Oregon’s governor says she told Kristi Noem ‘there is no insurrection in Oregon’
There was a bit of an unexplained delay earlier between Kristi Noem’s arrival at the airport in Portland and the departure of the homeland security secretary’s motorcade for the Ice field office.
The reason, it seems, is that Noem was greeted at the airport by Oregon’s governor, Tina Kotek, who said in a statement that she asked for the meeting when she “heard through unofficial channels” that the secretary planned to visit Portland.
According to Kotek, she “reiterated again that there is no insurrection in Oregon.”
“I requested that Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents obey Oregon laws when they engage in federal operations,” the governor added. “I reiterated that I continue to be focused on doing whatever I can to protect Oregonians from military intervention or harmful federal law enforcement tactics. Oregon is united against military policing in our communities.”
In a news conference on Sunday, after Oregon had convinced a federal judge appointed by Donald Trump that conditions on the ground did not come close to warranting military intervention, Kotek told reporters that she was concerned that federal officers were violating state law.
“We’ve worked really hard in the state of Oregon, from 2020 on, to have better crowd control techniques. There are clear laws of when you can be using teargas, for example. They’re not following any of those,” the governor said the day after federal officer blanketed the neighborhood around the facility in teargas.
The intensity of the chemical munitions was such that a reporter who visited the site the following day had trouble breathing.
Key events
Closing summary
This concludes our live coverage of the second Trump administration for the day, but we will be back on Wednesday. In the meantime, here are the latest developments:
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The attorney general, Pam Bondi, refused to answer questions about the indictment of James Comey and what happened to the $50,000 Tom Homan, the border czar, reportedly accepted from undercover FBI agents last year.
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Donald Trump met the Canadian prime minister, Mark Carney, and jokingly pushed him to agree to “a merger” of their two countries. He also declined to rule out invoking the insurrection act to put troops on the streets of the US, which might have made the prospect of joining the union even less appealing.
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Trump suggested that he might not follow a law mandating that furloughed government workers will get backpay after the government shutdown ends.
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Texas national guard troops arrived in Illinois, over the objections of the state’s governor.
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House speaker Mike Johnson said that his decision to stave off swearing in representative-elect Adelita Grijalva of Arizona has “nothing to do” with the fact that she would be the 218th signature on the bipartisan discharge petition – to compel a House vote on the full release of the Epstein files.
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Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, visited the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) facility in Portland, Oregon accompanied by conservative influencers. Portland police cleared the street outside ahead of Noem’s arrival, keeping a handful of protesters, one dressed as a chicken and another as a baby shark, at distance. She led federal officers in prayer and met Oregon’s governor and Portland’s mayor and police chief during her visit. When she appeared on the roof of the facility, protesters blared the Benny Hill theme.
Portland’s mayor tells Noem ‘out-of-state social media influencers’ distort reality in city
In a meeting with the homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, Portland’s mayor, Keith Wilson, complained about what he has described as excessive use of force and tear gas by federal officers and tried to convince her that conditions in the city bear little resemblance to the wild claims made by her boss, Donald Trump.
“What Secretary Noem saw today in Portland matches our reports: Portland continues to manage public safety professionally and responsibly, irrespective of the claims of out-of-state social media influencers,” Wilson said in a statement after the meeting.
Given that Noem invited a trio of conservative social influencers to join her on her brief visit to the city on Tuesday, two of whom are partisans from other states who falsely refer to the protesters as “terrorists”, Wilson’s warning about being fooled by their videos may have fallen on deaf ears.
“I continue to maintain that the tactics used by federal agents at the Ice facility are troubling and likely unconstitutional,” Wilson added.
“We believe a constitutional federal government must be accountable to the community in terms of clear limits on use of force, officer identification, limits on chemical munitions, and body-worn cameras,” the mayor said.
On Sunday, Wilson told reporters that he had complained to the civil rights division of the department of justice about the behavior of federal officers on Saturday, after they pushed protesters off the streets and sidewalks doused the neighborhood around the Ice facility in Portland in tear gas.
“We see Federal Protective Service that’s really trying to inflame the situation, not put it down and certainly not just protect property,” Wilson said. “We saw unjustified uses of force. We saw shoving peaceful veterans and elderly people to the ground. Indiscriminate use of impact munitions [and] pepper spray.”
The civil rights division of the department of justice that Wilson appealed to for help is currently run by Harmeet Dhillon, an assistant attorney general who previously represented prominent conservative social media influencers, including Andy Ngo and James O’Keefe.
