Trump Makes False Assertion Regarding National Guard Forces Are Deployed in Portland
Former President Donald Trump once again shared false information about Portland, Oregon on social media on Wednesday, stating how national guard troops he activated following a small protest near a Immigration and Customs Enforcement office are “now in place” and started bringing back “law and order”.
Yet, accounts from local media indicated that none of the guard were yet in place near the ICE building where protesters have been protesting opposing immigration enforcement for months.
The Oregon national guard had no immediate comment to a request for comment, but a national guard commander informed state lawmakers earlier this week how the 200 personnel who were activated required another four to seven days for preparation before being deployed, likely early next week.
Gibson explained how these forces, from two areas about an hour south from the city, have been either trained as military police or in crowd control.
Oregon’s governor stated in a statement, “The president’s unauthorized use of members of the Oregon National Guard may cost the public up to $10m, as per the Oregon Military Department.”
This estimate includes pay, equipment, food, accommodation and additional expenses linked to the assignment of 200 guard members to Portland for 60 days.
“The nation and our state should be focused on solving real problems,” the governor remarked. “Wasting an estimated $10m dollars on made up problems is an insult to Americans facing living expenses, healthcare costs, neighborhood safety and other concerns. Not only is this an abuse of power, it’s a failure of the president’s duty to solve real problems.”
Over the weekend, the state’s top lawyer Dan Rayfield initiated legal action through the courts to stop the deployment, arguing that the president’s description of the peaceful city as “war ravaged” is “pure fiction”.
Rayfield further contended that the president overstepped his powers by federalizing the National Guard from the governor. A court session on the temporary order for a temporary restraining order is set this Friday.
In remarks to senior military officers elsewhere, Trump reiterated his false claim that Portland “resembles a war zone”, and recounted a conversation with Governor Kotek recently. During it, he stated, he told Kotek how what he had seen on television contradicted her first-hand account that the city was peaceful and that authorities managed the protest limited to one area.
“‘Well, unless they’re playing false tapes, this look[s] like world war two,’” the president said he told Kotek. “‘Your place is burning down.’”
It is unclear precisely what Trump viewed on television that gave him the mistaken idea that Portland, presently calm and lively, looks like a battlefield, however the president’s favorite channel, a news outlet, aired a segment three weeks ago in which incorrectly dated video from Portland protests in 2020 was shown to illustrate the ongoing demonstrations.
Recently, the network has relied heavily in its coverage on Portland on dispatches from reporters from biased sources, including a conservative group, that routinely exaggerate the scale of unrest during progressive demonstrations.
On social media, Portlanders have kept ridiculing Trump’s inaccurate statements regarding Portland, sharing photos of themselves living normally contrasted with Trump’s audio stating, recently, that it is “like being in hell”.
Far from reassessing his impression of the situation in Portland truly are, based on feedback from elected officials and city residents, on Wednesday, Trump claimed online that Oregon’s governor “is out of touch with reality”.