Portland's July 4th uprising saw over a thousand protesters besiege the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse, launching fireworks against agents deploying tear gas through "murder holes." Hardened by weeks of violence and organized into decentralized affinity groups led by medics, demonstrators used shields and umbrellas to deflect projectiles during a two-hour standoff. Despite arrests like Emily's and heavy gas bombardments, the crowd refused to disperse, forcing police into a chaotic chase before regrouping near the Elk statue. This event highlighted how decentralized security culture and adaptive tactics allowed activists to withstand federal force, challenging narratives of organized infiltration while marking a temporary revolutionary victory against state violence. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: nvidia/parakeet-tdt-0.6b-v2, sat-12l-sm, and large-v3-turbo
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Trust Your Girlfriends00:02:50
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On the Ceno Show podcast, each episode invites you into a raw, unfiltered conversation about recovery, resilience, and redemption.
On a recent episode, I sit down with actor, cultural icon Danny Trail to talk about addiction, transformation, and the power of second chances.
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We can explain how AI works, data centers, but there are certain things that we don't necessarily understand.
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Coalescing Into Groups00:15:19
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The Gangster Chronicles podcast is a weekly conversation that revolves around the underworld.
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Gangster Chronicles podcast doesn't glorify or promote immissive activities.
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Violence has a curious way of rendering you both more resilient to and less tolerant of more violence.
By the start of July, every regular protester and press member in the city of Portland had seen dozens of flashbang grenades detonate within feet of their heads.
In June alone, I was tear gassed at least 60 times, and there are literally thousands of other Portlanders who endured similar barrages.
We'd all run like hell from charging riot lines, which is an experience in and of itself.
I've been to war zones on two continents.
I've been shot at and I've been shelled once, and I can honestly say that being bullrushed by dozens of armored policemen ranks as among the most frightening things I've ever experienced.
It's certainly less lethal than coming under sniper fire, but there's something uncontrollably panic-inducing about being chased by a wall of angry men who want to harm you.
The lizard part of your brain starts firing.
Panic rises up in the primal hinterlands of your brain.
If you aren't careful, it takes over completely.
And even if you do stay in control, the adrenaline coursing through your system, it'll make your hands shake.
It'll blur the parts of your mind that make coherent thought possible.
Portland protesters learned a lot through the month of June, but one thing they didn't quite figure out was how to stand up against a charging riot line.
They did learn a lot of other valuable things, though.
Tear gas went from something that instantly dispersed crowds to more of a moderate annoyance.
Some of this was a product of people acquiring gas masks and respirators, but more of it had to do with people learning how to treat gas injuries, how to put out or throw back smoking canisters, and most importantly, how not to panic while choking on poison.
One major way this information spread in the early days were live streams.
Conundrum, a blind journalist who recorded soundscapes for the Portland riots, recalls how she used live stream audio to train herself up before going out.
I had been, you know, since like the first week, helping out in ways I can, sort of from behind the scenes, constantly.
And it took until mid-Delay, you know, because initially when all this started going down, you know, here in Portland, I was like, how can I be involved?
You know, logic brain is going, okay, Katie, you're blind.
Not safe for you to go out there.
You know, all of these reasons why blind person probably running through clouds of tear gas, not the greatest idea you've ever had.
And so it was like, okay, well, what are the other ways I can support the community at large and specific people who I know that are out there?
Well, for one, I got that $1,200 stimulus check and I didn't need it.
So I'm like, who needs gear?
So donating into different organizations, that was one way that I could help very easily in my position.
I live by myself.
I live like a student because I am a student and I, yeah.
Also supporting friends that I had who were out on the ground, like sitting there watching all of the live streams and like following all of you guys that were out there on the ground since day one.
Like I'm sitting there up all night, every night, eight nights a week, because some number of my friends are out every night, right?
And so as stuff gets started, I start pulling up every stream that I could find.
So yeah, that was a lot of what I would be doing is having multiple live streams playing at the same time, like listening to the audio, because obviously I can't see what's happening in the videos.
So, I mean, I was not as effective as somebody who could actually see the pictures.
Obviously, in that tiny regard, I can't see the pictures people are tweeting out or what's in them.
But, you know, me and some of my friends had some groups set up where I wasn't the only one doing this, and we would sort of share the information with each other first before passing it on to the people who were, you know, out and about, like, hey, guys, maybe stay away from Third and Madison.
There's reports of fascists in a truck with U.S. flags.
Like, don't go around.
There's a guy with a gun.
You know, stuff like that.
Once people were actually out on the ground, getting tear gassed and grenaded and charged on a regular basis, they started coalescing into groups based on what they were particularly interested in doing to help out.
For Chris and a number of his colleagues, that meant learning to work as a team of medics.
So, this kid had a broken shoulder, and there's a bunch of people crowding around being like, I'm a medic, but I've only got water and band-aids and stuff.
And I wandered up and I said, Hi, my name's Chris.
I have triangle bandages.
Would you like one?
And so, I met a medic friend that way.
And then I met all of their medic friends.
And I was like, Well, we should keep in contact.
You guys have signal.
I made like a small signal group.
And then I started to meet other medics and like get their signal information.
I met other medics that were doing the same thing.
And so we all kind of like everybody kind of met like five medics, and all five medics knew another five medics.
And so it all kind of coalesced like that.
So there's a lot of independent medics, but really there are these medic groups.
And within the internal communications that we have, we usually have like a few people, like one or two people from each group.
Like I'm with Pam.
I know other medics that are with Pam that are in like a, you know, in communication.
