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Updated: 9:28 pm February 20
This story has been updated with additional reporting since it was first published.
After signaling a desire for a new policy that would allow city councilors to bring loaded firearms to City Hall, Portland City Councilor Loretta Smith says she “denounces violence” but wants additional safety protocols for her and her colleagues.
Smith initially indicated she was crafting an ordinance that would allow councilors to openly carry firearms at City Hall. Friday evening, her office released a somewhat murky explanation of her intent, but stopped short of saying she’d abandoned the plan.
OPB first reported on the councilor’s comments and ordinance, and has confirmed Smith’s decision to rescind the proposal.
“To be clear, I denounce violence. I want to emphasize that violence is not the first and only solution to solving matters,” Smith stated in a news release Friday. “And improving our security protocols is the best first action rather than an open carry ordinance.”
Councilor Smith’s firearm comments came a day after a City Council meeting was disrupted by protesters and abruptly shut down, after activists shouted demands for the Council to revoke the permit for the ICE facility in Portland’s South Waterfront neighborhood. While the land use permit is currently under review, city councilors maintain they don’t have the authority to immediately revoke it.
Security guards intervened Wednesday night after a few protesters approached the dais where councilors were seated following the public comment period. One of the protesters was holding a petition with thousands of signatures from Portlanders who support efforts to shut down the ICE facility.
Portland Police officers were called in and cleared everyone from the Council chambers, arresting four of the protesters with a group called Portland Contra Las Deportaciones, which has been actively pushing a “Revoke the Permit” campaign. The meeting resumed about 30 minutes later online.
The group denounced the arrests via press release earlier this week.
“These are politically motivated arrests of people exercising their first amendment rights to free speech and protest, and all charges should be dropped immediately,” Portland Contra Las Deportaciones stated in a news release.
Cole Dunahugh, one of the four people arrested that night, said the councilor was “grossly overstating” the events. “She was never put in any harm,” Dunahugh told the Mercury. “Susan [Anglada-Bartley, who was also arrested] never laid hands on her; never tried to put her in any danger.” Dunahugh said Anglada-Bartley was forcibly moved toward Smith by one of the security guards who stepped in.
Smith said, as a Black woman, she “carries the weight of history” with her. Oddly, she also referenced recent fatal shootings of protesters and observers by ICE and Customs and Border Protection “who were merely exercising their right to peacefully protest.”
“Just as protesters desire to feel safe in their communities, I, too, have a right to feel safe in my work environment. Some people at City Hall are considering getting a concealed weapon permit,” Smith stated in her press release Friday afternoon.
Her suggestion quickly drew ire from Portlanders, leading some to call for her resignation.
“You should resign if your answer to an angry protester armed with a petition is to carry a gun to wave around,” one commenter wrote on Smith’s Instagram page.
Protests outside City Hall have become commonplace, especially since Trump resumed office for his second term in early 2025. It’s also not the first time a Council meeting has been disrupted and paused, nor is the City Council the only local elected body to encounter raucous commentary and disruptions. The Portland Public Schools Board has also had to recess its meetings and move them online on occasion.
But it is the first time an elected official in Portland has publicly called for resorting to firearms as a response to political disturbances. In a social media post, Smith likened the experience to a “mini insurrection.”
“These protestors were not peaceful,” Smith wrote on Facebook. “A lady jumped over the testifying table and screamed in my face.”
In a news release from her office Friday, Smith said she “experienced a profound sense of uncertainty and fear in an increasingly chaotic and unpredictable environment” during the Council disruption and said she’s working with city leadership and “security experts” to discuss additional safety protocols that could be implemented during Council meetings.
“This will include implementing clear and stronger protocols for handling disturbances, enhancing de-escalation techniques, and ensuring better protection for both staff and attendees,” her statement reads.
What those additional protocols might entail is unclear. Currently, Portland City Council meetings are staffed with security officers. City Hall also has security checks with physical barriers at its public entrances.
Smith’s office didn’t respond to questions from the Mercury Friday afternoon.
City Councilor Angelita Morillo, who previously worked at City Hall for a city commissioner who often received threats, called the ‘Revoke the Permit’ activists “annoying but mostly harmless.” She empathized with Smith’s feelings of unease, but denounced the suggestion that bringing guns to meetings would solve anything.
“You need security on occasion, but this cannot become a bizarre arms race between us and the public, even when it gets uncomfortable. …Councilor Smith has gotten very real threats, and she will continue to as a Black woman in office, as I have as an immigrant in office. So I care for her well being deeply,” Morillo wrote on her personal Bluesky account. “AND this is the wrong move.”
The Council is scheduled to reconvene Wednesday, February 25.
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Courtney Vaughn
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