. And she she made mistakes too?
Did she kill everyone at her wedding? But hell is real.
We're all trapped here and there's nothing any of us
(00:20):
can do about it. So join me, won't you? Listen
to The Doctor sex re Show every Tuesday on the
I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast or wherever you get
your podcast. Mama, what does the chicken say? Uh? Draft diraffe? Really? Giraffe? Giraffe?
(00:44):
You're not gonna get it all right. Just make sure
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We cover all facets of the game. Gainst The Chronicles
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Chronicles podcast and my Heart Radio app or wherever you
get your podcasting fires stores that justice are in. Violence
(01:55):
has a curious way of rendering you both more resilient
to unless talk Laurant of more violence. By the start
of July, every regular protester and press member in the
city of Portland had seen dozens of flash bang grenades
detonate within feet of their heads. In June a lone
I was tear gas at least sixty times, and there
are literally thousands of other Portlanders who endured similar barrages.
(02:17):
We'd all run like hell from charging riot lines, which
isn't experience in and of itself. I've been to war
zones on two continents, have been shot at, and I've
been shelled once, and I can honestly say that being
bulrushed by dozens of armored policemen ranks as among the
most frightening things I've ever experienced. It's certainly less lethal
than coming under sniper fire, but there's something uncontrollably panic
(02:38):
inducing about being chased by a wall of angry men
who want to harm you. The lizard part of your
brain starts firing, panic rises up and the primal hinterlands
of your brain. If you aren't careful, it takes over completely.
And even if you do stay in control, the adrenaline
coursing through your system, it'll make your handshake, it'll blur
the parts of your mind to make coherent thought. Paul Possible.
(03:00):
Portland protesters learned a lot through the month of June,
but one thing they didn't quite figure out was how
to stand up against a charging riot line. They did
learn a lot of other valuable things, though. Tear gas
(03:22):
went from something that instantly dispersed crowds to more of
a moderate annoyance. Some of this was a product of
people acquiring gas masks and respirators, but more of it
had to do with people learning how to treat gas injuries,
how to put out or throw back smoking canisters, and
most importantly, how not to panic while choking on poison.
One major way this information spread in the early days
(03:42):
where live streams conundrum. A blind journalist who recorded soundscapes
for the Portland Riots recalls how she used live stream
audio to train herself up before going out. And I
had been, you know, since like the first week, helping
out in ways I can sort of from behind the
scenes constantly. It took until middle you know, because initially,
(04:04):
when all this started going down, you know here in Portland,
I was like, how can I be involved? You know,
logic brain is going, okay, Katie, you're blind. Not safe
for you to go out there. You know, all of
all of these reasons why blind person probably running through
clouds of tear gas not not the greatest idea you've
ever had. Um. And so it was like, okay, well,
(04:26):
what are the other ways I can I can support
the community at large and specific people who I know
that are out there. Well, for one, I got that
stimulus check and I didn't need it, so I'm like,
who needs gear? Um? So donating into different organizations that
was one way that I could help very easily. In
my position. I live by myself. I live like a
(04:47):
student because I am a student and I yeah, um.
Also supporting friends that I had who were out on
the ground, like sitting there watching all of the live
streams and like following you guys that were out there
on the ground since day one, Like I'm sitting there
up all night every night, eight nights a week, because
(05:07):
some number of my friends are out every night, right,
And so as stuff gets started, I start pulling up
every stream that I could find. So yeah, that was
a lot of what I would be doing, is having
multiple live streams playing at the same time, like listening
to the audio's. Obviously, I can't see what's happening in
the videos, So I mean I was not as effective
(05:28):
as somebody who could actually see the pictures, obviously, and
that tiny regard. I can't see the pictures people are
tweeting out or what's in them. But you know, me
and some of my friends had some groups set up
where I wasn't the only one doing this and we
would sort of share the information with each other first
before passing it on to the people who were, you know,
out and about, like, hey, guys, maybe stay away from
third and Mandason. There's reports of fascists in a truck
(05:50):
with U S flags, like don't go around. There's a
guy with a gun, you know, stuff like that. Once
people were actually out on the ground getting tear gas
and grenated and charged on a regular basis, they started
coalescing into groups based on what they were particularly interested
in doing to help out. For Chris and a number
of his colleagues, that meant learning to work as a
team of medics. It's this kid out of broken shoulder. Um,
(06:12):
and there's a bunch of people crowding around being like
I'm medic, but I've only got water and band aids
and stuff. Um. And I wandered up and I said, Hi,
my name's Chris. UM, I have triangle bandages? Would you
like one? And so I met a medic friend that way,
and then I met all of their medic friends and
it's like, well, we should keep in contact. You guys
have signaling and made like a small signal group. Um.