And then, you know, there's the Ewoks and we'll know some Ewoks.
And if I can't get a hold of the Ewoks, I know somebody who can.
If I can't get a hold of Rose Hips, I know somebody who can.
And so we do all try and talk to each other.
We try and talk to each other on the day of to make sure that, you know, like we're all on the same page because different medics have different styles.
And then another reason that's so important is because, especially in emergency medicine, you're taught how to deal with like biohazard situations, you know, things where you need to triage things where there's a lot of patients at once.
And there's a lot of people coming from different places to be medics.
And you have to learn, you know, who's above you, who's below you, so that you're not stepping on each other's toes and getting in each other's way.
And so learning what everyone's scope of practice is was very important.
And that's just kind of a standard question that we ask now.
If you see meet somebody that you haven't met, they're like, oh, I'm a medic.
Be like, oh, hey, cool.
My name's Chris.
I was trained as an EMT.
If you don't mind me asking, what's your scope of practice?
Because sometimes there are people who'll be like, oh, yeah, I've been taking care of my mom for like five years, but I have no formal training.
And be like, all right, cool.
I'm going to keep that in mind so that when something happens, you know, I don't ask someone like, hey, grab my Sam Splant and mold it for me.
I can be like, hey, hold my flashlight guy.
Or sometimes, you know, when a lot of people get tear gassed, those people are really good because flushing eyes isn't hard and I can teach somebody how to flush eyes.
And that way, if we've got those people flushing eyes and then someone else has like a broken bone, I can deal with that.
There were small emergent groups who brought shields, others who brought traffic cones and water jugs to douse tear gas, and others who showed up with food and protective gear to hand out to protesters.
A number of disabled activists who did not feel they could safely participate in toe-to-toe confrontations with riot lines filled valuable logistic roles, making sure that frontliners had ample water, respirator filters, and food.
Juniper was one of hundreds of people who took it upon themselves to see that the Portland protests were supplied with what they needed.
I was able to feel like I could go and drop off supplies.
Like I have, you know, I am a middle-class, upwardly mobile white person, and I have some money, and there are people out on the front lines putting their bodies and lives on the line.
And so I was like, I'm going to go give some snacks to people and get some water and just some other protective equipment and things that I had that I knew could be useful.
Other small groups helped coordinate aid and raise attention for actions online.
One of these organizations was Pop Mob, or Popular Mobilization, who formed early on in the Trump administration after a series of disastrous and bloody dueling rallies between fascist and anti-fascist protesters in Portland.
PopMob acted as a sort of unifying bridge for different local anti-fascist groups with a focus on getting the word out to large groups of what they called everyday anti-fascists.
These were people who weren't hardcore activists but didn't want Nazis marching around their city.
When Portland's BLM movement took off though, Effie Baum and their colleagues at PopMob decided they should take a less visible support role.
So mostly just retweeting things and then when people would share events with us, boosting those events or boosting different affinity groups that were involved in the nightly protests and really just kind of providing a basically a signal boost to the people that were doing the organizing and specifically like focusing only on trying to boost BIPOC led efforts,
Especially given all of the conversation around white anarchists and you know co-opting, the movement or the you know media like to blame everything on white anarchists, which then takes away the autonomy and disempowers the people that were in fact organizing those events and the very real anger and justified anger behind those events,
and so we also did not want to contribute to that narrative in any way, shape or form.
So we really made a very intense, intentional effort to operate exclusively in a supportive role.
A lot of us were there many nights and continue to go out many nights, but the organization as a whole did not have an organizational presence as organizers.
One of the you know goals that we would you know have is pushing back against kind of this like white supremacist culture that we have, all that we all participate in every day, and so that was one of the main reasons we did not want to take any kind of lead in the organizing is because it's one thing when we are coming out and organizing against,
like Joey Gibson and Patriot Prayer, who you know the proud boys and those groups target a lot of different marginalized and vulnerable populations from you know many different groups, and so in a sense you could look at It and say that the work is similar.
But at the same time, I think that it's important for the people who are most affected to be the voices that people are hearing.
And especially because we've seen how much that the media has latched on to trying to discredit those voices by painting it as angry white anarchists.
As the days and weeks wore on, Portland protesters grew hardened and increasingly effective at standing up to police violence.
Tear gas and grenades stopped working to disperse crowds.
Pepperballs, little paintball-style projectiles filled with mace and fired from a paintball gun, likewise lost their effectiveness as shields became more common.
Police bull rushes remain the most effective tactic for dispersing crowds, especially since, by late June, most of those crowds were quite small.
Portland protesters started gathering on Telegram, an anonymous messaging app, in order to coordinate and pass on intelligence.
During events, people would warn each other of police charges and the presence of riot trucks.
Before and after events, they would dissect their performance and discuss ways to improve.
Near the end of June, they started talking about how protesters might form their own shield wall, something that could stand up against police charges.
Now, in between numerous nights of reporting on riots, my partner Elaine Kinchin spent hours browsing through those conversations and watching as people worked out how to defend themselves from charging officers.
I'm going to throw you over to Elaine now, explaining how that process came together.
Well, since the very beginning of the protests, there had been various diagrams that were circulating on the internet.
A lot of them came from things that had been done in Hong Kong.
So different diagrams of roles that protesters could take to more effectively protect each other.
Some of those involved laser pointers and some of them involved shields or helmets or supply line stuff.
And so those had been being circulated throughout all of June, both on protester Telegram channels and also on Twitter and other communication channels.
And as the charges, then bull rushes and stuff really heated up and more people were being injured and the police brutality was becoming more intense.
