Story and photos by Pete Shaw Francisco Aguirre, the immigrant justice activist who for 81 days in 2014 took sanctuary in Augustana Lutheran Church when the US government threatened to detain and deport him, returned there on Sunday June 19. However, this time the cause was celebratory. On May 27, Assistant US Attorney Greg Nyhus…
Story by Pete Shaw The road to obtaining political power is fraught with obstacles, including a variety of institutional forms of racism. As Frederick Douglass once noted, power concedes nothing without a demand. Democracy must be wrested from the powerful through the hard work of those struggling for justice. As advocates for justice organize communities,…
Story by Pete Shaw “What have you learned here in the last year?” Ahjamu Umi poses that question to the four young people–Emmanuelle, Habakkuk, Jaiden, and Ja’waun–who have gathered around a table of food and packages just outside of Columbia International Cup coffeehouse in New Columbia. Last April, the All-African People’s Revolutionary Party (A-APRP), with…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw Over 120 people gathered at the Clinton Street Theater in SE Portland on Wednesday April 25 to mark the launch of of the Burgerville Workers Union. The workers have organized themselves with the support of the Industrial Workers of the World at multiple stores in Portland and Vancouver, Washington…
Story by Pete Shaw A small grin crept across Teressa Raiford’s face as the jury acquitted her of second degree disorderly conduct on Thursday April 21. It slowly got a little bigger, and she clapped her hands a couple of times. She certainly was relieved, but perhaps not ecstatic. While walking around downtown a few…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw Over 100 tenant rights activists gathered in front of the Multnomah County building on Thursday April 7 to demand the Multnomah County Commission declare an immediate one-year rent freeze and moratorium on no-cause evictions. Advocates want the county commissioners to counter the rapidly rising rents that are casting people…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw As a debilitating housing crisis continues to plague Portland, those people most affected are organizing against landlords and the laws that work to benefit them at the expense of tenants. On Wednesday December 16, Know Your City (KYC) and Portland Tenants United (PTU) hosted a community dialogue titled “The…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw Over 300 supporters of Don’t Shoot Portland and the Black Lives Matter movement gathered in Holladay Park on Friday November 27, making demands ranging from police reform to the abolition of capitalism that has created a system where Black lives do not matter. The rally also included a boisterous…
By Pete Shaw Frederick Douglass once stated that power concedes nothing without a struggle, and history certainly bears that out. The struggle to wrest power away from those who hoard it in vast disproportion is a story that is given short shrift in US history textbooks, the preferred narrative being a combination of the myth…
Story and photos by Pete Shaw The Fennica has left Portland despite the noble and courageous efforts of the kayaktivists and Greenpeace climbers whose blockade cost Shell Oil two days of profits. But while ultimately failing to keep the boat moored in Portland, they showed people that they can stand up to the large energy…
