BLOGTOWN

Joey Gibson talks to a Occupy ICE advocate. Alex Zielinski

The news that Joey Gibson—leader of Vancouver alt-right group Patriot Prayer and Washington candidate for US Senate—was heading to Portland's Occupy ICE camp this evening came as a surprise to both activists and the city. In fact, his appearance inspired Mayor Ted Wheeler to deploy Portland police officers to the Southwest Waterfront camp for the first time since the protest camp set up shop in mid-June.

But Gibson's visit nearly ended as quickly as it began. Gibson and his small Vancouver posse appeared around 6 pm to "get together, drop the fists... and exchange ideologies," according to his Facebook video posted earlier in the day.

Joey Gibson in 2017 Doug Brown

UPDATE (6:02 PM): Portland Police will have officers in the area during Joey Gibson's visit.

Looks like @PortlandPolice is making its #OccupyICEPDX debut tonight. pic.twitter.com/1NDfzxviWh

— Alex Zielinski (@alex_zee) July 21, 2018

ORIGINAL POST: Right wing rabble-rouser/Washington Senate candidate Joey Gibson says he'll be dropping by the Occupy ICE PDX protest this evening, seemingly to converse with protesters and learn about civil disobedience. However, occupiers aren't planning on taking the bait.

"I'm just so curious about what's going down there," Gibson said in a Facebook Live video that came out today.

Gibson's political organization Patriot Prayer is known for "freedom marches" in Portland that have drawn white supremacists, such as alleged MAX stabber Jeremy Christian.

"If you're down there [at the Occupy ICE protest] and hear that I'm coming, don't freak out," Gibson says, adding that he's bringing a small group and they don't "plan on being attacked."

Gibson claims to be interested in coalition building, referring to some of the Occupy protesters as libertarians. "These aren't all communists... some of them hate Antifa," he says, perhaps not realizing the large number of anti-fascist signs he'll be seeing at the protest site. "There's just tons of different groups and ideologies [there]. It's good to get together, drop the fists... and exchange ideologies," he said.

In the video, he adds that he's "extremely interested in civil disobedience," saying he might apply what he learns from occupiers to his future protests in favor of the second amendment.

Gibson's views on ICE are a little unclear from the video. Though he mentions he despises the government and many federal agencies, he noted that a secure border is important to him.

Occupy ICE PDX has already responded on Facebook: "We have unwelcome guests coming to visit camp today," the post says. "We intend to remain strategically chill. As evidenced by Portland Police's collaboration with DHS and Patriot Prayer at their last permitted melee, we should never expect assistance or protection from city or state forces."

When Gibson arrives at the camp tonight, Occupiers plan to greet him with "banners, music, signs, bubbles, vuvuzelas, and MASSIVE indifference to [his] presence."

A 2010 image of a man being held in an Arizona immigration detention center. JOHN MOORE / GETTY IMAGES

It's now been over a month since 121 immigrant men were separated from their families at the Mexico-US border, handcuffed, and shuttled to a federal prison in Sheridan, Oregon. The men represent 16 different countries and speak a combined 13 different languages. The majority of the detainees are seeking asylum from their country of origin, where they faced gang violence or religious persecution.

But the timing of their immigration—in the midst of the Trump administration's criminalization of any undocumented immigrant entering the US—couldn't have been worse. Because of Donald Trump's sweeping decision to detain each and every undocumented immigrant, the country's prison-like detention centers designated for immigrants ran out of space, leaving at least 1,600 immigrants to be divvied up between five actual prisons across the US, including Sheridan Federal Correctional Institution (FCI).

For the first weeks of their incarceration, no detainees were allowed access to a lawyer, make a phone call, read legal documents in their language, or have time outside their cramped cell for more than two hours—all legally-mandated requirements for detained immigrants in the US. While a federal judge ordered the prison to allow lawyers with a pro-bono group called Immigration Law Lab (ILL) inside Sheridan FCI on June 25, detainees are still lacking basic rights, like the ability to call their families or practice their religions. But the disregard goes beyond just legal rights violations.

"Here we have come to save our lives, but I think we will die here in jail.”

New court documents filed this week by federal public defenders who've met with the detainees (and first reported on by OPB) have revealed just how damaging the months of incarceration has been to the immigrants' mental health.

"We felt as if we are stuck on an island in sea and we cannot tell and ask anything from anyone. Sometimes I cried but no one listened," wrote one unidentified detainee in a statement shared by William Teesdale, chief investigator with the Federal Public Defender’s Office. "We are getting crazy by the way we [are] kept locked. Sometimes I feel like dying. It felt like everything is over and I should commit suicide. I [am] very sad. I have lost all hopes getting out of here."

Teesdale's 30-page declaration, describing his experience speaking with detainees inside the prison in June, accompanies five habeas corpus petitions (reports from people who believe they are being illegally detained) filed on behalf of five Sheridan FCI detainees by the public defender's office. For most Sheridan detainees, the public defenders were the first people advocating for their rights since being picked up at the border.

"Staff observed signs of depression, anxiety, terror, stress and despair among the detainees," Teesdale writes. Some of the immigrant men cried in their meeting with Teesdale, he notes.

Portland Bureau of Transportation

The Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) is repaving Rosa Parks Way, and taking the opportunity to make the street more bike friendly by building a new type of bike lane: one that places a row of parked cars between bicyclists and street traffic. The new lane, called a "parking protected bike lane," falls in line with a street design philosophy proven to prevent cars from hitting bicyclists while also maintaining street parking. The project began in May and is expected to be finished in the fall.

“The city of Portland is looking to provide protected bike lanes because they give people the level of comfort they need to go out and ride on the streets," says Geller. "It’s a key element to making biking more accessible to more people.”

Other types of protected bike lanes use trees, curbs, or other vertical design elements to create a visual or physical barrier between bicycles and motorized traffic. Take, for instance, Naito Parkway's "Better Naito" protected bike path, where bicyclists have a row of white plastic dividers between themselves and moving cars. On Rosa Parks, that protection will now be provided by parked cars.

"Parking protected bike lanes are fucking death traps," wrote one critic about the project on a Portland transit meme page on Facebook delightfully called "MAXed Out Memes for Overcast Teens." Another commenter pointed out that placing bikes near the curb exposed them to more debris, like broken glass, and that the configuration makes left turns difficult for bicyclists.

Longtime bike advocates are more moderate in their criticism.

“It’s a step above a regular bike lane, I guess,” says Jonathan Maus, editor and publisher of the prolific BikePortland blog. "I think parking protected bike lanes are okay, but far from ideal. It's like having sleeping sharks protect a swimming area at the beach. Given a choice, I'd much rather have curbs or trees protecting bike lanes instead of cars."