A lot of those discussions and how to effectively implement them would be happening after protests had wound down or during the day.
And so I would follow and read through all sorts of different threads where people were posting images of how to do Roman-style turtleshell formations with overlapping shields or could make an effective wall to block the people behind them from police munitions to more effectively protect all the peaceful protesters who were in the back.
All these different emergent groups that form to handle different tasks within the movement are what is called affinity groups.
This is a fairly old concept within anarchist organizing.
Here are our friends at the Youth Liberation Front, or YLF, explain the context.
Again, because President Trump and numerous right-wing media figures have repeatedly called for their imprisonment or execution, we've hired voice actors to reread the things they said to us rather than risk exposing their identities.
So an affinity group is usually like five to ten people who share some affinity, and it's the preferred method for anarchist organizing because it's small, it's informal, and usually non-hierarchical.
And usually horizontally organized.
Understanding Affinity Groups00:04:41
Yeah.
And it's, I think it's been preferable to like the large organization model that we attempted and just failed because there was no accountability and there's no way to ensure that like everyone was cool with each other.
And when problems came up, they just fucked us over.
We spoke to one anonymous activist who had no experience with anarchist organizing prior to the summer of 2020.
She started coming out to Portland protests earlier in the summer with her friends.
So the first time I went out to one of the nightly protests, I went with a couple of friends that I've known since I was like 18 or 19 because they had been going out and I felt comfortable being with them.
They don't come out anymore.
Once her friends stopped going, she floated around different crews of activists, experimenting with different affinity groups, but eventually deciding that she preferred an even more decentralized approach to protesting.
As far as, you know, like my length of knowledge, an affinity group is just, you know, a decentralized group of people that you can form ideas with and kind of go over maybe like safety tactics and different things like that.
But I kind of quickly realized that affinity groups weren't necessarily for me.
I think that sometimes it can get complicated fairly quickly.
And so I still go down to the protests by myself since I've been doing this for as long as I have.
It doesn't take me very long to run into somebody that I know.
And sometimes I feel like having someone that's worried about my safety can be a bit of a hindrance.
Sometimes I, you know, having to like be on a radio consistently and always be on my phone to make sure that I'm, you know, in communication with different people.
I don't want anybody to have to worry about if I'm going to be fine because I'm going to be fine.
So yeah, I mean, I just, I usually go down by myself.
I think that the network of affinity groups has been a positive thing.
There's two golden rules that any man should live by.
Rule one, never mess with a country girl.
You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes.
And rule two, never mess with her friends either.
We always say, trust your girlfriends.
I'm Anna Sinfield.
And in this new season of The Girlfriends.
Oh my God, this is the same man.
A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist.
I felt like I got hit by a truck.
I thought, how could this happen to me?
The cops didn't seem to care.
So they take matters into their own hands.
I said, oh, hell no.
I vowed I will be his last target.
He's going to get what he deserves.
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What's up, everyone?
I'm Ago Mona.
My next guest, you know, from Step Brothers, Anchorman, Saturday Night Live, and the Big Money Players Network.
It's Will Farrell.
My dad gave me the best advice ever.
I went and had lunch with him one day, and I was like, and dad, I think I want to really give this a shot.
I don't know what that means, but I just know the groundlings.
I'm working my way up through and I know it's a place that come look for up and coming talent.
He said, if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet.
Yeah.
He goes, but there's so much luck involved.
And he's like, just give it a shot.
He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit.
If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration.
It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat just hang in there.
Yeah, it would not be.
Right, it wouldn't be that.
There's a lot of luck.
Listen to Thanks Dad on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
In 2023, former bachelor star Clayton Eckard found himself at the center of a paternity scandal.
The family court hearings that followed revealed glaring inconsistencies in her story.
This began a years-long court battle to prove the truth.
You doctored this particular test twice, Ms. Owens, correct?
I doctored the test once.
It took an army of internet detectives to crack the case.
I wanted people to be able to see what their tax dollars were being used for.
Sunlight's the greatest disinfectant.
The Clayton Eckard Scandal00:03:31
They would uncover a disturbing pattern.
Two more men who'd been through the same thing.
Greg Oespi and Michael Marancini.
My mind was blown.
I'm Stephanie Young.
This is Love Trap.
Laura, Scottsdale Police.
As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences.
Ladies and gentlemen, breaking news at Americopa County as Laura Owens has been indicted on fraud charges.
This isn't over until justice is served in Arizona.
Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
10-10 shots fired.
City hall building.
A silver .40 caliber handgun was recovered at the scene.
From iHeart Podcasts and Best Case Studios.
This is Rorschach, murder at City Hall.
How could this have happened in City Hall?
Somebody tell me that.
Jeffrey Hood did.
July 2003.
Councilman James E. Davis arrives at New York City Hall with a guest.
Both men are carrying concealed weapons.
And in less than 30 minutes, both of them will be dead.
Everybody in the chamber ducks.
A shocking public murder.
They scream, get down, get down.
Those are shots.
Those are shots.
Get down.
A charismatic politician.
You know, he just bent the rules all the time.
I still have a weapon.
And I could shoot you.
And an outsider with a secret.
He alleged you.
A victim of flat down.
That may or may not have been political.
That may have been about sex.
Listen to Rorschach, murder at City Hall on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
You know, the people that have been around and experienced the most have that information that they can share with one another.
One major advantage of anarchist organizing tactics is that it makes anarchist groups harder to infiltrate and disrupt.
