Ore. loses bid to rein in feds sent in by Trump
State lacks standing, according to decision
PORTLAND, Ore. — A U.S. judge on Friday denied Oregon’s request to restrict federal agents’ actions when they arrest people during chaotic protests that have roiled Portland and pitted local officials against the Trump administration.
Federal agents deployed by President Donald Trump to tamp down the unrest have arrested dozens during nightly demonstrations against racial injustice that often turn violent.
Democratic leaders in Oregon say federal intervention has worsened the two-month crisis, and the state attorney general sued to allege that some people had been whisked off the streets in unmarked vehicles.
U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman said the state lacked standing to sue on behalf of protesters because the lawsuit was a “highly unusual one with a particular set of rules.”
Oregon was seeking a restraining order on behalf of its residents not for injuries that had already happened but to prevent injuries by federal officers in the future.
That combination makes the standard for granting such a motion very narrow, and the state did not prove it had standing in the case, Mosman wrote.
Legal experts who reviewed the case before the decision had warned that he could reject it on those grounds.
A lawsuit from a person accusing federal agents of violating his or her rights to free speech or against unconstitutional search and seizure would have a much higher chance of success, Michael Dorf, a constitutional law professor at Cornell University, said ahead of the ruling.
The clashes in Portland have further inflamed the nation’s political tensions and triggered a crisis over the limits of federal power.
Protesters in Portland have been targeting the federal courthouse, setting fires outside and vandalizing the building, which U.S. authorities say they have a duty to protect. Federal agents have used tear gas, less-lethal ammunition, which left one person critically injured, and other force to scatter protesters.
Before the federal intervention, Mayor Ted Wheeler and other local leaders had said a small cadre of violent activists were drowning out the message of peaceful protesters.
But the Democrat, who was teargassed this week by federal agents amid a tense meeting with protesters who jeered him, says the federal presence is exacerbating the situation and he’s repeatedly told them to leave.
Homeland Security acting Secretary Chad Wolf denied that federal agents were inflaming the situation in Portland and said Wheeler legitimized criminality by joining demonstrators, whom Trump has called “anarchists and agitators.”
Agents have arrested 18 people in Portland this week, not including early Friday, when they again used tear gas to force thousands of demonstrators from crowding around the courthouse.
Protesters projected lasers on the building and tried to take down a security fence. They scattered as clouds of gas rose up and agents fired crowd control munitions.
Wolf said Tuesday that 43 people had been arrested on federal charges at that point.
They face federal charges including assaulting federal officers, arson and damaging federal property,
U.S. Attorney Billy J. Williams said. All the defendants are local and were released after making a court appearance.