By Austin De Dios
oregonlive.com
PORTLAND, Ore. — Federal officers stalled and threatened a Portland ambulance crew taking an injured protester from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility to a hospital on Oct. 5, Willamette Week reported Monday.
American Medical Response employees made those claims in internal incident reports, Willamette Week wrote. The documents detail a heated exchange at the South Portland building, with one federal agent threatening to “shoot and arrest” one of the medics, the medic wrote in a report obtained by Willamette Week.
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A representative for the union representing the ambulance crew confirmed the allegations to The Oregonian /OregonLive.
“Our members responded with professionalism and calm in a situation that could have easily gotten out of control,” Austin DePaolo, spokesperson for Teamsters 223, said in a statement. “We respect the work law enforcement officers do every day, and we expect that same respect and cooperation when our members in EMS are performing their duty to protect and save lives.”
The alleged threat came as tensions flared between protesters and federal agents outside the ICE building, on a day when President Donald Trump attempted to circumvent a court order barring the deployment of Oregon National Guard troops by sending soldiers from California and then Texas instead.
Protesters cheered outside the ICE building around 8:35 p.m. when they learned U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut had just issued a new broader order barring any National Guard members from being relocated from any state for federal service in the state of Oregon.
The relative calm lasted until 8:45 p.m. when officers spilled out of the building and detained several individuals while protesters lobbed insults at the agents, calling them “Nazi scum” and saying “you are the terrorist” repeatedly. A protester then threw an open beverage that landed on the road amid the officers, and federal agents deployed red gas and shot pepper balls into the crowd, reporting from The Oregonian /OregonLive shows.
It was into this aftermath that the AMR ambulance arrived around 9:20 p.m. to treat a protester with a broken or dislocated collarbone, public records show.
The driver of the ambulance reported that federal employees wanted to ride in the ambulance with the patient, but the driver told them that wasn’t allowed if the person wasn’t under arrest, the weekly reported. Emergency records from the city of Portland describe the injured protester as 32 years old; neither federal agents nor Portland police arrested a 32-year-old on Oct. 5.
The ambulance was held up for around 20 minutes, Willamette Week wrote. “As the delay dragged on, according to the reports, the ambulance operator put the vehicle into park, causing it to lurch forward slightly,” the paper reported. An agent had been standing near the ambulance and believed the driver tried to hit him, the paper wrote.
That prompted one agent to yell at the driver, “Don’t you ever do that again, I will shoot you, I will arrest you,” Willamette Week reported.
The AMR crew was eventually permitted to leave just after 9:40 p.m., with an unmarked federal vehicle following them to the hospital, the news outlet wrote.
Representatives for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment. AMR spokesperson Ashton Polk said the company was “reviewing the specifics of the situation” and is “committed to a thorough review.”
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