Between 1956 and 1971, the FBI instituted a counterintelligence program, nicknamed COINTEL PRO, at the orders of Director J. Edgar Hoover.
The program was initially targeted at the U.S. Communist Party, but was quickly extended to all kinds of left-wing activist organizations, particularly the Black Panthers.
Hoover's goal with COINTEL PRO was to increase factionalism, cause disruption, and win defections.
He wanted to spread such terror among left-wing activists that none of them would again walk into a meeting without feeling like there must be FBI agents in the room.
COINTELPR was incredibly successful.
And while the program officially ended in 1971, the tactics the FBI pioneered in this period have been used by a variety of law enforcement agencies ever since.
Even organizations like the Portland chapter of the Black Panthers, whose more radical programs included free breakfast for neighborhood kids and dental care for all, earned the ire of COINTEL PRO.
In an interview last year, chapter co-founder Kent Ford recalled a journalist sharing with him plots from the FBI to poison the produce the Panthers would use to feed hundreds of kids every morning.
As a result, it is impossible to take part in any kind of mass anti-government action and not feel like there are probably federal agents in your midst.
We crooked when P.T. Barnum's great American Museum burned to the ground in 1865.
COINTEL PRO Plots00:15:10
What rose from its ashes would change the world.
Welcome to Grim and Mild Presents, an ongoing journey into the strange, the unusual, and the fascinating.
For our inaugural season, we'll be giving you a backstage tour of the always complex and often misunderstood cultural artifact that is the American Sideshow.
So come along as we visit the shadowy corners of the stage and learn about the people who are at the center of it all.
In a place where spectacle was king, we will soon discover there's always more to the story than meets the eye.
So step right up and get in line.
Listen to Grim and Mild presents now on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Learn more over at grimandmild.com slash presents.
The Gangster Chronicles podcast is a weekly conversation that revolves around the underworld.
From criminals and entertainers to victims of crime and law enforcement, we cover all facets of the game.
Gangster Chronicles podcast doesn't glorify or promote illicit activities.
We can discuss the ramifications and repercussions of these activities.
Because after all, if you play gangster games, you are ultimately rewarded with gangster prizes.
Our heart radio is number one for podcasts, but don't take our word for it.
Find the Gangster Chronicles podcast on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcast.
I'm Eve Rodsky, author of the New York Times bestseller Fair Play and Find Your Unicorn Space, activist on the gender division of labor, attorney, and family mediator.
And I'm Dr. Aditi Narukar, a Harvard physician and medical correspondent with an expertise in the science of stress, resilience, mental health, and burnout.
We're so excited to share our podcast, Time Out, a production of iHeart Podcasts and Hello Sunshine.
We're uncovering why society makes it so hard for women to treat their time with the value it deserves.
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Organizing by affinity groups helps to negate some of the advantages the state has.
It's impossible to know that any masked group of hundreds of people doesn't include undercover cops, but it is very possible to know that you and your four or five close buddies aren't cops.
The only organizing that occurs in the open at a large-scale event is very basic and not legally incriminating, i.e., we're gathering at this park at 8 p.m., hearing speeches, and then marching at 9.
On most occasions, either a specific organizer will pick the direction for that week's march or a vote will be taken as to the destination.
The decision to take part in any illegal activity, acts of property destruction and the like, is made by these small independent affinity groups and sometimes just individuals on their own.
Often, only two or three groups out of a 300-person march will actually engage in serious lawbreaking.
The others are there to shout, wave signs, and stand up to confront the police when they inevitably arrive.
This method of organization does have a number of weaknesses, which we will discuss in subsequent episodes, but it has proven more resilient to state surveillance than being part of an organization with a strict hierarchy.
One major aspect of this is that many more dedicated Portland protesters take something called security culture very seriously.
Here's the YLF again.
Security culture.
Security culture, I think, is it's interesting.
The risks you were taking and what precautions you need to take to be safe were like, because like not every risk is going to have the same consequences.
And so it's being able to judge those.
And like if you do something that's questionable, possibly illegal, don't talk about it.
Don't incriminate yourself.
Keep your mouth shut.
Don't incriminate others.
I mean, there's just a Crime Think article called What is Security Culture, I believe.
And that's like a great introduction for people who don't know.
It's a very important part of like really any movement.
Because if you have bad security culture and you're putting yourself at risk or their organizers at risk, you're going to disrupt a movement because you're going to get people in trouble.
So like that definitely plays like, don't let, you know, don't talk about things you did.
Don't photograph things you did.
You can like, you know, don't bring your phone if that's a thing you're able to do because like they could track you.
And feds in Portland literally clone phones and have like, you know, they can just pinpoint you.
So that's another thing where it's like, yeah, basically it's knowing the risk and knowing how to safely protect yourself from those risks.
That zine, what is security culture?
We like to make sure to send it to all, everyone who wants to get involved with us.
That's like the first thing.
Yeah.
It's the most basic thing that we send.
None of these security measures were enough to protect people from being arrested by cops during actions.
It doesn't matter how solid your digital security is or how trustworthy your friends are if a cop charges at you faster than you can run away.
But good security culture can prevent activists from being arrested after actions.
See, the United States is filled to hell and back with cameras.
When protesters damage or destroy property while protesting, police will spend weeks trying to identify the individuals responsible.
This is a big part of why Black Block has evolved as a tactic.
If everyone is dressed basically identically, with their features covered and no logos or tattoos showing, it's much more difficult for police to identify people after an action.
Going in block has disadvantages too, though, largely when it comes to optics.
