The plan was to federalize National Guard members already in Portland, but that was blocked by a Trump-appointed judge. So the Trump administration decided to get around the block by sending troops from other states to the city. According to Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker and California Gov. Gavin Newsom, the Trump administration is sending 400 Texas National Guard members and 300 California National Guard members to Portland and Chicago. “We must now start calling this what it is: Trump’s Invasion,” Pritzker wrote on X. “America is on the brink of martial law,” Newsom wrote.
For those of you scratching your heads as to why sleepy Portland, Oregon, was chosen for the next stop on President Donald Trump’s occupation tour, it seems almost undeniable that it was picked for any reason other than it was a hotbed for Black Lives Matter protests in 2020. Trumpism punishes anyone or anything that can steal its viral spotlight. And the White House has now activated every part of the MAGA ecosystem to make sure they control the attention economy as they storm Democratic cities.
And, right on cue, right-wing influencer Nick Sortor quickly made himself into the main character of the Portland occupation. On Friday, Sortor was arrested for disorderly conduct while making content at a protest in front of a local Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility. Now the Department of Justice says they’re investigating the arrest, and there was some chatter among right-wing influencers on X that there was even a briefly considered plan for ICE officers to personally yank Sortor out of jail.
As for what Sortor is actually filming, it’s exactly what you would expect. It’s the same kind of content-based aggression made popular by Charlie Kirk. Videos of left-wing protests chasing Sortor down the street while he screeches about how unhinged they are. And he has, obviously, made the rounds on Fox News.
A very dark lesson that right-wing influencers like Sortor have seemingly learned from Kirk’s death is that the more violent the situation they provoke, the harder the White House will respond. “Hey Antifa — just FYI: the more times you assauIt me, the higher the chances you have active duty Marines deployed to the streets of Portland by the end of the week,” Sortor wrote on X, offering himself up to the MAGA meat grinder. Anything to get those views, I guess!
The more malicious parts of the MAGA movement also know that these clashes, between citizens and the military, filmed by influencers, are a perfect venue for more explicitly violent intervention...
The Trump administration is not just occupying cities with soldiers and ICE officers, but creating flashpoints for propaganda. Every eventual showdown on the streets of a Democratic city is first teased by hysterical X posts from Trump administration members, Trump supporters and militias face off against local protesters, and then the chaos is livestreamed and clipped by right-wing influencers that just so happen to have the budgets to fly from city to city following the circus. And, of course, Fox News scoops up the best bits and packages them for viewers at home. Finally, the official X account for the Department of Homeland Security does a victory lap, collecting the best footage for a stupid music video about how they’re keeping us all safe. It’s the exact same playbook that was used for Trump’s endless rallies during his first term. The Trump hurricane comes to town and viral content and political violence follows in its wake. The key innovation of his second term is figuring out how to both scale the localized MAGA frenzy beyond just him and, also, most importantly, figure out a way to force it on blue states.
by Ryan Broderick, 404 Media | Read more:
Image: X
[ed. An ecosystem of disinformation. See also: How Right-Wing Influencers Are Shaping the Guard Fight in Portland (NYT):]***
To some extent, the right’s assertions of chaos in Oregon have been self-fulfilling. The administration’s close ties to a small but well-followed group of influencers and conspiracy theorists has amplified their voices, and they in turn have encouraged administration efforts to crack down on demonstrators. (...)Pro-Trump provocateurs have gotten more open about their efforts as the stakes in the battle over how to police protests grow. Ms. Noem has threatened to quadruple the number of federal law enforcement agents in Portland if she is not satisfied with the city’s crowd-control efforts. Troops from the Oregon and California National Guards are awaiting deployment. Another group of guardsmen from Texas could be summoned at the president’s request.
Meantime, influencers are seeking to raise the tension. Matt Tardio, a right-wing streamer who was broadcasting to an online audience of 10,000 or so from the ICE building in Portland on Wednesday night, conceded that other streamers were trying to stir up trouble so they could capture it on video.
“They were handing out flags and trying to get antifa folks to burn them, and then claimed that they were going to do physical harm to them if they burned the American flag,” he said. All the while, a videographer was capturing the action...
“BREAKING,” Bo Loudon, a 19-year-old influencer and friend of Mr. Trump’s youngest son, Barron, wrote on social media. Ms. Noem “just stared down violently Antifa rioters on the roof of a Portland ICE facility,” he wrote.
The video attached showed Ms. Noem on the roof of the building looking down at a small clutch of protesters far away, one of them in a chicken suit.
The man in the chicken suit, Jack Dickinson, 26, who had been coming to the ICE building to protest federal immigration policies for months, said he was struck by the disconnect. Mr. Dickinson said he watched one of the pro-Trump influencers, Nick Sortor, film outside the ICE building, then heard the narration.
“He was talking about this looking like a third-world country,” Mr. Dickinson said as he surveyed a riverfront neighborhood of apartment buildings, coffee shops and an Italian restaurant popular for holiday meals and graduation parties. “It’s just clearly not.” (...)
Mr. Sortor was initially charged with second-degree disorderly conduct, a misdemeanor in Oregon, after he took a burning American flag from a left-wing demonstrator and a fight ensued. The response from Washington, D.C., was intense and immediate. Attorney General Pam Bondi demanded an investigation into the Portland Police Bureau, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that Mr. Sortor had been “ambushed by antifa.”
For his efforts, Mr. Sortor found himself at the White House on Wednesday, as the president praised the actions of right-wing activists and pledged to dismantle antifa, a loose-knit group of anarchists whose presence in Portland has long angered Mr. Trump.
Mr. Sortor had been “assaulted in Portland by a flag-burning mob,” the president declared.
Mr. Sortor responded, “The Portland politicians literally are willing to sacrifice their own citizens just to appease these antifa terrorists.”
