Protesters marched through downtown Portland Friday night to show solidarity with the citizens of Portland, Oregon, who have faced violent confrontations with federal agents for more than a week.
The event was organized by Ahmed Beshir, a 22-year-old accountant from Gorham. He said he was spurred to act after seeing video footage of federal agents, sent to Oregon by President Trump to quell protests, using tear gas, pepper spray and physical force against protesters. Protests there have been ongoing since George Floyd was killed by a former Minneapolis police officer two months ago. Trump has called the protesters in Oregon “agitators” and “anarchists.”
The march Friday began at Lincoln Park on Congress Street, where Beshir told people he had only begun organizing the event days earlier and wasn’t sure how many people might turn out. The size of the crowd was not as important, he said, as the personal commitment each marcher has to change the racial and social injustice that exists in society. He told the crowd that they needed to protest the kind of government force being used in Oregon “while we still have the chance.”
“It doesn’t matter if we have 20 people or 20,000, we’re still making a statement, each of us, that I myself will be the change,” Beshir said. “We can’t have the mindset that’s it’s not really that serious yet, because soon it will be too late.”
Beshir led the group, about 30 people at first, from Lincoln Park down Federal Street to the United States Courthouse, then up Congress Street past Congress Square, then back down Congress Street to City Hall. By then the group had grown to about 200 people, many with signs. They chanted “Black Lives Matter,” and “No Justice, No Peace,” among other things. They walked in the street, with one Portland police vehicle leading them and another following.
At City Hall, the marchers joined a camping protest over the city’s homelessness problem, that was in its third day. Using a megaphone, Beshir addressed the crowd there and told them that the problems of homelessness and racial injustice were related, and had to be fought together.
“The same system has failed us,” Beshir told the group at City Hall.
Beshir planned to eventually lead the march to the Portland Police headquarters later Friday night.
Local officials in Oregon have called for federal agents to leave. On Wednesday Mayor Ted Wheeler was present at a protest when he was tear gassed by federal agents. The state of Oregon is seeking a legal order limiting federal agents’ arrest powers during the demonstrations. The Oregon Attorney General has sued multiple federal agencies, alleging agents in unmarked vehicles have grabbed people off the street without a warrant.
Beshir said he wanted to draw attention to the fact that people in Portland, Oregon, have been protesting police brutality and racial injustice for nearly two months, while other protests sparked by Floyd’s death have faded. Beshir thinks the Oregon protests have gotten stronger the more authorities have used violent force to stop them.
“This isn’t normal and this isn’t right. We can’t idly stand by sedated by the comforts of our lives and watch it unfold until it’s too late,” Beshir wrote in a Facebook post announcing the event Friday. “We must stand in solidarity against this authoritarian police state and fight back the tyranny and oppression that come with it.”
Beshir, who was born in Sudan and came to the United States in 2005, said he’s not part of any specific group. He said had not been involved in any protests until the death of Floyd and the launch of Black Lives Matter events that followed.
Some of the people who joined the march Friday they wanted to not only show solidarity with people in Oregon, but with people experiencing racism everywhere.
“I need to use my white privilege and my voice to speak up for what is right,” said Brooke Bolduc, 20, of Minot.
Anthony Fiori, 21 of Brunswick, said he was concerned that if people in Maine, and elsewhere, didn’t stand up against what is happening in Oregon such use of government force to squelch protest will only spread.
“When tyranny is rising, you have to stop it as soon as possible, you can’t just say it’s not that bad yet,” Fiori said.
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