(06:34):
And then I started to meet other medics and like
get their signal information and met other medics that we're
doing the same thing. And so we all kind of
like everybody kind of met like five medics and all
five medics new another five medics and so it all
kind of um coalesced like that. UM. So there's a
lot of independent medics. But really there are these medic groups,
(06:56):
and within the internal communications that we have, we usually
like a few people, like one or two people from
each group. Like I'm with PAM, I know other medics
that are with PAM that are in like uh, you know,
in communication UM. And then you know there's the e
walks and we'll know some e walks and well, if
(07:17):
I can't get ahold of the walks, I know somebody
you can. If I can't get ahold of rose hips,
I know somebody you can. UM. And so we do
all try and talk to each other. UM. We try
and talk to each other on the day of to
make sure that you know, like we're all on the
same page, because different medics have different styles UM. And
then another reason that's so important is because especially in
(07:40):
emergency medicine UM, you're taught how to deal with like
bio hazards, situations, you know, things we need to triage
things where there's a lot of patients at once and
there's a lot of people coming from different places to
be medics, and you have to learn you know who's
above you, who's below you, so that you're not stepping
at each other's does and getting each other's way, and
so learning what everyone's scope of practices was very important.
(08:03):
And that's just kind of a standard question that we asked. Now,
if you meet somebody that you haven't met, they're like, oh,
medic would be like, oh hey, cool, my names Chris Um.
I was trained as an emt uh. If you don't
mind me asking what's your scope of practice? Because sometimes
there are people would be like, oh, yeah, I've been
taking care of my mom for like five years, but
I have no formal training and be like all right, cool.
I'm gonna keep that in mind. So when something happens,
you know, I don't ask someone like, hey, grab my
(08:25):
sand's plant and mold it for me. I can be like,
hey hold my flashlight, guy, um. Or sometimes you know,
we know a lot of people get tear gas. Those
people are really good because flushing eyes isn't hard, and
I can teach somebody how to flush eyes um. And
that way, if we've got those people flushing eyes and
then someone else has like a broken bone, I can
deal with that. There were small emergent groups who brought shields,
(08:51):
others who brought traffic cones and water jugs to douse
tear gas, and others who showed up with food and
protective gear to hand out to protesters. A number of
disabled activists who didn't field they could safely participate in
toe to toe confrontations with riot lines filled valuable logistic
roles making sure that front liners had ample water, respirator filters,
and food. Juniper was one of hundreds of people who
(09:12):
took it upon themselves to see that the Portland protests
were supplied with what they needed. I was able to
UM feel like I could go and drop off supplies
like I have. You know, I am a middle class,
upwardly mobile white person, UM, and I have some money,
and there are people out on the front lines putting
(09:34):
their bodies and lives on the line. And so I
was like, I'm gonna go give some snacks to people
and get some water and just some other other protective
equipment and things that I had that I knew could
be useful. Other small groups helped coordinate aid and raise
attention for actions online. One of these organizations was pop
mob or Popular Mobilization, who formed early on in the
(09:55):
Trump administration after a series of disastrous and bloody dueling
rallies between fascis. An anti fascist protesters in Portland's bob
Mob act as a sort of unifying bridge for different
local anti fascist groups, with a focus on getting the
word out to large groups of what they called everyday
anti fascists. These were people who weren't hardcore activists but
(10:15):
didn't want Nazis marching around their city. When Portland's BLM
movement took off, though, Effie Baum and their colleagues at
pop Mob decided they should take a less visible support role,
so mostly just retweeting things and then UM when people
would share events with us, boosting those events or boosting
UM different affinity groups that were involved in the nightly
protests and UM really just kind of providing a UM
(10:39):
uh basically a signal boost to the people that we're
doing organizing UM and specifically like focusing only on trying
to boost UM bipoc led efforts, especially given all of
the conversation around UM white anarchists and UM you know
co opting the movement or the you know media like
(11:02):
to blame everything on white anarchists, which then takes away
the autonomy and disempowers the people that were in fact
organizing those events and the very real anger, UM and
justified anger behind those events, and so we also did
not want to UM contribute to that narrative in any way,
shape or form. So we really made a very intest
(11:26):
intentional efforts to UM operate exclusively in a supportive role.
A lot of us were there UM many nights, and
UM continue to go out many nights, but UM the
organization as a whole did not have an organizational presence
as organizers. One of the you know, goals that we
(11:50):
would you know, have is pushing back against kind of
this like white supremacist culture that we have all that
we all participate in every day. And so that was
one of the main reasons we did not want to
take any kind of lead in the organizing is because
it's one thing when we are coming out and organizing
(12:15):
against je like Joey Gibson and Patriot Prayer, UM who
you know, the Proud Boys and those groups target a
lot of different marginalized and vulnerable populations from you know,
many different UM groups and so in a sense you
could look at it and say that that the work
(12:36):
is similar UM. But at the same time I think
that it's important for the people who are most affected
to be the voices that people are hearing, and especially
because we've seen how much that the media has latched
onto trying to discredit those voices by painting it as
(12:58):
angry white anarchists. Days and weeks war on Portland, protesters
grew hardened and increasingly effective at standing up to police violence.