When you're properly blocked up, it will be difficult or impossible to determine your race.
As a result, police and local politicians in Portland tended to blame the activities of blocked up crowds on white anarchists, alleging that the city's Black Lives Matter movement had been hijacked by white kids who just wanted to break things.
Koska, an indigenous Portlander who has been arrested by this point at least 10 times in 2020, pushed back against that characterization.
Definitely a narrative that works because people believe it and people keep repeating it.
Even some people of color I hear repeating it.
But I know for a fact it's not true because I've been doing this with people in Black Block for several years and have gotten to know lots of people and I have never ever seen so many people of color in Block before and particularly Native people.
You know, like we're just the Native people in Block is a huge amount compared compared to the population, the general population of the area.
So yeah, I think it's, I think you could even say it's racist to say that everyone in Black Block is white.
In September, after more than four months of nightly protests, the Justice Department launched a criminal inquiry targeting the leaders of organizations responsible for anti-police brutality protests across the nation.
Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf told Fox News, What we know is that we have seen groups and individuals move from Portland to other parts of the country.
I also found a very poorly written USA Today article on the subject.
It includes this paragraph.
Asked why leaders of Antifa, a loosely organized extreme far-left ideology and Black Lives Matter, formed in part to call attention to violence against black communities, had not been arrested, Wolf said, This is something I talked to the AG personally about, and I know that they are working on it.
So far, these investigations have been markedly unsuccessful.
Leaked reports later in the year revealed that the Department of Homeland Security thought that Antifa was an organized group with a structured leadership caste that could be identified and arrested.
No evidence of this was ever turned up, which suggests that this sort of decentralized organizational tactic is at least harder for law enforcement to penetrate.
The vast majority of affinity groups don't exist to organize window breaking, fire starting, or any of the other things the media love to focus on in their coverage of Portland protests.
At their most basic level, affinity groups are a safety tool.
Cop riots can be incredibly dangerous, and everyone considering going into such a situation should have buddies who are there to watch your back and render aid if you get hurt.
Obviously, not everyone interested in participating in protests had friends who were willing to go out with them.
Enter Comrade Collective, an organization that formed in the middle of the protests to help match loan activists with buddies they could protest with for the night.
And so the first time I had met up with Comrade Collective, it was funny because like I, you know, I had all this like anxiety and stuff.
And I remember thinking like, oh my God, I'm so uncomfortable.
Like I don't know these people.
And then I was like, I'm totally not going to meet up with them again because I was like, I'll just stay by myself.
Here we are.
But it was like, it was when I left and one of our other comrades like messaged me and was like, are you home?
And like, I wasn't expecting that.
And I was like, what?
And I was like, oh my God, that's awesome.
And then just like getting used to like the checking in, you know, to make sure like they're not arrested or didn't get attacked by, you know, fascists or whatever.
And so just kind of like, I think just getting exposed to like people, I'm like, oh my God, these are like strangers that I don't know that like give a shit about my well-being.
And so that kind of in turn makes you care more about yourself.
Like, and then also want to do the same for others.
And I also, I'm one that likes, that tends to stray from the group.
So like, I'm definitely like comfortable by myself in certain situations, but I still, I, even if I'm separated.
There's two golden rules that any man should live by.
Rule one, never mess with a country girl.
You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes.
And rule two, never mess with her friends either.
We always say, trust your girlfriends.
I'm Anna Sinfield.
And in this new season of the girlfriends.
Oh my God, this is the same man.
A group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist.
I felt like I got hit by a truck.
I thought, how could this happen to me?
The cops didn't seem to care.
So they take matters into their own hands.
I said, oh, hell no.
I vowed I will be his last target.
He's going to get what he deserves.
Listen to the girlfriends.
Trust me, babe.
On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
What's up, everyone?
I'm Ago Moda.
My next guest, you know, from Step Brothers, Anchorman, Saturday Night Live, and the Big Money Players Network.
It's Will Farrell.
My dad gave me the best advice ever.
I went and had lunch with him one day and I was like, and dad, I think I want to really give this a shot.
I don't know what that means, but I just know the groundlings.
I'm working my way up through and I know it's a place they come look for up and coming talent.
He said, if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet.
Yeah.
He goes, but there's so much luck involved.
And he's like, just give it a shot.
He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit.
If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration.
It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat just hang in there.
Yeah, it would not be.
Right, it wouldn't be that.
There's a lot of luck.
Listen to Thanks Dad on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.
In 2023, former bachelor star Clayton Eckard found himself at the center of a paternity scandal.
The family court hearings that followed revealed glaring inconsistencies in her story.
This began a years-long court battle to prove the truth.
You doctored this particular test twice, Miss Owens, correct?
I doctored the test once.
It took an army of internet detectives to crack the case.
I wanted people to be able to see what their tax dollars were being used for.
Sunlight's the greatest disinfectant.
They would uncover a disturbing pattern.
Two more men who'd been through the same thing.
Greg Gillespie and Michael Marancini.
My mind was blown.
I'm Stephanie Young.
This is Love Trap.
Laura, Scottsdale Police.
As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences.
Ladies and gentlemen, breaking news at Americopa County as Laura Owens has been indicted on fraud charges.
This isn't over until justice is served in Arizona.
Listen to the Love Trapped podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
10-10 shots fired in the City Hall building.
A silver .40 caliber handgun was recovered at the scene.
From iHeart Podcasts and Best Case Studios.
This is Rorschach, murder at City Hall.
How could this have happened in City Hall?
Somebody tell me that!
Jeffrey Hood did.
