On September 23, 2020, the PMPC co-organized a comprehensive forum, Police Violence Against the People of Portland, featuring those targeted by state violence, medical and legal experts, and on-the-ground observers.
Hosted by Portland United Against Hate, Unite Oregon, First Unitarian Portland, and Portland-Metro People’s Coalition and attended by over 500 community members.
The George Floyd Black Lives Matter protests have launched an extraordinary movement against police violence in Portland, Oregon, with months of daily protests. Legal observers describe the demonstrations as overwhelmingly peaceful, yet they have been met by extreme police brutality. The array of military weapons deployed has injured thousands of Portlanders in horrifying ways and in ways that are still unknown. The Portland Police Bureau is using weapons of war against the public itself, yet it looks the other way at far right violence. The potential for greater harm is a serious and immediate concern. Participants included:
- Kaniku X NuKezi, Afro-Indigenous activist and organizer in Portland
- Professor Alex Vitale, Professor of Sociology and Coordinator of the Policing and Social Justice Project at Brooklyn College
- Jan Haaken, Ph.D., professor emeritus of psychology at Portland State University
- Rohini Haar, Ph.D., Physicians for Human Rights
- Maureen Katz, MD, Bay Area psychiatrist and psychoanalyst
- Anita Randolph, Ph.D., postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Psychiatry and the Department of Behavioral Neuroscience at Oregon Health and Science University
- Shane Burley, independent journalist