Remember 2020, when the narrative about the George Floyd/BLM protests became so much Silly Putty in the hands of the media, don’t believe your lyin’ eyes and all that?

Chelly Boufferache, known on social media as Hunnybadgermom, remembers it well, both as a longtime Portland resident distressed by what was happening to a city she loved, and as a photographer/videographer watching the chaos night after night after night. (NB: I shot the three videos below; any crappy quality is mine!)

Chelly and I reported together many of those nights. We were tear-gassed, had our equipment swiped, were surrounded by people in black bloc hissing, “We know who you are.” We watched the federal building be molested over and over and over.

We saw an untold number dumpsters on fire, marched with young men toting rifles, kicked through a metric ton of broken glass.

We chronicled the LARPing as it turned to murder, and saw people celebrate that murder. It was an electric time to be reporting, the friction partially due to the pushback both Chelly and I received for telling the story as we found it, which was that nearly all the violence at that time was coming from the left, which, with a heavy assist from the media, was constructing and controlling the narrative.

As I state in the intro, Chelly is a conservative. She is pro law-and-order and a Trump supporter, and could easily go all-in on the new narrative the president desires and kindles: that the 2025 protests in front of Portland’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility - and the city itself - is “a war zone” in need of heavy federal incursion. Has the Trump administration had a difficult time finding useful idiots to spread that narrative? It has not. Readers here know my position on some of the self-described “investigative reporters” shining their star with clumps of manure…

But you may be surprised to hear Chelly — who’s embedded with some of the more-favored pro-ICE reporters as well as ICE itself — call these people out:

I hope you’ll stick around and listen to the audio, where Chelly and I get to tell some war stories, including the time the guy yelling at me here swung the metal rod at my head, just after Chelly shot this clip.

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Journalist Susan Orlean (who has a new memoir coming out!) once said something like, “If I didn’t have a deadline, my spice drawer would never be organized.” And I am on a deadline! But I also watched a few videos last night on Narcissistic Personality Disorder, both because I am narrating a new series called “The Sociopaths Among Us” (three episodes so far: Intro, Candace Owens, Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome), as well as for my own edification, having to deal, as I do, with someone with NPD on a semi-regular basis.

Before we get to that, here are some of the disorder’s characteristics, from the Mayo Clinic:

* Have an unreasonably high sense of self-importance and require constant, excessive admiration.

* Feel that they deserve privileges and special treatment.

* Expect to be recognized as superior even without achievements.

* Make achievements and talents seem bigger than they are.

* Be preoccupied with fantasies about success, power, brilliance, beauty or the perfect mate.

* Be critical of and look down on people they feel are not important.

* Take advantage of others to get what they want.

* Have an inability or unwillingness to recognize the needs and feelings of others.

* Be envious of others and believe others envy them.

* Behave in an arrogant way, brag a lot and come across as conceited.

* Insist on having the best of everything — for instance, the best car or office.

As I say in the video, I have been dealing with someone I’ll call “Gary,” who displays all of these, for decades. This has at times been taxing, albeit you learn over the years how not to engage (this, because it will always always always cost you if you do), or not beyond what is needed to protect your loved ones and yourself.

While looking for a documentary about NPD, I came across Mel Robbins on YouTube. Oof she has a lot of videos, I only watched one in its entirety, but I found the tips useful. This, because the goal of people with NPD is to unseat you, to drag you into whatever drama they deem to be useful to them. Note this need not have any basis in reality, anyway, a few of those tips include, when the person poses the current inanity, “You’re entitled to your opinion” or to just stay silent. I can tell you from experience - and relay several stories in the video - this drives them bonkers.

I have a years-long file on Gary’s misadventures, maybe I’ll write a novel about it at some point, until then…

This week, and I suspect the weeks to come, will be all about what’s unrolling in Portland: the possibility of Trump invoking the Insurrection Act, the debate about whether Portland is bleeding out or trying to recover, and whether yesterday’s Emergency Naked Bike Riders are anarchists in clever disguise. (NB: The Naked Bike Ride is an annual event going on in Portland since 2003, I did it once myself - in sheer underwear!)

Portland made up the first part of yesterday’s episode of Smoke ‘Em If You Got ‘Em, the podcast I do with Sarah Hepola. I am patching part of that in here. A clip - which I am getting pushback about. All comments welcome!

There’s a lot more to say about this changing scene, until then…

How it started…

…how it’s going, courtesy of a Twitter follower who asked, “May I please send you a proper gas mask?”

Your paid subscription helps me keep reporting (and maybe buy more protective gear)

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Hey everybody. I have a few minutes before I book down to ICE, where the scene looks a little hotter today than it’s been in previous days.

After the break*, a report on what happened yesterday in court, where federal judge Karin Immergut (who, weirdly, I went to kindergarten with but have not seen since) heard an argument from the state to temporarily block Trump from federalizing and deploying Oregon National Guard troops. Her decision is expected any minute.

Also, some links, and a recitation as to why my friend says Portland is a war zone, in ways that are sadder and less fixable than the scene in front of ICE.

To new subscribers, welcome. Follow along here and Twitter/X (x.com/NancyRomm), where I live-stream and post clips of the action du jour.

* As you will hear in the opening, this was recording take II III IV, as Substack kept eating my files. What I forgot to mention in final recording was what I see as the endemic corruption among media covering this story, something I alluded to yesterday (and which you can read more about in a piece dropping Monday). Short version: At the moment and of this action, I do not believe anyone’s reporting but my own.

Breaking after this was recorded: Judge Karin Immergut temporarily blocked National Guard troops from deploying in Portland.