Tear gas and grenades stopped working to disperse crowds. Pepper balls,
little paintball style projectiles filled with mace and fired from
a paintball gun, likewise lost their effectiveness. As shields became
more common, police bul rushes remained the most effective tactic
(13:20):
for dispersing crowds, especially since by late June most of
those crowds were quite small. Portland protesters started gathering on Telegram,
an anonymous messaging app, in order to coordinate and pass
on intelligence. During events, people would warn each other of
police charges in the presence of riot trucks. Before and
after events, they would dissect their performance and discuss ways
(13:41):
to improve. Near the end of June, they started talking
about how protesters might form their own shield wall, something
that could stand up against police charges. Now, in between
numerous nights of reporting on riots, my partner Elaine Kinchen
spent hours browsing through those conversations and watching as people
worked out how to defend themse elves from charging officers.
(14:01):
I'm gonna throw you over to a lane now, explaining
how that process came together. Well. Since the very beginning
of the protests, there had been various diagrams that were
circulating on the Internet. A lot of them came from
things that had been done in Hong Kong, so different
diagrams of roles that protesters could take two more effectively
(14:23):
protect each other. Some of those involved laser pointers and
some of them involved shields or helmets or supply line stuff.
And so those have been being circulated throughout all of June,
both on protester telegram channels and also on Twitter and
other communication channels. And as the charges than bullrushes and
(14:46):
stuff really heated up and more people were being injured
and the police brutality was becoming more intense, a lot
of those discussions and how to effectively implement them would
be happen they after protests had wound down or during
the day, and so I would follow and read through
(15:06):
all sorts of different threads where people were posting images
of how to do Roman style turtleshelf formations with overlapping shields,
or could make an effective vault to block the people
behind them from police munitions to more effectively protect all
the peaceful protesters who are in the back. All these
different emergent groups that form to handle different tasks within
(15:28):
the movement are what is called affinity groups. This is
a fairly old concept within anarchist organizing. Here are friends
at the Youth Liberation Front or why I left? Explain
the context again. Because President Trump and numerous right wing
media figures have repeatedly called for their imprisonment or execution,
we've hired voice actors to reread the things they said
to us rather than risk exposing their identities. So an
(15:51):
affinity group is usually like five to tend people who
share some affinity. And it's the preferred method for anarchist
organizing because it's small, it's informal, and usually non hierarchical,
and usually horizontally organized. Yeah, and um it's uh. I
think it's been preferable to like the large organization model
that we attempted and just failed because there was no
(16:12):
accountability and there's no way to ensure that like everyone
was cool with each other and when problems came up,
they just sucked us over. We spoke to one anonymous
activist who had no experience with anarchist organizing prior to
the summer of She started coming out to Portland protests
earlier in the summer with her friends. So the first
time I went out to one of the nightly protests,
I went with a couple of friends that I've known
(16:34):
since I was like eighteen or nineteen, because they had
been going out and I felt comfortable being with them. Um,
they don't come out anymore. Once her friends stopped going,
she floated around different crews of activists, experimenting with different
affinity groups, but eventually deciding that she preferred an even
more decentralized approach to protesting. As far as you know,
(16:55):
like my length of knowledge, an affinity group is just
you know, a decentralized group of people that you can
uh form ideas with and kind of go over maybe
like safety tactics and different things like that. UM. But
I kind of quickly realized that affinity groups weren't necessarily
for me. UM. I think that sometimes it can get
(17:19):
complicated fairly quickly, and so I still go down to
the protests by myself. Since I've been doing this for
as long as I have, it doesn't take me very
long to run into somebody that I know, And sometimes
I feel like having someone that's worried about my safety
can be a bit of a hindrance sometimes, I you know,
(17:41):
having to like be on a radio consistently and and
always be on my phone to make sure that I'm
you know, in communication with different people. I don't want
anybody to have to worry about if I'm going to
be fine, because I'm going to be fine. So yeah,
I mean, I just I usually go down by myself.
I think that the network of affinity groups has been
(18:04):
a positive thing. You know, the people that have been
around and experienced the most have that information that they
can share with one another. One major advantage of anarchist
organizing tactics is that it makes anarchist groups harder to
infiltrate and disrupt. Between nineteen fifty six and nineteen seventy one,
the FBI instituted a counter intelligence program nicknamed co Intel
(18:28):
Pro at the orders of Director J. Edgar Hoover. The
program was initially targeted at the US Communist Party, but
was quickly extended to all kinds of left wing activist organizations,
particularly the Black Panthers. Hoover's goal with co intel Pro
was to increase factionalism caused disruption and wind defections. He
wanted to spread such terror among left wing activists that
(18:49):
none of them would again walk into a meeting without
feeling like there must be FBI agents in the room.
