Mayor Ted Wheeler’s Email Address Shut Down After Being Flooded With Emails

The city shut down Mayor Ted Wheeler's official email address after receiving a flood of emails following national headlines that put Portland in the spotlight for a violent clash between far-right provocateurs and antifascist demonstrators.

"Because of the thousands and thousands of emails and it crashing the inbox, [the Bureau of Technology Services] had to temporarily pause incoming emails," says Wheeler spokeswoman Eileen Park, who said many of the emails are from out of state and "they have perpetuating the same false narratives" found on right-win media outlets such as Breitbart.

Park also estimated they have received at least a couple thousand telephone calls.

Again, antifascists and far-right supporters affiliated with the Proud Boys, Patriot Prayer, Portland's Liberation and the HimToo movement clashed in Portland's streets on June 29.

Some exchanged blows with batons and sprayed pepper spray. A group of masked protesters kicked, punched and threw milkshakes at conservative blogger Andy Ngo, who has frequently raised the hackles of antifascists and demonized leftist protesters in the national media.

In October, a video Ngo provided to Fox News sparked another flood of antagonistic messages from right-wing callers to city officials, after he suggested, misleadingly, that antifascists had seized control over Portland's streets.

Saturday's attack on Ngo drew widespread criticisms from right-wing media, conservative politicians and far-right figures.

Allegations that some protesters mixed quick-drying cement with milkshakes also spread widely on social media and in headlines because of a Portland Police Bureau Tweet, but officials say they do not have physical evidence to back up the claim.

City Hall shut down briefly July 2 before a bomb threat, but city officials did not identify a possible motive for that call.