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GOOD MORNING, PORTLAND!👋
Welcome back to Thong Summer™, and while temps may temporarily calm down to a still-toasty 88 degrees today, the sun will come blasting back tomorrow through Thursday, hitting the upper 90s and close to 100 degrees on Wednesday! So dress for heat success, and be sure to check in on your neighbors. Now let’s warm up with some NEWS.
IN LOCAL NEWS:
• Once again a Black man has died by the hands of Portland Police, with video being released on late Friday afternoon—the dead zone when public officials hope you aren’t paying attention—of officers cuffing a man in mental distress on his stomach, where he died minutes later. Officers were called on June 27 to the apartment of Damon Lamarr Johnson who was reportedly acting erratically. Our Courtney Vaughn reports, “Police body camera footage shows Johnson, 52, was wrestled to the ground, where he lay face down with his hands cuffed and officers’ hands on his back. A few minutes later, Johnson was unresponsive.” Many police agencies across the nation have stopped putting suspects face down, because they have been warned for decades that it has been a factor in hundreds of in-custody deaths. The city is still under a settlement agreement with the US Department of Justice, following a pattern of PPB using force against people with mental illness. Unfortunately, Johnson’s death will not be investigated by the new Police Accountability Board, as it is not yet operational—so dollars to doughnuts, don’t be surprised if thanks to the police union, they get away with it again. Our Courtney Vaughn has more.
Newly released body camera footage shows the moments leading up to Damon Lamarr Johnson’s death after Portland police held him on the ground in handcuffs. Johnson’s death has renewed calls for a robust alternative response system to handle calls for behavioral health issues.
— Portland Mercury (@portlandmercury.com) July 11, 2025 at 8:15 PM
• Oregon is one of 18 states that boasts the Health Related Social Needs program, which offers low income people with medical conditions funding to stay housed. However, the rollout has not gone as planned, with roughly 2,000 Portland area residents getting dangerously close to homelessness because the checks have not come through as promised. CareOregon, who facilitates the payment, apparently hasn’t noticed the homelessness crisis in the city, and “didn’t fully anticipate the number of people who needed help and the urgency of their needs.” Nearly a third of the people who were accepted into the program have not received their funding after seven months, and many are in eviction proceedings. 😑
• Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem (AKA “ICE Barbie”) issued a statement on Friday lambasting Portland protesters who continue to demonstrate at the Southwest ICE facility, saying they’ve been doxxing masked federal officers who (after gassing demonstrators and the surrounding neighborhood) were “facing a nearly 700% increase in assaults against them.” (Presumably that’s up from ZERO percent, i.e. before they started kidnapping innocent immigrants and shipping them off to random dangerous countries.) As usual, the protesters who do take a more violent tact toward ICE agents are few and far between, and do not represent the much larger crowd of peaceful protesters—though that’s not stopping these federal kidnappers from playing the victim. From OPB: “In one case, a person knocked loose an officer’s gas mask, causing the officer to ‘suck in a large amount of OC spray and pepperball dust.’ The agent later vomited and dry-heaved for half an hour.” Huh. Wonder why that happened?
The federal government narrative around ICE protests in Portland is much like it was in 2020, describing the demonstrations as chaotic and violent.
Court records filed by government prosecutors don’t fully back up that story.
— Ryan Haas (@ryanjhaas.bsky.social) July 14, 2025 at 7:54 AM
• Oh and reminder, Trump’s ICE kidnapping squad got a big financial boost from the president’s “Big, beautiful bill” increasing their funding from $8 billion to roughly $28 billion of YOUR tax money—making it the most well-funded law enforcement agency in the federal government. POOR BABIES! I hope they’re okay!
• Starting today Intel, one of Oregon’s biggest employers, is laying off nearly 2,400 workers—some of whom will be replaced by AI. The cuts include a broad swath of employees at their Washington County campuses, including those who develop cutting-edge chips and maintain the equipment. Last Tuesday, the company announced it would only be cutting 300 employees, before flipping the script and saying it would instead be laying off 2,400 on Friday. Nvidia, Intel’s current primary competition and the originators of ChatGPT, have taken the lead in the industry, announcing on Thursday they have become “the first publicly traded microchip company to see its market value top $4 trillion.”
Hey brainiac! It’s time to play the super fun POP QUIZ PDX! This week’s trivia Qs include: Mascots! Monsters! And (as usual) MAYHEM. See how well YOU score! 🤓
— Portland Mercury (@portlandmercury.com) July 10, 2025 at 10:59 AM
IN NATIONAL/WORLD NEWS:
• Flip-flopping Trump continues to flip (and flop)—this time on the attempted occupation of Ukraine by Russia. As you know, Russian President Vladimir Putin has been actively ignoring Trump’s calls to stop bombing Ukraine, causing King Fool to make an abrupt about face and once again start supporting the small country with arms (just like Biden did). The president is expected to release a statement about his latest plans—which he will eventually flip (or flop) on—later today.
ICE plans to deport migrants to countries where they are not citizens and do not speak the language with as little as six hours’ notice.
— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast.bsky.social) July 13, 2025 at 1:58 PM
• Detainees at Trump’s overcrowded ICE kidnapping facilities are rightfully complaining about a lack of food—some of it moldy or spoiled—and increasing hunger as the administration ramps up its mass deportation scheme. In a Texas detention center, detainees are going hungry as their captors feed them around “two spoons of rice” per meal. Meanwhile at Tacoma, Washington’s Northwest ICE Processing Center, 57 cases of food poisoning were reported in mid-April.
• Ten days after the catastrophic flooding in Texas that killed at least 130 people, heavy rains are returning to the state, thwarting rescue and recovery efforts. Six-to-10 inches of rain fell over the weekend, and flood warnings remain in effect.
This is definitely the best way to get people to stop talking about Epstein
— Stone Cold Jane Austen (@abbyhiggs.bsky.social) July 12, 2025 at 8:52 AM
• Though Chelsea was the big winner at Sunday’s FIFA Club World Cup Championship, King Fool once again stole the show—first by being roundly booed when his bloated face showed up on the Jumbotron, and then later, taking centerstage on the victory podium along with confused Chelsea players as they lifted their trophy. (He simply is incapable of not ruining everything for everyone.)
• And finally… start your week off right with this ah-MAY-zing example of young Black excellence. (Holler if you need help getting your jaw off the floor.)
@layla_.mckenzie Miyu hiphop #youngdancer #talenteddancer #kiddancer #hiphopdancer #hiphopdance #hiphop #dancecompetition #redbulldanceyourstyle #danceperformance #dance #dancer #billieeilisharmaniwhite #fyp #foryou #viral#ComproDoPequeno ♬ Hip Hop Background(814204) – Pavel