Co intel Pro was incredibly successful, and while the program
officially ended in nineteen seventy one, the tactics the FBI
pioneered in this period have been used by a variety
of law enforcement agencies ever since. Even organizations like the
Portland Chapter of the Black Panthers, whose more radical programs
(19:10):
included free breakfast for neighborhood kids and dental care for all,
earned the ire of co intel Pro. In an interview
last year, chapter co founder Kent Ford recalled a journalist
sharing with him plots from the FBI to poison the
produce the Panthers would use to feed hundreds of kids
every morning. As a result, it is impossible to take
part in any kind of mass anti government action and
not feel like there are probably federal agents in your
(19:33):
missed when p t Barnum's Great American Museum burned to
the ground in eighteen sixty five. What rose from its
ashes would change the world? Welcome to Grim and Mild Presents,
an ongoing journey into the strange, the unusual, and the fascinating,
(19:56):
where our inaugural season will be giving you a backstage
tour of always complex and often misunderstood cultural artifact that
is the American Side Show. So come along as we
visit the shadowy corners of the stage and learn about
the people who are at the center of it all
in a place where spectacle was king, We will soon
discover there's always more to the story than meets the eye.
(20:19):
So step right up and get in line. Listen to
Grim and Mild Presents now on the I Heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Learn more
over at Grim and Mild dot com. Slash Presents. The
Gangster Chronicles podcast is a weekly conversation that revolves around
(20:40):
underworld the criminals and entertainers into victims, crime and law enforcement.
We cover all facets of the game. Gangster Chronicles podcast
doesn't glorify promotive list of activities. We just discussed the
ramifications and repercussions of these activities. Because at the Wall
you played gamester games, you are ultimately rewarded with gangster prizes.
All radios number one for podcasts, but don't take our
(21:02):
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Radio app, wherever you get your podcast I'm Ev Rodsky,
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Find your Unicorn Space, activists on the gender division of labor,
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a Harvard physician and medical correspondent with an expertise and
(21:25):
the science of stress, resilience, mental health, and burnout. We're
so excited to share our podcast, Time Out, a production
of I Heart Podcasts and Hello Sunshine. We're uncovering why
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time with the value it deserves. So take this time
out with us. Listen to Time Out, a fair Play
podcast on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or
(21:49):
wherever you get your podcasts. Organizing by affinity groups helps
to negate some of the advantages the state has. It's
impossible to know that any mass group of hundreds of
people doesn't include undercover cops, but it is very possible
to know that you and your four or five close
buddies aren't cops. The only organizing that occurs in the
(22:11):
open at a large scale event is very basic and
not legally incriminating, i e. We're gathering at this park
at eight PM, hearing speeches, and then marching at nine.
On most occasions, either a specific organizer will pick the
direction for that week's march, or a vote will be
taken as to the destination. The decision to take part
in any illegal activity, acts of property destruction, in the
like is made by these small, independent affinity groups and
(22:34):
sometimes just individuals on their own. Often only two or
three groups out of a three person march will actually
engage in serious law breaking. The others are there to shout,
wave signs and stand up to confront the police when
they inevitably arrive. This method of organization does have a
number of weaknesses, which we will discuss in subsequent episodes,
but it has proven more resilient to state surveillance than
(22:55):
being part of an organization with a strict hierarchy. One
major aspect of this is that many more dedicated Portland
protesters take something called security culture. Very seriously, here's the
y I left again. Security culture? Uh, security culture, I
think is it's interesting the risks you're taking and what
precautions you need to take to be safe. Were like
(23:16):
because like not every risk is going to have the
same consequences, and so it's being able to judge those,
um and like if you do something that's questionable, possibly illegal,
don't talk about it, don't don't incriminate yourself, keep your
mouth shut, don't incriminate others. I mean, um, this is
a crime. Think article called what is security culture? I
believe and that's like a great introduction for people who
(23:38):
don't know. It's a very important part of like really
any movement because if you have bad security culture and
you're putting yourself at risk or or the organizers at risks,
you're going to disrupt a movement because you're going to
get people in trouble. So like that definitely plays like
don't let you know, don't talk about things you did,
don't photograph things you did. You can like you know,
(23:58):
don't don't bring your phone if that's the thing you're
able to do, because like they could track you, and
Feds in Portland literally clone phones and have like you know,
they can just pinpoint you. So that's another thing where
it's like, yeah, basically it's knowing the risk and knowing
how to safely protect yourself from those risks. That Zene.
What is security culture? We like to make sure to
send it to all everyone who wants to get involved
(24:20):
with us. That's like the first thing. Yeah, it's the
most basic thing that we send. None of these security
measures were enough to protect people from being arrested by
cops during actions. It doesn't matter how solid your digital
security is or how trustworthy your friends are if a
cop charges that you faster than you can run away.
