"Portlanders deploying inflatable animal costumes, a brass band, mass ukulele renditions of "This Land Is Your Land," naked bike rides, and other tactics in their ICE protests are undermining the Trump administration's lurid claims that Portland, Oregon, is a "war-torn" city under siege by a violent left. It's hard to portray someone dancing in an inflatable frog or chicken costume as a terrorist."
"This, of course, hasn't stopped the Trump administration from officially designating antifa a domestic terrorist organization. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem even claimed to have arrested in Portland "one of the girlfriends of one of the founders of Antifa," which has never been a real organization, just a nickname for antifascists. Girlfriend of founder of imaginary group is, well, a very Kristi Noem category. But the right has been claiming the left is violent even longer than it's been hallucinating about antifa."
The Trump administration portrays an imagined 'antifa' threat to justify transforming ICE into an ultra-violent, unaccountable force operating in US cities. Playful, nonviolent Portland protests—inflatable animal costumes, brass bands, mass ukulele renditions, naked bike rides—expose the mismatch between spectacle and claims that the city is 'war-torn' and besieged by violent leftists. Antifa lacks centralized organization yet has been officially labeled a domestic terrorist threat, and arrests tied to alleged founders remain unsubstantiated. Authoritarian politics routinely invent or exaggerate enemies, depict marginalized groups as existential threats, and amplify danger to rationalize suspending laws, violating rights, and militarizing enforcement against dissent.
Read at The Nation
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