PORTLAND NEEDS WILLAMETTE WEEK.
NOW WILLAMETTE WEEK NEEDS YOU.

The need for strong, independent local journalism
is more urgent than ever. Please support the city we
love by joining Friends of Willamette Week.

Antifa Crashes Pro-Trump Rally in Vancouver, Briefly Setting Off Wrestling, Mania

A smoke-filled scrum grew to include dozens of people.

(Mike Bivins)

By Mike Bivins and Aaron Mesh

Fights over President Donald Trump continue to rock the suburbs.

A sunny spring afternoon in Vancouver, Wash. filled with bright red smoke and black-masked faces as Portland-area anarchists known as "antifa" invaded a "Rally for Trump and Freedom" in Esther Short Park.

Vancouver police arrested at least three antifa counter-protesters today, wrestling them to the grass after a large scrum that grew to include dozens of people.

With the White House embattled in policy delays and Russian election-tampering allegations, demonstrators arrived in the park for something of a class reunion from the campaign trail of 2016. They played the hits, at one point chanting "Lock her up!" about erstwhile opponent Hillary Rodham Clinton.

A pro-Trump demonstrator in an anti-Muslim sweater observes antifa gathering in Vancover, Wash. (Mike Bivins)

The rally attracted about 200 people, many aboard big motorcycles and bigger trucks. A handful of men packed open-carry pistols on their hips.

It also drew the antifa crowd—bandanna-clad vigilantes by now a common and disruptive sight at anti-Trump and pro-Trump events alike.

(Mike Bivins)

Today, the counter-protesters came with smoke bombs, which they hurled into the Trump rally. Then they rushed the front gate of the private event, bringing police into what resembled a midday mosh pit.