But good security culture can prevent activists from being arrested
(24:40):
after actions. See the United States has filled to hell
and back with cameras when protesters damage your destroyed property.
While protesting, police will spend weeks trying to identify the
individuals responsible. This is a big part of why black
block has evolved as a tactic. If everyone is dressed
basically identically with their features covered and no logos or
hatto showing, it's much more difficult for police to identify
(25:03):
people after an action. Going in block has disadvantages too, though,
largely when it comes to optics. When you're properly blocked up,
it will be difficult or impossible to determine your race.
As a result, police and local politicians important tended to
blame the activities have blocked up crowds on white anarchists
allegend that the city's Black Lives Matter movement had been
(25:23):
hijacked by white kids who just wanted to break things. Cosca,
an Indigenous Portlander who has been arrested by this point
at least ten times, pushed back against that characterization. Definitely
a narrative that works because people believe it, and people
keep repeating it, even some people of color. I hear
repeating it. But I know for a fact it's not true,
because because I've been doing this with you know, people
(25:47):
in Black Block for several years and have gotten to
know lots of people, and I have never ever seen
so many people of color in block before, and particularly
Native people, you know, like the just the Native people
in block is a huge amount compared you know, compared
to the population the general population of the area. So yeah,
(26:12):
I think it's I think you could even say it's
race that everyone in Black Block is white. In September,
after more than four months of nightly protests, the Justice
Department launched a criminal inquiry targeting the leaders of organizations
responsible for anti police brutality protests across the nation. Homeland
Security Secretary Chad Wolf told Fox News what we know
(26:33):
is that we have seen groups and individuals moved from
Portland to other parts of the country. I also found
a very poorly written USA Today article on the subject
and includes this paragraph asked why leaders of Antifa, a
loosely organized extreme far left ideology, and Black Lives Matter
formed in part to call attention to violence against black
communities had not been arrested. Wolf said, this is something
I talked to the a G personally about and I
(26:56):
know that they are working on it. So far, these
investigations had been markedly unsuccessful. Leaked reports later in the
year revealed that the Department of Homeland Security thought that
Antifa was an organized group with a structured leadership cast
that could be identified and arrested. No evidence of this
was ever turned up. Would suggest that this sort of
decentralized organizational tactic is at least harder for law enforcement
(27:17):
to penetrate. The vast majority of affinity groups don't exist
to organized window breaking, fire starting, or any of the
other things the media love to focus on in their
coverage of Portland protests. At their most basic level, affinity
groups are a safety tool. Cop rights can be incredibly dangerous,
and everyone considering going into such a situation should have
buddies who are there to watch your back and render
(27:38):
aid if you get hurt. Obviously, not everyone interested in
participating in protests had friends who are willing to go
out with them. Inter Comrade Collective an organization that formed
in the middle of the protests to help match loan
activists with buddies they could protest with for the night,
and so. UM the first time I had met up
with Commrad Collective, it was funny because, like, you know,
(28:00):
I had all this like anxiety and stuff, and uh.
I remember thinking like, oh my god, I'm so uncomfortable,
like I don't know these people. And then I was like,
I'm totally not going to meet up with them again
because I was like, I'll just stay by myself. Um,
here we are. But but it was like it was
when I when I left, and um, one of our
(28:23):
other comrades, uh like messaged me and was like are
you home? And like I wasn't expecting that, and I
was like what, And I was like, oh my god,
that's awesome. And then just like getting used to like
the checking in, you know, to make sure like they're
not arrested or didn't get attacked by you know, fascists
or whatever, and so just kind of like, um, I
(28:46):
think just getting exposed to like people, I'm like, oh
my god, these are like strangers that I don't know
that like give a ship about my well being and
so that kind of in turn makes you care more
about yourself, like and then also want to do the
same for others. And I also I'm one that likes
(29:06):
that tends to stray from the group. So like I'm
definitely like comfortable by myself in certain situations, but I
still I even if I'm separated, I just I like
to know that there is someone out there that like
I can hit up or whatever or check in with,
even if we're not like together at that moment. By
(29:28):
the start of July, all the ingredients were in place
for Portland's protest movement to display its first real meaningful
resistance to the violent might of a police riot line.
Protests had seriously waned in the days prior to the fourth,
with just a few dozen people showing up most nights,
but the holiday, and more to the point, the fact
that shiploads of fireworks were on sale for the holiday
brought a massive crowd of more than a thousand Portlander's
(29:51):
out to the city parks in front of the Justice
Center and the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse. In the
days that followed DHS Director Chad Wolf's announcement that rapid
deployment team were being sent to Portland's activists had been
on the lookout for Feds. They'd been visible inside the I. R.
