The city feels like a war zone even before the boom of flashbangs crack the air. Protesters clad in body armor consisting of kneepads and elbow guards flee police in body armor made from ceramic and Kevlar. Yellow smoke fills the air with a pepper scent that triggers coughing fits, from a substance cops tweet has not been deployed by them. As some protesters retreat, Cameron Whitten begins to sprint toward the chaos.
Portland was at peace when he arrived hours earlier. He carried a frozen slushy in one hand; in the other, his iPhone on a selfie stick, streaming the scene on Facebook. “Feels pretty calm so far. Lots of different peacekeepers, medics,” he told his followers. He couldn’t take more than a few steps without someone stopping to speak to him. Most thanked him for his work; one said he should win a Pulitzer. Being the most visible activist in the City of Roses was a blessing, he knew. But it had its drawbacks too: Basic chores like buying groceries had become a hassle, and he was always running late. Left-wingers, anarchists, cops, Trumpeters, last year’s GOP Senate candidate — they all flagged him down. A woman approached to ask, “How’s it going over there?” It’s calm so far, he said — and there had been many occasions that weren’t.
The week before, two white men had been murdered on a light-rail train in Northwest Portland while protecting a pair of young girl — one was wearing a hijab — from a racially charged harasser, adding to the documented rise in anti-Muslim hate crimes in the U.S. in recent years. The incident sparked mourning, and then outrage, when Trump supporters and white nationalists announced a downtown, alt-right Free Speech Rally. Three counter-protests emerged surrounding Chapman Square, where the rally was held. Outside City Hall, an anti-hate event was organized. Directly east, local labor leaders chanted “Union workers here to say: Nazi thugs, not your day.” And to the north, scores of black-clad antifascists hurled expletives and water bottles. As the morning progressed, the opposing factions shouted and harassed anyone who dared cross over to another group.
Battle lines are multiplying across America — and not just in protest-heavy Portland but in places from Berkeley, California, to Washington, D.C., pitting the alt-right movement emboldened by the election of Donald Trump against activists compelled to draw arms against them. And new terminology is emerging to meet them. Left-leaning “antifa” — militant antifascists — face off against right-leaning “Kekists,” Trump-supporting meme-makers who sardonically praise Pepe the Frog, a symbol the Anti-Defamation League has declared racist and which supporters defend as social commentary. Amid these shifting coalitions are folks like Whitten, 26, trying to define ethical activism in the age of the anti-Trump resistance.
Only Whitten doesn’t quite feel up to the task today. He is sick, has been staying up too late and his thoughts are increasingly turning to self-care: how organizers must be effective but most don’t get paid. It’s especially insulting for people of color like himself, he thinks. Despite Portland’s feel-good liberalism and leafy neighborhoods filled with Black Lives Matter signs, too often he’s seen his white neighbors fall silent when they are needed most. Walking through Chapman Square, Whitten gets pulled aside once more. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry,” says a man in commando gear, one of the Oregon Three Percent, a self-styled patriot group that provides volunteer security for many Trump events. The man was apologizing for what had happened in Salem. “We should talk about it later,” Whitten says, and keeps moving.
