Violent Proto-Fascists Came To Portland. The Police Went After The Anti-Fascists.

[workinclasszero]

Portland wasn’t the next Charlottesville. But activists say police almost accidentally killed an anti-fascist protester.
By Christopher Mathias and Andy Campbell/Huffpost 08/05/2018 10:00 am ET

PORTLAND, Ore. ― Police did a good job on Saturday preventing what could have been the most violent far-right rally since last year’s deadly “Unite the Right” gathering in Charlottesville, Virginia — all they had to do was protect the proto-fascists who came to town, and use riot control weapons, flash-bang grenades and chemical irritants against anti-fascist counter-protesters.

For hours, dozens of officers in full riot gear stood across a closed section of Naito Parkway along the Willamette River, keeping the two sides apart. On one side of the parkway, in Tom McCall Waterfront Park, stood hundreds of out-of-towners belonging to the Proud Boys — a punch-drunk far-right group of self-described “Western chauvinists” dressed in helmets and body armor — and those aligned with Patriot Prayer and its leader Joey Gibson, a Republican Senate candidate from Washington state who has held a series of increasingly violent rallies in the Pacific Northwest since 2017.

Both groups have deep ties to white supremacists.

And yet, when police decided the standoff was too tense for comfort, they targeted the local anti-fascists. As officers lobbed flash-bang grenades at them — ear-piercing explosives that temporarily disorient the senses — Proud Boys and Patriot Prayer members cheered on the cops, claiming victory against the “violent leftists” they’d come expecting to fight themselves.

One police flash-bang canister reportedly pierced an anti-fascist’s helmet, cutting into his head. “I’m certain he would be dead if he wasn’t wearing a helmet,” 39-year-old Jenny Nickolaus, an anti-fascist demonstrator and friend of the victim, told HuffPost. “The trauma nurse said as much.”

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/portland-patriot-prayer-proud-boys-police-antifascists_us_5b668b7de4b0de86f4a22faf

[Iggo]

1. Actual fascists protect proto-fascists?

Color me unsurprised.

[workinclasszero]

3. Yeah this story is for all who think the cops

are on the side of dems/libs/leftists.

Like Occupy Wall Street times when the cops beat up and assaulted peaceful protesters over and over.

Nothing has changed obviously.

The police either stand by and let anti fascists get beaten by fascist mobs and murdered or they assault the anti fascists themselves.

Its hard to believe that my Dad fought the fucking nazis in WW2 and came home a hero and now this country hates anti fascism and loves NAZIS!!!

[RKP5637]

2. Some cops are cut from the same piece of cloth as fascists IMO. I was watching the video of

some of the cops going after the anti-fascists, like they were having a lot of fun beating up on the anti-fascists. ... dangerous country on the edge thanks to tRump.

[0rganism]

4. some of those that work forces

are the same that burn crosses

[Initech]

6. Rage Against The Machine FTW!

Where's Zach when you need him?

[Initech]

5. If we as a country want to deal with our white supremacist problem...

Let's start by kicking their asses out of law enforcement!

[workinclasszero]

7. I hear lots of nazi Oath Keepers are police

[Ilsa]

8. The neo-nazis/fascists/oath keepers have

done well to recruit their kind into police forces to protect their members and like-minded scum.