S Building across the street from the Justice Center. Reporters
had taken several photographs of men in heavy military body
(30:11):
armor carrying rifles, but until the fourth none of those
men had actively engaged with a protest. My team, Beatrix, Selaine,
and Garrison and I all arrived in front of the
Justice Center at around nine pm. The energy in the
air was as apparent as the smell of gunpowder. People
were setting off fireworks, mostly mortars, at random in and
around the crowd. We hated it at first, after weeks
(30:40):
of being repeatedly flashbanged by cops. We were all just
ridiculously on edge. The first thing I saw upon a
rifle was a pile of American flags burning in a
concrete pit that had once held a massive Elk statue.
For several nights in a row, protesters had set fires
in and around the Elk statue, not out of anger,
but out of a desire to stay warm, and one
assumes for the joy of setting fires. Eventually, the city
(31:02):
removed the elk out of fears that it might collapse
and injure somebody. Protesters loved the Elk statue, though, and
began constructing a series of fasimilar Elk statues. On the
fourth it was a tiny model of a baby Elk
sandwiched in between billowing flames. While the flags burned, protesters
chanted Black Lives Matter. As more folks arrived, more fireworks
(31:26):
were set off. At first, people simply stood in the
street in front of the Justice Center, aiming fireworks straight
into the air to provide their incarcerated friends with the show.
This was not universally popular behavior, because again, at least
half the crowd was dealing with the opening salvos of
pretty serious PTSD. At this point, of course, The fireworks continued,
(31:57):
and once they hit a certain frequency, everyone's brains kind
of gotten numb to the effect. If I can be honest,
it started to be fun. Some individuals and affinity groups
within the crowd had brought lasers to shine into the
giant camera that had been installed out in front of
the Justice Center. By ten PM, the fireworks usage had
(32:18):
grown more militant and people were shooting dozens of commercial
grade fireworks straight into the Justice Center, breaking several windows.
At least one prisoner inside was seen waving excitedly out
to the crowd, which provoked rejoicing outside the fire where
sparrage continued, with protesters aiming occasional salvos at the Federal
(32:39):
courthouse too. At around ten PM, the police finally showed
up Judge or fireworks stores the Justice Center. These fireworks
are in the Academian Dolts in the building. Activities We
crooket conquer your New Year's resolution to be more productive
(33:07):
with the Before Breakfast podcast. In each bite sized daily episode,
time management and productivity expert Laura Vanderkam teaches you how
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(33:30):
before Breakfast, wherever you get your podcasts, give us the attention.
We need everything you've got fast Waiting on Reparations. We'd
be the podcast two in every Thursday politics and wordplay.
We fight for the people because they got us in
the worst way, from the Hill Cooper, the Bomb Bay,
from the left Enclave to what the neo kansee every
(33:51):
Thursday conversation and to break us off with some break
because we wait in the Listen to Waiting on Reparations
and I heart Radio, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get
your podcasts. After thirty years, it's time to return to
the halls of West Beverly High and hang out at
the peach pit. On the podcast nine O two one,
(34:12):
OMG joined Jenny Garth and Tori Spelling for a rewatch
of the hit series Beverly Hills nine O two one oh.
From the very beginning, we get to tell the fans
all of the behind the scenes stories to actually happen,
so they know what happened on camera. Obviously, but we
can tell them all the good stuff that happened off camera,
get all the juicy details of every episode that you've
(34:33):
been wondering about for decades. As nine O two one
oh super fan and radio host Sissany sits in with
Jenny and Tory, two reminisce, reflect and relive each moment,
from Brandon and Kelly's first kiss to shouting, Donna Martin graduates,
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(34:53):
remember absolutely nothing of the ten years that we filmed
that show. Listen to nine O two one oh G
on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts. Virtually all the people out on
the fourth work by this point hardened the police violence.
(35:15):
They've been trained by weeks in the streets to do
exactly the opposite of whatever the police l Red told
them to do, true to form. They surged forward at this,
moving in force into the intersection between the courthouse and
Justice Center. More and more fireworks were launched at both buildings.
As I moved forward, sensing imminent tear gas, I heard
one person behind me say they shouldn't have said anything.
Look what happens when they talk. At ten forty one
(35:38):
pm I started live streaming. Almost immediately after that, federal
agents inside the courthouse started dumping tear gas out of
holes in the walls of the courthouse. Yeah. Yeah, so
basically so far people were shooting it. Ship of fireworks off, uh,
(36:01):
and they gave a warning, and people kept firing fireworks
And now it looks like PUDs are out and shooting
tear gas there. The crowd backed up, but did not disperse. Instead,
they retreated to the parks, washed each other's eyes out,
and continued to shoot fireworks at both buildings. After a
(36:21):
few minutes, they marched forward again into the intersection. No
one knew it at the time, but with the first
federal tear gaest deployment and the decision of protesters to
continue advancing on the courthouse, a series of events had
been set into motion that would turn Portlands into one
of the biggest stories in the country, lead to hundreds
(36:42):
of arrests and several near fatal injuries. I don't believe
any of the people in the crowd that night particularly
wanted that to happen. I certainly saw no evidence of
a concerted plan. Instead, what I saw was a community
of battered people who had just spent weeks being gassed
and grenaded and beaten with truncheons and arrested for crymes.
