Protesters tell KEPW: We didn’t mean to break the window

Presenter: Protesters told KEPW’s Jana Thrift they didn’t mean to break the window in the Federal Building. The executive producer of Legalize Survival was broadcasting live from downtown Eugene when police declared a riot and asked the crowd to disperse. Jana Thrift:

Jana Thrift: So this is good to know. It’s interesting that everyone is put into the position of being told that they must leave if a certain group of people make a choice, like busting a window. I don’t know what the right answers for you guys is. You know what I—(listens to off-mic voice)

Okay, so it wasn’t an intentionally broken window, it sounds like. It was the process of banging on those windows that caused—the oscillation of it all actually broke a window. So I would imagine that that surprised the person at the window probably as much as it did the people inside.

But last week they were throwing those grenades and tear-gassing people without any windows broken. So it seems like this is just an elevation of that, and that is kind of how it works. If you elevate violence, then it’s met with people that are angry, trying to say that it’s not okay, and things increase.

They definitely have a weapon out here meant to hurt people. The, that rod device, hopefully they don’t decide to use it. So it just really gives you a feeling there’s no way to protect yourself against a sound weapon.

(Chanting)

Jana Thrift: So they’re saying ‘No justice, no peace.’ And I think that’s the point, you know. If we sit in the shadows and we don’t do something, then how does the administration know that we’re not okay with it? 

So protesting is one of the ways that that effort is happening, and it is an ancient tradition in places everywhere to stand like this.

So we got about 10 minutes before we’re going to give you to Shady Grove and thank you for listening here on KEPW-LP 97.3 FM in Eugene, live at the Fed building, where hundreds of people are outside of the building, and apparently they were banging on the window and a window broke, and that is why they put off the sound grenade or the smoke grenades or whatever those grenades are. Flash grenades! That’s what they call them. Flash grenades.

Yeah, you could see that this is out of my box. I—this is not what I’m familiar with. This is not what I thought I’d ever see on the streets of my town, you know: People being disappeared. We’ve got these kids coming from school to this walkout here on this building. It’s pretty intense, pretty intense, guys, I— 

(chanting)

‘The people united will never be defeated.’ That’s what we’re hearing from these guys right now. We got lots of signs, ‘Ch— la migra,’ ‘Abolish ICE.’

(chanting)

Jana Thrift: So most of the people left. There’s a lot of people that have left. I’m just curious, is it possible—I’m live on a community radio station. It’s my face, not anybody else’s. And we’re just like, why? Why do you think it’s important to be here right now? 

Protester: We need to stick up for immigrant neighbors. We can’t let the police and the government use excessive force on people. I believe in freedom for all. I think everyone’s equal, and I feel like the government’s acting like Nazis, and we need to stand up to that. People need to stand up to what’s wrong. You can’t be, you can’t be silent. Silence is complicity. 

Jana Thrift: Yeah. Yeah. I feel you, I feel you. Oh, thank you. Apparently it’s somebody I’ve already interviewed before, but it’s just so important and I didn’t actually recognize her face because she’s now wearing a gas mask.

I am on the street on the northeast corner of 7th and Pearl. I am walking and looking at probably 100 people up closer to the building. There’s definitely an effort here to say ‘No, no, you know, what happened on Tuesday wasn’t okay, and we’re still not okay with it, and we’re not walking away. We’re not, we’re not leaving.’ 

I suspect that about the time enough people are gone, they will deploy their weapons. I’m definitely seeing a certain amount of, all right, so here we are. I’m going to attempt to— 

(shouting)

Jana Thrift: Yeah. So yeah, so we got some pretty frustrated, unhappy, sad people here trying to figure out the right way to stand their ground. And I think, you know, what I’m seeing out here in the front, I didn’t even know there had been a window broken. 

I’m going to stand behind this tree. Trees are very happy and I feel, I feel like nobody’s going to run into me through this tree. Oh, hugging a tree, my favorite thing to do. Yes, I’m going to hug this tree and actually I’m going to really appreciate this tree. And I’m going to go ahead and stay right here. I’m not leaving. 

Ah, I don’t actually have here, can I, is it okay if I put you on my livestream? All right. Here we go. Some tree huggers. You know, this is the kind of terrorists we got these days. Yeah. Aw. Gotta love this tree. It’s holding a sign. The tree is holding a sign: ‘The wrong ICE is melting.’ Oh, ‘Abolish ICE.’ Yep. Yep. That’s what’s happening here. 

We just have a pretty heavy situation going on here where there is an expectation that people will most likely be treated the way they were last Tuesday—I made a mistake. It wasn’t Friday, it was Tuesday. On Friday was when they actually chose to respect the youth and not tear gas and bomb them. 

We’ve got all these drones flying around here. I’m sure they’re taking note of our faces. My face, even though it’s behind the mic most of the time, I think, is, I’m already giving myself up. So here I am, baring my soul to the world: Target me, do what you will.

But I believe in freedom and I’m going to stand by it till the bitter end and I’m going to use this radio station to stand by it till the bitter end. And we’re going to do our best and we’re facing some really scary stuff in this nation, and I think the only thing we can do is stand our ground.

I think that if we choose not to stand our ground, then the freedoms that we value we will lose. And I don’t want my grandkids to grow up in a place that is headed the direction that this country is headed, unless people—everyone—figures out how to say it’s not okay.

So we’re just working hard at doing our part here at KEPW, doing our part, trying to stand our ground. We were at the Springfield protest. We stood and had conversations with men that arrived with guns thinking they believe in their right to protest with a gun, but they don’t believe that what is happening in this country with ICE is wrong.

And we have some interviews coming up with those guys. We’re going to talk more with them. We need to figure out how to unite. And there were some things that felt very unifying, even with those guys being a little scary carrying their guns out into the street like that, you know, that’s cool.

People can support what they want and hopefully not enough people support hurting people, that the majority of Americans stand for not hurting people, and we can go that direction because if we support hurting people, we’ve got to be careful about that because your family might be the next people that get hurt and then then you care only if it’s your family.

That would be really sad, right? So hopefully we can get to a place where it doesn’t matter who you are, as long as you’re human, you don’t deserve to be hurt. Your kids don’t deserve to be jailed. You don’t deserve to be the victim of what this country is doing, and then try to seek shelter here and be told, ‘Oh, it’s only us white Americans deserve to be immigrants here.’

You know? Because, because we’re all immigrants. Just because we are born here—sounds like Trump wants to get rid of natural citizenship. So, like, maybe if they’d done that a long time ago, the Native Americans would’ve appreciated it. Got rid of the real terrorist immigrants that showed up in their country, way back when. That would be good, right? 

Okay. So I’m sure that I am one minute away. One minute away. I haven’t managed to do much more than rant myself. I was trying to get some interviews, but it’s hard. There’s a lot of energy going on here. There’s a lot of people. I definitely got a few words from different people, but now we’re going to give it to Shady Grove.

We’re going to make it possible for you to listen to some music and maybe decompress from all this madness. So let me say goodbye for now. I’m going to stick around here and I will probably request to go live on the air again if anything goes crazy down here, but for now, we’re going to say goodbye and let Shady Grove take on the livestream.

Presenter: KEPW’s Jana Thrift, while livestreaming from what was declared to be a riot, shares a protester’s explanation that they didn’t mean to break the window in the Federal Building.

You can hear Jana Thrift on Legalize Survival every Wednesday at 7 p.m. on KEPW 97.3, Eugene PeaceWorks Community Radio.