Republican House leaders refuse to swear in newly elected Democrat Adelita Grijalva, key vote on release of Epstein files
Asked earlier on Tuesday if Adelita Grijalva, a newly elected Democrat, has not yet been sworn in as a member of Congress because she intends to sign a discharge petition which would require a House vote to compel the justice department to release all of its files on Jeffrey Epstein, Mike Johnson, the Republican House speaker told reporters he would swear her in “as soon as she wants”.
Hours later, however, a House Republican leadership aide told CNN that Grijalva, who won a special election last month to replace her late father, would not be sworn in until the government shutdown ends.
“We will swear in representative-elect Grijalva as soon as the House returns to session when Chuck Schumer, Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego decide to open up the government,” the Republican aide told the broadcaster.
As the CNN reporter Manu Raju pointed out to Johnson, he previously swore in two newly elected members during a pro-forma session, like the current one.
Senator Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat who lives in the Congressional district Grijalva was elected to represent two weeks ago, said in a social media video: “This is starting to get ridiculous.”
“I’m not sure exactly the reason,” Kelly added. “Maybe it’s about Jeffrey Epstein, I don’t know.”
Senior Illinois senator Dick Durbin deplores arrival of Texas national guard in his state
Senator Dick Durbin, the Illinois Democrat, issued a blistering statement on the arrival of troops from the Texas national guard troops arrive in his state.
“Deploying the Texas National Guard, over the objections of Illinois elected officials, is not only unnecessary, but it is also unlawful. The law, specifically the Posse Comitatus Act, expressly forbids our nation’s military to be used for domestic law enforcement without express statutory or constitutional authorization. National Guard personnel do not deserve to be used as political pawns in President Trump’s political theater,” Durbin said.
He continued:
“As made clear in today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, the Trump Administration continues to shut out Illinois officials. Administration officials have recklessly sent in troops and agency leaders, including FBI Director Kash Patel, to Chicago without speaking to our state’s leaders. If the Trump Administration truly wanted to help Chicagoans, they wouldn’t defy Illinois’ elected leaders. They would work with us.”
Gabrielle Canon
Earlier on Tuesday, senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, accused the Trump administration of orchestrating a plan to crush dissent and opposition, and called on his colleagues to recognize the authoritarian takeover unfolding around them.
“We aren’t on the verge of an authoritarian takeover – we are in the middle of it,” he said, after outlining how a cycle of outrage has clouded the ability of senators to see the concentration of power in its totality. “I think it’s time for all of us – Republicans and Democrats – to really step back and come to terms with the full picture of what is happening right now in America.”
Speaking on the Senate floor, Murphy stood next to a sign outlining what he described as five steps in what he called “The Plan” to bring about the death of a democracy:
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Convert the justice system into a political witch hunt operation
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Eliminate the free press and replace it with state-run media
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Militarize law enforcement
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Seize control of government spending and taxation
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Rig the rules
Murphy talked through each step, connecting actions already taken by the Trump administration to each. Murphy described how the indictment of former FBI director James Comey, and the investigation of the attorney general of New York, Letitia James, both of whom previously led investigations of Trump, instills fear in people who might otherwise speak out. “This is a tried and true tactic of a totalitarian state,” he said.
Murphy pointed to the administration’s use of the federal government regulatory powers to censor and consolidate media, and threats to pull the licenses of stations that didn’t remove the president’s loudest critics from the air.
“The deployment of the military to Chicago and to Portland and Los Angeles is illegal,” Murphy said, moving to step three. “But it is designed, once again to quell dissent and protest. This isn’t about public safety – it is about political intimidation.”
Murphy named examples of the administration overstepping Congressional control of spending and taxation, including the cancellation of grants and suspending projects in Democratic-led cities and states.
The fifth part of the plan, he said, is happening through Trump’s demands that Congressional lines be redrawn to elect more Republicans.
Murphy said all these events are connected to a “well-thought-out plan” that will allow Trump and his allies to “rule forever”.
“The rules get rigged, essentially, so the party in power never loses – that is the plan,” Murphy said. “It is not too late for us to see it and for us to stop it.”
Oregon governor says state’s national guard is under her command and should be sent home
Oregon’s governor, Tina Kotek, said on Tuesday that she is back in command of the state’s national guard, following a federal judge’s ruling that Donald Trump acted illegally by federalizing 200 troops to respond to an emergency in Portland that simply does not exist.
In a statement, the governor said that she has written to the regional US military command in Colorado asking that 200 citizen-soldiers from Oregon’s national guard be immediately demobilized, and 200 federalized troops from California’s national guard be sent home.
