- A Black man was filmed holding an American flag while trying to guard a federal courthouse from protesters in
Portland ,Oregon , on Sunday night. - The protesters appeared to be trying to tear down a fence outside the courthouse.
- In the video, the man could be heard saying: "None of you guys represent Black lives."
- The man appears to be Gabriel Johnson, an eight-year veteran of the US Marine Corps.
- Johnson told KOIN on Saturday that he lived downtown and that the weeks of
protests had aggravated his post-traumatic stress disorder.
A Black man holding an American flag called out protesters trying to tear down a fence outside a federal courthouse in Portland, Oregon, saying, "None of you guys represent Black lives."
The incident happened at a
In the video, the man was seen guarding a fence that had been set up to keep protesters away from the courthouse, which has been regularly vandalized in the more than 50 days of protests that have been going on in the city.
—Jorge Ventura Media (@VenturaReport) July 19, 2020
In the video, a protester eventually got the man to sit up, at which point the man started yelling at the crowd of demonstrators.
"If you stand for justice, come here and stand with me. Stand with me because I'm here for justice. I'm not here to tear down this f---ing fence, I'm not here to spray-paint," he was heard saying.
"It's going on every day. If you don't want to get gassed, stop. If you don't want to get gassed, stop. It has to stop.
"This ain't peaceful, this is not peaceful — none of you guys represent Black lives. Sit in protest, sit in protest."
The man in the video appears to be Gabriel Johnson, a Marine veteran who set up flags along the fence on Saturday.
In a separate interview with the local
"I have tremendous PTSD," he said. "So 85 flash bangs and tear gas in my apartment is very triggering, and part of that trigger and one way to stop it is to be about change. We deserve better. We deserve to be brought together."
He said the American flags were meant as a symbol of unity, but they angered some of the protesters — including a woman who was shown throwing one of the flags onto the ground.
"I support the city. I support the police. I support us coming together because it's about time. It's been 50-plus days of us being out in the street — and what's been accomplished?" Johnson asked.
Johnson said he agreed with the protesters on some points, including his opposition to federal law-enforcement officers being sent to the city.
"We shouldn't have paramilitary forces in our streets," he said.
The video of Johnson confronting protesters emerged a week after a Black Portland police officer accused the protest movement of consisting of fewer people of color than the Black cops they had been facing off against.
"It says something when you're at a Black Lives Matter protest, you have more minorities on the police side than you have in a violent crowd and you have white people screaming at Black officers: 'You have the biggest nose I've ever seen,'" Officer Jakhary Jackson said in an interview released by the Portland police.
Expanded Coverage Module: black-lives-matter-module