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Not a bad picture from, if I do say - and not a trick one: The attendance outside of the Portland Immigration and Detention Center last night was sparse, maybe 30 active protesters, the same number of looky-loos and press, and a score of federal officers. A lively night of entertainment it did not make. Because that’s what it felt like: A show, each small group coming onstage on cue, playing its part, saying its lines (or, in the case of the feds, saying nothing), then going back to their respective places until it was time for the next performance.

That said, word is the National Guard will make their presence known tonight, which will in all likelihood bring out additional protesters. I’ll be there too. Maybe I’ll do some live-streaming for you, here and/or on Twitter (x.com/NancyRomm).

To new subscribers - welcome! To all of you, I have an interview with a somewhat controversial protest figure, dropping likely tomorrow.

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Reporting schedule willing, I’ll post a video or interview each day I am here…

Did I write type those words yesterday morning? I did. And then got preposterously swamped. I’ll be posting Portland Debrief, Day #2 later today (… she types). Until then, I got to Portland on Tuesday and have been down to the ICE headquarters, two miles south of downtown Portland, each day and night since. To say the action is different than in 2020 is an understatement that borders on parody. Which does not mean there is not a story here! Oh, there is.

I am keeping most of the dispatches behind the paywall - and if there has ever been a reason to support reporting that is in the bag for no one, it’s the story on the ground - but two quick teaser videos, one from Tuesday evening. Was it fun to hear the name Ronald Reagan invoked by a protester? It sure was.

The title question, asked of me over cocktails in Brooklyn in July 2020, by Tablet’s Jake Siegel. I was back in my former city within 24 hours and reported for many months about the protests and the mayhem, as many of you here know.

I have continued reporting on various issues in Portland, including Measure 110 and murder. I don’t think I’ll ever be off the Portland beat, nor do I want to be.

Four months ago, a small contingent of Portlanders began demonstrating in front of ICE headquarters. The behavior has not always been great - lots of noise disturbing local residents, people in all-black bear-spraying videographers they feel are on the “other side.” That said, the numbers have been dwindling. Maxine Bernstein at the Oregonian posted a solid data-driven piece about that today.

Messaging and optics often count, alas, more than data. Want “the number of necessary troops in Portland is zero”?

Want Portland as “war-ravaged”?

The only thing I can is give you the story as I find it and as people tell it to me, which I will be doing starting Tuesday. I can tell you now what I was just told: that several hundred National Guard will be moving in tonight or tomorrow. I was further told the action last night in front of ICE was subdued. Will it stay this way? I’ll let you know.

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Short-and-sweet show notes today, friends. Cross-posted at Smoke ‘Em If You Got ‘Em. No paywall on this episode, so feel free to share.

Nancy and Sarah discuss the killing of Charlie Kirk, the 31-year-old founder of Talking Points USA. He was a husband and the father of two young children, and he was shot yesterday while engaging with college students at a Utah College. There is no version of the world that makes his murder anything but a horror.

We talk about political violence, radical movements, violence versus microaggressions, bloodlust in the human animal, ideology as a leverage for murder, and how politics became religion. We also discuss the case of Iryna Zarutska, the 23-year-old Ukrainian refugee stabbed to death on a Charlotte, NC subway. What stories make the news? What do we want our news to tell us? These are deep/complicated questions, and whether this moment pushes us closer or farther from the light, Nancy and Sarah are in it together.

Also, here we are again, at September 11.

This is a free episode. Pass it around!

Episode Notes:

“College students increasingly believe violence is justifiable to stop speech,” by Angel Eduardo (The Argument)

Men We Reaped, by Jesmyn Ward

The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates, by Wes Moore

What’s in your hot box?

Nancy:

Sarah: Public Enemies: America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34, by Bryan Burrough

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Hello from JFK, my third trip to airports in 24 hours, maybe this time the plane will not return to the gate to refuel/be cancelled/be delayed to the point that I will miss my connection, which is not an option.

I have been thinking a lot in the past few days (months/forever) about how to be of use. I am very fortunate to be surrounded by many friends whose work means a lot to many people. That it does is no accident! Not when you churn out content that informs and entertains people and, when they are frightened or confused, reassures them. I have written more than once that after 9/11, I had an image of the poets blinking out from the warrens they work in; we needed them now, to explain what was going on. I mention in the video The Fifth Column guys and what they mean to people. As an example, see today’s Mailbucket, letters from listeners in North Carolina and Spain and South Africa and the UK, reaching out to exchange heartache and offer thanks and to jackass and to just keep talking. What a service.

I mention too Matt Taibbi’s Racket News as being useful. Whether you are agree or disagree (I am somewhere in the middle) with what he is reporting, re: the allegations Tulsi Gabbard has leveled at Obama et al, people want what it, in that it rips open a part of our brains where questions have been worming for a decade. Letting in the sunshine is of use.

I am sorry to report that my video is no sunshiny, but perhaps it is of use. Or perhaps I am asking you to be of use to me.

When I was writing To the Bridge, I listened to the soundtrack of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford many hundreds of times. The song “Rather Lovely Thing,” especially, felt and still feels like an encapsulation of the death of a child. It was as though the song was a line from this world to the next I had to hold on to it; I had to, I could not let it go.

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Pie people, here’s a portion of the latest episode of Smoke ‘Em If You Got ‘Em, where Blocked and Reported co-host Katie Herzog talks about how she quit drinking. We talk about her cancelation for, imo, writing one of the tenderest features (albeit about detransitioners so, no safe ground), her upcoming book, Drink Your Way Sober, the tragic story of Jonathan Joss (who I wrote about in “Men Alone”), and end with a long appreciation for the journalist William Langewiesche, who I’ve written about and gone drinking with and who died this week at age 70.

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