July 2003, Councilman James E. Davis arrives at New York City Hall with a guest.
Both men are carrying concealed weapons.
And in less than 30 minutes, both of them will be dead.
Everybody in the chamber's ducks.
A shocking public murder.
I screamed, get down, get down.
Those are shots.
Those are shots.
Get down.
A charismatic politician.
You know, you just bent the rules all the time, man.
I still have a weapon.
And I could shoot you.
And an outsider with a secret.
He alleged he was a victim of flat down.
That may or may not have been political.
That may have been about sex.
Listen to Rorschach, murder at City Hall on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
I just, I like to know that there is someone out there that like I can hit up or whatever or check in with, even if we're not like together at that moment.
By the start of July, all the ingredients were in place for Portland's protest movement to display its first real, meaningful resistance to the violent might of a police riot line.
Protests had seriously waned in the days prior to the 4th, with just a few dozen people showing up most nights.
But the holiday, and more to the point, the fact that shitloads of fireworks were on sale for the holiday, brought a massive crowd of more than a thousand Portlanders out to the city parks in front of the Justice Center and the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse.
In the days that followed DHS Director Chad Wolf's announcement that rapid deployment teams were being sent to Portland, activists had been on the lookout for feds.
They'd been visible inside the IRS building across the street from the Justice Center.
Reporters had taken several photographs of men in heavy military body armor carrying rifles.
But until the 4th, none of those men had actively engaged with a protest.
My team, Beatrix, Elaine, and Garrison, and I all arrived in front of the Justice Center at around 9.30 p.m.
The energy in the air was as apparent as the smell of gunpowder.
A Siege At Justice Center00:15:14
People were setting off fireworks, mostly mortars, at random in and around the crowd.
We hated it at first.
After weeks of being repeatedly flashbanged by cops, we were all just ridiculously on edge.
The first thing I saw upon arrival was a pile of American flags burning in a concrete pit that had once held a massive elk statue.
For several nights in a row, protesters had set fires in and around the elk statue, not out of anger, but out of a desire to stay warm and, one assumes, for the joy of setting fires.
Eventually, the city removed the elk out of fears that it might collapse and injure somebody.
Protesters loved the elk statue, though, and began constructing a series of facsimile elk statues.
On the fourth, it was a tiny model of a baby elk sandwiched in between billowing flames.
While the flags burned, protesters chanted, Black Lives Matter.
Black Lives Matter!
Black Lives Matter!
As more folks arrived, more fireworks were set off.
At first, people simply stood in the street in front of the Justice Center, aiming fireworks straight into the air to provide their incarcerated friends with a show.
This was not universally popular behavior because, again, at least half the crowd was dealing with the opening salvos of pretty serious PTSD at this point.
Of course, the fireworks continued.
And once they hit a certain frequency, everyone's brains kind of got numbed to the effect.
If I can be honest, it started to be fun.
Some individuals and affinity groups within the crowd had brought lasers to shine into the giant camera that had been installed out in front of the Justice Center.
By 10:15 p.m., the fireworks usage had grown more militant, and people were shooting dozens of commercial-grade fireworks straight into the Justice Center, breaking several windows.
At least one prisoner inside was seen waving excitedly out to the crowd, which provoked rejoicing outside.
The fireworks barrage continued, with protesters aiming occasional salvos at the federal courthouse, too.
At around 10.35 p.m., the police finally showed up.
Conquer your New Year's resolution to be more productive with the Before Breakfast podcast.
In each bite-sized daily episode, time management and productivity expert Laura Vanderkam teaches you how to make the most of your time, both at work and at home.
These are the practical suggestions you need to get more done with your day.
Just as lifting weights keeps our bodies strong as we age, learning new skills is the mental equivalent of pumping iron.
Listen to Before Breakfast wherever you get your podcasts.
Give us your attention.
We need everything you got fast.
Waiting on reparations.
We'd be the illest podcast.
Tune in every Thursday, politics and wordplay.
We fight for the people because they got us in the worst way.
From the hill to Brazil, Bombay to Kanty.
From the left enclave to what the neocons say.
Every Thursday, cop the heady conversation.
Break us off with some bread because we're waiting on reparations.
Listen to Waiting on Reparations on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
After 30 years, it's time to return to the halls of West Beverly High and hang out at the Peach Pit.
On the podcast, 9021OMG, join Jenny Garth and Tori Spelling for a rewatch of the hit series Beverly Hills 90210 from the very beginning.
We get to tell the fans all of the behind-the-scenes stories that actually happen.
So they know what happened on camera, obviously, but we can tell them all the good stuff that happened off camera.
Get all the juicy details of every episode that you've been wondering about for decades as 90210 Superfan and radio host Sissony sits in with Jenny and Tori to reminisce, reflect, and relive each moment from Brandon and Kelly's first kiss to shouting, Donna Martin graduates.
You have an amazing memory.
You remember everything about the entire 10 years that we filmed that show.
And you remember absolutely nothing of the 10 years that we filmed that show.
Listen to 9021OMG on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Virtually all the people out on the 4th were, by this point, hardened to police violence.
They'd been trained by weeks in the streets to do exactly the opposite of whatever the police LRAD told them to do.
True to form, they surged forward at this, moving in force into the intersection between the courthouse and justice center.
More and more fireworks were launched at both buildings.
As I moved forward, sensing imminent tear gas, I heard one person behind me say, they shouldn't have said anything.
Look what happens when they talk.
At 10:41 p.m., I started live streaming.
Almost immediately after that, federal agents inside the courthouse started dumping tear gas out of holes in the walls of the courthouse.
