Federal officers are pulling Portland protesters into unmarked vehicles, reports say

Federal law enforcement officers have used unmarked vehicles to detain protesters in Portland, according to news reports.

Videos shared online show officers driving up to people, detaining individuals without explanation, then driving off, Oregon Public Broadcastingfirst reported. Officers appeared to detain people who weren’t near federal property, and it isn’t clear that all of those being arrested had committed a crime, according to OPB.

Mark Pettibone, 29, told the Washington Post and OPB that he was among those protesters grabbed off the streets of Portland. Pettibone said he was heading home from a protest with a friend early Wednesday morning when several men in green military fatigues jumped out of an unmarked gray van. 

FILE – In this July 4, 2020, file photo, protesters gather near a fire in downtown Portland, Ore. Oregon’s largest city is in crisis as violent protests have wracked downtown for weeks.

 (Photo: Beth Nakamura)

“I was terrified,” Pettibone told the Post. “It seemed like it was out of a horror/sci-fi, like a Philip K. Dick novel. It was like being preyed upon.”

He ran, but said he was caught, detained and searched. He was taken to a federal courthouse and placed in a holding cell. Officers read him his Miranda rights and he declined to waive those rights and answer questions. Then, he was released with no record of his arrest. 

The U.S. Marshals Service told OPB that their officers did not arrest or detain Pettibone and declined to comment on the use of unmarked vehicles.

Protests in Oregon’s largest city following the police killing of George Floyd have continued for 47 days. In the past two weeks, federal officers sent to Portland by President Donald Trump have escalated tensions, particularly after an officer with the U.S. Marshals Service fired a less-lethal round at a protester’s head on July 11, critically injuring him.  

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Federal officers fired rounds and deployed tear gas to break up a crowd a few hundred people gathered near the federal courthouse Thursday night, according to The Oregonian. Some protesters remained in the area early Friday and were detained, but it was unclear how many arrests were made by either Portland police or federal officers, the newspaper reported.

Trump said the city “was totally out of control” and praised efforts to handle the situation at a news conference on Monday.

“We’ve done a great job in Portlan,.” Trump said. “I guess, we have many people right now in jail, and we very much quelled it. And if it starts again, we’ll quell it again very easily. It’s not hard to do if you know what you’re doing.”

Oregon Governor Kate Brown, Mayor Ted Wheeler and other local leaders have said they didn’t ask for help from federal law enforcement and have asked them to leave.

“We’re aware that they’re here,” Wheeler said on Twitter. “We wish they weren’t.”

Homeland Security Acting Secretary Chad Wolf also drew criticism from local leaders when he visited the city Thursday hours after calling the protesters “violent anarchists” and a “violent mob” and saying state and city authorities are to blame for not putting an end to the protests.

“I told Acting Secretary Wolf that the federal government should remove all federal officers from our streets,” Brown said in a tweet. “His response showed me he is on a mission to provoke confrontation for political purposes. He is putting both Oregonians and local law enforcement officers in harm’s way.”

Contributing: The Associated Press

Follow N’dea Yancey-Bragg on Twitter: @NdeaYanceyBragg

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