I Won’t Quit
Antifa’s beatings won’t stop my reporting
‘Can you see through those goggles?” John Hacker asked me as I stood in the middle of an Antifa crowd outside the Portland Police Central Precinct May 28, 2021.
It had been four months since the release of my book, “Unmasked,” and half a year since I’d been on the ground in Oregon. After I completed the book manuscript in 2020, I left Portland due to growing credible threats against my life. But family matters pulled me back to my hometown — the city still under siege by violent protests and riots a year after George Floyd died.
Hacker was partially masked, but I recognized him right away. In May 2019, he confronted, assaulted and robbed me at a gym in northeast Portland. In October 2021, he was indicted by a Multnomah County grand jury for felony robbery against me. His criminal case is still pending.
But that night, Hacker’s question signaled Antifa had grown suspicious of me. I was undercover again, dressed head-to-toe in black like the Antifa militants around me. As before, I knew it was extremely dangerous to be on the streets.
There was already a bounty on my head. The threats increased as I systematically documented who was arrested and charged at every riot. I posted their photos and evidence of their ties to Antifa. But the motivation to learn more about how Antifa’s tactics have evolved drove me to return to the streets.
This time, it nearly cost me my life. Again.
After Hacker left, I walked one block west, near the Mark O. Hatfield US Courthouse. In July 2020, thousands of rioters tried to break its protective fencing and set the building on fire night after night.
Antifa fully masked in black had followed me. “Why did you look so nervous tonight?” asked one. I answered, quietly: “I have anxiety.” The man looked to his comrades and said, “I think it’s him.”
I began walking north, towards the AC Hotel by Marriott. Everything else was boarded up.
After two city blocks, I made it to the hotel lobby doors — but they were locked. Antifa surrounded me, then one forcefully grabbed at my face, pulling off my goggles and mask. “It’s Andy! Get him! Get him!” he screamed as I took off sprinting for my life.
I was tackled at full force to the concrete ground. My left knee absorbed the full brunt of both my body as well as the person who tackled me. The impact shredded my skin as I slid. I tried getting up, but the Antifa held me until some of his comrades caught up. One man began punching my face, head and body until I collapsed. He put me in a hold. Those who had been baying for my blood for two years had me in their literal grip.
I could hear others approaching. I knew that when they got to me, they would kill me. And they would make it painful and long.
But someone shouted, “Get off!” A local journalist ran up and intervened. His courageous act distracted the person holding me down so I could push his arms off and take off running again, albeit with a limp. Given what felt like a second chance at life, I ran to a nearby hotel, the Nines. “Call 911. Call 911. They’re going to kill me!”
The two staff on duty refused and said I needed to leave the property. I got on my knees behind the desk and continued pleading. By now, one of the female Antifa had run inside the lobby after me. Elizabeth Renee Richter, 38, began livestreaming to rally more comrades to the hotel.
“I can’t wait for you to come out, Andy,” she threatened. “You
thought the milkshakes were bad last time? We’re gonna beat the f--k out of you, bitch.” She was referring to my June 2019 assault in which after punching me repeatedly on the head and robbing me of my camera equipment, an Antifa mob doused me with “milkshakes” and other liquids. I had a brain hemorrhage and nearly died.
The lobby shook from rioters outside pounding on the hotel’s glass. I escaped in the elevator.
Outside, dozens of responding officers in riot gear finally mobilized to push the Antifa back and secure the building. Eventually a lone Portland Fire and Rescue medic found me. I was driven to the emergency room of the Oregon Health and Science University — the same hospital I was treated at in June 2019 for the last Antifa beating. Online, Antifa accounts were trying to find out which hospital I was at and discussed ways to finish me off.
The morning after my discharge from the hospital, I left Portland. For four weeks, I was rushed from safehouse to safehouse in different states.
Antifa think they’ve won. I suffer the long-term effects of the brain injury from their assault in 2019. They’ve forced me away from my family in Portland. And as a result of the latest beating, I suffer from a long-term knee injury and PTSD.
But Antifa haven’t won. My resolve is strengthened, and the public is more informed than ever as a result of their violence.
Adapted from the just-released paperback version of “Unmasked.”