The Oregon national guard troops are currently staged at Camp Rilea on the Pacific coast, about a two-hour drive from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) field office in Portland, according to the governor. The California national guard troops are staged at Camp Withycombe, about 30 minutes southeast of the Ice facility.
“Judge Karin J. Immergut’s orders are a clear and forceful rebuttal to President Trump’s misuse of states’ National Guard. Thus, I am directing Northern Command to send Oregon’s citizen-soldiers home from Camp Rilea immediately,” Kotek said in her statement. “Let’s remember that these Oregonians are our neighbors and friends, who have been unlawfully uprooted from their family and careers – they deserve better than this.”
On Saturday, Immergut ruled that Trump did not have the authority to federalize the Oregon national guard since his claims about mass anarchy and arson in Portland were “simply untethered to the facts.”
On Sunday, after Trump attempted to evade that ruling by deploying troops from the California guard he had seized control of in June, the judge issued a second order, blocking the deployment of national guard troops from any state or the District of Columbia to Oregon.
Oregon’s governor says she told Kristi Noem ‘there is no insurrection in Oregon’
There was a bit of an unexplained delay earlier between Kristi Noem’s arrival at the airport in Portland and the departure of the homeland security secretary’s motorcade for the Ice field office.
The reason, it seems, is that Noem was greeted at the airport by Oregon’s governor, Tina Kotek, who said in a statement that she asked for the meeting when she “heard through unofficial channels” that the secretary planned to visit Portland.
According to Kotek, she “reiterated again that there is no insurrection in Oregon.”
“I requested that Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents obey Oregon laws when they engage in federal operations,” the governor added. “I reiterated that I continue to be focused on doing whatever I can to protect Oregonians from military intervention or harmful federal law enforcement tactics. Oregon is united against military policing in our communities.”
In a news conference on Sunday, after Oregon had convinced a federal judge appointed by Donald Trump that conditions on the ground did not come close to warranting military intervention, Kotek told reporters that she was concerned that federal officers were violating state law.
“We’ve worked really hard in the state of Oregon, from 2020 on, to have better crowd control techniques. There are clear laws of when you can be using teargas, for example. They’re not following any of those,” the governor said the day after federal officer blanketed the neighborhood around the facility in teargas.
The intensity of the chemical munitions was such that a reporter who visited the site the following day had trouble breathing.
Noem departs Ice facility in Portland, passing protesters in animal costumes
Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, has apparently completed her visit to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) field office in Portland, Oregon.
According to the Maga influencers in her entourage, Noem met with the Portland police chief, Bob Day, and then drove out of the facility past a handful of protesters outside, including one dressed as a bear wearing a sombrero.
Despite the obvious comedic disconnect between the claims from Donald Trump that this field office is “under siege” from “domestic terrorists” and the real evidence of a small number of demonstrators in such non-threatening attire, the influencers continued to refer to the protesters as dangerous radicals.
One of the influencers, Benny Johnson, claimed that Portland’s police chief had “sided with violent ANTIFA militants assaulting journalists and officers outside ICE facility”.
Johnson was referring to the arrest last week of another influencer in Noem’s entourage, Nick Sortor, after he tried to force his way through a protest encampment and got into a scuffle with protesters. Johnson made no mention of the fact that the charges of disorderly conduct against Sortor have already been dropped.
While Johnson referred to Sortor and other pro-Trump influencers who have been engaged in scuffles with protesters as journalists, there is copious evidence that they are partisan activists who often act in provocative ways, rather than nonpartisan reporters documenting events as observers.
Kristi Noem visits Portland Ice office with Maga influencers in tow
Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, is currently touring the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) facility in Portland, Oregon accompanied by conservative influencers who arrived in her motorcade.
Portland police cleared the street outside the Ice office in the city’s south waterfront neighborhood ahead of Noem’s arrival, keeping a handful of protesters, one dressed as a chicken and another as a baby shark, at distance.
A country-style song, with the refrain, “Trump is in the Epstein files, yes he is”, blared from a protest encampment down the street and one protesters shouted to a government videographer on the roof of the facility, “Did we rename the department of homeland security the ministry of propaganda?”
Reporters from local news outlets were also held behind the police line outside, as the partisan influencers in Noem’s entourage, Benny Johnson, Nick Sortor and David Media, shared social media updates of the secretary leading federal officers in prayer inside, giving a pep talk, and telling a member of the Oregon national guard to “Get ready.”