A miner is standing in an intersection with a sign.
(37:03):
They had started coming out to protest police brutality and
wound up repeated victims of it, and now over the
course of June they'd gotten good at resisting it. Each
person there had learned tactics to mitigate police riot control agents.
They'd come to trust their fellow Portlanders, and now finally
there were enough of them out again to put up
serious resistance to the cops. And they had sacks full
(37:23):
of commercial grade fireworks to throw back at the thin
blue line shooting grenades at them. With all that psychic
weight behind them, there was simply no way this crowd
was going to back down to the demands of police
or federal agents. Instead, the massive Portlanders swarmed the front
steps of the federal courthouse that had just gassed them.
They began launching fireworks directly into its facade, shattering some
(37:44):
of the windows higher up. The street level windows were
all covered in plywood and those plywood walls had several
hinged slits on them that federal agents inside could flip
open to shoot from. I started calling them murder holes
after similar features built into medieval castles. The term stuck
minutes went by. Federal agents would occasionally fire pepper balls
into the crowd, but eleven PM came and went without
(38:05):
another major show of force. At around eleven o five,
the police started dumping gas or smoke out of the
side door of the Justice Center. The Feds dropped more
gas out too, but instead of dispersing, the crowd moved
back in an orderly fashion. Front liners with umbrellas and
shields moved to the front and deflected pepper balls, while
medics washed out eyes and people with gas masks and
respirators ran into the cloud to throw more fireworks at
(38:27):
the courthouse. Gas. Yeah, they're dropped the ropping it out
of the window. HOPEOU see how the fire we're going
off there. The whole situation evolved into something very much
like a siege. You can see here one of the
murders works a medieval time I think, so that's here
(38:50):
they're scooting, So we definitely have like an old fashioned
medieval seeds to sort of crowd getting their fears. Uh.
You see a crowd get into shields to the front.
You see the defenders firing had a murder hole. You
see fire. You know pilots big shot into the thing
(39:15):
is Jesus Christ. Yeah, Friday night, everybody, Friday night. I
hope can't tell what's smoked from fireworks and what's tear gas.
I think the FEDS and the police had expected the
gas and pepper balls would suffice to force the crowd away,
but the crowd kept advancing. Dedicated teams would run up
(39:35):
with traffic cones and put out gas grenades. Eventually, the
FEDS and the Portland Police were forced to bombard both
parks just to push the crowd away. Yeah wow, okay,
it's going wild. Somebody's riding a bicycle with a shield
to the crowd. Words are fire and death till there's
all behind us. Let's go through here, go through here. Eventually,
(39:59):
the FEDS and the police made a decision more gas.
It was the most gas deployed in Portland since tear
gas Tuesday. Despite being doused with gas, the crowd did
not scatter. When I washed my eyes out and was
able to look around, I saw hundreds of people still
arrayed for battle and ready to go. The police and
federal agents both came out and forced that night. They
marched forward, pumping out gas and pepper balls and smoke grenades.
(40:21):
The crowd was forced back foot by foot, but they
held together. I think DHS had expected that the presence
of federal agents and military gear would have rattled protesters more,
but activists just treated them like more cops. The sight
of fully armored soldiers in military gear was unsettling, especially
since no one at the time had any idea what
agency they were with. Look at these guys, we got
(40:41):
army guys. Look at guys here. The combined Feds and
police succeeded in splitting the crowd in two through a
combination of walls of gas and bulrushes, but both groups
held together and proceeded to lead law enforcement on a
two hour chase through the streets of Portland. There were
moments of shocking brutality where police would tackle protesters and
dragged them on their back across asphalt into clouds of
gas to arrest them. One protester we interviewed was arrested
(41:05):
that night. She'd shown up as a shield bearer and
had been one of the people protecting the crowd from
incoming fire. Yeah. Yeah, the fourth of July was wild.
You know. I think we everyone went into that night knowing, like,
you know, this is the fourth of July. It's going
to be a fairly big night. The protests for really,
they were going strong. And I showed up before the
sun went down and was just kind of doing the
(41:27):
thing that I had been doing the entire time leading
up to that point, which is, you know, I was
far enough away from the police that I could be
there if anyone got tear gas to help them with
sailing or something like that. Um and I had been
coming out each night with like extra gear to hand
out to people that didn't have anything. So I was
with one of my friends who ended up getting arrested
(41:51):
right next to me, UM and I was giving someone
sailing and he said, Emily, get up there about to
rush us. And and I had been given a shield
that night because the night before there was a woman
who was who had been tear gased really really badly,
and I gave her like my personal gear. I had
(42:12):
given away all of my extra stuff, so I gave
her my my stuff and someone came up to me
earlier in the evening and was like are you Emily
and as Ya, They're like, we made this for you,
like you helped my friend last night, um, and so
this is for you. And so I had a shield
with me. I used my shield to get up off
of the ground and I started to run and that's
(42:35):
when I got tackled and arrested. I had, you know,
after looking at the video, I remember feeling, um, at
least two knees on top of me and um, you know,
going back and thinking about it, like I had a
palm on top of my head. I ended up with
a black eye that had for like three weeks. Um.