Yeah, that's gas.
Yeah, so basically, this has been the 4th of July so far.
People were shooting a shitload of fireworks.
And they gave a warning, and people kept firing fireworks.
And now it looks like thugs are out and shooting tear gas into the square.
The crowd backed up, but did not disperse.
Instead, they retreated to the parks, washed each other's eyes out, and continued to shoot fireworks at both buildings.
After a few minutes, they marched forward again into the intersection.
No one knew it at the time, but with the first federal tear gas deployment and the decision of protesters to continue advancing on the courthouse, a series of events had been set into motion that would turn Portland into one of the biggest stories in the country, lead to hundreds of arrests and several near-fatal injuries.
I don't believe any of the people in the crowd that night particularly wanted that to happen.
I certainly saw no evidence of a concerted plan.
Instead, what I saw was a community of battered people who had just spent weeks being gassed and grenaded and beaten with truncheons and arrested for crimes as minor as standing in an intersection with a sign.
They had started coming out to protest police brutality and wound up repeated victims of it.
And now, over the course of June, they'd gotten good at resisting it.
Each person there had learned tactics to mitigate police riot control agents.
They'd come to trust their fellow Portlanders.
And now, finally, there were enough of them out again to put up serious resistance to the cops, and they had sacks full of commercial-grade fireworks to throw back at the thin blue line shooting grenades at them.
With all that psychic weight behind them, there was simply no way this crowd was going to back down to the demands of police or federal agents.
Instead, the mass of Portlanders swarmed the front steps of the federal courthouse that had just gassed them.
They began launching fireworks directly into its facade, shattering some of the windows higher up.
The street-level windows were all covered in plywood, and those plywood walls had several hinged slits on them that federal agents inside could flip open to shoot from.
I started calling them murder holes after similar features built into medieval castles.
The term stuck.
Minutes went by.
Federal agents would occasionally fire pepperballs into the crowd, but 11 p.m. came and went without another major show of force.
At around 11:05, the police started dumping gas or smoke out of the side door of the justice center.
The feds dropped more gas out too, but instead of dispersing, the crowd moved back in an orderly fashion.
Frontliners with umbrellas and shields moved to the front and deflected pepperballs, while medics washed out eyes and people with gas masks and respirators ran into the cloud to throw more fireworks at the courthouse.
Lots of gas.
The whole situation evolved into something very much like a siege.
Yeah, you can see here one of the murder slits.
Every old medieval time, I think.
So that's where they shooting in house problem, I treat this.
So we definitely have like an old-fashioned medieval scene here.
This sort of crowd getting their shields and firewalls with a crumb.
Yeah, you see the crowd getting their shields to the front.
You see the defenders firing out of murder hold.
You see fire, you know, fireworks being shot into the thing.
This is oh, Jesus Christ.
Yeah.
Clarity night, everybody.
Quite a night.
I can't tell what's smoke from fireworks and what's tear gas.
I think the feds and the police had expected that gas and pepperballs would suffice to force the crowd away, but the crowd kept advancing.
Dedicated teams would run up with traffic cones and put out gas grenades.
Eventually, the feds and the Portland police were forced to bombard both parks just to push the crowd away.
Yeah, wow.
Okay.
Shit is going wild.
Somebody's riding a bicycle with a shield through the crowd.
Fireworks are firing gas pillars.
Oh, there's that behind us.
Let's go through here.
Go through here.
Eventually, the feds and the police made a decision.
More gas.
It was the most gas deployed in Portland since Tear Gas Tuesday.
Despite being doused with gas, the crowd did not scatter.
When I washed my eyes out and was able to look around, I saw hundreds of people still arrayed for battle and ready to go.
The police and federal agents both came out in force that night.
They marched forward, pumping out gas and pepperballs and smoke grenades.
The crowd was forced back foot by foot, but they held together.
I think DHS had expected that the presence of federal agents in military gear would have rattled protesters more.
But activists just treated them like more cops.
The sight of fully armored soldiers in military gear was unsettling, especially since no one at the time had any idea what agency they were with.
Look at these guys.
We got army guys.
Look at guys here.
The combined feds and police succeeded in splitting the crowd in two through a combination of walls of gas and bull rushes.
But both groups held together and proceeded to lead law enforcement on a two-hour chase through the streets of Portland.
There were moments of shocking brutality where police would tackle protesters and drag them on their backs across asphalt into clouds of gas to arrest them.
One protester we interviewed was arrested that night.
She'd shown up as a shield bearer and had been one of the people protecting the crowd from incoming fire.
Yeah, yeah, the 4th of July was wild.
You know, I think everyone went into that night knowing like, you know, this is the 4th of July.
It's going to be a fairly big night.
The protests were really, they were going strong.
And I showed up before the sun went down and was just kind of doing the thing that I had been doing the entire time leading up to that point, which is, you know, I was far enough away from the police that I could be there if anyone got tear gas to help them with saline or something like that.
And I had been coming out each night with like extra gear to hand out to people that didn't have anything.
So I was with one of my friends who ended up getting arrested right next to me.
And I was giving someone saline and he said, Emily, get up there about to rush us.
And I had been given a shield that night because the night before, there was a woman who was who had been tear gassed really, really badly.
And I gave her like my personal gear.
I'd given away all of my extra stuff.
So I gave her my stuff.
And someone came up to me earlier in the evening and was like, are you Emily?
And I was like, yeah.
And they're like, we made this for you.
Like you helped my friend last night.
And so this is for you.