Noem has previously echoed Donald Trump’’s claims that a small band of protesters, who have rallied in their dozens outside the Ice facility since June, including one who wears an inflatable frog costume, are “terrorists” who have placed the office “under siege”, making the deployment of federal troops essential.
On Saturday, a federal judge in Portland blocked Trump’s effort to federalize Oregon’s national guard, determining that the president’s claims that the peaceful city was “burning to the ground” were “untethered to the facts.”
A day later the same judge, who was nominated to the bench by Trump, expanded her order to block national guards troops from any jurisdiction from being deployed in Portland, after Trump tried to deploy members of the California national guard, previously federalized in response to protests in Los Angeles, to Oregon.
Since Trump has drawn attention to the small but persistent protest outside the Ice facility, and made false claims that Portland is “war ravaged”, a growing number of his supporters, including Maga influencers, have turned up to confront the protesters, which has resulted in fistfights and to a series of arrests, including of Sortor. After an outcry in the conservative media, and from the attorney general, Pam Bondi, charges against Sortor were dropped.
Johnson, a former journalist who reinvented himself as a Christian nationalist influencer after he was fired from Buzzfeed for plagiarism, just shared video of Noem looking down from the roof of the Ice facility at the small group of protesters below, including Jack Dickinson, a protest organizers who wears a chicken costume to mock Trump.
Johnson captioned the video of Noem inspecting the placid scene below: “DHS Secretary Kristi Noem stares down army of Antifa and a guy in a chicken suit”.
Raskin says Trump’s threat to withhold back pay from federal workers after shutdown is illegal
Congressman Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat who represents many federal workers, responded on Tuesday to a leaked White House memo arguing that furloughed federal employees may not be entitled to back pay after a government shutdown ends.
“All federal employees are legally entitled to back pay when the government reopens after a shutdown. I know this because in 2019, I helped pass the Government Employee Fair Treatment Act which made this a requirement. Donald Trump knows this, too—he signed it into law,” Raskin said in a statement.
“Now, as the White House reverses course, the president is threatening to deliberately violate the law; or he is suffering from a debilitating case of legislative amnesia. Either way, he should refresh his memory on the law he signed. And if he chooses to barrel forward anyway, he should get ready for a fight in court,” the Maryland congressman continued.
“The president has no right to just pay the federal workers in his own political camp. That’s a violation of the law and of the First Amendment,” Raskin, a former constitutional law professor, said.
Per my last post, it’s worth noting that Republican congressman Thomas Massie, who is a co-sponsor of the discharge petition to force a vote on the Epstein files, has called out the House speaker directly.
Massie said that Johnson is “doing everything he can, including delaying the swearing in of the most recently elected member of Congress and spreading misinformation about the legislation, to block a vote in Congress on legislation to release the Epstein files”.
Johnson says that not swearing in Arizona congresswoman has ‘nothing to do’ with Epstein file vote
Also today, House speaker Mike Johnson said that his decision to stave off swearing in representative-elect Adelita Grijalva of Arizona has “nothing to do” with the fact that she would be the 218th signature on the bipartisan discharge petition – to compel a House vote on the full release of the Epstein files.
“We will swear her in when everybody gets back,” Johnson said, referring to his decision to not call lawmakers back to the hill, in order to jam Democrats and force the Senate to vote on a House-passed funding bill to keep the government funded. “We’re in pro forma session because there is nothing for the House to do. The House has done its job … it’s exactly the same thing that Chuck Schumer voted for in March, so the house will get back to our normal order in doing our job as soon as he votes to reopen the government, because real people’s lives are hanging in the balance right now.”
Edward Helmore
Six former US surgeons general – the top medical posting in Washington – warned in an opinion column published Tuesday that policy changes enacted by health and human services (HHS) secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, are “endangering the health of the nation”.
The surgeons general – Jerome Adams, Richard Carmona, Joycelyn Elders, Vivek Murthy, Antonia Novello and David Satcher – who served under both Republican and Democrat administrations, identified changes in vaccine policy, medical research funding, a shift in priorities from rationality to ideology, plunging morale, and changes to staffing as areas of concern.
Referring to their oaths of office, both Hippocratic as physicians and as public servants, the former officials wrote in the Washington Post that they felt “compelled to speak with one voice to say that the actions of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are endangering the health of the nation”.
“Never before have we issued a joint public warning like this. But the profound, immediate and unprecedented threat that Kennedy’s policies and positions pose to the nation’s health cannot be ignored,” they said, adding that they could not ignore the “profound, immediate and unprecedented threat” of his policies.