(42:56):
But someone was palming my face into the pavement. Uh.
And so you know, I get up. I had a
backpack on. They cut my backpack off of me. The person,
the officer that arrested me, told me that I had
tried to hit a police officer with my shield. And
I just like very calmly and and politely said, you know,
(43:19):
like you know, look proving that because I would never
do anything like that. Because I wouldn't. I was down
there to help the people that needed to be helped.
I'm not a medic. I never wore met a gear.
I never claimed to be a medic. You know. I
was just there to to assist in any way that
I could. Both crowds engaged in something of a fighting
retreat for the better part of two hours. When police
(43:40):
would mass up for a bulrush, protesters would launch fireworks
into their riot line. This disrupted them every time and
seemed to even panic some. Eventually, the police grew so
weary of being blasted that they pulled back and both
crowds were able to escape pursuit. At around forty am,
both crowds met up again, just a couple of blocks
away from the courthouse and Justice Center. After two hours
(44:00):
of constant fighting, hundreds and hundreds of people were still together,
organized and dangerous. Despite everyone's weariness, there was tremendous excitement
in the air as the crowd of Portlanders reoccupied the
parks and set off celebratory fireworks in the center of
the Elk statue. He sutting off fireworks again celebart for
(44:20):
the first time since the demonstrations had begun on May
twenty nine, Portland protesters had what felt like a real
victory the police and the federal agents had thrown everything
in their arsenal at a crowd that refused to disperse.
People had held their own against multiple riot lines and
forced them to back away. For the first time ever,
a crowd kicked out of the parks in front of
(44:40):
the Justice Center had succeeded in reoccupying those parks. For
a long time, people just celebrated whoa boy. In my
own experience, July four was the first night that did
feel a little like a revolution, And of course, the
coming days weeks would make it very clear that the
(45:01):
fight was far from over and that July four had
been at best a very temporary victory. But in the
early hours of July five, it still felt like one
uh where the grandpops who couldn't fathom the obamasist and
(45:22):
I don't hate America just to me, and she keeps
the promises twenty teens looking like the sixties. It's crazy,
a nationwide deja wo? What my people post to do?
Go to schools named after the clan founder we're around
town is I don't see why we're frowning Native American
students forced to learn about when o'pellah Sarah. How is
that fair? Bro? Some euros unsung in some months. That's
(45:44):
get monuments built for them. But it ain't be all
a little bit of monster. We crook it. Give us
ever attention. We need everything you've got Fast Waiting on
Reparations we be the podcast tune in every Thursday politics
(46:06):
and wordplay. We fight for the people because they got
us in the worst way, from the Hill Cooper, the
Bombay to Kanya, from the left enclave to what the
neo kanse every Thursday, the heavy conversation and to break
us off with some break because we're waiting. Listen to
Waiting on Reparations on the I Heart Radio app, Apple
podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Robert
(46:30):
sex Reese, host of The Doctor sex Rees Show, and
every episode I listened to people talk about their sex
and intimacy issues, and yes, I despise every minute of it.
And she she made mistakes too? Did she kill everyone
at her wedding? But hell is real. We're all trapped
here and there's nothing any of us can do about it.
(46:50):
So join me, won't you? Listen to The Doctor sex
re Show every Tuesday on the I Heart Radio app,
Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast Sow guys
have a Shop Aloud and I am Troy Millions and
we are the host of the Earnier Leisure podcast, where
we break down business models and examine the latest trends
and finance. We hold court and have exclusive interviews with
some of the biggest names of business, sport, and entertainment,
(47:12):
from DJ Khaled to Mark Cuban, Rick Ross and Shaquille O'Neil.
I mean our alumnilist's expansive Listen to as our guests
reveal their business models, hardships and triumphs and their respective fields.
The knowledge is in death and the questions are always
delivered from your standpoint. We want to know what you
want to know. We talked to the legends of business,
sports and entertainment about how they got their start and
most importantly, how they make their money. Earn your Leisia
(47:34):
is a college business class mixed with pop culture. I
want to learn about the real estate game, unclears, how
the stock market works. We got you interested in starting
a truck and company or vending machine business. Not really
sure about how taxes or credit work. We got it
all covered. The Earnier Leisure podcast is available now Listen
to Earnier Leisure on the Black Effect podcast Network, I
Heart Radio, app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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