Mayor of Portland, Oregon, demands ICE leave the city after federal
agents gas protesters
[February 02, 2026]
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — The mayor of Portland, Oregon,
demanded U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement leave his city after
federal agents launched tear gas at a crowd of demonstrators — including
young children — outside an ICE facility during a weekend protest that
he characterized as peaceful.
Witnesses said agents deployed tear gas, pepper balls and rubber bullets
as thousands of marchers arrived at the South Waterfront facility on
Saturday. Erin Hoover Barnett, a former OregonLive reporter who joined
the protest, said she was about 100 yards (90 meters) from the building
when “what looked like two guys with rocket launchers” started dousing
the crowd with gas.
“To be among parents frantically trying to tend to little children in
strollers, people using motorized carts trying to navigate as the rest
of us staggered in retreat, unsure of how to get to safety, was
terrifying,” Barnett wrote in an email to OregonLive.
Messages were sent Sunday to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security,
which oversees ICE, seeking to confirm details of the incident,
including that federal agents deployed tear gas against demonstrators.
Portland Mayor Keith Wilson said the daytime demonstration was peaceful,
“where the vast majority of those present violated no laws, made no
threat and posed no danger” to federal agents.
“To those who continue to work for ICE: Resign. To those who control
this facility: Leave,” Wilson wrote in a statement Saturday night.
“Through your use of violence and the trampling of the Constitution, you
have lost all legitimacy and replaced it with shame.”
The Portland Fire Bureau sent paramedics to treat people at the scene,
police said. Police officers monitored the crowd but made no arrests
Saturday.
The ICE facility in Portland is a field office that includes a
processing center where federal officers detain and interview people to
determine their legal status as U.S. residents, according to a city
website.
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Federal agents lobbed tear gas and flash bangs at protesters in
front of the ICE building on Jan. 31, 2026, in Portland, Ore.
(Allison Barr/The Oregonian via AP)
Saturday's Portland protest was one of many similar demonstrations
nationwide against President Donald Trump administration's
immigration crackdown in cities like Minneapolis, where in recent
weeks federal agents killed two residents, Alex Pretti and Renee
Good.
Federal agents in Eugene, Oregon, deployed tear gas on Friday when
protesters broke windows and tried to get inside the Federal
Building near downtown. City police declared a riot and ordered the
crowd to disperse.
Trump posted Saturday on social media that it was up to local law
enforcement agencies to police protests in their cities. However,
Trump said he has instructed Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem
to have federal agents be vigilant in guarding U.S. government
facilities.
“Please be aware that I have instructed ICE and/or Border Patrol to
be very forceful in this protection of Federal Government Property.
There will be no spitting in the faces of our Officers, there will
be no punching or kicking the headlights of our cars, and there will
be no rock or brick throwing at our vehicles, or at our Patriot
Warriors,” Trump wrote. “If there is, those people will suffer an
equal, or more, consequence.”
Wilson said Portland would be imposing a fee on detention facilities
that use chemical agents.
The federal government “must, and will, be held accountable," the
mayor said. “To those who continue to make these sickening
decisions, go home, look in a mirror, and ask yourselves why you
have gassed children."
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