According to a recent post on Truth Social, President Trump has directed Secretary of War Pete Hegseth to deploy troops to Portland with an authorization of “full force.”
In response, Governor Tina Kotek held a joint press conference in downtown Portland yesterday morning along with law enforcement representatives and local, county, regional, and state elected officials. You can watch Governor Kotek’s remarks here:
Two themes emerged from the press conference: that Portland does not require, nor has it requested, the deployment of federal troops; and that local leaders have a list of resources and actions that the federal government could offer to support the challenges that Portland and other regions face.
Kotek stated multiple times that she has not requested troop deployment. "There is no insurrection. There is no threat to national security, and there is no need for military troops in our major city. Military service members should be dedicated to real emergencies. " She went on to say, "Oregon is our home. It is not a military target."
Mayor Keith Wilson followed Gov. Kotek's statements, saying, “The number of necessary troops in Portland is zero.”
Police Chief Bob Day added his perspective: "We have had an amazing year of free speech expression, and I have no doubt that will continue. We have had literally tens of thousands of Portlanders walking the streets, in our parks, expressing their First Amendment rights, their opinions, their dissidence with what they’re seeing happen on a federal or even a local level, and yet we have not had arrests, we have not had vandalism."
Instead, local leaders described the federal resources that have previously been allocated and which they would like to have.
Congresswoman Bonamici spoke as a representative of the congressional delegation that includes Representatives Bynum, Dexter, and Salinas, itemizing federal opportunities for support: "There are so many things you could be doing to help Portland. You could hire back the federal employees you fired. You could send the dollars that Congress appropriated for infrastructure, for housing, for education. Those are things that will help Portland."
Multnomah County Chair Vega Pederson followed a similar thread, saying, "What our region actually needs from the federal government is Medicaid and our social safety net services."
Many Portlanders and Oregonians, including Senator Ron Wyden, have taken to social media over the weekend to visually describe "war-ravaged Portland."
It is unclear at this point what federal deployment might look like.
