Imagine if Obama had unmarked “Gestapo” — plucking conservative protestors off the street, and stuffing them in vans.— Planterspunch (@planterspunch7) July 17, 2020
The collective head exploding on the Right would be epic.😂
Easy if you try...
Seriously, what is happening here? Who are these guys? What is the legal authorization? Where are the courts? https://t.co/FHss1chACl— Charlie Sykes (@SykesCharlie) July 17, 2020
From the original article:Federal agents in Portland - principally DHS and Marshals but unclear what other agencies are involved - won’t say who they are after firing an impact munition at a protester’s head, or grab others off the streets, or why. Have the rules changed for 1811s? https://t.co/Ry90Jy3vBR— Devlin Barrett (@DevlinBarrett) July 17, 2020
[Pettibone and O'Shea are walking away from a protest at the federal courthouse. They are blocks from it, when they are warned of unmarked vans with men in camo seizing people off the streets.]
“I am basically tossed into the van,” Pettibone said. “And I had my beanie pulled over my face so I couldn’t see and they held my hands over my head.”
Pettibone and O’Shea both said they couldn’t think of anything they might have done to end up targeted by law enforcement. They attend protests regularly but they said they aren’t “instigators.” They don’t spray paint buildings, shine laser pointers at officers or do anything else other than attend protests, which law enforcement have regularly deemed “unlawful assemblies.”
Blinded by his hat, in an unmarked minivan full of armed people dressed in camouflage and body armor who hadn’t identified themselves, Pettibone said he was driven around downtown before being unloaded inside a building. He wouldn’t learn until after his release that he had been inside the federal courthouse.
“It was basically a process of facing many walls and corners as they patted me down and took my picture and rummaged through my belongings,” Pettibone said. “One of them said, ‘This is a whole lot of nothing.’”
Pettibone said he was put into a cell. Soon after, two officers came in to read him his Miranda rights. They didn’t tell him why he was being arrested. He said they asked him if he wanted to waive his rights and answer some questions, but Pettibone declined and said he wanted a lawyer. The interview was terminated, and about 90 minutes later he was released. He said he did not receive any paperwork, citation or record of his arrest.
“I just happened to be wearing black on a sidewalk in downtown Portland at the time,” Pettibone said. “And that apparently is grounds for detaining me.”
In a statement, the U.S. Marshals Service declined to comment on the practice of using unmarked vehicles, but said their officers had not arrested Pettibone.
“All United States Marshals Service arrestees have public records of arrest documenting their charges. Our agency did not arrest or detain Mark James Pettibone.”
Government runs on paperwork. Damned convenient when there isn't any. No records Mr. Pettibone was ever taken against his will and held anywhere without his consent. No paperwork, no courts.
This is basically what happened in El Salvador where people were "disappeared," except they were never seen again. Those of us old enough to remember that still have a copy of Joan Didion's Salvador on our bookshelves as witness to history, now repeating itself in America where the School of the Americas started those practices.
This is a very, very ugly story, that's only going to get uglier.
By the way, on the DHS "troops" in Portland: What is the legal authority under which they're operating? I assume there's a DOJ or at least DHS Office of General Counsel legal memo explaining this? I assume it can be shared with congressional oversight committees--and the public?— Bill Kristol (@BillKristol) July 17, 2020
FEAR! FIRE! FOES! AWAKE!When a guy in unmarked camo picks you up in a minivan, we normally call that a hunting trip not an arrest. What the hell is happening out there? https://t.co/wx4cFqWFX9— stuart stevens (@stuartpstevens) July 17, 2020
The fact that DHS is making graffiti in Portland look like WWIII and using it to justify mass deployments of federal officers is sign of how politicized the department has become. https://t.co/Ru12Y3GuGK— Garrett M. Graff (@vermontgmg) July 17, 2020
Anti-anti-Trumpers have been saying things like "LOL you people with Trump Derangement Syndrome expected there to be secret police rounding people up" for a while now.— Jacob T. Levy (@jtlevy) July 17, 2020
I'd say just plain totalitarian.Fashy https://t.co/Ya4wjXjAHn— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 17, 2020
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