And so I had a shield with me.
I used my shield to get up off of the ground and I started to run.
And that's when I got tackled and arrested.
I had, you know, after looking at the video, I remember feeling at least two knees on top of me.
And, you know, going back and thinking about it, like I had a palm on top of my head.
I ended up with a black eye that I had for like three weeks.
But someone was palming my face into the pavement.
And so, you know, I get up.
I had a backpack on.
They cut my backpack off of me.
The person, the officer that arrested me told me that I had tried to hit a police officer with my shield.
And I just like very calmly and politely said, you know, like, you know, good luck proving that because I would never do anything like that because I wouldn't.
I was down there to help the people that needed to be helped.
I'm not a medic.
I never wore medic gear.
I never claimed to be a medic.
You know, I was just there to assist in any way that I could.
Both crowds engaged in something of a fighting retreat for the better part of two hours.
When police would mass up for a bull rush, protesters would launch fireworks into their riot line.
This disrupted them every time and seemed to even panic some.
Eventually, the police grew so weary of being blasted that they pulled back and both crowds were able to escape pursuit.
At around 1240 a.m., both crowds met up again, just a couple of blocks away from the courthouse and justice center.
After two hours of constant fighting, hundreds and hundreds of people were still together, organized and dangerous.
Despite everyone's weariness, there was tremendous excitement in the air as the crowd of Portlanders reoccupied the parks and set off celebratory fireworks in the center of the Elk statue.
For the first time since the demonstrations had begun on May 29th, Portland protesters had what felt like a real victory.
The police and the federal agents had thrown everything in their arsenal at a crowd that refused to disperse.
People had held their own against multiple riot lines and forced them to back away.
For the first time ever, a crowd kicked out of the parks in front of the Justice Center had succeeded in reoccupying those parks.
For a long time, people just celebrated.
In my own experience, July 4th was the first night that did feel a little like a revolution.
And of course, the coming days and weeks would make it very clear that the fight was far from over and that July 4th had been, at best, a very temporary victory.
But in the early hours of July 5th, it still felt like one.
We'll be right back.
Earning Leisure Time00:04:27
How is that fair, bruh?
Some heroes unsung and some monsters get monuments built for them.
But ain't we all a little bit of monster?
We crooked.
Give us your attention.
We need everything you got fast.
Waiting on reparations.
We'd be the illest podcast.
Tune in every Thursday.
Politics and wordplay.
We fight for the people because they got us in the worst way.
From the hill to Brazil, Bombay to Kanty.
From the left enclave to what the neocons say.
Every Thursday, cop the heady conversation.
Break us off with some bread because we waiting on reparations.
Listen to Waiting on Reparations on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hi, I'm Robert Sex Reese, host of the Dr. Sex Reese Show.
And every episode, I listen to people talk about their sex and intimacy issues.
And yes, I despise every minute of it.
She made mistakes too.
That's true.
She did kill everyone at her wedding.
But hell is real.
We're all trapped here.
And there's nothing any of us can do about it.
So join me, won't you?
Listen to the Dr. Sex Reef Show every Tuesday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.
What's up, guys?
I'm Rashad Bilal.
And I am Troy Millings, and we are the host of the Earn Your Leisure Podcast, where we break down business models and examine the latest trends in finance.
We hold court and have exclusive interviews with some of the biggest names in business, sport and entertainment.
From DJ Khaled to Mark Cuban, Rick Ross, and Shaquille O'Neal.
I mean, our alumni list is expansive.
Listen in as our guests reveal their business models, hardships, and triumphs in their respective fields.
The knowledge is in-depth, and the questions are always delivered from your standpoint.
We want to know what you want to know.
We talk to the legends of business, sports, and entertainment about how they got their start and most importantly, how they make their money.
Earn your leisure is a college business class mixed with pop culture.
Want to learn about the real estate game?
Unclear as how the stock market works?
We got you.
Interested in starting a trucking company or a vending machine business?
Not really sure about how taxes or credit work?
We got it all covered.
The Earn Your Leisure podcast is available now.
Listen to Earn Your Leisure on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands.
I vowed I will be his last target.
He is not going to get away with this.
He's going to get what he deserves.
We always say that, trust your girlfriends.
Listen to the girlfriends.
Trust me, babe.
On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
You know the famous author Roald Dahl.
He thought up Willy Wonka and the BFG.
But did you know he was a spy?
Neither did I. You can hear all about his wildlife story in the podcast, The Secret World of Roald Dahl.
All episodes are out now.
Was this before he wrote his stories?
It must have been.
What?
Okay, I don't think that's true.
I'm telling you, I was a spy.
Binge all 10 episodes of The Secret World of Roald Dahl.
Now on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
On the Ceno Show podcast, each episode invites you into a raw, unfiltered conversation about recovery, resilience, and redemption.
On a recent episode, I sit down with actor, cultural icon Danny Trail to talk about addiction, transformation, and the power of second chances.
The entire season two is now available to binge, featuring powerful conversations with guests like Tiffany Addish, Johnny Knoxville, and more.
I'm an alcoholic.
Without this probe, I'm going to die.
Listen to Ceno's show on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.
On paper, the three hosts of the Nick Dick and Paul Show are geniuses.
We can explain how AI works, data centers, but there are certain things that we don't necessarily understand.
Better version of Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes.
Yes.
Which, by the way, wasn't Taylor Swift who said that for the first time.
I actually, I thought it was.
I got that wrong.
But hey, no one's perfect.
We're pretty close, though.
Listen to the Nick Dick and Paul Show on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.