MOSTLY PEACEFUL ARSON: Portland Antifa Rioters Again Try to Burn Down Police Union, Police Stand Down to ‘Deescalate’ the Riot.
Since antifa rioters have a well-funded network that bails them out after they get arrested, and since the local district attorney has announced he will not prosecute various crimes — even when rioters violently attack police — perhaps the police decided it was not worth their time to arrest the rioters. Or perhaps Wheeler directed them to stand down on the ridiculous hope that not enforcing the law would somehow “deescalate” the situation.
Although Wheeler has finally vocally condemned the violent antifa rioters, it appears he is triangulating in the race against self-described antifa candidate Sarah Iannarone. Wheeler rightly condemned violent antifa rioters for “attempting to commit murder” by trapping police officers inside the Penumbra Kelly building before trying to light it on fire. Iannarone refused to condemn the attempted murder, saying, “I understand why they’re angry.”
These are the two candidates who will face off in November — the mayor who waited for months to condemn the violence and the challenger who still refuses to condemn attempted murder.
Related: Portland police officer on nightly protests: ‘They’ve been hijacked by anarchists’
“I believe that we would have buildings on fire. I truly do,” [Sgt. Brent Maxey] replied. He continued, “The people that have been coming out to the justice center and to the police precincts, they want to abolish the police…They’re basically trying to bankrupt the Portland Police Bureau. I think if we didn’t respond to these things I think that we would have buildings on fire.”
As for what Sgt. Maxey sees as the solution to this ongoing situation, he says it has to be about conversations rather than screaming matches. He describes one incident where someone shouted something vulgar at him. He engaged the person and they wound up speaking for 90 minutes. He said that at the end they didn’t agree but they both shook hands and he felt like there was some mutual understanding. “All I see anymore is screaming. We go out and nobody is interested in a dialogue,” he said. He added, “If I do find somebody who wants to talk, other people come and shut them down.”
At this point I would just interject that there are reasons the woke won’t debate people, including the officers they are protesting. As James Lindsay put it, “Conversation and debate are part of our game, and they are not part of their game.” Their game, in the case of the Portland protests, is tactics of conflict and “direct action.” Conversation is counter to that goal.
More: Andy Ngo tweets a link to the following video, in which veteran journalist Lisa Balick of Portland CBS affiliate KOIN 6 “reports what happened yesterday when a BLM mob beat Adam Haner unconscious in downtown after attacking his partner. Straight news like this is rare. Most media in Portland have systematically failed or misled the public:”