Portland Mayor Tear Gassed By Federal Agents During Wednesday Protest

R&I ~ Løki

Like the liberal white male mayor of Minneapolis learned when he had the temerity to stand up and tell a crowd of angry protesters that he wouldn’t support disbanding the Minneapolis Police Department, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler has struggled to connect with the throngs of angry, young and (mostly) white crowds of impressionable college students and disgruntled post-grads who have flooded the area outside a federal courthouse in downtown Portland for nearly 2 months straight, SARS-CoV-2 be damned.

Many of these demonstrators probably aren’t even from Portland. And it’s clear that their animosity toward Wheeler stems not from any personal failing on his part, but rather due to his role in “the system”, and the fact that he’s a white man. But that hasn’t dissuaded Wheeler from trying to pander to them, anyway, guided perhaps by misguided political strategists who feel that the hard-core protesters truly have the public’s sympathy. Over the past 10 days, as federal agents have moved to defend the federal courthouse mentioned above from vandals and enforce laws after Wheeler pulled out the local cops, Wheeler has sided with the rabble over the government he was elected to represent, denouncing the federal “stormtroopers” who have been “abducting” residents of his city, according to the AP.

This has done nothing to quell the unrest (many of the people out there on the barricade night after night after night are clearly being supported by somebody – even if that somebody is the absentee father who nevertheless left them a generous trust). So on Wednesday night, Wheeler took his ‘revolutionary’ kayfabe to the next level and wandered down to the courthouse, where he stood up and took his tear-gassing, an act that was filmed by eager journalists.

The footage of Wheeler’s tear-gassing, and his reaction, have gone viral overnight.

Amusingly, one protester brought a sign urging the mayor to take his dose of tear gas. The simple placard bore a terse message: “Tear Gas Ted!”.

David Adams

Article URL : https://www.zerohedge.com/political/portland-mayor-tear-gassed-federal-agents-during-wednesday-protest?